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THE Bitcoin Podcast
BEAUTY, VIRTUE, EXTREMISM & THE BUSHIDO OF BITCOIN | Aleks Svetski (THE Bitcoin Podcast)
02:03:14
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- [00:00]
Alex Svetsky
You, Mr. Bitcoiner, are going to hold a bunch of Bitcoin and you are going to become disproportionately wealthy, which comes with a level of influence that you might not be ready for. You're no longer going to be a pleb. You're actually going to be, socioeconomically speaking, an aristocrat. You become economically strong, you become economically significant. You become therefore socially significant. That comes with a set of duties. That comes with a set of responsibilities, that if you don't begin to inculcate that in yourself today, it's going to crush you under that, the burden of that weight, the burden of that economic responsibility. And you're going to deform into a fucking Brock Pierce or into, you know, someone like that. Because that's what happens. When people come into wealth all of a sudden and they haven't developed the character to support that capital or that wealth. How are you going to behave? Not just for yourself or for your family or for all of that, but to the world, to your community, to all of these things. The whole point of Bitcoin is to fix the money so that we forget about the money. Today in the modern world, everything is so overly financialized. Everything from Wall street to Silicon Valley to, you know, just. Just everyday living. Like people are sitting there talking about their fucking investments and their Robin hood and their 401ks and their superannuation in Australia, like all this sort of shit. It's like things that people should not need to worry about, but it's all a function of upstream the money being broken. So therefore we can't say we can't be normal human beings, et cetera. There's a lot of skepticism on the right, particularly the new right, with people that are just like, looking to make money and gamble, like in this financialization of the world, as opposed to establishing families and culture and dynasties and lineages and building things of quality, etc. Which are sometimes counter to making money, right? Like, these things are not often in alignment. This is about fixing the money so that we can forget about the money. When it's. When it's like the air we breathe, we. We can then think about other things like family, like nobility, like excellence, like virtue, like all of these things which are about creating a ascendant civilization or a beautiful culture. All the great civilizations, all the great cultures encoded that in these bushidos or these chivalries or these, you know, commandments or whatever, right? You know, they all had a slightly different name. And I. I genuinely think there's Going to be a version for this new world which will be under. Underpinned by Bitcoin. The desire for average, the desire for equality, the desire for all of these things, I believe, is largely driven by this envy. And it's been weaponized because everybody can feel envy in some way. But it's like if it's particularly weaponized, if you are particularly made to feel like, you must eat the rich, you must do this, you must do that, all this sort of stuff, like, I mean, this is. This is literally where communism comes from. The entire fucking playbook of communism is envy, right? You got these like dumb fucking kids out there throwing paint and shit like that on, you know, on these beautiful sculptures and statues and stuff like that, you know, and people like trying to pull down statues of the people who came and like, built civilization, everything like that. And then they're like making artwork of like fat blobs and, you know, whatever that other stupidity they're making these days, it's like, it's completely like it's a revolt against the beautiful and it's disgusting. It's like it's. It's elevating the ugly and de. Elevating or denigrating the beauty and the beautiful. And that, that is. That also comes from. What was the word we spoke about earlier? Envy. It comes from the same fucking place. And this is why, coming back to our last conversation, the opposite of communism is not capitalism. It is beautiful.
- [03:40]
Walker
Greetings and salutations, my fellow plebs. My name is Walker and this is the Bitcoin podcast. The bitcoin time chain is 886329 and the value of one bitcoin is still one bitcoin. Today my guest is Alex Svetsky. We discuss Fedsky's latest book, the Bushido of Bitcoin, A Code for Virtue, on a bitcoin standard. And also go down a bunch of different rabbit holes, including why communists hate beauty, whether NPCs can be saved, morality versus virtue, how Bitcoiners need to prepare for when bitcoin inevitably wins, what it means to truly excel and be excellent, and why modern society is focused so much on mediocrity, equality versus fairness, war, building the culture of the future, and a whole lot more. Before we dive in, do me a favor and subscribe to the Bitcoin podcast wherever you're listening. And make sure to subscribe on YouTube or rumble as well. Just search Walker America. And if you find this show valuable, consider giving value back by giving it a zap on Noster or A boost on Fountain. You can find me on noster@primal.net walker and this podcast@primal.netcoin. without further ado, let's get into this bitcoin talk with Alex Vedsky. Well, dude, Svetsky, it's good to see you, man. It's been a while. It's been too long. We were supposed to do this conversation, I realized. I checked my notes from the last conversation when we were supposed to have it. It was like right after the Trump assassination attempt, like a couple days after, I think is when we were scheduled. But yeah, it's good to make this happen. Good to see you again, man.
- [05:28]
Alex Svetsky
You too, my friend. You too. It's been, as you said, too long, I think. When was the last time we saw each other? I've got this vision in my head of Lugano, like when we're sitting at dinner next to each other. But that kind of been the last time. I feel like I must have seen you.
- [05:42]
Walker
I mean, was it, was it Nosta Rica? Would that have been it?
- [05:47]
Alex Svetsky
Okay, okay, yes.
- [05:48]
Walker
Maybe that was.
- [05:49]
Alex Svetsky
That was more recent, correct? True, true. Yeah.
- [05:51]
Walker
Either way, that's been. It's been a while.
- [05:53]
Alex Svetsky
Yeah, two years.
- [05:53]
Walker
So you are without doxxing anything, you're in Brazil, right?
- [05:58]
Alex Svetsky
Yes, thank you for doxxing. No, I'm kidding.
- [06:00]
Walker
Yeah, okay. No, I know you've said it. I know you've said it at other shows and Brazil's a big ass country. Like, good luck, you know, finding you. It' but how do you, how do you like it down there? Like, the weather is obviously pretty, pretty stellar, I assume.
- [06:16]
Alex Svetsky
I mean, it's. It obviously just depends on where you are, right? So Brazil, as you said, is a big ass country. So the, the south is colder than the north, obviously. The north is basically tropical, right? So it's like, it's, you know, the north hits the Caribbean and it's sort of up there in the, in the warm waters and stuff like that, where if you go surfing, the sharks are going to fucking eat you and stuff like that. I've seen some, like, wild, like, videos, like, people just jumping in the ocean and then like, this lady got her leg bitten off and they're like dragging her out of the, the, the beach and like, blood's pissing out. Everyone was like, jesus, what the. I was like, okay, I'm definitely not gonna go up there. So I think I prefer to stay here in the south. We are, okay, a little bit less on the shark side of things. And actually, literally, like, we, we live Right on the beach. And when you look outside in the winter, there's whales swimming in the beach.
- [07:10]
Walker
Wow.
- [07:11]
Alex Svetsky
It's beautiful.
- [07:12]
Walker
That's pretty amazing.
- [07:14]
Alex Svetsky
It's. It's really nice.
- [07:15]
Walker
When I look outside in the Midwest of the United States during the winter, I see gray and some shades of brown. So, yeah, it's. Yeah.
- [07:25]
Alex Svetsky
Different experience.
- [07:26]
Walker
Yeah, I just, you know, I tell myself I'm like, yeah, no, I just. I love the seasons, but I'm pretty sure that's just like my coping mechanism. It's like, yeah, the season, you know, there's. It's so great. Like, you know, those two weeks of summer and couple days of fall and spring we get. Are immaculate. But yeah, it's. It's got its perks, though, being around. Like, we're. We're close to both of our families, so that's like a. A huge thing with the little one. Like, you make some sacrifices, you know, for family close.
- [07:52]
Alex Svetsky
Honestly, that is super important. And honestly, I feel like that's probably even more important. That's our biggest issue, if I, If I have to be frank here is that I, We. We are quite isolated. That's the, like, my one qualm with being all the way over here is that, like, the. The place is beautiful, the environment's beautiful. You know, we've got our gym, we found our raw milk. We, you know, we found our local butcher and all this sort of stuff. Like, we've got all of that stuff down pat. But it's, yeah, man. Super far from family, super far from friends. You know, we've got a couple, you know, good sort of friends down here. But it's, It's. It's difficult in a country where you're never gonna, like, I'm too old to learn a language. And, and, and I don't mean that, like, facetiously. I mean it as, like, yeah, there's no way I'm gonna get 35, 36 years of, like, English proficiency that I've developed from fucking as a child. Right. Like, to. And. And, you know, having that real depth of language is necessary to build depth of relationship. Right? So. So, like, by the time I get proficient in Portuguese to that degree where I can really have a deep kind of conversation, it's probably going to take me five or 10 years. And then by the time you build those relationships, that. So anyway, we've been. We've been contemplating what to do and, you know, first step is to pop the baby out, and then second step will be then to decide whether we stay here or whether we piss off somewhere else.
- [09:31]
Walker
Do you have a place in mind in the world where you're like, this is kind of the area I would like to end up this point?
- [09:41]
Alex Svetsky
I think Dubai is in the leading sort of candidates of locations for a couple of reasons. One is it's kind of the center of the world. So for, for travel, it's, it's, it's the most connected airport on the planet, basically. Like with Emirates, you can get to any corner of the world with a single flight. So, so that doesn't exist anywhere else. It is, it is a place of high collision factor. And what I mean by that is there's, there's stuff happening on a, on a consistent basis, whether it's conferences, whether it's, you know, people traveling through, whether it's whatever. It's like a. I, I think of when Steve Jobs built the, the Apple campus, he built it and he architected it in such a way that people would collide from different departments as much as possible. And, and Dubai really has that going for it. I mean, the US has that as well, big time. I mean, that's why as much as there's complete retardation happening in Silicon Valley, it is still a place of extremely high collision factor, which is why still some of the best startups and talent and everything in the world still comes from there. But you know, Dubai has that. And it's also, it seems to attract like you don't get to live in Dubai unless you're there to work. So like everyone's on some sort of mission there, everyone's building something now, you know, sure, you've got your grifters and your morons and everything like that, but you know, that's kind of like everywhere these days. Exactly. So, you know, everyone's got a story over there. And I mean, just to give you one example, I was there for, for, for a conference and some meetups a couple weeks ago, and swear on my life, I ended up at dinner at the palace of Sheikh Zayed, his, his grandson. So, so, so the actual prince. So the, he's the great grandson, great son of the founder of Dubai and casual. Yeah, but, but it happened because of that sort of collision factor, right? Like, I was there, caught up with Bruce Fenton. Bruce was like, hey, you want to come to a dinner? I was like, yeah, sure. And he's like, it's the prince. I'm like, okay, no worries. Because, you know, everyone kind of calls themselves a prince over. He's like, no, no. He's like, no, no, no, it's the prince. Like, he's, it's the, the prince, yeah. He's like, his, his art collection is worth $20 billion. I was like, what?
- [12:11]
Walker
Oh, my God.
- [12:13]
Alex Svetsky
The. So I was like, okay, I'll, I'll come. I was like, can I give him a book? He's like, yeah, sure, no worries. So, but that kind of stuff, I don't say that to bragging. Anyway. What I'm saying is that it's, it's the kind of collision that was never going to happen here in Brazil. And I, I find that interesting now. I don't know if I could live there full time. I think it'd probably end up being a bit too much. So my, my gut instinct is that I would like to potentially move my base there and then figure out where to sort of spend the other parts of the year. So, anyway, this is. Thank you for coming to my TED Talk about Dubai and where I'm going to live.
- [12:59]
Walker
No, no, I mean, I'm, I'm, I'm interested by Dubai because obviously I know a lot of people who have moved there. There's, you know, that have expatriated from a number of different countries to Dubai. And it certainly has, like, a lot of benefits. There are other things on the other side of the coin where I'm like, man, you know, it is, it's people like, okay, how do I say this? People. Everybody who lives there and comes as an expat seems to really speak highly of it. At the same time, there are restrictions there based on the style of, you know, monarchy, government, general, you know, control that they have, where you are maybe more free in some ways, you are less free in other ways. Absolutely. That being said, this is the case everywhere, right? Everything is trade offs, everything is deciding what concessions are you willing to make to get which benefits. What is most important to you personally. And so that's why, like, it's, there's no one size fits all for anyone, you know, but exactly.
- [13:58]
Alex Svetsky
It's certainly, you said the magic word, which is trade offs is the thing I like about Dubai is it's very clear, like you are coming. It almost feels like you're coming into someone's house. Like you actually feel like a guest and you get treated like a guest. That's, that's something I noticed is, you know, you get treated very courteously, you get treated very friendly, everyone's nice to you, shit gets fucking done, like, because you're, you're, you're effectively a customer and they don't Treat you like a subject. So, so that's very important. But there are very clear rules around. Okay, well, you're a customer and you're a guest. You're not actually part of the family. Yeah. And, and that's okay because we're not gonna pretend like you're a part of the family. You know, for example, there's no way to get a citizenship that you can't be naturalized. Like, if you have a baby on, you know, UAE soil, the baby is not an Emirati. Like, it's so, so. And I actually have a lot of respect for that because it's, it means that they, they have a different relationship to their own people, to their own ethnos, which is really how the west was built originally anyway. Like, we had, you know, we, we valued our own people first and then everybody else, and we've kind of like inverted that. And now everybody else is more important and our own people are not important anymore. And you know, the, the difference. I've got this montage of, of Dubai in the last like 40, 50 years. It was like fucking desert patch. And now it's like this metropolis. And in that same period of time, the metropolis that was San Francisco, for example, has turned into a turd infested fucking junkie alley. And so one is democratic and outsiders are more important than insiders, and the other one is monarchy is our people come first. And you are welcome as a guest. But there's some clear rules and you sort of see what's happened. So, yeah, I mean, it's, as you said, trade offs. Like it's, you know, you don't go there to, you know, talk shit about your host, basically.
- [16:04]
Walker
Yeah. And no, I feel that. And like, again, trade offs, trade offs, trade offs. Nothing. Like nowhere is perfect. Like, if there were a perfect state, everyone would live there. And then it beg, you know, it's also a question of, okay, like, what is, what is a perfect state? Like, what is that even? What does that even look like? Like, I, you know, I would want one that is as small as is humanly possible, takes care of basic safety. It's basically a, you know, it's basically a security force that is organized for the collective defense of my private property. And like, so that we don't have to resort to mob violence and I don't have to string up my neighbor Bob when he steals my car. Like I will, but I don't want to have to do that. And it's also, we're going to have a more respectful society if we do Organize in that way. But that's, yeah, I mean you just.
- [16:54]
Alex Svetsky
You, you somewhat described Dubai in that sense because like it's one of the safest places. Like I, I was in such a rush to get to the hotel on the last trip that I was there. I left my laptop in the airport for five hours and I came back and it was exactly where I left it.
- [17:11]
Walker
That's, I've, okay, I've like heard stories about that, you know, but like this is the first, first hand story I've.
- [17:16]
Alex Svetsky
Heard where it's like totally firsthand story. I got, we got to the hotel, Paloma and I, we checked in. We were sitting there and I was like, I'm gonna get some work done. And I like, is my laptop. I was like searching through everything, all this sort of. I was like, holy, I lost my laptop. Went down to the, to the front desk and I'm like panicking. They're like, so don't worry, it's okay, we'll, we'll find it. You know, they got me a taxi, went all the way and we were right, right on the edge of the palm. So it was like an hour back to the airport and I went to the airport and I'm like freaking out. I'm like, hey, you know, I left my thing and the guy's like, look, relax, don't worry, it'll be there. And I'm sitting there in the back of my mind thinking there's no fucking way that's gonna be there. It's like gone, gone. I, I up and yeah, he walked me through like, you know the, the part where you're not allowed to walk back in? Like, he's like, look, come with me. Security walk through. And the, the bag is just sitting there on the floor like. And I was like, okay, that's super interesting. I, I've got actually second story like that. The first time I went to Dubai in 2019, I. I forgot my phone. I was listening to like, it was when the AirPods first came out. So I was just listening to some music and the phone was not in my pocket, it was just on the, on the train seat. And I got off the train and you know, at my stop and all of a sudden I heard like the Bluetooth like disconnecting. And I was like, fuck, my phone. I was like running after the train, but the train left. I was like, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. You know, I'm stuck in Dubai. I was only supposed to be there for like a week. All this sort of shit. I'm Panicking. So I waited for the next train to come. I jumped on the next train and like, I had no idea what to do. So I was like, okay, maybe I'll just go to the next stop. So I jump off at the next stop and I'm like running around. I ask a few security guards, I'm like, have you seen my phone? This and that. And one of the kind of. He was, he wasn't a security guard. He was kind of like a military police, whatever they have there. And you know, he asked me to explain the phone, describe it, all this sort of stuff. And like, again, I was in this panic state. And then he just like pulled the phone out of his pocket. He was like, here you go.
- [19:14]
Walker
What the.
- [19:15]
Alex Svetsky
So someone literally got off at the next stop, gave the phone to somebody, and then I came and picked it up. Like I was like, holy. So anyway, there you go. Two. Two first hand stories.
- [19:26]
Walker
I mean, honestly it's, it's pretty impressive. Like that, that would not be the case in Chicago. I can tell you that. That, that laptop and that phone are gone in 60 seconds or less. But yeah, well, you know, and that it's kind of a, a nice bridge into our main topic for the day, which is, I think a lot of it is going to center around virtue because it's one of the things that you have focused on a lot in this book, the Bushido of bitcoin. Can we maybe, maybe we need like a little bit of a primer first for folks about like, they see the word Bushido and they're like, I don't even know what that means. Like, is this, you know, some, some Japanese stuff? There's crazy characters. So like, could you give us the, the, the backdrop for this? Like, like what, what is the Bushido of bitcoin and what the. Does Bushido actually mean?
- [20:19]
Alex Svetsky
Okay, let's, let's start with the second question first and then we'll go into what Bushido. So the, the word Bushido in Japanese means way of the warrior. That's that etymologically what it means, but it essentially stood for a, it's another way to say a code of virtue. Right? And the Western or the Western Christian European equivalent was like chivalry. Right? So it's like a way of living or a code of virtue that was primarily established and adopted and embodied by the warrior class. And it was the same in both Christendom, European Christendom and in, in feudal Japan, which is very interesting. We'll get into it later. Like these sort of parallels in different civilizations at different times in different region, and everything kind of converging on these, like, codes, which were almost carbon copies of each other. And you're like, what the fuck? So, like, as I wrote the book, I found that out. So you got this code of virtue. So when. When I originally started the book, it actually came about as an idea from a. From a podcast that Eric Kaysen and I did on my old Wake up podcast from back in the day. And he and I were discussing a book called Shogun by James Clavell, which is. Is now like some HBO show. And actually that they did a good job of that, I must admit.
- [21:48]
Walker
I wanted to read this slight interjection. I watched the show, and I was like, this is badass. Like, it was just really well done. I would need to read the book now, I feel, because.
- [21:56]
Alex Svetsky
Do the audiobook. The audiobook is. I would say, as much as the show was fantastic, the audiobook is even 10 times better than the show.
- [22:05]
Walker
Nice.
- [22:06]
Alex Svetsky
The first time I listened to the audiobook, dude, I was in Germany during lockdowns. And here I am, like, listening to this book, you know, I was, like, transported back through time. And, you know, there's, like, honor and virtue and, like, people who, you know, they do something slightly wrong and they fucking cut out their spleen, you know, for the dishonor and stuff like that. And then I walk outside and there's people wearing masks in the middle of the day, protecting themselves from a fantasy virus. I was like, what fucking planet am I on?
- [22:36]
Walker
God, that's a trip.
- [22:37]
Alex Svetsky
I was almost gonna fucking commit seppuka myself. Brush. So. So. So anyway, Casey and I had both read or listened to this book multiple times, and we ended up doing a podcast on it. And the theme at the time was this idea of these emergent values or these emergent virtues in the bitcoin space. And a couple months later, I thought, this is a great idea for a book. So that's what the original incarnation of the book was. And the book evolved. The. The one that I ended up sending you, the one you read, is draft number eight. I rewrote this book eight times. Probably could have rewritten another eight times, but it just evolved over time, and it became something different. It became more a exploration of history, culture, civilization, of what it took for us to get here and what we can learn from what it took for us to get here and project forward on a new socioeconomic standard. And that's why, like, the. The subtitle of the book is a. A Code of virtue for a new socioeconomic standard. And. And it became, over time, less and less and less about Bitcoin and more and more and more about what do we do after we win the economic game. Because that's like. I just did a. I don't know if you know Will Tanner from his. He's been doing a lot of great content on Rhodesia and stuff like that on Twitter. But he. And I just did a podcast earlier today and you know, I'm on this sort of crusade to orange pill, you know, the right wingers. And he's one of the key figures that I really want to get on board. And I kind of told him, I said, look, the whole point of Bitcoin is to fix the money so that we forget about the money. Like today in the modern world, everything is so overly financialized. Like everything from Wall street to Silicon Valley to, you know, just. Just everyday living. Like people are sitting there talking about their fucking investments and their robinhood and their 401ks and their superannuation Australia, like all this sort of shit. It's like things that people should not need to worry about, but it's all a function of upstream the money being broken. So therefore we can't save, we can't be normal human beings, etc. So I said the whole point because, you know, there's a lot of skepticism on, on the right, particularly the new right, with people that are just like, looking to make money and gamble, like in this financialization of the world, as opposed to establishing families and culture and dynasties and lineages and building things of quality, etc. Which are sometimes counter to making money. Right? Like these things are not often in alignment. So the, the argument I made to him, I said, look, this is about fixing the money so that we can forget about the money when it's, when it's like the air we breathe, we. We can then think about other things like family, like nobility, like excellence, like virtue, like all of these things which are about creating a ascendant civilization or a beautiful culture. Right? These things. Because, you know, if you. I. Because I've, I've come with this, you know, I'm going off on tangents here, so I apologize, but like, you know.
- [25:52]
Walker
That tangents are always welcome on this show. No apologies.
- [25:56]
Alex Svetsky
So the, you know, the, the critique I've had recently is the, the sort of, the incessant focus on pure economics I kind of envision. Now economics is like the, the foundation. But a healthy society doesn't focus purely on economics. It focuses on something higher which is beauty and truth, right, like that. That should be the. Where the gaze is. And then it should be under. Underlied by sound economics. But that's not the goal. The goal is not to build something because it makes money. The goal is to build something because it's beautiful and transcendent like. And it should also make money, but that should be the secondary factor, not the primary factor. And this is sort of like a little bit of a. Not an issue, but a small disconnect that I've personally developed, particularly with, you know, Austrian economics and libertarianism and all that sort of stuff. But anyway, without, without going off on that tangent, the, the book evolved a lot and it became a book about constructing, as I said, an ascendant civilization. And what are the virtues? What are the values? What is the. What is the way that we must behave when bitcoin sort of wins this economic game? Do we become a new parasitic class? Do we become Lambo Bros or do we become men and women of virtue? And if we're going to become the latter, what are those virtues? And the best clues we have to those great virtues are the cultures and the civilizations that preceded us that were great, that set the foundation upon which we built. So that's where the digging came into it and that's where I. Where I ended up. And the book really turned into something I didn't expect. So I think I've answered both questions.
- [27:51]
Walker
Yeah, no, you definitely haven't. So, I mean, fair to say that the book presupposes that bitcoin wins. And is that your, like, not just as a literary device but your personal belief that like bitcoin will win, you view it as inevitability. It continues to blow my mind that there are bitcoiners out there who are not yet on Nostr. Seriously, what are you doing? Just like you shouldn't need to ask permission to use your money, you shouldn't need to ask permission to speak freely or have control of your own account. But that is exactly what you are doing. If you are still trusting centralized social media platforms. You may have seen several high profile bitcoiners and friends of mine like Lawrence Lepard and Lyn Alden more recently get their X accounts hacked and then struggle to work with X support to get those accounts back. Where did they go to give people updates? They went to Nostr. On Nostr, you can't be censored, you can't be banned, and you can't be deboosted for saying words that Mark Zuckerberg or Elon Musk don't like. And honestly the vibes are just better on Nostr. Plus Nostr has bitcoin payments built in so when you post a meme, a spicy hot take, or just a photo of your steak, people will zap you bitcoin to show you they like it and find your content valuable. And if you are a content creator, you can start monetizing your work immediately on Nostr. Unlike on X, YouTube or literally any other centralized platform where you have to hit engagement thresholds and then kyc yourself. You can find me on Nostr by going to primal.netwalker and you can find this podcast on Nostr@primal.net Titcoin Primal also has a built in bitcoin wallet so you can literally get zapped by people for your posts. Then go use those sats to buy a coffee or do whatever you want all from the same app. Search for Primal in the app store, go to primal.net or choose any of the hundreds of other Nostr apps that are out there because you can freely switch between any of them anytime you want. So come join the largest bitcoin circular economy in the world and start zapping sats on Nostr. Shitcoining is bad for you. And you know what else is bad for you? Trusting a centralized exchange to keep your bitcoin safe. So go to Bitbox Swiss Walker and use the promo code walker for 5% off the easy to use Bitcoin only fully open source Bitbox 02 hardware wallet. Then get your bitcoin off the exchange and into your own self custody. Bitcoin is chopsolidating around $0.1 million and companies are buying, nation states are buying. And unless you have your head stuck in the sand, you realize that your stack is going to be worth a heck of a lot more later than it is today. At least in fiat value. Because we all know one bitcoin equals one bitcoin, right? So now is the perfect time to make sure you have your security locked down tight with Bitbox Plus. And I cannot emphasize this enough, the Bitbox 02 is just super easy to use. Whether you're brand new to bitcoin. It's your first time setting up a hardware wallet so you're a little bit nervous. That's okay. Or you are a well seasoned psychopath. Again, it's Bitcoin only and again fully open source. Head to their GitHub and verify that for yourself. Don't trust me or Bitbox when you go to Bitbox Swiss Walker and use the promo code Walker. Not only do you get 5% off a great piece of bitcoin only open source hardware, but you also help support this podcast. So thank you.
- [31:25]
Alex Svetsky
Almost. I think so. I think in my opinion, the economic gravity that bitcoin has is too strong to unwind now. Sure, we've got the blackrocks and this problem and that problem and all the crap that we're going to have to fight along the way, but in the end, bitcoin is a bit of a black hole in that sense, which we all know everyone listening to this is going to agree. It's going to keep sucking in capital and it'll keep getting heavier and heavier and heavier, and as it does, it'll. It'll do its thing. I genuinely believe that while that fight still needs to happen, because we're obviously not out of the woods yet, I think the probability of bitcoin failing and not winning the economic game is lower than the probability of bitcoin winning the economic game. But the culture still being a shit show, and the people who end up with a bunch of bitcoin not being virtuous, I actually think that's a bigger risk. Because as much as I guess there is a subset of bitcoiners who are thinking about family, thinking about nobility, thinking about community, thinking about all of the things that we know that are like, wholesome in the bitcoin space. But I've spent a little bit of time outside of the bitcoin bubble over the last year, and I found that actually more people who have bitcoin are more likely to be degenerates. Like, it's not. Like, I've actually backflipped on my belief that bitcoin fixes people. I actually think that people need to have a particular predisposition for bitcoin to affect them in that way. Because I've met way more bitcoiners now that are not what we would call bitcoiners, but they consider themselves bitcoiners and they're more interested in Lambos and whatever the fuck else that we would not consider wholesome. So it was like a real shock for me because it's very easy for us to get caught in our own little echo chambers, right? Like, we did that on bitcoin Twitter. We do that a lot on Noster. It's like it's us, it's our little crew. But it's not so clear to me that bitcoin fixes everyone it touches. If anything, it magnifies the ingredients that are already sort of within them, you know, particularly if that's their nature and particularly if the nurturers reinforced that nature. So this book is almost an attempt to say, look, you, Mr. Bitcoiner, are going to hold a bunch of Bitcoin, and you are going to become disproportionately wealthy, which comes with a level of influence that you might not be ready for. So. So you're actually. You're no longer going to be a pleb. You're actually going to be, socioeconomically speaking, an aristocrat. And to. To be an aristocrat. You know, the word aristocrat is, you know, power. What the was it. It was like rule of the strong, right? So. So you become economically strong. You become economically significant. You become, therefore, socially significant. That comes with a set of duties, that comes with a set of responsibilities that if you don't begin to inculcate that in yourself today, it's going to crush you under that. The burden of that weight, the burden of that economic responsibility. And you're going to deform into a Brock Pierce or into, you know, someone like that, because that's what happens when people come into wealth all of a sudden, and they haven't developed the character to support that capital or that wealth. Right? And that's the whole premise of this book. It's. There's things that we all need to work on, and I put myself first on that list. You know, I've been a complete at, you know, sorry for swearing. I've been a complete asshole for a long time. And writing this book was, for me, an opportunity to say, okay, Alex, how are you going to behave? Not just for the, you know, for yourself or for your family or for all that, but to the world, to community, to all of these things. And all the great civilizations, all the great cultures encoded that in these bushidos or these chivalries or these, you know, commandments or whatever. Right. You know, they all had a slightly different name. And I. I genuinely think there's going to be a version for this new world which will be underpinned by Bitcoin. And my attempt at distilling those is the premise of the book. Like, there's these 10 virtues, and they're not Svetsky's virtues. They are the timeless virtues that seem to come up again and again and again.
- [36:26]
Walker
I'll shut up there. No, no, not at all. Again, safe space for rants. Safe space for. For swearing as well. Because let's. Let's be honest. Sometimes it's just necessary to emphasize a Point. I'll put the explicit tag on there for if anyone's listening with. With their kids. And. And if not, you know, well, then, you know, your kids are going to hear these. They're just words, guys. They're just. They're just words. Your kid's gonna hear them anyway. Like, can't shelter them forever. But. So, you know, one of the things that I. I love, and it's something that you've talked about before, it's also kind of mentioned in the book, it's this idea that it's not enough to have. Just have capital. You must have character as well to make a positive impact on the world. I'm paraphrasing here, but without character, capital is a magnifier of the worst traits in us. And I thought that's a really interesting point because we. It's easy to say, you know, bitcoin fixes this. You know, bitcoin fixes me, right? It's like, no, bitcoin fixes this. Bitcoin doesn't necessarily fix you. Like, bitcoin may be a path to a better version of yourself, but it could also be a path to a worse version of yourself. Like, that's. It's not like, deterministic in a positive direction.
- [37:36]
Alex Svetsky
Yes.
- [37:37]
Walker
And so, like, is. Is that kind of what you're seeing is like, no matter what the form of capital is, and perhaps some forms of capital, perhaps forms of fiat capital, have a more. More potentially negative effect on you because of the game that you have to play. But even with bitcoin, you're still susceptible to the same weaknesses, negative traits, whatever they may be within you. And it's going, you know, it's like the line between good and evil cuts through the heart of all of us. Right. It's a question of which side is going to win. Is that kind of how you view this? Like, pretty much gonna just fix you? Like, doesn't fix everything.
- [38:11]
Alex Svetsky
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. In short, yes. Like, I, you know, this came from a place of. Of a little bit of disillusionment because I, you know, I. I went through and, you know, there was people that I, you know, thought were real solid people in the bitcoin space that turned out. I was like, you know what? Actually, you're not actually as solid as I thought. Like, you know, there's. And, you know, I'm not going to name any names or any of that sort of stuff, but, like, there was a. There was a period of reckoning for me, and I felt Like I, you know, the, the whole rosy veil of like, yeah, you know, we're all bitcoiners. We're all on the same side. You know, we're all kind of like, think, live, breathe and all this sort of stuff. The same, like that kind of disappeared. And I ended up finding people who I aligned with more in a values capacity outside of bitcoin as well. So then I realized, wait a minute, there's actually super based people that are not bitcoiners, then there is bitcoiners that are literally the opposite of fucking based, completely retarded. So I'm like, how do I reconcile that? So it's like, clearly bitcoin didn't fix this person. And clearly bitcoin turned this person into a bigger retard. So the equation bitcoin fixes you and all this sort of stuff just I found, you know, I guess this is the mathematician in me. When I was young, like I was really into math and like, I would, you know, you find something, a proof or a disproof for an equation. And like I found something that disproved the equation. So I was like, okay, there's something else here. And I, you know, Ross Stevens and I were having a discussion because he, you know, very graciously agreed to write the forward for the book. And he, he and I had a discussion about this and we kind of came to the conclusion that bitcoin is like a keystone. So if, if you want to build a bridge, like bitcoin is necessary, but it's not sufficient for the bridge. So you can't finish the bridge without the keystone, but you can't just put a keystone in the middle without the rest of the bridge. So there's, there's other stuff there that is necessary. And that's, I guess if I had to boil down the whole message, it's that, that's what this is about. Like, it's about what else do we need to do other than stack sats. And there's a lot. And I think bitcoiners have slowly sort of found that to some degree. But I think there's so much more. That rabbit hole goes just as deep as the bitcoin rabbit hole, but it's a rabbit hole that is often ignored or at least not explored to the same degree.
- [41:03]
Walker
And yeah, I completely agree. And I mean, it's this. The other idea here is that like money itself, the accumulation of more units of money is not the end all be all right. The money is a tool. For some people, the sheer Accumulation of more monetary units is the end all, be all. I would argue that those people have a lot of regrets on their deathbed.
- [41:29]
Alex Svetsky
Totally, totally.
- [41:30]
Walker
You know, but like, you hear these, you know, it's a cliche at this point, but you hear these stories that nobody is ever sitting on their deathbed being like, ah, you know, like, I wish I would have, you know, spent a little more time away from my family and you know, done. It's like, no, you always wish. I wish I would have spent more time with my family, with my friends. I wish I would have, you know, helped build my community more. It's those things that are. Yes. Does money help you to do those things in perhaps a better, more enhanced way because you have more freedom over your time? Yes. But there's a point of diminishing marginal return where additional units of money don't actually get you anything else when it comes to the real, the things that life is actually about. Right. And so I think, and I agree, I think that gets lost in the sauce a lot for bitcoiners too. But I hope that we see a little bit more of an awakening in that. And I'm curious too. So these virtues, you said these aren't Svetsky's virtues. These are kind of, let's say universal virtues or these are time tested virtues. Do you want to talk through those a little bit now? And maybe another thing that I think you maybe want to clarify is the difference between virtue and morality and kind of this interplay a little bit because I think that does get muddied a bit at times.
- [42:51]
Alex Svetsky
It does, yeah. So let's again start with the second one first. So the, the original subtitle of the book was A Moral Code for a World on a Bitcoin Standard. And I, and I went through and I just kind of like removed the word morality from a lot of the book and, and from the subtitle on the basis that, look, if you want morality, go read the Bible or the Quran or something like that. Like, I'm, I'm not here to moralize to you and I feel like that happens a lot with, with people is that they try and like, you know, I, I'm holier than thou and you know, I am better because I did this or whatever. Like, there's like, I don't think moralizing works very well because it's very hard to, to disprove. Right. Like a virtue, in my opinion is, is an act. So it's like a, it's like a principle in action that, that's maybe a way to conceptualize what a virtue is. And like, if we use courage as an example, when you see someone do something courageous, somebody else doesn't have to tell you that, oh, that was a courageous act or something. It's. It's something you feel like it moves you, right? Like there's. There's a. There's a feeling, you know, same. Same with compassion or, you know, or, you know, you see something and you can tell if it's just or unjust. It doesn't have to have a fucking label on it. So to me, you know, that's sort of like the difference between virtue and morality. And I think virtue is actually, in my opinion, upstream of morality because you can have different cultures or different religions with different morals or different frameworks for morals. But from what I've noticed, and I have an example in the book about the. The Crusades with Saladin, and I can't remember who it was on the Christian side, but they developed a respect for each other because of the way, the virtues they respected about each other. Courage, justice. You know, Saladin was very well known for, like, honor, for example. Like, he. There's one story in the book about how he captures his enemy's father. And at any point in time, he could have used them as ransom, could have killed him, whatever, all this sort of stuff, but it was not the honorable thing to do. So he actually took care of him. And once the siege was over, he handed his father back to him because it was, you know, the dishonorable thing. And. And that kind of like respect among enemies, you know, comes from a place of less. I guess you could argue it's morality as well, but. But it comes from a place of virtue. And. And I guess where I'm going with this is you could be Muslim, you could be Christian, you could be Buddhist, you can be whatever, but every single one of us will recognize courage or recognize compassion or recognize a virtue, right? So. So the virtues kind of, to me, transcend morality, or at least if they don't, you know, for those who are getting triggered by my interpretation that they transcend morality or that they come higher, they are on a different plane. You know, maybe we can put it that way. And for me, I felt it was. I felt I could write about virtue, but I didn't feel I could write about morality. Let's. Let's put it that way. And that's why, you know, to kind of tie it back to my initial comment is like, you know, morality, you'll find in the the good books. Here you'll find a guide on what are the virtues and who embodied these. Like, I talk a whole lot about Alexander the Great and Caesar and Napoleon and Tokugawi Asu and all these sort of like great figures who bent the arc of history, you know, in. In the direction of their will, for example.
- [46:47]
Walker
So, quick, a quick question. Would it be fair to say then that in. In your mind, morality is more of culture, it's more culturally subjective, whereas virtue is something that sort of transcends culture. We're not saying it transcends morality, but it does transcend culture. It's. One can't say that it's purely objective, but it's certainly more objective than morality, which is entirely culturally subjective. Fair characterization.
- [47:16]
Alex Svetsky
Yeah, I think so. I think so. That's a good. That's a good way to summarize it. So the first question, what are the. What are the virtues that I selected? So, yeah, I. I started off with the. The. The eight virtues from Japanese bashira from the feudal time. And these, These are not like the thing about the, The Japanese virtues was that it was never a. Like a Ten Commandments or something. Right. It wasn't like something that was written. And this is what the virtues are. So there's. There's no real, like, official eight virtues. There's just like a consensus around what were the most common of the eight. And they include justice, compassion. Let's see how good my memory is here. Justice, compassion, if you want.
- [48:06]
Walker
Yeah, I do have them handy just for a visual aid for folks.
- [48:09]
Alex Svetsky
Excellent. Yeah. Loyalty, respect. Wait, they're the 10. Okay, so let me. Let me make sure I read out the right one. So, yeah, so justice, courage, compassion, honor, integrity, respect, duty, loyalty and restraint, or self control. So they are the kind of the original eight Japanese ones. And the two that I added that were explicitly not or that explicitly did not come up in. In a lot of the texts that I read on Japanese Bushido were excellence and responsibility. And I think the reason why they weren't explicitly mentioning those is that those cultures kind of had responsibility and excellence embedded within them. And, you know, maybe 100, 200 years from now, we'll, you know, we'll once again enter an age where responsibility and excellence are like kind of second nature. But I felt that it was necessary to have these as explicit virtues because the job we have over the next century or two is to rebuild civilization and point us back towards an ascendant direction. And that fundamentally requires responsibility and excellence. And honestly, they were two of my Favorite chapters in writing. Like, there's the responsibility one as well, is like, there's. There's some real fire sections in there. Like, I, I. In there, I talk about Alfred Adler, who's like the. The forgotten Austrian psychologist who's kind of like the psychology equivalent of Mises, who, you know, the universities will never teach you about because he does away with labels and therapy and drugs and all this sort of stuff. It's. It's incredible. But Anyway, that's the 10 virtues.
- [50:03]
Walker
I like it. It reminds. So I'm. Fun fact about me, I'm an Eagle Scout, and I still like, to this day have it ingrained in me. A Scout is trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean and reverent. Like, I can never. They're. They're literally, like in. They're so deep down in my brain that they, like, they just are always there. And there's a couple of those that I will take issue with on occasion, like the obedient one, because they don't mean it in a negative connotation. But I think the way I take it is sort of is when it means, like, automatic obedience to authority, which I don't support. But that being said, it's this idea of a code of conduct, right? It's a framework for not what you should do, but how you should go about doing it. And I think that that's something that, like, I don't think most people think about this kind of stuff literally at all, like, ever in their whole life. And I guess maybe that's just like the NPC class. Like, there's no curiosity. There's no desire to say, like, instead of whining about how unfair the world is to you, what can I do to actually better myself? What can I do to elevate myself on this playing field? What can I do to take myself to the next level? But the sad thing is that I think I would argue the majority of people will never ask themselves that question. And that's really sad.
- [51:30]
Alex Svetsky
Totally. Totally. Let's. You know, I want to dig into what you just said about obedience then, because it. I, like, you have like a. A trigger to that word, right? Like, it's like, you know, just like. It's almost like an electric shock. It's like, yeah, you. I'm not a Roomba machine. Right. But when you, when you. It's interesting. Like, the, the duty and loyalty part is related to obedience. Right? And these virtues are extremely important in these warrior cultures and obviously in Family and in all sorts of things like that. But when you, when you unpack, the reason why in Eagle Scouts or these kind of environments, like obedience is. Is necessary almost is because of how. It's because of the environment in which the obedience is necessary. And I think of. I think of a. Two examples. A phalanx in battle or. And I think of also a sailors on a boat. And I, I have a vision right now in my head of there's a. There's a great movie called Mutiny on the Bounty. It's also. It was, it was. I don't know if it was based on the book, but I read the book before I saw the movie. It's about the. These English sailors who are going to Tahiti to get breadfruit. And without getting into the story, there's a section where they're trying to round the Cape of. I can't remember if it was the Argentinian one or if it was the African one. I think it was the Argentinian one because of the, the coldness of the weather and stuff. And basically it was like a visceral example of the only way they survived was 100% obedience to the captain of what? Like, they had to function like a unit. There was no, oh, I'm a libertarian, I'm free. Don't tell me what the fuck to do. Sorry, bro, that shit.
- [53:43]
Walker
You're dead. Yeah, yeah, you're dead.
- [53:45]
Alex Svetsky
Exactly.
- [53:45]
Walker
And everyone around you is dead.
- [53:47]
Alex Svetsky
Yeah, not only are you dead, but probably everyone else is going to die because you didn't do your duty. And, you know, the, the, the, you know, the, the phalanx is a similar situation. It's the. With the Spartans, the Macedonians and all this sort of stuff. There was a greater penalty for dropping your shield than there was for dropping your weapon because the man to your left was the greater priority than yourself. Right. And that's how the unit was strong. And we, you know, oftentimes in, you know, in a libertarian freedom, all this sort of shit context, we laugh at that shit, but, you know, these micro collectives, these tribes are far stronger than the individual libertarian like they are. And in my opinion, I've sort of come to believe, like, maybe I'm a micro collectivist now, but I've honestly come to believe that it's not the individual that matters, it's actually the, the tribe that matters more than individual. And that is the, the organizing unit, like the whole sovereign, individual libertarian. You know, even, like I look back on some of my Uncommunist manifesto stuff and I'M like, man, I was like too excessive on the individual side of the spectrum. I think the, the right point of, of sovereignty is whatever that wolf pack kind of tribe is. And you know, whether that is family, whether there's like, you know, close knit friends, whatever that is. I, I kind of almost imagine it as Alexander the Great and his Royal guard, like his best friends, the one that he, the ones that he grew up with, that he went to war with for 15 years. Like they, they took arrows, everything for each other. That to me seems to be more important than the individual. So anyway, I just want to unpack what you said earlier about obedience because yes, it does trigger the individualist within us, but it is absolutely necessary in the context that it is applied and it's arrogant of, of any of us to kind of look at that stuff and laugh at it as it's like, oh, you know, you're, you're a stupid brute. It's, well no, there's actually something noble about that.
- [56:12]
Walker
No, I, I, I agree with that completely. And that's, that's kind of the caveat I put out there is that like I realized that they're not using it in that way like they're actually using, you know, and granted it turns out that if you were in Boy Scouts and you were in the wrong troop and you were being obedient to the wrong troop leader, that may not have worked out so well for you. That's a whole different story. We don't need to unpack. Luckily no funny business in my troop. I think maybe just some embezzlement by someone, but that's just fiat games. But no, I think it is an important point that I think there are people that excel by themselves and there are people that excel in teams and there are people that can do both. But excelling by yourself, while it is incredibly rewarding, I think there is often a lot of like, community is important. There's a reason why people in close knit communities live longer. There's a reason why people in close knit communities are happier. Even when they're forced to do really unpleasant stuff, they're going to find ways to do it with a smile on their face. Community matters. We are social beings. You can still succeed on your own, but you're able to do a hell of a lot more when you have a pack, a tribe around you. Like that's human cooperation is what has allowed us to get to where we are today, where we're sitting across the world from each other using these fancy cameras, running, you know, Little bits across the. Across the Internet, and we can see each other and talk in real time while we stream it live on Nostr. None of that's possible. But with one person working by themselves, all of it requires, you know, and there's also a difference between a tribal mentality and a collectivist mentality. And I think that's like. That's kind of the key thing. It's like, this isn't for the greater good. You're doing it for the very immediate good of your tribe. Like, I think that's an important distinction there.
- [58:09]
Alex Svetsky
Totally, totally.
- [58:11]
Walker
You know, so I appreciate the breakdown of the virtues because again, I, I think we're at this point where we were mentioning the NPC earlier and you had, you had a quote at one point in the book. It's like, I wrote this not for the sheep or the npc, for they can never be woken up, but for the lions, whether you've been asleep or have woken up. And I thought that was kind of. Kind of amazing. And it's something I've sort of come to myself where it's like, some people are. I mean, maybe I'll ask this of you. Are some people just beyond saving? Like, are there some people that are just too broken, lack the inquisitiveness, lack the vigor, lack the drive to ever pull themselves out of their sorry little hole?
- [58:52]
Alex Svetsky
Yes.
- [58:55]
Walker
It'S a sad state of affairs.
- [58:57]
Alex Svetsky
It is, it is. I mean, I don't know if it's. It comes back to the nature nurture discussion. I think there is just some level of nature that is necessary for the kind of nurture that we respect and admire to matter. And there's. Yeah, there's just no amount of anything you can do to. To fix that or change that. And yeah, man, the. The. The older I get, the more. The more selective I think I become. Because, you know, you just kind of realize that, man, time flies. You know, we're not getting any younger. Like, really. And like, why. Why waste your time with things that really don't matter or people that are not gonna change, or people like, you know, this is not gonna sound nice, but people that don't matter. Like, not, not everyone can fucking matter, man. Like, and that's okay. So, like, cut them out, forget about them, block them, ignore them, whatever. It's like life's too short to, To. To spend it on. On lost causes. And there's more lost causes than there is useful causes.
- [60:17]
Walker
You can't save everyone.
- [60:18]
Alex Svetsky
No, you can't. No. And. And I mean, I. I wrote about this. Like, it's funny because I mean, that. That the original Remnant essay that I did, like, back in 2021, like, that was the whole premise of it. It's like the masses don't matter. Like, find. Find the Remnant, and. And I find myself just coming back to that idea on a regular basis, and it just, like, proves itself out for whatever reason every week, every month, every whatever. Right. It's so, you know, we all need to find our 1% where it matters. And. And this is, you know, this is why I've also got, like, a problem with things like, you know, equality and egalitarianism and all this sort of stuff, because it pretends like, you know, the very act of prioritization is the act of de. Equalizing things and, you know, making something more important. Everything else not important. Right. Like, so. So everything we do, like existence itself, is the process of, you know, making things unequal. And we, you know, we've been brainwashed for the last 70 years since, you know, the end of World War II, that, like, everything must be democratic and egalitarian and equal and all this kind of stuff. And we've, you know, we've kind of. We've cut the head off, like, excellence, and we've tried to, like, turn everything into some sort of mediocre middle ground where, you know, everything is equal and same and all this sort of stuff and everything that. That's where relativism lives as well. Right? Because, like, you know, nothing really matters because, you know, everything matters and nothing matters. So therefore, nothing matters because everything matters. And like, it's the. It's, you know, that circular, sort of like infinite, pointless logic that is illogical but logical because, you know, both can exist at the same time.
- [62:17]
Walker
No, and that's. That's perfect. This is exactly what I wanted to get into next is this idea of equality versus fairness. It seems that we've pushed more and more and more. And, you know, this isn't just like a, you know, I'm an American, obviously, this isn't just an American thing. This is. Now, we see this across the world, this idea that, you know, we're trying to level the playing field. And, you know, that's actually not even a good. A good example. A playing field should be level in the sense that it should be fair. Both sides should be the same height. That does not mean that you should take the fastest guy in the field who's two times faster than anyone else, and tie weights to his legs or give the other one a bionic exoskeleton give the weakest person a bionic exoskeleton that allows them to crush even the strongest guy. You know, like, we've, for some reason, it's like we've seen this globalized version of the no Child Left behind bullshit where it's like, we just need to make everyone equal. And then when everyone's equal and the same, it'll all be fine, but also at the same time, which is extremely. Like, this is why none of this makes any sense. It's like, everyone's equal, but also like it's Animal Farm. Some people are more equal than others. We're going to build an intersectional hierarchy of diversity so that we can tell you, usually straight white man, why you are at the very bottom of this. And all of us have way more grievances than you, and they're also your fault. And so we need to basically have reparations of some sort for all of this so that again, we can make us all equal. But again, some of us are more equal than others. Like, this is just like this lunacy. And like, you've talked a lot about this. People confuse equality with fairness. And. Can you just expand on that a little bit and why people get this so wrong?
- [64:09]
Alex Svetsky
Yeah, man. I mean, you, you just summed it up perfectly. So I think the, the only thing I'll add to that is that fairness is actually contrary or counter to equality. Like, the, the whole point of it is that if, if you, for example, forced an equal outcome in a game, you would most likely have to do it in a, in a way that you created some unfairness. Right? But if you, if you made sure that the, the game was fair. The point of the game is to have an unequal outcome is to have a winner and a loser. Like, you don't just go and watch the games just because everyone wins every time. Like, fucking pointless. Like, the point of winning is to get the reward and dopamine and the, you know, the, the trophy or whatever it is, like, you won. And the point of losing actually is also to learn something and to either come back better or, or to just like, like lose. It's okay. Like, so, you know, the, the fair game has an unequal outcome and the unfair game has a, has an equal outcome. And this is, this goes beyond just humans. Like, all of the natural world is like this. There's, you know, it's, it's not equal when a lion runs out and, you know, they, they take out one of the gazelles, like, but it's Fair, because that's the one they got. And like, if, you know, if it was equal, you know, all the gazelles would be dead, you know, or. Or none of the lions would eat. But, you know, lo and behold, this is. This is the way of the world, is the way of life. And trying to kind of like, short circus that short circuit that for some unattainable ideal, I think, has done just as much damage to civilization as money printing, if not more. And that's actually one of the other big points that I made in the book. I said, look, there's like, two twin evils that have destroyed civilization. You know, one is money printing, but the other one is egalitarianism and democracy. Like, kind of put those into a. Into a bucket together. This idea that, you know, we're all created equal and we're all equal and everything should be egalitarian and all this sort of stuff. Like, it. It is a fucking cancer that is slowly eroded at the. At the soul, particularly of the west, because, like, you know, as much as, you know, they. They want to blame Western European man for, like, destroying the world and all this sort of stuff. I'm sorry, but fuck you. We came, we conquered, and we established the world. So I'm sorry, but that, that, that. That didn't happen by accident. It happened for a reason. And, you know, like, we can debate about what that reason is, but fundamentally, like, we have as Western men, forgotten that, and we're sort of like, been asleep for a long time and. And, you know, that that fire is starting to come back now, you know, which is very encouraging. But anyway, I'll just shut up there. But fairness, equality, divergent.
- [67:26]
Walker
Yeah, it's. One would think it would be easier for people to grok, but apparently it just is not. I mean, just building out of that. I mean, do you think that this is just also. This comes back to, like, mediocrity, being average like that, you know. Oh, you know, I'm not like that. It comes from, like, a lack of drive. Like, is that where the desire for equality comes from? Like, because either you don't have the drive to strive for excellence, or you believe that even if you have the drive, you don't have the innate skills to become excellent. Some part of you acknowledges that, whether or not explicitly or implicitly. And that is where some of this push for equality over fairness comes from. Just a kind of internal acknowledgment of that fact.
- [68:16]
Alex Svetsky
Hmm. How conspiratorial should we get?
- [68:20]
Walker
As. As conspiratorial as you want?
- [68:24]
Alex Svetsky
Oh, okay. I think, I think it all boils down to envy. There's. There's a, there's a deep seated. And Nietzsche talks about this a lot. In fact, like as much as I love all the Austrian writers and Hans Herman Hopper is my favorite for sure. Nietzsche is just like some next level philosophy with a hammer. Gu. Brilliant. Honestly, he. He would have been if he was alive today. He'd be that like troll on Twitter that just like, just anything someone says would be like, dork, loser. Like that would be his like one liners.
- [69:05]
Walker
Maybe. Maybe there's like the spirit of Nietzsche running the. Have you seen the finder account? I haven't, but I'll send this to you afterwards. It's. It, it's. It's got like half a million followers already in a week. It is the funniest thing I've seen in a while. I digress. But maybe that's his spirit living on.
- [69:21]
Alex Svetsky
Totally, man, totally. His spirit has infected a bunch of things and it's a beautiful thing to behold. Envy. Nietzsche talks about envy a lot and he talks about the envy being the tool of the weak to subvert the strong. And what that means is that the strong doesn't go about looking to stomp on the weak because the strong is more interested in climbing and competing with the other strong. In fact, the, the strong rarely recognizes the weak because, you know, they just sort of see them there as like children and you know, often times like kind of take care of them, but it's kind of like a, like a condescending love, right? So it's like, okay, yeah, that's, that's, that's cute, whatever. But like my battle is with the wave or the mountain or this other warrior clan here or this other king. Like, I want to take his woman, like whatever it is, right? Like there's this like the strong wants to reach and climb. And traditionally speaking, you know, throughout history, throughout the millennia, you know, you had these different classes of people and, and people knew like, you know, the word, you know, the surname blacksmith, you know, and all this sort of stuff like, came from, you know, these classes of people who they were, you know, all biologically different and they were good at doing different things. And you know, this is why in my opinion, feudalism worked quite well, because it was, you know, we today have a modern form of phantom feudalism where we still have these classes but we pretend like we don't have it. Whereas at least 500 years ago there was like clear feudalism where we knew we had it, and people, you know, knew which class they were in and they would have, you know, a meritocracy within their classes, but the classes would rarely mix, which, you know, there's a whole argument to be made that that's a, that's a better structure for society. But anyway, that aside, you had this kind of like respect from the, the, the weaker classes to the stronger classes. And you had, this was very strong and very prevalent in, in Japan. The, the warrior class was that strong class and they acted as the white blood cells to the culture and society they were in. And they, they acted as the protectors, right? That was their job. And the, the quote unquote weak classes. So the peasantry, the artisans, the merchants and all this sort of stuff would look up to them and they didn't sort of like have this necessary resentment that it's like, oh, you know, you're stronger, you know that you're better. It's like you, that's what you did and this is what we do. And your job as the strong is to go and compete and claim territory and do whatever else you do, but also protect like so, so there's this kind of like two way relationship. And you know, our job is to grow the rice, produce the swords, like do all the other sort of stuff that, that makes things happen. And unfortunately there's, there's also another class of people who are, call it the parasitic or envious or you know, the trader class, the, you know, the money changers of the world. And they've existed in all sorts of civilizations and you know, Nietzsche calls them the priestly class. You know, the, the people who didn't have the class of individual who didn't have the vitality to go and claim and to conquer and to create and to build and to reach. They would turn their drives inwards and they would create this, these kind of like moralities that strength is, is evil and oppressive and weakness is virtuous. And therefore we must elevate all that is weak and desecrate all that is strong as evil. And this is sort of like, if I paraphrase Nietzsche here, this is the genesis of good and evil, right? Because prior to good and evil was strong and weak and strong and weak had a hierarchy. And good and evil was the attempt to make strong evil and weak good. And what you end up getting over generations, over centuries, over millennia is the erosion of the concept of strong. And the tool used to basically desecrate the strong is guilt. Guilt is the tool and it comes from the, the source of it all is envy. Envy is the attempt to tear down that which is above you, that which is more beautiful, more strong, more prosperous, more. More ascendant. And yeah, the. The. The desire for average, the desire for equality, the desire for all of these things, I believe, is largely driven by this envy. And it's been weaponized because everybody can feel envy in some way. But it's like, if it's particularly weaponized, if you are particularly made to feel like you must eat the rich, you must do this, you must do that, all this sort of stuff, like, I mean, this is literally where conflict communism comes from.
- [75:01]
Walker
I was just gonna say this is. That's the playbook right there.
- [75:04]
Alex Svetsky
Exactly. The entire playbook of communism is envy. Right? It's. It's to tear down everything that is above everything that is more beautiful, everything that is more strong, everything that is more excellent and bring it all down. And the fact that, you know, the. The subconscious predisposition for envy and resentment exists within us all is enough for the orchestrators of that mass envy to light it up and to turn the masses against the best of us. And I think that's been the. The quote, unquote conspiracy for. For many centuries now. And, you know, we've potentially reached the crescendo. I don't know. Maybe, maybe not. But. Yeah, that's my little attempt at explaining why average is so desirous.
- [76:12]
Walker
It's also like this to go back to the kind of the communist playbook and that, like envy is used as a tool. It's used as a means by which to create the kind of social unrest that allows you to establish a totalitarian state. And it necessitates having an us versus them, a little guys versus the big guys, while actually obfuscating the fact that the quarrel is not between those two groups. Those two groups actually typically got along fine. The quarrel is actually between both of those groups and the parasitic class that pulls the levers.
- [76:50]
Alex Svetsky
Yes, yes.
- [76:50]
Walker
And that's like. And you see the same playbook used over and over again. You see politicians in the United States, which is not communist, thank God, doing this same thing where it's trying, you know, it's trying to pit the red versus the blue constantly, the Coca Cola, Pepsi Cola democracy always clashing with each other. You should hate that other guy. You should hate that other guy. But don't pay any attention to us. We're just your public servants. Don't mind us. We're just here to tell you who the bad guys are and take your frustration out on them. Blame them, blame the other. Don't look for the real other, which is not your neighbor, not your brother or sister. But it is the parasites and that's what they ultimately try to hide. That those bloodsuckers don't want you to realize that they're draining both of you, like they're draining both of you dry. And I think that's the real, that is the honest evil. There is that obfuscation of the truth, which is that it is the many versus the few. But I don't mean that as the few that are the actually strong. I mean the few that are the parasites, they are weak, but they have found themselves and sucked blood all the way up to positions of power. And now they wield that power in a very destructive way that ultimately only enriches themselves and the ultra few. And I think that there is a growing acknowledgment of that. And I would say this on both sides of the political spectrum, more so probably on the new right. But I think people are becoming increasingly disillusioned. That's at least my feeling. They're starting to realize. And part of this is the fact that the nobody trusts the main, or I'm not even going to say mainstream the legacy media anymore. So they don't have their one to many pipe to control the message. People just don't trust politicians as much as they used to trust in institutions of all types is down because they realize, people realize something is fundamentally broken. And no matter what you say on the podium, nothing materially changes, nothing gets better. So maybe you've been lying to me. This is what I my sense. Like do you see this as well? Do you see more people that have the ability to wake up, waking up now versus obviously the ones which will. They're too far gone. Like we've already forgotten about them. But for those that can wake up, do you see more of them waking up now?
- [79:20]
Alex Svetsky
I mean, yeah, I guess the momentum is in our favor now fundamentally. And, and when I say our favor, I mean it's definitely in the, in the favor of like.
- [79:35]
Walker
It, it's in.
- [79:36]
Alex Svetsky
The favor of the right. And I mean that in every sense of the word. Right. It's, it's funny, I, I remember some essays or sorry, it's not some essays, some publications that came out from whoever it was, you know, Daily Wire or not Daily Wire, but some retard publication, you know, online news news outlet or whatever, saying like, you know, working out is for right wing extremists. And I remember the Funny thing, though. The funny thing though, it's actually. They're actually right. And so there's like, there's. There's two funny parts about it is like, okay, it's funny because, okay, yeah, you know, right wing extremists, but it's actually true. Like working out, for example, is right wing. It is, it is not fucking left wing. It's, you know, the left wing conception of like, you know, equality and we're all equal and, you know, everything is relative and all that sort of stuff doesn't, doesn't gel well with sun steel and steak of like, you know, carving yourself and, you know, excelling and separating yourself from the average like this. This. It is actually the funniest part about it is that they try and they tried to turn it into like a derogatory thing, but they were actually fucking spot on. And it was a compliment. Which is sometimes, you know how I feel about when people call me a fascist? I'm like, well, okay, I don't mind because it's like I'm writing an essay now called anarcho fascism. And I kind of make out this idea that, you know, the only true anarchists are actually fascists. And there's a, there's a whole. Man, there's a whole rabbit hole there. I'll have to. Once I finish writing it and getting, getting it done, it's. It's gonna trigger a bunch of people.
- [81:21]
Walker
But I look forward to the triggering.
- [81:23]
Alex Svetsky
Yeah, it's. It's. Look, it's partly tongue in cheek, but it's partly actually accurate because there's. You described it very well. You said there's the, there's the, the parasites, then sort of there's the right and then there's the, there's the left, you know, and I would say that, you know, most of the right is just like, you know, really centrist. You know, they're just like normal fucking people. Like, there's, you know, there's a, there's a more real right wing. And the right wing is always, always, always smaller because the, the real right wing is always more extreme in their behavior and their beliefs. And I would consider myself one of those because I am an extreme kind of personality. I'm extreme in the way I eat. I'm extreme in the way I train. I'm extreme in the way I focus on my relationship. I'm extreme in my beliefs and opinions and all this sort of stuff which, you know, extreme in excellence, like trying to be in a 1%, trying to be elite is once Again, counter to, you know, the more egalitarian centrist even, and particularly counter to the leftist ideology of we're all the same and everything is equal. Right. So, and that's not a bad thing. Like the, it would if there's not enough room for everybody to be on the right. You know, the, the fact that the Overton Window has shifted so far to the right now makes, you know, a lot of things, or, sorry, the fact that the Overton Window was so far left made everything on this side start to feel more right. But you know, now that it's going to shift a little bit more extreme, we're going to find that, you know, we're going to rebalance where centrism actually, actually is. And you know, we'll have a, of a, you know, we'll have our right wing, we'll have all that sort of stuff. Where was I going with this? I feel like I was going to go somewhere with it.
- [83:18]
Walker
Not enough room for folks, for everyone on the right. Excellence, extremism. Extremism and excellence being hand in hand.
- [83:28]
Alex Svetsky
Yep, they, they certainly are. Like, you have to be an absolute extremist to win a gold medal, for example.
- [83:35]
Walker
Yes.
- [83:35]
Alex Svetsky
Which is, which is fine. That, that is, that is a, that is a very right wing thing to do. Can't remember what my point was, but I guess ultimately, yeah, I don't remember what the. We were talking about a couple steps back, but I feel like I was going somewhere. Maybe it'll come back.
- [83:56]
Walker
We'll, we'll find our way back to it. Okay, so, you know, one, perhaps this will spark it a little bit. But the last time we talked was a last time we talked on the show. I mean, great conversation. And one of the things that you had thrown out there was this idea that communism is the opposite of beauty, which I think is fantastic in terms of a way of framing that. And I think you're working on another book in addition to the essay. You're working on another book right now as well that does have something, it has to do with beauty additionally. Right. Because. So I feel like this is something we need to, to unpack a little bit because I think when people hear, hear the word beauty, they may think of it in a very limited sense. You know, they may think of it in a very like conventional, like, like marketing type sense versus like the actual truth of the word. So can we explore that a little bit? And like. And you are working on another, another book right now, right?
- [84:55]
Alex Svetsky
Yeah, so, so let me, let me break that down a little Bit, actually, I'm gonna. I'm gonna find the chapter here. So, yes, the. There's gonna be a part two to the Bushido bitcoin called the Metaphysics of War and Beauty. And that was a complete accident because the. The book was getting too long and I had like a couple chapters here. So one called the Eternal Battle, the other one called Freedom and War. The other one called warriorhood in the 22nd century territorial imperative, A new heroic Age. There was a chapter on Hierarchy, Feudalism, and then one called Beauty Will Save the World, which was one of my favorite fucking chapters that I wrote. And I couldn't for the life of me figure out where to insert them in the book. And on top of that, they were adding another fucking hundred pages to the book. And I was like, Jesus Christ, I'm worried at 500 pages. Like, I need to chop this damn thing down. So, yeah, I ended up pulling out a bunch from the book and I thought, fuck, what am I going to do with it? And then I kind of looked at all of the chapters and I thought, you know what? This is sort of like a discussion on, like, you know, the themes here are like war and struggle and beauty. And, you know, when I talk about war, I, you know, I talk about it in the. The practical, physical all the way through to like the metaphysical sense. Like the whole. The whole way through. You know, if I. If I kind of read a section here, I want to. I want to. Okay, let me read this out to you. It says, freedom and responsibility are in a never ending dance. And life is only possible in the tension between such opposites. Conflict and war make us fertile. In the same way nature's struggle of life, death and rebirth makes the soil fertile. This is the eternal battle. It is a cosmic war raging across the entire universe. It has and always will endure. And despite the fact that we cannot change it, we each play a part in the grand game. It's in our DNA. Nature literally seeks to prosecute life through us. Consider the battle for biological human life. There are hundreds of millions of sperm fighting for the chance just to reach the female egg, only to be faced with the enormous task of fertilizing it successfully, following which the DNA of your mother and father have to match, fuse and unite to miraculously become you, the living, breathing, thinking being that is sitting here reading this now. This competition was won for the territory of existence in which there was one winner and many losers over many iterations. You are literally the product of a successful territorial conquest. The sperm who claimed the egg and thus change the destiny of both progenitors. Like, so, like, I get into this whole. Thank you. I get into this whole, like, deep dive on like, what is the essence of war and struggle and battle? Like, it's literally in us. It is a part of like, who and what we are. And like trying to ignore it and imagine that we can have fucking peace. Internal, you know, it doesn't work. Like, we need to have a healthier relationship with, with conflict, with struggle, with war, with battle, with all of this sort of stuff. So that's, that's, you know, part of what the, what the new book is going to focus on. And then there's this like, section about beauty. And I, you know, there's like sort of four or five pages in there which talk about like, how beauty, beauty is this sort of like, transcendent quality. And I want to, want to find a nice little passage from that to kind of to break this down. So let's, let's start with the, with the quote that I open up the chapter with. It says, if you crush a cockroach, you're a hero. If you crush a butterfly, you're a villain. Morals have aesthetic standards, and that is attributed to Nietzsche, but I'm not sure if he ever said that or not. I haven't been able to find the sighting of that work, but it sounds like a very Nietzschean things to Nietzschean thing to say. So I then follow this with. Of Nietzsche's many profound aphorisms, this is one of my favorite because it cuts right to a deep visceral truth that few want to admit intellectually despite agreeing with intuitively. So the beauty of his statement, pun intended, is that the rationalist will argue with it. The equalitarian and democrat will be offended. The moralist will tell you it's unethical. The theologian will say it's wrong. The hippie will tell you it's cruel. The materialist or the atheist will disagree on subjective grounds. In fact, all of your modern, sensible, civilized conditioning will try to tell you it's unfair. But when push comes to shove, you will step on the cockroach and praise the person who does. While you are very unlikely to do the same to a butterfly, and if you did see someone crush a butterfly, you would be immediately, intuitively enraged by it. You might not say anything, but you will feel the anger. And that is precisely why it matters. Visceral reactions like this reveal the deepest truths. They go beyond the intellect and our rational psyche. They are physio psychologically true and reside deep in our subconscious. These are instincts developed over thousands of years of human experience. The lessons learned and the heuristics developed across generations become the intuition we store in our blood, our bones, and our bodies, none of which can lie. Beauty transcends dimension. It is found in the material and the metaphysical, the poor and the rich, the small and the large, the young and the old, the perfect and the imperfect. Beauty is simultaneously objective and subjective. So that's kind of like the. The opening section to that.
- [90:29]
Walker
I dig that too, man. I'm. I'm stoked for. For this to come out. I mean, so. Because I think that's. That's such a great example to start with there. That idea. Like, we all. Again, the rationalist will say, like, well, no, they're both. They're both insects, so really, you know, they should be true. But. But, like, if you are being honest with yourself and how you feel, like, yeah, if I saw somebody out there crush a butterfly, I'd be like, you sick son of a. What is wrong with you? Like, what the. What the. Is wrong with you? Why would you do that to a beautiful creature of the sky? Then you see somebody do that to a cockroach, and you're like, thank God you got that disgusting thing out of here. Like, phew. Good on you, man. I'll buy you a beer. Like, really appreciate it, you know, like, we all know this, and yet, like, maybe that's kind of like. Do you think that that's what we've. Have we in some way taken that example and blown it out to the whole culture as it relates to human beings? Is that kind of what you see as having happened?
- [91:30]
Alex Svetsky
100%, man. You know, you got these, like, dumb fucking kids out there throwing paint and shit like that on, you know, on these beautiful sculptures and statues and stuff like that, you know, and people, like, trying to pull down statues of the people who came and, like, built civilization, everything like that, and then they're, like, making artwork of, like, fat blobs and, you know, whatever that other stupidity they're making these days, it's like. It's. It's completely like. It's a revolt against the beautiful. And it's. It's disgusting. It's like. It's. It's. It's elevating the ugly and de. Elevating or denigrating the beauty and the beautiful. And that. That is. That also comes from. What was the word we spoke about earlier? Envy. It comes from the same place. And this is why. This is why. Coming back to our last Conversation. The opposite of communism is not capitalism, it is beauty. Because communism seeks to denigrate all that is beautiful, all that is pure, all that is holy, all that is great, all that is excellent. It wants to bring it all down. And like, you know, when you look at, when you look at a mountain, right, like the mountain is this, you know, jagged structure that is like unequal and, you know, fierce and sharp and you know, it's, it's not welcoming. You know, the. Even the word excellent comes from the proto Indo European of egg and celer, which means to climb a mountain. Like the genesis of the word excellent is to do with a mountain, which is an unforgiving and unwelcoming place. But that's what's beautiful. Whereas, you know, the communists would prefer everything just to be fucking flat forever because it's equal.
- [93:27]
Walker
And you see this. If anyone who has traveled and who has spent time in, in formerly communist countries, you see it in the architecture. It is scarred across every city in Eastern Europe. Every city in every large city in Eastern Europe still looks exactly the same with brutalist, utilitarian, disgustingly awful to the eye. Architecture that was put up by the communists and under the guise of, you know, progress and utilitarianism. Yes, of course, of course, but it's like, it's awful to look at. And then you see that interspersed with beautiful old, old architecture that, you know, with, with stonework and just in like something, a building that makes you feel something that you can just, that you stop outside of and you just look up for a second. You just, you just marvel at it. Like, can you believe some humans built this? Like, isn't that, isn't that.
- [94:27]
Alex Svetsky
And they did it over generations as well. The guy who started it didn't live to see the end of it. See, see, do you know what that right there is Right wing as like, you see what I mean? Like, this is what I mean. Like, imagine those cultures, like the most right wing of modern cultures. You take us back. Like, if I went back 500 years, I would be considered a total fucking leftoid. Like, this is what I mean. And they were the ones who built the cathedrals and shit, not us. Yeah, so, so it makes you, makes you actually think, like, you know, the more we've drifted, the more ugly shit we've created. But you know, it's, it's obviously not entirely like as cut and dry as that. But anyway, sure, I, I find that stuff interesting sometimes.
- [95:11]
Walker
No, I, I do too. And like, you see, especially like to, to speak of Eastern Europe, as well. Like, just because I've got, you know, Carla's a Romanian, she was born there. Parents, father was a defector from communism. You know, like they, they know it very well. Like they know it firsthand. They, they talk about what that experience was like. And like, there's a reason that I won't say everyone who experienced communism goes far, far more, right? Because there are still a lot of people who were very comfortable in communism and they, and they actually liked, just like they, and this is not me saying this, this is from talking to people who grew up in post communist countries. A lot of them I have talked to more than I can possibly imagine. They liked it because they didn't have to think too much.
- [96:02]
Alex Svetsky
Yeah, they didn't have to try too hard.
- [96:04]
Walker
It was just, you know what, Wasn't it just easier when the party decided? And yeah, maybe not everything was great, but, but it made sense. And then there's the people like Carla's father who rejected that and said, no, I'm getting out of here, even if it cost me my life. And those people are the ones that go on to build things. Those people are the ones who were trapped by that parasitic system of communism and needed to get out.
- [96:31]
Alex Svetsky
They were the extremists. They were the 1%, they were the true excellent who didn't want to be the average 100 man. Like, I, I mean, my parents came from, same sort of thing, Eastern European block, all this kind of. And I go back and I speak with, with like. So my mum was one of the ones that got out because she had this kind of drive, whereas her family stayed there and her family are the ones who reminisce about the good old days when, you know, it was under communism and all this sort of stuff. And like, I, I remember having this conversation with them like, because I, I hadn't been back to Macedonia for like 30 years practically. And just hearing this and, and this was like a couple years back when I was, you know, like ultra like, you know, libertarian and like this. And I was like, ah, my ears hurt. Like, what am I listening to? What's wrong with you people? But, you know, it, it dawned on me that they were, you know, happy being average. And, and that's why, like, I mean, that perfectly ties in. What we said earlier is that, you know, that the true right wing is like, it's, it's a much smaller percentage and you know that that smaller percentage of people have always been. That's the remnant for you. That is the, the tip of the spear. Right. Like. And. And you do. You do need the rest of the spear. Right? But you need, like, a small, sharp elite at the tip. And the. The biggest problem I have with, you know, egalitarianism and democracy and all this sort of stuff is it. It pretends like the tip of the spear doesn't need to exist, so you just have a stick. And it's like, well, fuck, I need a spear. Like, I need to stab someone. Like, we're going to war. We can't do it with sticks. And. And it's like, no, no, it's all good. The. It. Yeah, it's been a painful, painful couple of years, man.
- [98:30]
Walker
Well, you know, that's the thing. I do feel that there's a. A tide shift happening. I feel that, like, people are not as. Let's say, not as afraid. Like. Okay, let me say it this way, you know, that there's a shift when a guy like Mark Zuckerberg is suddenly, like, trying to be, you know, based king. Yeah, right. Like, where he's no longer, like, you know, licking. Licking the balls of the surveillance state. He's. He's like, actually, that was pretty bad, and I didn't really agree with it. And now I'm cool, guys. Look at my hair. I wear gold chains on the outside of my shirt, man. I'm. I'm one. I'm like, how do you do kids? Yeah, but, like, like, that's a vibe shift right there, and that's just like, one little microcosm of the vibe shift. But I'm curious where you see us going from here, and how much does that. Like, does this framework, this Bushido, how much does that need to factor into where we go next? For bitcoiners, for everyone, but maybe specifically for bitcoiners, how do we need to set ourselves up for what is coming?
- [99:43]
Alex Svetsky
Yeah, really good question. I think the. The first part is, like, what. What happens next? So, I mean, you know, everyone's got a different opinion on Elon and Trump and all this sort of stuff, and I think I've been pretty vocal about my support of both of those guys. I. I think they're phenomenal. I think, you know, like, it's. It's very easy to be the. The man in the arena and point and say, oh, you know, why didn't you do this? Why don't you do that? And all this sort of. But I think to play at that level and to, you know, I think people forget that, you know, using Trump as an example, like, he was, you know, people say oh, you know, he's an actor and a politician. But no, no, he was actually a businessman first. Like that, that's, that's in his DNA first and foremost. He's a deal maker. The has aura, no matter what anyone says. Like, he has like, like undeniably, like, he's the only, like, silhouette I could show anyone in the world a silhouette of a guy and they'd be like, that's Trump. Like, that's insane. And you know, nobody's, nobody's perfect, nobody's going to make all the right decision, all that sort of stuff. But you know, in my opinion, where it matters, he has the leadership qualities and the presence and the aura to do things that very, very, very few people on the planet, in my opinion, could do, like, hands down. And, and you know, I, I have a lot of admiration for that. I think he represents the archetype of a leader more than just about any. I mean, you know, Bukele is up there and stuff like that as well. But still, still, like, as much as I love Bukele, like, in comparison to a Trump, like, Trump has a much greater aura. Like, you know, Bukele is still a kid in comparison to someone like Trump. And I think that comes with, you know, age, experience, personality and all that sort of stuff. So he's definitely an extremely, extremely, in my opinion, unique and timely character in, in the, in the. I think he's going to go down in history in, in a big way. And I mean, clearly something. God was looking out for him or whatever. But the dodged the bullet like that for me was like the last, like, stroll, quite literally. Yeah, it's like I, I think of it as we were. That was like a moment where maybe, maybe whoever was running the Large Hadron Collider in Zurich or whatever, like forgot to turn it off and we ended up in alternate dimension or some like that because, like, everything flipped at that moment. Like, that was when, you know, Musk got on board, like all this sort of stuff. Like, we fundamentally shifted the course of history with that. And I think it's. It would be naive to underestimate how significant that moment was, in my opinion. I think it was, it was, it was very significant. So that's my Trump fanboy moment over. But like, I think he's, I think he's an important figure and I think he has the deal making capacity and just the instinct to, to do things in the right way. And I mean, you know, we saw what he did with Ross and all that sort of stuff, which I think Was like, it. You know, he. He didn't even have to. He was. He promised to commute the sentence, and he just, like, straight up pardoned. Absolute legend, you know, like, he's an amazing moment. Totally. Like, you know, he just has that, again, that right instinct about what to do at, you know, at what time. So I also have that massive respect for Elon. I, you know, I got into a little bit of a Twitter beef with. I can't remember who it was, but someone was like, oh, you know, Elon bought Twitter for 42 billion. You know, if he'd bought bitcoin with the same amount of money, he'd have 84 billion. And I was like, are you fucking kidding me? Do you realize, like, you know, the point of having money is not just so you can have more money? Like, the point of it is. And this is kind of what we said earlier about, like, you know, you have capital and it's the means, you know. So, sure, you. You gave the example of, like, people wishing they were more with their families and doing all that sort of stuff, but there's also the. The people who want to make a dent in the universe and channeling that capital to make a bigger and bigger and bigger impact. Like, Steve Jobs was one of these characters. He exited Apple the first time when he got booted out with about $55 million. He put 50 million into Pixar because he fucking believed in the. The narrative power of what they were building. Like, that's fucking 95% of your wealth. And not like, you know, like, sure, if. If I had $1,000 and I put, you know, $900 of it, like, you know that the percentages are the same, but that's a thousand dollars. It's much easier to make back $1,000 than fucking $55 million, right? And. And Musk, in the same sense, came and took this tool, which had been abused and captured by the state and all this kind of stuff, and he fucking gave him a big finger. And literally, I don't think the outcome that happened with Trump and this whole sort of shift in the world would have happened had Elon not done that. And my whole point was, like, dude, that 42 billion was way better spent in terms of, like, for the benefit of civilization than any amount of fucking bitcoin that he could have purchased. I don't give a. Flying about, you know, pumping my bags here. Like there was something more important that needed to happen at this point. So I think if this sort of trajectory continues, like, it's. It's a stellar team. You know, you got Tulsi there, now you've got fucking rfk. You've got, like, such a good sort of lineup. You know, there's a couple of weird eggs and stuff like that. And sure, again, perfection is the enemy of progress. I think this is something that, you know, people forget when, you know, we. We sort of become like spectators and we're like, oh, you know, but this can be better. This can be better. It's like, okay, we'll go and do it. And if you're not going to do it, then, like. Like, it's important to be critical. So it's hard, obviously, to find that balance. But there's also, like, as I said, perfection is the enemy of progress at times. So I think with the Department of Governmental Efficiency and all this sort of stuff, America has a chance at having a true renaissance, like, in a way that I did not expect. When I first started writing the Bushido of Bitcoin, I was convinced that America was at the end of the empire stage. So 500 AD in the Rome equivalent, I am now of the opinion that America is at the end of the Republic stage and at the beginning of the Empire stage. So right at the midpoint, so more like 70 AD, right. Like, I think that's where America is, and I think there's a golden age that is right before us, which coincides perfectly with where Bitcoin is, with where, you know, the consciousness around everything is moving with, like, everything from eating healthy to seed oil free to home birthing to homeschooling and all this sort of stuff. There's this, like. There's this massive, like, renaissance of thought and thinking and lifestyle and action. Everything coming up with now the political will and proof that we can just do right. Like the first time Trump got in, like, and I have a lot of sympathy for this, you know, people like, oh, he didn't do this right into this, right? It's like, like, okay, wait a minute. You. You've got a guy who's come from a business paradigm, and in the business paradigm you do and actually happens, enters the political paradigm for the first time and is, like, stuck in a swamp and is, like, trying to do, but can't do anything. You know, the second round is going to be better. And so far, like, he's done more in, like, one month than he did in his entire four years before. Like, so. So that, yeah, is very encouraging. So I think the confluence of all of these things is very, very, very encouraging. And that leads me to the, the second part of your question, which is, okay, where do these virtues and everything fit in? I, I think this is. Obviously I'm biased because I wrote the book, but I think this is honestly the most important thing that those of us who have some capital should now be thinking about. It's like, okay, who do we become now? And how do we take positions of power and influence and be examples to the people around us, to the communities around us, and to the generations that come after us? Because this, this is something I realized and Mark Moss and I were having a chat just in private about this, which is a big part of what happened. And I actually blame libertarian, Libertarianism a bit for this. A big part of what happened over the last 20, 50 years, call it whatever, is that good, strong, virtuous men abdicated their responsibility and their duty to lead and to, to basically represent those around them. Like, we, we created, we left a vacuum because rightly so, like, you know, to some degree, we're like, okay, politics is all popularity contests, all this sort of stuff. And we took a step back, but the problem is, is that we left a fucking vacuum. And who filled it? It was the worst of the worst of the worst, and continually more of the worst came in and filled it. And what sort of dawned on me in writing this book and kind of being a little bit outside of the libertarian circles for a little bit, is that apathy or not participating is basically just letting evil win, or it's letting the opposition win. And battling entropy requires consistent input. Like, I talk about this in that eternal battle chapter of where I explain the sperm and the battle and all this sort of stuff. It's like entropy is always in action. Like there's no, there's no point of stasis, right? It's either you're growing or you're dying. Like, it's one of the two, right? And the, you know, the midpoint is like infinitesimally small. And if you're not sort of beating back entropy, entropy is beating you back. And that's, That's a difficult thing to come to terms with because, you know, you, you realize there is no rest, right, for, for the good or for the wicked. But it means that it's incumbent on those of us who, without, without sounding like I got my head too much up my ass. But, like, basically those of us who consider ourselves the good and the virtuous, right, those who want to build an ascendant civilization, those who want to prosper, who want to create, who want to produce, who want to build, who want to reach, who want to explore, to develop, like, all of that sort of stuff. We are the ones who need to rest the power because, you know, with power comes responsibility. And the good, the strong are those who can channel power towards ends that are meaningful and beneficial and that produce something, right? Those who are evil, those who choose to channel power to ends that are destructive and ugly and equalitarian and all this sort of stuff. So. So, like, we've. We've actually got to rest that from them. And I don't know, seeing what I've seen over the last six months is very encouraging, but. But it really is at the tip of the iceberg. Like, there's so much more that we need to do. Like, there's so much more cleaning and healing and unraveling and, you know, reconstruction and redevelopment and all this sort of stuff. Like, what we, what we could do as a human species is phenomenal. And we are still playing at like, 5% of the game. You know, we need to sort of up that and yeah, to sort of tie back to the book. Like, the capital and character thing is very important to me is in the next 10 years, we Bitcoiners are going to have a shitload of capital to work with. We. We've got to start developing this, the necessary character to, to work with that. Because, man, we're like, if we take on that duty, we're going to be the leaders of the world when we're in our late 40s, in our 50s, and in our 60s, like, we're going to be the adults in the room. And we, for the love of Christ, cannot be like the boomer generation that came before us and everything up, right? And I don't say that as, like every boomer everything up. But, yeah, you know, generationally, speaking, like, that was pretty fucked up generation. Like, we've got to, we've got to learn from that and we've got to sort that out so that we can be beacons for the ones that come after us. So, super meandering response there, but I.
- [113:38]
Walker
Love a good meandering response. No, I, I think, I think it's important because, like, this idea that we can't abdicate responsibility. Right? Because if you abdicate responsibility, you are just. You're leaving a hole, right? You're leaving a void, you're leaving a vacuum. You're leaving. And like, you know, nature abhors a vacuum. Yes. And so do, you know, parasites. And, and so much of this is, like, if I was talking of one of my, like, I think my favorite new sci fi offer, I had him on as one of the first episodes of the show. Yeah. You know Devin. Yeah, yeah.
- [114:14]
Alex Svetsky
Devin's a fucking legend. Yes.
- [114:15]
Walker
Devin Erickson is awesome. If you haven't. If anyone listening hasn't read his book Theft of Fire, I highly recommend it. But one of the things he said that just really stuck with me is like, if we don't take the culture back, and by taking the culture, you also take the politics back, because the politics is downstream of the culture. If we don't take that back, then our children are going to be raised in a society constructed by our enemies, constructed by people that hate who we are, that hate the success that we've had. So what? And if you abdicate responsibility, okay, not my problem. But it's your children's problem.
- [114:52]
Alex Svetsky
Yep.
- [114:53]
Walker
And it's their children's problem. And is that really the world that you want to leave? That'd be a very boomer thing to do, right? To say. And again, not all boomers. I know some amazing boomers that very much will shit on their own boomer generation, but a lot of the boomers, it was like an abdication of, like, well, things worked out great for us. So why don't you just, you know, pick yourself up by your bootstraps? You know, why don't you go get yourself a house for two raspberries, sonny boy? Like, you know, it's like, no, they. They've thrown this world into shit after milking it for all it was worth. Are we going to do the same or are we going to fight? Are we going to stand up to make sure that the world that we leave our kids and our grandkids is one that, yeah, that is better. And that is culturally what we want it to be like. That is a world that really incentivizes and celebrates achievement and excellence and beauty. That's the world I want to leave to my son. And I think, you know, if anyone's being honest, they. That's the world they'd like to leave, too. At least people that are listening to this show. I can't speak for, you know, everyone.
- [115:56]
Alex Svetsky
It. It's. It's truly that man. And I. I'm really glad you brought up what Devin said. So, like, I. I came across Devin's work very early because John Carter, who's the guy who helped edit my book, actually, he's. He did the first review for Devin, so he kind of kicked Devin off. And. And you know, that. That's when I discovered his book. And I, I still haven't read it yet. I was waiting for the audiobook because I have a rule. I, I read non fiction and I listen to fiction. Okay, so now the audiobook is almost ready, so I can't wait to listen to it. But yeah, Devin's work is fantastic. And he's just. His Twitter rants are like, so good. So good. He's just got a real way with words. He's like hyper sharp, hyper intelligent and. Yeah, man, like, this is, this is why I personally moved away from libertarianism. Because it is, it is a very defensive thing. It's more like, you know, don't, don't tread on me, but do whatever you want. It's like, well, no, because do whatever you want very quickly becomes trannies in school. Indoctrinating your kids and telling them to chop the dicks off. Like, that's, that's, that's not good. Like, culture needs to be actively, not just defended, but actively, like, instantiated. Like, it is, it is an active thing. And this is why, like, I think, you know, people sometimes get offended by, you know, some of the things I say, etc, but like, this is why I've kind of started to become, you know, more and more right wing, because the right wing is more action oriented. It is the recognition of, hey, there are things that are better and there are things that are worse. There are things that are beautiful and there are things that are ugly, There are things that are excellent, there are things that are average. And it's the recognition of those differences and then the selection of one or the other. And sure, it's, it's not nice and cozy and kumbaya and we're all in it together and all that sort of stuff. But I'm sorry, the, the price, the, the price of excellence is a whole bunch of discomfort. Like when you climb that mountain, it's not cozy, man. It's not like, you know, cushions and shit like that. Like, if you want cushions and all that kind of stuff, like, go build yourself a fucking padded cell and you'll be safe and you'll be comfortable and you don't have to do anything. And, you know, you can be like Wally, right? Like, like that's your two archetypes. You know, you can be like the statue of David and, you know, go and train your ass off in a gym and do all this sort of stuff and get the scars and go through all of that. Or you can be the Wall E character who has a chair. Netflix and Soylent coming through your veins. One's more comfortable. One is uncomfortable, one is excellent, one is equal and all the same. And, you know, coming back to where we started the entire conversation, trade offs. These are the trade offs. And the trade offs that I have personally selected are the ones that are a little bit more uncomfortable, but in my opinion, pay the dividends that are more important and more culturally and civilizationally beneficial in the long term.
- [119:23]
Walker
Amen, man. And I. I think that's a. That's a perfect note for us to wrap up on, because now I'm itching just to go hit my punching bag and do some squats. But, man, where. Where do you want to send people? It was great having you back on, dude. Where. Where should they go? Tell. Tell them everywhere that they should go to check out more of your stuff.
- [119:41]
Alex Svetsky
I recommend. I mean, most people here probably gonna know me from Twitter or Nostra or whatever, so just search for Svetsky. You'll find me. But. But I highly recommend people do one thing. Go to Bushido of Bitcoin.com and watch the trailer. I promise it'll blow your ass away.
- [120:01]
Walker
It's a banger of a trailer, man. It really is. It got me pumped up like goosebumps. And I was like, I want to. Where's my sword? I've got a lot of them lying around. So I was literally like, I need to go pick one up, swing it around a bit.
- [120:13]
Alex Svetsky
Do some Conan. Conan stuff.
- [120:15]
Walker
Exactly.
- [120:17]
Alex Svetsky
So, yeah, bushidobitcoin.com there's. There's a couple links there. There's a link to Amazon, which you can get it. It's the cheapest way to get it there. You can also buy it for bitcoin. It's more expensive because the only version I do for bitcoin is. Is a special color edition. So it is not printed on Amazon. It's not available anywhere else. It's something that I need to custom print and send out. So that's available. I mean, you can obviously pirate the book as well if you want. By all means. I'm sure it's available on some sort of pirating sites. You can buy it digitally as well. For bitcoin, if you want, just reach out to me and I'll send it to you and you can just send me some SATs as a zap. But yeah, man, other than that, we should. We should definitely chat again in like a month or two when Atlantis is ready, because we've got to talk noster. But this is clearly not enough time. In a single interview, we'll get this.
- [121:18]
Walker
Scheduled get the next one scheduled right when we finish this because we definitely have more to dig into there. But I enjoyed this as always, man. Great catching up with you. And yeah, it's always inspiring and motivating to know that there are other people out there who give a shit. I hope that's what anyone out there took away from this is like other people give a shit. It's okay to give a shit and you can go do something with that give a shit energy and make make things a little bit better.
- [121:46]
Alex Svetsky
Beautifully put, Honestly, beautifully put.
- [121:49]
Walker
Thank you, man. I hope we get to see each other in the flesh soon too.
- [121:53]
Alex Svetsky
I hope so, man.
- [121:54]
Walker
All right, dude. And that's a wrap on this Bitcoin Talk episode of the Bitcoin Bitcoin Podcast. If you are a Bitcoin only company interested in sponsoring the Bitcoin podcast, head to bitcoin podcast.net Sponsor or send an email to hello@bitcoin podcast.net if you are enjoying the Bitcoin Podcast and find it valuable, give it a boost on Fountain a five star review wherever you're listening. Or better yet, share this show with your network so more people can learn about Bitcoin. Bitcoin or don't. Bitcoin doesn't care, but I sure do appreciate it. You can grab links in the show Notes to watch or list this show wherever you get your podcasts. Or go to bitcoin podcast.net podcast and you'll also find the links to Follow me and the show on Noster and on X. Bitcoin is scarce. There will only ever be 21 million, but Bitcoin podcasts are abundant. So thank you for spending your scarce time to listen to these Bitcoin podcast. Until next time, stay free.