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Douglas Murray LIVE: Sydney Matinee · Uncomfortable Conversations with Josh Szeps

• 0:00
  Get a humans welcome to safe space for dangerous ideas and before you put your phone back in your pocket after pressing play on this podcast
• 0:09
  I want you to open the YouTube page for a very good reason
• 0:12
  So go to open your browser and search for Josh Zepp's YouTube that's SZEPS YouTube
• 0:19
  Because this is the last piece of audio of the Douglas Murray tour that you're going to get
• 0:25
  But two of the shows were filmed and instead of inundating you with endless Douglas Murray content which could get a bit laborious
• 0:34
  Much as we loved Mr. Murray
• 0:37
  We thought we'd put two of the video professionally shot video versions of the live show on YouTube
• 0:44
  Which are completely different content from anything that you'll hear in the podcast feed
• 0:47
  Whether or not you're interested in that you should be interested in the existence of oh look there's a cookabara
• 0:52
  Sorry, that's not I'm literally that's not part of my spiel
• 0:56
  I'm on holiday at the moment. I'm on the south coast of New South Wales and a big cookabara has just flown down right next to me
• 1:03
  And right outside the window is smashing a massive insect in his beak against the side of a pole and has just swallowed it
• 1:12
  So that's a little slice of real life coming to you from the south coast of New South Wales
• 1:18
  Nonetheless, the reason why you should be subscribed to the YouTube channel
• 1:21
  And your subscription is easy because you're probably logged into your Google or Gmail anyway in your browser
• 1:26
  So you that they own YouTube and therefore you just press subscribe
• 1:30
  It's a one click thing. It's you have to faff around with credit cards and whatnot
• 1:34
  The reason you want that is because increasingly we're going to be putting up video content
• 1:38
  That is and does not exist exclusively on the podcast and you know it includes extra stuff on YouTube
• 1:47
  It's just a way of diversifying this some people prefer to see our faces some people just like to listen to things on YouTube
• 1:53
  Just open it in a tab in their browser while they're at work when I was in New York recently
• 1:58
  I sat down with Thomas Chatterton Williams who's fascinating I sat down with Coleman Hughes and Jesse single
• 2:04
  Outside in a park and we shot the breeze for over an hour and it was fabulous
• 2:09
  That will be released as a podcast but why wouldn't you want to see it?
• 2:14
  Yeah, faces in the hubbub the reality the gritty city of New York
• 2:20
  So be part of the YouTube community as well as just listening to this now this episode of the Douglas Murray tour
• 2:27
  Is the only other so we've really we're releasing two of the of the live shows
• 2:32
  We already released the finale which was the Melbourne show which you can go back and listen to
• 2:37
  This is a different show from about four days prior
• 2:41
  I had a raging head cold and this was the matinee of the Sydney event where two shows in one day
• 2:49
  And this was the show that got protests
• 2:52
  The you know people's front of Judea for the liberation of some Samaria and the West Bank Palestinian
• 3:00
  NACBA collective communist pink queer gay pride Palestinian
• 3:06
  Jihadist group had other things on that were better things than us to protest on other days
• 3:14
  But the matinee on the Saturday they came out and they jingled and jangled their bells and whistles
• 3:22
  And they intimidated participants and attendees and I suppose they did the Lord's work
• 3:29
  And then in the evening show there was nary a whisper from them why because they had another
• 3:35
  There was apparently maybe an Israeli boat or there was maybe a boat that had been to Israel
• 3:40
  Or a boat that looked a bit Jewish or something was coming into a harbor in Sydney
• 3:44
  And they decided to go off and jingled jangle their tambourines and throw shit at the boat
• 3:50
  So luckily we were less important than the than the Jew boat that they had to go and protest
• 3:55
  So if you hear me talking about the fact that I sort of applaud the audience for having endured these ninkam poops
• 4:03
  That's what this is a reference to
• 4:05
  So apologies for the cold for my head cold and my not really sounding like I'm up to form on this
• 4:11
  But I hope you enjoyed this last piece of content from the Douglas Murray tour
• 4:15
  Be sure to subscribe to the YouTube page for all sorts of goodies and enjoy this the one and only Douglas Murray
• 4:46
  I was here with Cornell West two-hander and fortunately nothing's happened in the six years since
• 4:54
  Not much to talk about it all
• 4:56
  Thank you for coming
• 4:58
  So great to have you guys here especially since you had to brave some people outside who don't have anything
• 5:06
  It's interesting to say something that doesn't have something interesting to say
• 5:10
  Where do you agree with what I'm talking about?
• 5:16
  The main one being that you're a racist man
• 5:20
  And you're a hypocrite for one team from Jews to have a state
• 5:25
  And there's a lot to have a state
• 5:29
  Is that the last bit true?
• 5:32
  Are you sure that's the thinking?
• 5:35
  But two-shay
• 5:38
  My general rule is to take the most strong version of who I'm talking about in the club in the weakest one
• 5:45
  So let's just set aside the fact that there are probably some people who think of what I'm asking
• 5:49
  On October 7th was great
• 5:51
  It's not addressed to them, it's too easy to knock that down
• 5:55
  What about the question of whether I'm asking because there is nothing
• 6:00
  Well, let's start from the basic which is a gatherer that one of the chances for the river to see, isn't it?
• 6:11
  And that only means one thing
• 6:16
  Let's assume from moment they know which river and which sea
• 6:23
  Which I wouldn't bet
• 6:28
  There was a lady in New York I saw a video who was chanting in the middle of New York from the mountain to the sea
• 6:38
  Somebody said which mountain?
• 6:41
  Any guy on the outside of the mountain?
• 6:45
  Look for the river to the sea means only one thing which is no Israel
• 6:50
  And of course that's the dream of Hamas and the dream of the Palestinian Authority
• 6:56
  Their statement is that the state that they would get would have no Jews in it
• 7:02
  I would think that was a definitional racist
• 7:07
  Almost by definition it would be we have a state that will not allow a particular racial group to be in it
• 7:15
  But to steal the language of their predecessors would be a human right on state
• 7:23
  I feel you're somewhat dug in the question of our Palestinian state
• 7:27
  Because I mean I know who people who do believe that his retreat is
• 7:32
  They do believe in Zionism
• 7:34
  And they also believe that the current situation is untenable
• 7:38
  And that Israel is partly culpable for the situation
• 7:41
  I'm sorry it's violent so I was saying that therefore it would be easier for us to do something about it
• 7:45
  Well the first rule I don't think it is untenable
• 7:48
  And even if it were there are lots of things in the world that are untenable
• 7:52
  And I'm not being what a battery and I will come to a question
• 7:56
  For instance is it untenable that Turkey continues its occupation of Cyprus
• 8:03
  It is if you're a separate but nobody else seems to care for the last half a century
• 8:10
  An EU member state has been part occupied by a NATO member state
• 8:15
  Is it untenable?
• 8:17
  Yeah sure does anyone care almost locally
• 8:21
  And when you again I'm welcome I am coming for it
• 8:26
  But when somebody says they're concerned about Palestinian state reference is fine
• 8:33
  But where were you even for the hours or days after October 7th
• 8:41
  When Israel had done nothing to respond nothing
• 8:47
  I would listen and want to discuss with somebody who said
• 8:53
  Look on the time the condemned would happen on the 7th of October
• 8:58
  I called for the hostages to be returned day after day after day
• 9:04
  And after some months of that I not only won the hostages be returned
• 9:08
  But I also won the Palestinians have a state
• 9:12
  But a lot of the people who want that last thing escaped those first two things
• 9:18
  Which seems to me to be a couple of big things to scare
• 9:23
  There is a very straightforward way to end this war
• 9:27
  Which is how mass return postages
• 9:30
  If they returned then by the admission of the Israeli government
• 9:36
  There would be a ceasefire
• 9:38
  And an end to the war
• 9:41
  It should be that difficult to do that by the way
• 9:46
  And with that reasonable position
• 9:50
  You just articulate it was a tragedy
• 9:53
  How the states returned the hostages
• 9:55
  And let's talk about two states
• 9:57
  On October 8th, when that was the position that influenced the air
• 10:01
  Was the position of Saudi Arabia
• 10:03
  Was the position of a lot of countries that in the subsequent months have been alienated by Israel's actions
• 10:08
  It was, I mean I said at the beginning of a matter of who falls away when
• 10:15
  But it's always like that with any war involved in Israel
• 10:19
  And I'll come back to why just on the issue of statehood
• 10:23
  I think lots of people have the cause of statehood
• 10:26
  I think the Palestinians should and can make a reasonable demand for statehood
• 10:33
  A desire for statehood
• 10:35
  But that state cannot include either the eradication or the chucking out from the whole region
• 10:44
  Of all these regions, of all Jewish regions, of all Zionists
• 10:49
  And the problem as I see it is since some people do want to history still
• 10:56
  That there was a state offered to the Palestinians as the Jews in 47-48
• 11:02
  It was declined in favor of war
• 11:05
  And it's been declined ever since, including by Assad, I've had a candidate
• 11:11
  I believe that Hamas, certainly I know that Hamas doesn't want to choose states
• 11:16
  So we should, does the Palestinian authority well?
• 11:21
  My foodabass is currently into his, I think, 18th year of his first four-year term
• 11:27
  So he's a figure that he would gladly have put in would look at with some admiration
• 11:34
  And one reason why they don't go to elections in the West Bank in Kiss
• 11:39
  Because all the polls show that 75% to 80% of the Palestinians in the West Bank were vote for Hamas
• 11:46
  And you know, if any other country of the world had to justify its existence and permits existence
• 11:57
  By also committing in the short term, whatever on term looks like it
• 12:03
  No we know it, forgot the South American change of heart, the Palestinian leadership side
• 12:09
  But absentee there, the shill the short term
• 12:13
  The world is demanding that Israel gives land, sees land, gives up land
• 12:22
  To people who have not had a great recent track record of treating the land they've been given well
• 12:30
  I mean, I say this to some feeling because I've covered every conflict in Israel since 2006, Lebanon war
• 12:37
  And I remember very well the disengaging from Gaza
• 12:43
  When the policies were effectively given a state, when the Secretary of State companies and rice said there should be elections in Gaza
• 12:49
  After Israel was driven free to you from Gaza, pulled them out of their homes forcibly
• 12:56
  And Gaza was handed over to the Palestinians and then they had elections they voted in Hamas
• 13:02
  And to the great detriment of the Palestinian people
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  They just killed their political opponents in Fatah, three of my buildings, shot me in the back
• 13:11
  Directed their court system through the speed behind trucks
• 13:14
  And they ruled Gaza for 18 years, which is exactly the length of time between the child's birth and the end of their formal education
• 13:23
  I think what could have been done at that time
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  But then instead of, of course, what happened was that we're celebrating peace as we've got rockets
• 13:32
  And instead of all the billions of dollars that taxpayers in this country and across Europe and America and rest of the world gave to the Palestinians and Gaza
• 13:42
  Instead of that money going to build what I remember at the time was described as being Singapore on the Mediterranean
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  Hamas made the rather calculated decision to not build upwards but downwards
• 13:55
  And build a tunnel network and, you know, store rockets and fire rockets
• 14:03
  So, you know, anyone who doesn't realize, at least have anything with the follow
• 14:09
  I mean, if we in this city were constantly being interrupted by his sirens
• 14:19
  And any audience like this had to always be told where the bomb shelter was
• 14:26
  And had to have to go to the bomb shelter during any normal event
• 14:32
  We might get used to life like that and the Israelis have sort of got used to life like that since we were brought from Gaza
• 14:39
  And first of all, that wouldn't be tolerated by many countries
• 14:44
  If we were Britain, what we were in front was, if we were being shelved daily by France
• 14:50
  I mean, I think we'd have an attitude towards it
• 14:54
  And of course, and you would be, I mean, New Zealand's far further away from Australia
• 15:03
  And Gaza is to Israel, but if Australia was repeatedly being rocketed by New Zealand
• 15:11
  At the rest of the world said, well, you've just got to give for more land, give a more chance
• 15:17
  I would expect the average sensible Australia to trust is still the average Australia
• 15:24
  To not view that with that croninity
• 15:27
  And alone, by the way, if that whole thing changed as it did in one day in October last year
• 15:34
  One of the confusions that a lot of people have about some of the community's disabilities in the South, which were attacked, is that people often say
• 15:45
  I don't understand why people couldn't go to their safe rooms
• 15:50
  They know that about the safe rooms or once they're in the safe rooms, why were they massacred
• 15:55
  And lots of people just don't realise that every single house, it is often pretty poor communities
• 16:01
  Of very beautiful, pretty poor communities
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  Every single house had a safe room
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  And every single house had a safe room, which on the day, they shot where they couldn't lock
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  And people often said to me, well, I don't understand why they couldn't lock them
• 16:23
  Because nobody ever expected that they would have terrorists on the other side of the door
• 16:29
  They would use absolutely used to the whole family going into the safe room, shutting it and waiting for the bombardment to stop
• 16:38
  But they would not use to the idea that the terrorists would be right on the other side of the door
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  And nobody expected that
• 16:46
  And, you know, I've spoken to too many relatives and victims and others
• 16:51
  There was a man I spoke with in the community called Niraaz
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  It's very, very badly attacked on the day, about half of its residents were ever murdered
• 16:59
  In their houses all stolen and kidnapped in the Gaza
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  There was one grandfather I spoke with who showed me the ruins of his family's house
• 17:06
  And he had two teenage grandchildren who were alone at home on the 7th
• 17:12
  They called him, he told them, you know, just keep the door shut and hold the handle
• 17:21
  And, you know, they couldn't hold it for as long as they needed to
• 17:27
  Because on the other side, they were grown men from them as
• 17:30
  Who managed to open the door and stole his two grand sons and took them into Gaza
• 17:38
  And, you see everywhere in these safe rooms the ones where they were kidnapped or killed there
• 17:45
  The bullet holes from the outside, the door had door where they would shoot
• 17:50
  And, whoever was on the other side kind of hold the door would have the hand blown off
• 17:56
  I mean, it's tremendous, it's no picnic in Gaza
• 18:00
  The piece of the jigsaw that you're leaning out of the analogy about Sydney being
• 18:06
  You know, some subjected to shells from New Zealand
• 18:09
  But isn't it a bit more like if we built a big blockade and a wall around
• 18:15
  What have I got from that city just to the south?
• 18:18
  And, we're complicit in the administration of the people who lived there
• 18:22
  And then, based on shelliness, it's not like there's nothing that Israel is down there
• 18:27
  The past half century that would create a scenario which they now find themselves
• 18:32
  So, the question for people who want to defend Israel and the future and want it to thrive is
• 18:37
  What is the best way for it to proceed?
• 18:40
  Now, many people don't feel that there's been any in there
• 18:43
  Well, first of all, I mean, I think it's for any country
• 18:46
  I think all countries know best how to look after their own security
• 18:50
  And, I think people from outside should know
• 18:53
  Some countries always know how to defend their own security best
• 18:56
  First of all, it's the first government, it's the first rule of any government to look after their own security
• 19:01
  They sometimes get blinded by grief and retaliation after 9-11 America
• 19:06
  They can be sure
• 19:09
  But, I mean, who do you want to be a tighter American for a policy after 9-11 France?
• 19:14
  I think it's just here
• 19:16
  Is there anyone else who knew better how to protect the American people?
• 19:19
  It's just a statement of apps
• 19:21
  Okay, which ones?
• 19:24
  In the case of 9-11, any wives' rights?
• 19:26
  Tell me the friends you've listened to on the international stage
• 19:29
  Well, Chuck Truer
• 19:37
  I respect the senator representative from New York
• 19:41
  But I do not agree with him
• 19:44
  I think it was a maybe say that Chuck Schumer should say that they should be changed of government in Israel
• 19:50
  In the same way that I think that it would be extraordinary
• 19:55
  Chuck Schumer announced that they should be changed of government in Australia
• 20:00
  You know, you can sure, you can defice that no one knows better than you have to look after your own security
• 20:06
  And, sure, that might mean that you do some things that people will condemn
• 20:11
  I mean, a few years ago, I was clear of a room by talking about Northern Ireland
• 20:19
  In the middle of a second, it was flat
• 20:22
  But I'll give you an example, in the 1980s there was an IRA sell
• 20:26
  Advancing to a police station at a place called Luffa Hall
• 20:31
  And it was found out by intelligence in the UK
• 20:35
  And an SAS team shot and killed all eight members of the IRA sell
• 20:40
  As they were advancing to the police station, which she got at a bomb-prime in a truck
• 20:45
  And, you know, 12 years later, the families of the dead terrorists took the British government to court
• 20:52
  The European court that ruled that Britain had not respected the right to life of these people's relatives
• 20:59
  I mean, I do sort of think that if you're driving towards a police station with a bomb and a gun
• 21:08
  Maybe you don't respect a right to life in general or self
• 21:13
  And, but this was a foreign court telling the British how to prevent the British government deeply resented that judgement
• 21:19
  And still that was when other judgements have come a lot sooner
• 21:23
  Because it's sort of fine for a Scandinavian judge to say
• 21:28
  Or it would be better in this situation if you'd have asked them nicely to put out the bomb
• 21:37
  Step away from the government, take a gun-desk attitude towards a local police station
• 21:44
  But there wasn't the option at the time
• 21:47
  And the British government and the British forces were doing what they thought they needed to do to keep the British public safe
• 21:52
  I think it's the same in this way
• 21:54
  He said, at the very least, you know, one of the things about listening to allies in my view is
• 22:00
  You genuinely ought to work out whether they understand accurately the predicament you're in
• 22:08
  Like, do they actually understand the predicament that your country is in with a daily security for a political population?
• 22:16
  And if you answer it, yes, I mean, of course, you've got an idea, but we think, as I said, no
• 22:24
  You have to really understand from outside because inside a volunteering up of trust or land
• 22:36
  Is your population a life or death issue?
• 22:40
  People will be killed for making the wrong decision
• 22:46
  You know, let me give you a very quick example
• 22:48
  I was in Gaza in December and I was speaking to a colonel in the idea in the middle of the strip
• 22:56
  And I said to him, when were you last here?
• 23:02
  And he said to me, I was last here 18 years ago
• 23:08
  Terry and family friends from their houses
• 23:11
  And here I am back again
• 23:13
  Now, with Chuck Schumer or the Indian government or the Australian government or the British government
• 23:21
  Things they know better, the amount of trust or land or whatever else is really
• 23:29
  Should hand over or give or volunteer up
• 23:33
  They better be 100% certain and 100% right
• 23:41
  Because if you tell an ally or a friend to take that risk and you're wrong
• 23:49
  You might be able to shrug it off
• 23:51
  But the walks of television will be full again
• 23:55
  I expect not just empathy but a serious understanding of the fact that in the case of Israel
• 24:03
  Israel doesn't have the luxury of being Australia or being Britain
• 24:11
  It doesn't even have the luxury of being Russia
• 24:15
  I mean, we've just seen the falling atrocities, vices, claim responsibility for Moscow
• 24:23
  When you make it that, by the way, because one of the audience questions which we'll come to later
• 24:27
  And thank you for submitting so many great questions as well on their newsletter
• 24:31
  I'll just take a look in the weeks
• 24:33
  Was about the Moscow attack and your thoughts on that
• 24:35
  So why don't we just touch that now?
• 24:39
  Well, I see that the usual novels online seem to think that it was not racist
• 24:47
  That's quite a common among these sorts of attacks
• 24:51
  The same thing happened with Al Qaeda, certain types of persons in there
• 24:55
  I don't think that's Al Qaeda, I think that's CIA or Mossad or whatever
• 24:59
  And like, Al Qaeda, we go, it's us
• 25:03
  You're doing
• 25:05
  Give us that phrase
• 25:07
  Come on
• 25:09
  I mean, actually, as our theory, the number two of Al Qaeda actually released the tape in the mid-2000s
• 25:15
  I was saying, why does everyone keep on saying it's not us?
• 25:19
  And it's the same with ISIS
• 25:23
  I mean, I think it surprised a lot of people because it hasn't been serious during the time in Russia for a while
• 25:31
  But I mean, Chechnya and Stagostanis and others, it's pretty easy to get to Moscow and it seems to be weather
• 25:39
  Terrorists, this weekend, came from Stagostan, Chechnya
• 25:43
  Does it have any broader implications? Because I've been wanting an interest to me about the years that have been there
• 25:49
  After October 7th, you moved to Israel basically and you went there to cover up with you've pretty much been living in a hotel room in Israel ever since
• 25:57
  So you see it clearly see this battle as something bigger than merely the war that's going on
• 26:05
  Is there a metaphor in that?
• 26:07
  I mean, first of all, of course, Vladimir Putin has already claimed that he had had this egregious
• 26:11
  And you can do that if you have all the state media on side
• 26:17
  One of the very disturbing things about Russian public opinion is he said to which all the Russians
• 26:23
  Basically, you've had the thing that Putin has propaganda that channels say
• 26:27
  It might experience younger Russians or skeptical that have access to a wider range of information
• 26:35
  There's a whiteness we have in the free west but they still have, they have the savvy to find stuff out and telegram and so on
• 26:43
  But if Vladimir Putin decides to blame not Ukraine, a significant chunk of modern majority of Russian public will believe that this tank was carried out by Ukraine
• 26:55
  That's a very sad reality of the disinformation age
• 27:01
  But yes, I mean, I saw the videos from Moscow
• 27:07
  It's the operating method that I says use
• 27:11
  As for the broader picture, I mean, I would just say that yes, I do see it as big
• 27:19
  I do see what happened on the 7th and what has happened since was being something with far wider amplifications for the rest of the world
• 27:27
  And, you know, early on when I was there I was speaking with some of the survivors of the Novifest
• 27:36
  By the way, that's another one
• 27:39
  If you're a young person in the west, in Sydney or anywhere else, and care about human rights as you should, care about freedom as you should, care about justice as you should
• 27:56
  Doesn't it bother you for more than a day that your contemporaries in Israel, who were at a peace rave, were raped and massacred and shot and kidnapped for a party that you would have been at if you had been in Sydney?
• 28:14
  Do you not spend any time thinking about those people?
• 28:18
  Or have you so dehumanized them because they're Israelis, therefore different?
• 28:23
  But one of the reunions of the survivors, I remember there was a deeply traumatized young man who was showing me his footage of the day
• 28:35
  And he said to me at one point, he said, what would you do if this happened in your country?
• 28:43
  And I had a very mixed feeling about that because one of my thoughts which I didn't say to him was, it has happened in my country
• 28:54
  I mean, not to the same extent, but it happened in 2017 where she had been detonated as suicide versus an Ariana Grande concert of Manchester Arena who killed 22 young girls
• 29:10
  I mean, the British passed over that quite fast, the media decided to seize on a small group of people who signed the rather than hour, who racist, some don't look back in anger
• 29:23
  And suddenly, don't look back in anger was the feat of the bombing
• 29:29
  And as I said at the time of the BBC, which I think was the last time I was on
• 29:37
  The BBC and ABC, you'll find out some of the similarities
• 29:42
  Yeah, Josh, I wouldn't know
• 29:44
  They're gonna public broadcast the darkness
• 29:47
  But as I said on the BBC, I said, I don't understand why we shouldn't be angry
• 29:56
  But why shouldn't you look back in anger? Your daughter's been blown up for going to a concert
• 30:02
  She's been very angry
• 30:05
  But what's more, you should do something about it to make sure it never happens again
• 30:09
  But so yes, I've seen that it had happened in my country, it happened in the batter planet Paris
• 30:16
  Where the jihadists went through the disabled section and shot everyone to the back of their head in a wheelchair
• 30:25
  And by the way, one of the bizarre things that's happened in recent weeks was a concert at the batter planet
• 30:34
  The other week, which finished all the crowds shouting, free, free palestine
• 30:39
  It just shows that some people don't make what I think is an obvious connection
• 30:44
  Which is also, again, they should listen to the people who do these things
• 30:47
  The obvious connection is, as ISIS, is how kind of all these groups always say
• 30:53
  You know, Israel's the little satan in America's big satan in Australia
• 30:58
  British and a sort of medium sized satan
• 31:02
  But you know, if they can get some Australians in Bali or some Brits to the popcorn, so they'll do that
• 31:08
  If they get some Russian shoppers, they'll do that
• 31:12
  But as I see it, Israel's on the front line of that
• 31:16
  And there's this weird inter-imperial where a lot of people don't realise that
• 31:20
  Where they blame Israel for the thing that is happening to them as well, inter-missing to them
• 31:25
  But only inter-missing to them
• 31:27
  I would say, I mean, what is the population of Australia compared to Israel
• 31:32
  Three or four times a big or four times a big, let me write it
• 31:35
  So if you had a day where, as well as being shell of daily from New Zealand, as we were agreeing
• 31:42
  If you had a day where tourists there came and killed five thousand Australians
• 31:52
  And took one thousand Australians hostage
• 31:56
  And you knew that those Australians were being raped and tortured on a daily basis
• 32:02
  Would you not expect the world to be on your side when you asked them to be returned?
• 32:08
  Would you not expect...
• 32:15
  Would you not expect your government to tear up the earth to get your citizens back?
• 32:20
  And would you not be insulted and offended if nobody talked about your civilians?
• 32:26
  I mean, I've been in Israel as the various hostages have been released
• 32:35
  And there has been, for instance, there has been, understandably, a very focus on being women and the children
• 32:44
  Who have been out-hosted by him, as it is like you heard in Gaza
• 32:50
  But, and there are still children including the bebis, babies
• 32:55
  One of whom passes first birthday in captivity in January
• 33:02
  By the way, there's a lot of it, you'd expect a UNICEF
• 33:07
  You'd expect one job looking after children
• 33:13
  It's really children stolen from their homes, often with their parents murdered
• 33:18
  UNICEF is silent, not for weeks but for months
• 33:23
  I was actually at a meeting in Jerusalem with parents and all of the children hostages
• 33:29
  And the heads of UNICEF in December, no, no, no, no, no
• 33:37
  And it was an off-road meeting, but since it wasn't here, I could show it with you
• 33:47
  But I noticed it was heartbreak, absolutely heartbreak
• 33:50
  As you can imagine the parents, total desolation
• 33:55
  But the heartbreak hinting on top of it was some say, where have you been?
• 34:02
  And that very day, by the way, the head of UNICEF
• 34:06
  Had had a very small car crash in Cairo a few days before
• 34:11
  It would have been a small automobile accident, nothing to do with the war
• 34:14
  And I think just average traffic in Cairo
• 34:17
  And said she couldn't make it to Jerusalem for this meeting
• 34:21
  Since she sent her deputy, and I discovered during the meeting
• 34:24
  As I was sitting beside one of the parents and child hostages
• 34:27
  And the parents were saying to me, wait, what are you doing?
• 34:35
  You have one thing, tell them to give our children back
• 34:40
  But my point is again, it goes back to the thing, isolation
• 34:44
  The lack of health, the lack of attention
• 34:49
  But the reason I mention is because it's the weeks and months have gone
• 34:53
  Some of the hostages of people turn some of the women and some of the children
• 34:59
  But even as the official community and protesters around the world
• 35:04
  I walked past the protest in Sydney yesterday calling for a ceasefire
• 35:12
  I mean, I still don't quite understand why people scream advice to these radio government
• 35:20
  For Sydney
• 35:26
  But again, the better thing for them to do would be to at least have had one protest
• 35:32
  Calling for Hamas to release hostages, at least one
• 35:37
  But now in captivity and you see this when you attend
• 35:42
  Israel is one country where the posters of the kid do not get told down
• 35:47
  The one country, one of the relatives of the being best children I referred to earlier
• 35:53
  Told me that he had been on a trip to Dublin
• 35:55
  The families have been remarkable, remarkably strong
• 35:59
  And many of them would be going around the world trying to get into national attention
• 36:04
  And try to put their loved ones
• 36:06
  And this young man, his late twenties, said to me that he had been in Dublin to see the T-shirt
• 36:13
  Radke, who I'm very pleased to see as now resigned for central matters
• 36:19
  Not for being a moral ignorant, but not principally for that
• 36:27
  And they went to see him
• 36:30
  And this young is very massive, I saw the poster of my one-year-old cousin
• 36:36
  Ripped down on the streets of Dublin
• 36:41
  Now, at this stage, though, whenever you return to Israel, you see it there
• 36:46
  For the remaining hostages, images are still there
• 36:49
  And those are the months that have gone on, they're more and more
• 36:52
  It's been
• 36:55
  One of the things I still can't understand is, you know
• 37:00
  There is no crime in being a 21-year-old man
• 37:05
  It went from music festival
• 37:07
  There's no crime in there
• 37:09
  There's no crime in being a 74-year-old grandfather
• 37:13
  Stolen from your house, in your community
• 37:16
  There's no crime in there
• 37:19
  And I would think those people too are deserving of the world's empathy
• 37:25
  Their attention, their care, and an endless court for their police
• 37:31
  So let's talk about our culture, because that...
• 37:35
  That's the normative of calling for a ceasefire without calling for the return of the hostages
• 37:46
  Or partying at a better plan than saying a free Palestine
• 37:50
  Strikes me as evidence
• 37:52
  Well, the ungenerous interpretation is that they're all 80-semits
• 37:56
  The more complicated and explanation which I find no more reassuring
• 38:02
  Is that increasingly we're all trapped inside our own echo chambers
• 38:06
  We think that for the people who only see the plight of the tens of thousands of garrisons who have been killed
• 38:14
  On their spot for a day, that is the concern that is captivating their attention
• 38:20
  For, you know, the people who regard the history of the world
• 38:25
  And our power problems as being a phenomena of oppressors, oppressing oppressed people
• 38:33
  The oppressors normally being white people wearing suits, and they're oppressed
• 38:38
  Yes
• 38:40
  Let me track it off
• 38:43
  And they're oppressed being around skinned poor people
• 38:48
  Like, it is getting increasingly difficult to sort of understand the other side
• 38:54
  Appreciate the other side and have empathy for the point of view of the other side
• 38:59
  I don't know what you have thought about that here in Australia and in the UK
• 39:03
  I don't think everyone is in a silo
• 39:06
  I think a lot of people are obviously the devices we all have in our pockets
• 39:10
  Encourage a silo
• 39:12
  You get pushed things that all you agree with things you like
• 39:16
  But we're not condemned to be slaves of our devices
• 39:20
  And we don't have to be obviously working out how to deal with them
• 39:24
  But there's no reason you can't reach out to be all that
• 39:28
  I mean, there's no reason that a form of communication should be shouting rather than dialogue
• 39:34
  There's no reason why cold-hearted callousness should replace some attempt to empathize with people you think you disagree with
• 39:44
  I think it is and I think they're being afraid
• 39:47
  I think you're cold
• 39:49
  Well, I can be
• 39:51
  But you know, it's an allocation and concern question
• 39:58
  And I suppose it's also where the tabloos exist in a society
• 40:02
  It's sort of there is a strong pressure and to belong to a tribe
• 40:07
  I don't know if the tribe is screw that pressure
• 40:10
  I mean, seriously, if you're grown up, why don't you want belong to a tribe, wrong with you
• 40:18
  I'm more conservative than you are
• 40:28
  And if you said to me, well, don't play with me all the time
• 40:32
  If somebody said to me, I've been this for a generally conservative
• 40:36
  And this thing you've said, or I don't know if we can see you conservative anymore
• 40:43
  I think you might be out of the club
• 40:48
  I don't care
• 40:51
  It's not being invited to something you don't want to be part of
• 40:56
  It wouldn't bother me for a second
• 40:59
  For instance, I know an American media disagree with my stance on Ukraine
• 41:06
  Which is having been there and been embedded with Ukrainian army
• 41:10
  And so if you push it back, the Russian aggression is very much
• 41:14
  Should I want the Ukrainians to win?
• 41:17
  Like, I want this race to win
• 41:20
  And I don't want either of them to win a bit
• 41:24
  I want to win
• 41:26
  By the way, that's one of the strange things about the Israeli cases, everybody
• 41:30
  The government's like Australia
• 41:32
  One is in Europe, they get so much testosterone from their thrill about Ukraine
• 41:37
  And, you know, we're going to be with you till the end
• 41:41
  Although we have no arms to sell you
• 41:44
  We've got our poshmasters when I've got them
• 41:47
  They're not only poshmasters
• 41:49
  They all say what you're painting win
• 41:52
  They say that we want you to get a free quarters win
• 41:54
  They don't say what you'd have a draw
• 41:57
  No, all of them even just in Trudeau
• 42:00
  A former war I'm getting on the side of Ukrainians to the bitter end
• 42:05
  It's a very useful ally I just did
• 42:09
  I said to Josh before
• 42:13
  But a man who surveyed that he left his wife to spend more time with himself
• 42:20
  But, I mean, none of these people have any travel burnishing their military credentials
• 42:33
  When it comes to Ukraine, oh no
• 42:35
  They never say are you sure that your actions are proportionate
• 42:38
  We're very worried about the loss of life on the Russian side
• 42:41
  Actually, they should be concerned about the loss of life on the Russian side as well
• 42:44
  Because when it is a poor young combscript thrown into the army
• 42:48
  But my point is that I have to read us who disagree with me
• 42:55
  If I could read, America should have nothing to do with any foreign laws
• 42:58
  But my point is I don't care
• 43:00
  And this is not my point
• 43:02
  It's a descriptive point that I may need
• 43:06
  What I'm trying to say is why the obsession of the general left with membership of the club
• 43:13
  Well, why? That's my question I ask myself every day
• 43:16
  If you're here to answer it, you're the guest
• 43:18
  You're the victim of that
• 43:22
  I mean, you don't know
• 43:24
  I regard my whole podcast as being for the tribe of people who are triathletists and proudly sub
• 43:31
  Who will assess a situation under rhyme at the most rational conclusion
• 43:36
  Regardless of where that puts them on some checklist that they want to take
• 43:40
  It's pretty ridiculous
• 43:42
  Yes, thank you
• 43:45
  It's clearly ridiculous that you can tell me what you think about corporate tax rates
• 43:50
  And I can pretty much guess what you think about climate change
• 43:53
  Because, you know, you've gone down the box taking exercise
• 43:58
  You're in that tribe, you're going to go it off the shelf
• 44:01
  Yeah, exactly
• 44:02
  Instead of thinking things through independently
• 44:05
  But I see more of that tribalism
• 44:08
  I don't think it's a good thing
• 44:10
  But I wonder if you have a theory about why it is going to mean by what's about this argument theory
• 44:16
  Well, it is opposed to religious thinking
• 44:18
  I think that if you, just because society loses religious, it doesn't mean it loses the religious instinct
• 44:25
  I think it's not my opinion, it made this observation
• 44:28
  But clearly one of the things that's happening in R.A. which is a deep need for meaning and belonging
• 44:34
  It always exists in our species, the fact that goodness in some ways
• 44:39
  And it has been moved from religious affiliation to political tribal affiliation
• 44:47
  Even to the extent, I mean, to consider it this way
• 44:50
  I mean, like, no religious community likes it
• 44:53
  When they're dirty, then it is law to do public
• 44:57
  Why did the Catholic Church, to that extent, also the Anglican Church, for that system
• 45:03
  Why did they cover up the child sex abuse scandals?
• 45:07
  Because they didn't want people to know, they didn't want the flock to know
• 45:11
  And they didn't want the wider world to know
• 45:13
  That is a perfectly normal, reprehensible but normal way in which people behave
• 45:19
  When they're members of a religious community, they don't want outsiders to know
• 45:26
  Is it that different from the people who don't want the world to know about the rapes committed in their name?
• 45:32
  Of their side in the Middle East?
• 45:35
  I don't think so, I think it's something I just, I know about that
• 45:39
  I'd like to get past it and get onto everything else
• 45:44
  You know, I want to be able to continue to shout on the streets on the Saturday
• 45:49
  And of course it's about the deep need to belong
• 45:53
  And also to be recognized as a person of virtue by your peers
• 45:59
  I mean, that's the most obvious one
• 46:02
  It's a human instinct, or you'll never be eradicated from us
• 46:07
  But it could be directed in better ways
• 46:10
  I mean, the instinct to be thought of as a good person as a charitable person or somebody concerned about the world
• 46:17
  Do you have that instinct?
• 46:20
  Well, I don't, yes I do, but I don't think it's an instinct you need to broadcast
• 46:25
  I mean, it's like the thing with charity, I believe that you should do charity
• 46:31
  Rather than talk about it
• 46:34
  You know, I'm always amazed by it, it was a divorce some years ago
• 46:39
  Paul McCartney, wasn't it, Heather?
• 46:42
  And she demanded a divorce settlement among other things
• 46:45
  X million pounds a year to give to charity
• 46:50
  It's fantastic, you awful
• 46:53
  I would like this matter of my year to make you look good
• 46:57
  At the point it would be whatever money you had, you'd give a portion of it quietly
• 47:02
  You'd have to prepare to do good deeds
• 47:04
  That was how I was brought up to believe for good deeds
• 47:07
  And then they would just go around and say, I'm a good deeds person
• 47:12
  You do it, you enact it in your life
• 47:15
  But the desire to broadcast yourself doing it
• 47:18
  Well, that leads to terrible error
• 47:22
  Very often to do something really wicked
• 47:24
  You have to do it in the name of doing good
• 47:27
  And I think there's a lot of what we see in our time
• 47:31
  You see us in the media again, you know this very well
• 47:35
  In the last 20 years, we had enough during the course of my own career
• 47:40
  The media has gone south
• 47:43
  And that includes salaries of the media, as you know
• 47:48
  And for a while I thought, what is going to be the repercussion of this
• 47:54
  And one repercussion I can see it has been happening for a long time
• 47:57
  Which is, as it's a less prestige profession
• 48:02
  And as the salaries have been going down, you would be leaving
• 48:06
  People in the media want to be paid in another currency
• 48:11
  What is the other currency, admiration, respect
• 48:17
  Democracy dies in darkness, I am the light
• 48:25
  You know, you're also a human being is going to make mistakes
• 48:30
  And this, I mean, I've never known the profession but perhaps itself on the back more
• 48:35
  The endless endless war ceremonies
• 48:39
  You never see fire, but endlessly give me to the courage of war
• 48:46
  Well, actors
• 48:48
  Oh, actors of course
• 48:50
  I mean, where would we be morally without the guns of Hollywood?
• 48:55
  Very big question
• 48:58
  I mean, before you think, yes, I always think what would Ryan Gosling do
• 49:05
  It's interesting that you talk about this sort of public desire
• 49:09
  It's a signal one's virtue because in addition to that positive aspiration
• 49:14
  I'm not saying positive in a moral sense but just that aspirational component of a group thing
• 49:22
  You now also have an increasingly tight set of taboos if you don't telegraph your virtue in that way
• 49:29
  So, on race, on sex, on sexuality, on gender, on any of the sort of hot-pumped issues
• 49:35
  where one has to tread on HL's and worry about the trip, why hasn't one of my trigger
• 49:40
  It strikes me that they're increasingly severe penalties for not joining a club
• 49:47
  Yes, so I think that might be ending, or at least it's on the way out
• 49:52
  My observation is all the smarter young people coming up now have seen their way through the bullshit
• 49:58
  I really do think, I don't know how advanced is in Australia where everywhere else is pretty much
• 50:03
  There are some malcontents in their late 20s and 30s
• 50:11
  Not all at some, it makes sense that the cleverer young people coming up know this stupid game of the year
• 50:19
  I mean, five or so years ago when my book The Baddest Prouds came out
• 50:24
  I said to my publisher, you know, I've trodden on one big taboos, and I write about it
• 50:30
  They're very, very important but then there's still a difficult conversation about immigration
• 50:35
  And I said to my publisher, I want to do everything else next
• 50:40
  They look to be with a slight fear of their eyes
• 50:44
  I said, well, I just like to get every other taboo and jump all over it, I think that's okay
• 50:49
  Anyway, one of my favorite things on that book came out was I gave a...
• 50:54
  I was asked to go to speed locks and there was a very smart graduate student interviewing me
• 51:02
  This sort of format, wonderful packed theatre of students, 18 to 21, or whatever, sitting on the steps
• 51:09
  And having a really sort of wonderful electrics of atmosphere
• 51:15
  And my interviewer said, he said, so Douglas, I'd like to just start by reading out the contents page of your new book
• 51:24
  And silence, and he said, gay, women, race, trans
• 51:35
  And he looked at me, and I looked at the audience, and we were burst out laughing
• 51:40
  Because you could feel these were all the things that we've wanted to talk about
• 51:46
  Do talk about, can't talk about publicly, but are thinking about, and this is like
• 51:53
  All the important things can't be a mind field
• 51:57
  I gave the analogy of that book, the friend of mine from the British military, when I was describing what I was trying to do with that book
• 52:04
  I had said to me, there's a mind clearing device we used to use that doesn't exactly that
• 52:10
  I described to you this extraordinary thing that they use, apparently Americans use it as well, but a rather better one, unsurprisingly
• 52:17
  And it's a sort of rocket with a long tail and fire it over a mind field, lands on the other side, it uses long tail
• 52:25
  And then the whole thing detonates, and what it means is you get a truck across the mind field
• 52:31
  So the device makes it possible to cross
• 52:35
  That's what I'm trying to do, and I think it just is easier
• 52:40
  I think that there have been a lot of people, far from me, just me
• 52:45
  I mean, for instance in the UK, it was extremely lucky, not just lucky, we've got terrific women
• 52:55
  And it has to be said, largely off the left, who have stood up for their rights and remained kind and decent
• 53:04
  And who have been treated in the most indecent ways
• 53:08
  Was it any day of other French literature?
• 53:11
  Yes, I mean, I just, I mean, when J.K. Rowling became an architect
• 53:19
  She changed something very big, because I mean of course people have tried to demonize her
• 53:27
  But I mean, it's hard to take out the love of Harry Potter from the culture
• 53:33
  And for most reasonable people, what Rowling said was complete the other reasonable
• 53:42
  There was a bigger tree, it's a defense of women's rights
• 53:48
  And of course they tried everything on her
• 53:53
  And I've often said that I was struck on that by a detail, it was a detail that's important, which is
• 54:00
  My friends, I thought that I had a choice of others who were on this in the UK
• 54:08
  The left wingers campaign for women's rights, I would say, they say things very similar to some points I have made
• 54:15
  But it's them that get the real abuse
• 54:20
  And I've always found that something very telling about that
• 54:23
  The belief that you can or leave women
• 54:27
  And that you should and that you can beat them
• 54:32
  It's a very striking misogyny, among people who seem to pretend they care about misogyny
• 54:40
  The misogyny that these women get
• 54:44
  The harm they put people bashing on the windows in pubs but they're speaking
• 54:49
  It's very striking to me, and that is also, and that's a small difference
• 54:53
  They assume that you're going to be conservative because you're conservative
• 54:57
  But they assume that people are not allowed to know that
• 55:00
  That's just boundary between you, isn't it?
• 55:03
  I mean, you are expert for you should be why
• 55:07
  Yes, it's possible they've given me up for not a salvation, whatever it is they offer
• 55:14
  You're lost already, and I was way lost
• 55:18
  But why are you a mind sweeper?
• 55:21
  Well, I just think it's important to do, so I don't like lies
• 55:26
  I think lies are the culture and the lethal
• 55:31
  And I mean, okay, get away with the thing with white lies
• 55:35
  Things have never been better
• 55:38
  That's got a big one
• 55:41
  No, if you get away with your white lie, but big lies about facts
• 55:49
  I know where that goes
• 55:53
  First of all, I think the job of a writer and journalist should be to not do lies among other things
• 55:59
  One of my favourite lines is a line from Boweray Shorwood
• 56:02
  Who wrote his great poem in September 1st, 1939
• 56:06
  Wrote the great line, all I have is a voice to undo the folded lie
• 56:12
  I love that line
• 56:14
  And so I think that is sort of one thing writers should do
• 56:20
  But the other thing is just I know what, as historians, as student of history, I know what the consequence of lies is
• 56:29
  Like I know the consequence of being told as a society to pretend the things are not as they are
• 56:36
  And we know that from the history of all totalitarianism
• 56:41
  I've been to plenty of benited countries and ones of them being misguided by the horrible regimes
• 56:50
  One of the things they always have in common is that the public are made to agree to things they know are true
• 56:59
  And I talk to everyone sort of friend who grew up in the Soviet Union
• 57:05
  He said, of course, society was filled with us having to agree to things we knew not to be true
• 57:11
  But the point was partly exactly that
• 57:15
  Because if you agree to something that's not true, you'll be made to agree to another thing that's not true
• 57:21
  Now what's the purpose of that?
• 57:23
  Actually, the great writer of Harvard came to, yes, the last lot of Harvard there from the distant north
• 57:30
  But that's that power book, apart from being a great writer and paperite and statesman
• 57:36
  And first leader of his country after the fall of communism
• 57:39
  He said, this is a great, great essay power and the power of us in the 1970s
• 57:45
  He said, he said, take the example of the shopkeeper who, the grocer in Prague
• 57:53
  Who has in their window a sign that says, think tree to the workers or the regime will always provide
• 58:05
  Whatever, some but now slogan of the party headquarters
• 58:12
  And Harvard says, why is the sign there?
• 58:17
  The sign is there because the shopkeeper has sent the sign every year to put it in his window
• 58:22
  But Harvard goes underneath that, he says, but does party headquarters think that the shop owner is going to believe what the sign says because it's there
• 58:33
  And he'll have a day to think about some interesting argument
• 58:37
  And with that note, Harvard makes observation the point of the sign is to demoralize the shopkeeper
• 58:45
  It is to remind him every day of how insignificant he is and how his vision of the world doesn't matter
• 58:56
  The sign is there to tell you as a daily reminder you have agreed to live in a world of lies and you are part of it
• 59:07
  Therefore, you are no one
• 59:11
  The subjugation of the lie causes the person and indeed in the end the population to be demoralized
• 59:20
  And I believe that's one of the things inadvertently that's going on at the moment
• 59:24
  If you agree to the insane anti-biological claims that many people are being told to agree to at the moment
• 59:35
  It doesn't matter to many people on a daily basis, it matters in the long run
• 59:42
  Because if you've been told to tell that lie today, you will be told to tell another one tomorrow and it will be really easy to get
• 59:50
  I do feel the problem is even worse in the sense that I'm always pleased to be outdone in that
• 1:00:05
  In the sense that if it was just a matter of being encouraged to lie, that would be easier to identify
• 1:00:13
  Part of what I think is happening is that there's a university educated, most of the white group of people who have a set of ideas that they regard as being on the right side of history
• 1:00:27
  And they're not lies necessarily, your sign reminded me of the sign I saw just the other day I was at Nairport
• 1:00:34
  Has anyone seen and write on this board that looks like this?
• 1:00:38
  JQ950 Sydney, JQ9122, NARM, QF2346, Government Bill Barra, VA771, Mianjan
• 1:00:51
  Fortunately, all international travellers know that NARM means Melbourne, Mianjan is Brisbane
• 1:00:58
  Garandilla is Darwin and Garand Bill Barra is townspeople
• 1:01:03
  So this is definitely about the user experience and not about virtue signaling between mostly white corporate executives
• 1:01:10
  We're at the lack of both of us being good here today
• 1:01:15
  I thought it was supposed to be a high bat tonight, I mean
• 1:01:19
  And then the board changed back to the real city names, you know, after about 20 seconds
• 1:01:26
  It's not a lie, it's not a lie, then another word from Melbourne is not
• 1:01:33
  It's not useful to put it on a departure board and Nairport
• 1:01:39
  So another game has been played there, one second
• 1:01:43
  That's quite a familiar one, this was done about 25 years ago with Welsh language
• 1:01:48
  Which is like all, you know, little, no, or risk of dying language is important to keep alive
• 1:01:58
  But introduced government to that process of wow, I do get a field of misery
• 1:02:06
  The British government decided to save it for Welsh language
• 1:02:09
  And I'm out of things to put up all place names in Wales in Welsh
• 1:02:15
  Forgetting that almost nobody spoke Welsh in Wales
• 1:02:19
  And I mean, nobody found their way anywhere for a couple of years
• 1:02:25
  They were all in NARM
• 1:02:29
  They were in the next flight to NARM
• 1:02:33
  There was actually a fantastic one, it was one incredibly long walk to the Welsh language
• 1:02:41
  One reason why it was dying out was because it was quite efficient in its use of letters
• 1:02:49
  There was a long, long thing with an arrow pointing that way
• 1:02:53
  That was a place name for this place
• 1:02:55
  And it had been up for about a year until an actual Welsh speaker spotted it
• 1:03:00
  And pointed out that the theme said, put the name of the place here
• 1:03:12
  For a year everyone had just been out of here
• 1:03:17
  I mean, it's obviously what are the other things that the example that you give is
• 1:03:22
  It's obviously a sort of attempt to rectify something or make up for something
• 1:03:27
  That is a question whether it's the best way to do so
• 1:03:31
  But the reason also can't hand it, isn't it?
• 1:03:35
  I mean, obviously what they're trying to do is to make up for the past, the Aboriginal also
• 1:03:45
  You know, there's something to be said for a couple
• 1:03:49
  But over doing it is something that always happens
• 1:03:53
  It's always fantastically inept, cact-handed
• 1:03:57
  And I said in my piece the Australian before the recent referendum here
• 1:04:04
  But, you know, do you have to ask ourselves a country, any country has to ask itself
• 1:04:13
  About its view of itself
• 1:04:16
  And their country's view of itself can often change over time
• 1:04:21
  And it can change the better and it can also change the worse
• 1:04:25
  Sometimes that the change can include something good
• 1:04:29
  You can acknowledge things that happened in the past
• 1:04:31
  But you don't need to be endlessly beleaguered, beaten down and give it to you
• 1:04:37
  I mean, I see this all the time in America, where I live much at the time
• 1:04:43
  In New York, the council chamber in New York voted to remove the statue of Thomas Jefferson
• 1:04:52
  That's been there since 1830s
• 1:04:55
  And they created, they reached Thomas Jefferson down, they created him up and wheeled him out the back in a box
• 1:05:03
  And he hasn't been seen since he entered some kind of witness protection program
• 1:05:09
  But the...
• 1:05:12
  One of the council members who voted for the removal of Thomas Jefferson's statue said
• 1:05:19
  Well, Thomas Jefferson doesn't represent our values
• 1:05:27
  It's other than your post, there's an interesting question that raises to this is
• 1:05:32
  Then who does?
• 1:05:34
  And they thought that if the council would be questioned, would it be not us, she would have said
• 1:05:39
  Or me, obviously
• 1:05:41
  I mean, not if it is a sort of grab for that, but why could you not take the view?
• 1:05:47
  Yes, Thomas Jefferson had said every single school child in America knows that
• 1:05:52
  It would be nice if they knew something else about him, like he found it out, Republic
• 1:05:58
  Well, if he hadn't...
• 1:06:00
  No, no, no, no, if they know he own slaves and they know he found it
• 1:06:04
  But they're the one thing they know, with absolutely certain use of slavery
• 1:06:08
  If you ask that America is a school child, how would history have been different if Thomas Jefferson had not been there at the founding
• 1:06:18
  You will not get an explanation of Thomas Jefferson's understanding of the importance of religious liberty
• 1:06:25
  You will not get an understanding of big extraordinary foresight he had on a range of things including
• 1:06:33
  The first amendment for the right to freedom of speech
• 1:06:36
  You know, you are actually use it
• 1:06:39
  Tools that Thomas Jefferson gave you the right to have to indict Thomas Jefferson
• 1:06:46
  And they don't know it, because they think like fishing water
• 1:06:50
  It's always like this
• 1:06:52
  It isn't, you're only here because of him
• 1:06:55
  You're only here because of George Washington
• 1:06:57
  And it's same in Australia, it's same in Britain
• 1:07:00
  There has become this fetish of all of our countries for attacking our most sacred places of our greatest heroes
• 1:07:07
  In American terms, that comes across in things like the endless war of Christopher Columbus
• 1:07:14
  The general view in America setting schools in the university seems to be these days that it would be better if Christopher Columbus had never set out
• 1:07:23
  Or it would be better if Christopher Columbus had set out, came back home and said to a king of Spain nothing to see there
• 1:07:31
  In Britain we have the assault endlessly on Winston Churchill
• 1:07:37
  They say things like Winston Churchill held Victorian attitudes
• 1:07:42
  On race some other things, I was saying well of course he held Victorian attitudes
• 1:07:46
  He was born in Victorian England
• 1:07:49
  It would be very curious if he had 20-20 attitudes
• 1:07:53
  In fact he wouldn't have made it very far in politics at his time if he'd spent his career trying to advocate for trans rights and gay marriage
• 1:08:02
  He might have been able to go around to leading the country and destroy not-sisms
• 1:08:10
  And I think it's sort of the same with this country
• 1:08:16
  Obviously everybody here knows his country better than me
• 1:08:20
  But in my observation this country has undergone a very interesting, I think so
• 1:08:25
  I deserve in change in recent decades of the turning from the sort of happy country into the healthy country
• 1:08:32
  It seems to me to be a shame
• 1:08:43
  I think everyone has grown up and adult enough to be able to accept that
• 1:08:48
  But all of our societies, like all societies, have made mistakes, sometimes terrible mistakes
• 1:08:55
  But we also have the ability to rectify our mistakes and to make up for them and hopefully make things better going forward
• 1:09:02
  But it's like Elon Musk said the other day that they introduced Donald Leman
• 1:09:06
  He said you know when Donald Leman was just endlessly talking about slavery
• 1:09:11
  Elon Musk said well nothing's gonna get better and we just keep talking about slavery
• 1:09:15
  You can't solve it, you can't historically stop the transatlantic slave trade
• 1:09:23
  What you can do is use whatever energy you have to address such problems
• 1:09:29
  To friends who've stopped them today
• 1:09:32
  And somehow I wonder if my last book in the war in the West is an unbelievable paper
• 1:09:37
  Perhaps to many people there are more slaves in the world today
• 1:09:40
  But there were a time when the transatlantic slave trade
• 1:09:43
  So if I, I mean we're all anti-slavery now, it's so darn easy
• 1:09:49
  I don't know that everyone here thinks that they wouldn't be willing to force, wouldn't be
• 1:09:55
  But we could have at least used the good energy that you referred to earlier too
• 1:10:01
  For instance instead of accusing living people of being responsible for things they never did
• 1:10:08
  Or the things that people who looked like for did
• 1:10:12
  To make it like a slave in Africa and the Middle East and the Far East
• 1:10:16
  I mean everyone's got these darn devices in their pockets or trainers and things made by sweatshops
• 1:10:23
  I mean might have had success and look at us and say what were they thinking
• 1:10:29
  They all sort of used clothes a few times and threw them away knowing
• 1:10:35
  That many of them were made by children in the Far East
• 1:10:39
  But what were they thinking?
• 1:10:41
  One of the reasons why I was arguing that we should be understanding of the past
• 1:10:48
  That's not to say we shouldn't have judgements about the past, but how understanding about it
• 1:10:53
  Is because it's a request to our own successors to be kind to us
• 1:10:58
  Because we're bound to be doing things that they will look back on with an aspect
• 1:11:04
  Indeed, when you say we don't know whether or not people who now say that slavery was bad
• 1:11:12
  Would have been saying that several hundred years ago
• 1:11:16
  I would say I don't know further and say we do know that they wouldn't have been saying that
• 1:11:20
  Because what I always say to such people is you show me the issue which is completely outside the mainstream right now
• 1:11:28
  That you are banging on about selling like a lunatic because of your moral courage
• 1:11:32
  And then maybe I'll believe you would have been anti slavery
• 1:11:36
  But if all of your views just happen to align with what the elite consensus is about social justice right now
• 1:11:42
  You're a conformist
• 1:11:44
  Procession
• 1:11:46
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