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E2: Emerging American Countercultures · The Junto Podcast

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Hello, and welcome to the Juneto podcast, where we promote the practical applications
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of critical thought and bold creativity.
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Music.
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Hello, America. I'm your host, Edgar Mills, and welcome to Episode 2,
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Emerging American Countercultures.
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So this is a topic that I enjoy.
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It's near and dear to me, and I think it's very interesting.
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The reemergence of countercultures in America.
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They've been around always on the fringes, but we're seeing a reemergence,
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and we're seeing them because of the Internet, we're seeing them more clearly,
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and with a little more understanding and acceptance even.
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The internet is magical in that all the information is out there and if you know how to,
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analyze it you can find you can find
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it and people who have diverse
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interests go and look for diverse things this
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this counterculture isn't one unified
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thing this is a very splintered it's
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not even a group it's just several groups with several
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overlapping goals really and not
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only counterculture but that's that's how movements are made right there political
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movements or artistic movements and whatnot you don't have to believe 100% of
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what someone else believes to have supporting or overlapping goals.
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But one thing's for sure is that many, many people are beginning to reject the
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mainstream norms that exist today.
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They're always being twisted, the norms. They're always being shaped by the,
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Whoever's in charge or I don't want to put rich against poor,
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but usually people attribute that the people with money try to shape what the
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norms are that people without money have to conform to.
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But the first group I want to talk about, because I know a lot of these folks,
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is the self-sustainment or the off-grid movement.
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People who are out there seeking to separate from the grid, the mainstream,
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to live self-sustainably, to grow their own food, to educate their children
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on their own, to build their own structures, and things like that.
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Some people in mainstream, I imagine, think that that's crazy.
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I don't know that it's loony.
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And now I'm only 52. In the 70s, though, people looked at survivalists like
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they were legit whack jobs.
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And this isn't survivalism or survivalists or necessarily militiamen out trying
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to create little bands of warriors in the woods.
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These are educated humans with a desire to live purely and not have their children
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or their spouses or their family tainted by mainstream consumerism.
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I pause to say capitalism because I am an unrepentant capitalist.
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But what's that word I'm looking for?
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Materialism, consumerism and materialism, and government-mandated education.
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And now I'm just a small tirade here, but ever since the existence of the Department
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of Education in America,
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our measurable education statistics have tanked as compared to other civilized
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first world countries. Why is that?
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I say because of centralized control, top-down mandates.
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And I think centralization in general is bad for most things.
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I think that lends itself to not being nuanced to solve the little problems.
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For instance, out of 360 million or 370 million people in America,
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one answer does not fit everyone.
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That's just the way it is. I don't care if it's education or monetary policy
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or land policy or anything else.
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So anyway, these off-grid folks, these self-sustaining people, what drives them?
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What motivates them? Well, environmentalists.
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Now, I'm not an activist, but I consider myself an environmentalist.
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We all think it's probably very important to keep the earth clean and to not
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molest the earth needlessly.
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Economic stability. If you simplify life to where you live on your own piece
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of land, you farm and grow and kill your own food,
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how simple is economics there?
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You educate your own children, and then you trade with your neighbors for clothes
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and items of comfort and That is very simplistic, therefore adding to economic simplicity.
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Because right now in the world today, in America today, economic instability is insane.
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Fortunately, Bitcoin exists, and we'll talk about that in a little bit.
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Some people just want autonomy, outright autonomy from the current systems.
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No one, I don't think anyone likes to be told what to do.
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The current system does just that via policy, tells us how we can live,
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how we can eat, sometimes what we can and can't listen to or read and all those things.
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So detaching from that seems kind of like a romantic idea, but is it that bad? Really?
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Now, some implied things are you are required to have a little skill.
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Farming isn't easy as far as labor goes and even intelligence goes.
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Some people can't grow a cactus in the desert or a palm tree in the tropics.
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So individuals and communities also who are going with this off-grid sort of way,
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maybe they're looking to use more renewable energy sources or just to exercise
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their traditional skills or to grow their own food that is not tainted by, I don't know.
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The big evil is Monsanto, I guess, and the FDA has all these backdoor deals
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with all these folks to allow whatever things do and don't go into food.
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Our food has certainly been tainted. I think that's one of the platforms that Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
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Is pushing, is to clean up the food.
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Now, politics aside, who could be against that? Do you know? I'm not sure.
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People who argue that just to be contrarian to political opponents and aren't
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looking at the bigger picture, I think that's a shame.
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But the lifestyle of self-sustainment, they kind of emphasize anti-consumption, right?
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Minimalism, sustaining and using less of the earth, of the world.
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And they're trying to localize their economic system and simplify it.
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And there is nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with that.
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I think, I think the environmentalists probably embrace this way more,
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even the lefties embrace this way more.
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But oddly enough, so do the extreme far right, the diehard hunters,
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guys who are out there and walking the mountains in Montana and getting,
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not trophy hunting, but hunting for food.
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I think those guys are some of the most diehard environmentalists.
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And the left-wingers refuse to see that,
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just as the right-wingers refuse to see the left-wing environmentalists as being
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rational, because sometimes they're not very.
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But at any rate, to try to minimize your own ecological footprint is just good stewardship.
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Just try to consume less as an individual without going around telling everyone
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else what they can and can't consume.
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So, yeah, that's a form of protest and consumerism and industrial excess and carbon pollution.
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If you're so lucky, you might get to hear Leonardo DiCaprio or Taylor Swift
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tell us about how important it is to minimize our carbon footprint as they're
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flying around in their private jets.
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I love – there's an app that I'm sure you guys have seen that tracks Taylor
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Swift's private flights leaving out of Kansas, going across Kansas and back and just –.
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And countless trips every year flying around in her private jet.
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It would take the average human, I don't know, a hundred years of driving a
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car every day to match her yearly footprint.
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Insane. Hypocrite at its finest. So the self-sustainment crew,
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a lot of the people I know who are into that, they're libertarians.
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And every year, there's a festival called the great create.
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And it's essentially a do-it-yourself convention.
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Yes, there's politics involved, but people who grow mushrooms and brew their own beer.
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And my friend Jake, I don't know if he still does it, but he had a thing called
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Vanarchy where they set up expedition vans, which was cool as hell.
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All sorts of things like that. Anyway, yeah, there's a political component,
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but it doesn't have to be a political component.
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Now, as we get into the political component, we're talking about,
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generally speaking, the minarchist libertarians, right? The minimalists.
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I consider myself an anarcho-capitalist, if you want to really,
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really get down to it. But the minarchists.
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They kind of run parallel to the off-grid movement and their thought process.
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But their thing is minimal state interference, minimal state coercion,
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minimal governmental rules and restrictions and policies that affect the individual.
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They believe that the government has a very,
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very restricted role in a society, and that is to provide security,
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to make sure contract disputes do not go to violence.
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As stated in the U.S. Constitution, to protect individual rights.
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The government does not grant rights. It exists to protect inherent rights and
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to maybe maintain infrastructure.
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Now, sure, I think government roads are awesome.
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But as you all should know, government roads are just contracted roads.
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There ain't many governments. Now, my dad, no, okay, I'm going to back up.
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My dad worked for the City of Atlanta Streets and Highways Division for 35 years,
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and he has either graded, destroyed, or repaved every road in the City of Atlanta.
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And that's a city function. But if you only knew,
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if you only had an inkling of the information that I heard from my dad over
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35 years about the waste and the inefficiency that went on in that agency, oh, my God,
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everybody would be suing the city of Atlanta. Yeah.
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So the government itself has minimal role in our lives or it should.
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And for those of you out there who don't believe that, is it possible that you're
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maybe scared of too much freedom? I don't know, man.
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But the government doesn't need to be doing the things, all the things that it's doing.
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Now, given my background, my work history, I believe in decentralized movement,
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decentralized efforts.
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I believe small groups of people, small groups of communities can make decisions.
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Better things happen for that community and each individually, right?
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Are we going to build a grandiose thing? No.
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Are we going to build a super freeway, 20 lanes wide going across Americas?
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No, that's not community oriented.
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That's a big nation state thing to do.
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Small-time communities do not need that. And if they want that,
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then guess what? They can coordinate with the next community over.
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Hey, would you guys like to build a really awesome road between our communities?
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And then they negotiate and figure out the pros and cons and either do or do not.
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So decentralized is the way to
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go. But in a decentralized economy or decentralized government or society,
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you could implement a free market system that would truly and really be a free market system.
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Now, some of you out there are going to carry on about what about monopolies, and I understand that.
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But I side with Ayn Rand that monopolies cannot thrive under a true free market
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system. What makes monopolies possible is cronyism.
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You can call it crony capitalism if you want, or you can call it late stage capitalism if you want.
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But cronyism exists, and it can only exist if there is a capitalist out there
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who has a government man making policy in his pocket.
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That's cronyism. That is not the free market. That is not capitalism. That is pure cronyism.
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So the free market minus the politician willing to write policy for money will thrive. It will thrive.
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So with a minimal government, then the free market would be what it could be imagined to be.
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And even then, in its current state, it's still better than the vast majority of systems out there.
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I didn't know until probably about 2010.
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I didn't know about Ron Paul much. I wasn't very political up until about then.
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And a friend of mine introduced me to Ron Paul.
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That guy, we missed an opportunity. I'm pretty sure he ran for president probably...
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Was it 08? I don't remember.
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We missed it. We missed an opportunity. He's, I'm not saying he's out of the game.
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He still has a podcast and he's, he's still out there doing lectures and all those things.
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But I hate, I don't think he has any interest even in being president,
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even if it were a guaranteed shot. I don't know, but he's brilliant.
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He's consistent and he has the American the individual American in his heart,
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at the best interest of the individual American.
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Now, Ron Paul famously, someone asked, hey, if you abolish the IRS,
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what do you replace it with?
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And he said, well, what do you replace cancer with once you get it out of someone? Nothing.
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Right. He's so anti-government that he believes that, and I believe that we
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should get rid of the IRS.
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The vast majority of those agencies just suck money and just violate rights.
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The metric between good and bad on these guys, the bad far, far outweighs the good.
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So, minarchist libertarian movement, minimal state coercion,
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minimal state interference, minimal state policy, individual communities decentralized
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taking steps to make their lives better and yes by virtue of making their own
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lives better they make people around them their lives better so,
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think about that in the current
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in the current bitcoin was
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not in my lexicon in 2000 i don't know eight or ten or so i heard an article
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npr radio article on bitcoin way back and i thought oh nerds that sounds like
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some nerd stuff neat you can buy pizza with with digital currency awesome.
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I'm sure me like you probably oh man if i knew then what i know now well i'm
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a bitcoin holder Of course I am, and I buy a little bit all the time.
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Now, never mind what people, if you think it's a non-traceable and non-this and non-that.
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Depends on the source of where you keep your Bitcoin and how you buy your Bitcoin.
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Ultimately, it could be. But the point of Bitcoin is that it's not manipulatable.
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It's finite. It's finite.
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The Bitcoin that gets mined, there's a finite amount that gets mined.
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And I want to say every four years, they half that amount.
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And I want to go further and say probably somewhere around the year 2074 or
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so or 2078, I can't remember, Bitcoin will stop being mined altogether.
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At that time, Bitcoin will be so frigging valuable.
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It's unreal.
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Folks, for those of you out there,
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the Luddites who reject artificial intelligence and reject the modernization
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of everything, you can reject it all you like, but it's the way. It's what's happening.
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We're not going to go back in time, no matter how much some of us want to,
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to include the off-gridders.
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They, sure, they will live that way, but there's a computer in their life.
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There's a phone in their life.
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To function in a modern society, it's the way it is. You almost have to have it.
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You would be far behind the power curve. And that's quite all right if you want
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to live that way, if you don't have other humans depending on you to stay behind that power curve.
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But mark my words, Bitcoin will be a very valuable currency. It's already valuable.
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I want to say it's already over definitely $107,000, maybe $109,000.
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I was buying Bitcoin when it was at $30,000. And I thought, man, I missed the boat.
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So anyway, Bitcoin, decentralized currency that is not, you cannot counterfeit
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it. You can't duplicate it.
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And the more and more organizations or businesses or even individuals that start to trade in Bitcoin.
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You will see that that that is
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that's gonna that's gonna emerge more
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now when you have the companies now i'm
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not an economist folks and i'm not really even a conspiracy theorist
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too much but when you got companies like blackrock out there buying up the bitcoin
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they're buying it up what are they going to do with it they're trying to figure
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out how to manipulate it i'm sure And I think probably that if they think they own all of it,
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then they will be able to either just leave it or or manipulate it somehow.
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And that probably is true to some degree.
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But there's already so much out there now that there's no way they can own all the Bitcoin.
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Anyway, that's for another discussion. I'm sidetracking here and I'm sorry about that.
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Countercultures in America, folks. Self-sustainment, off-grid movement. Thank you.
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Good people, mostly. Minarchist libertarian movement. Awesome people, mostly.
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Next, I want to talk about music. Countercultures in music.
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There's a phrase that I'd only heard once or twice. My son turned me on to it.
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It was called the alternative.
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The alternative, right? The country alternative music. The new rebels of country music.
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Now, my son and I coined, I think we coined this phrase. We called it counter
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country before I knew the term, the alternative.
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Now I happen to be a huge fan of Charlie Crockett and, and Sierra Farrell and
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some of those types who play traditional music,
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but with non-traditional subject matter, or not only non-traditional subject
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matter, maybe it's a traditional song.
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Now, Charlie Crockett covers a lot
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of music from a lot of classic country artists, but it's not even that.
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What's the counterculture part of this?
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These days, it's how they're getting their music out there.
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It's how they're making the music. Well, obviously the good old-fashioned way,
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right? On a guitar, bass, and a drum kit.
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But in the modern age...
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Young people who can't move off to Nashville and grovel at the feet of the music
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executives, you have a computer right here.
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I'm a nobody, and I'm on a computer talking into a microphone right now,
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and this is going to get out to thousands of people.
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One day, hopefully, hundreds of thousands. But my point is this. I am now a talk radio guy.
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I didn't go through any studio. I didn't go through any network.
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I didn't go through anything.
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A friend of mine said, hey, we got to do a dang podcast. Get on it.
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So these musicians who, ultra talented, by the way, Charlie Crockett is to me
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one of the most talented guys out there.
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I don't necessarily mean the way he plays guitar either. I mean,
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just his showmanship, his style.
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At any rate, I digress.
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How they're getting the music out there.
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You can, they're skipping over the mainstream.
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They're skipping the traditional steps and they're going straight from basement
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studio to worldwide via YouTube or Rumble or Spotify or whatever.
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So when someone like that becomes popular, they've become popular via grassroots
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movement because these people are still out there playing small venues.
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They're still playing these little music festivals in rural America or some
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little suburban near Atlanta, right?
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And they're putting their music on all these social media platforms that the
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Luddites hate, but it's the way you do business now.
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I consider Instagram and these things, and I don't like Instagram very much,
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by the way, because they have shadow banned me. and I've had the same number
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of followers for like the past six months.
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And I'm sure each and every one of those followers are legit and not robots.
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But beyond that, my stuff don't get out there.
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At any rate, that's a different story. That's a different algorithm, right?
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What I'm saying now is that this counterculture movement of musicians and artists,
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not just musicians, all types of artists,
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they can get their stuff on social media and
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this is the modern equivalent of the
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mad men you guys saw the mad men series back in
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you know 10 15 years ago with the
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the the 1960s ads salesmen ad marketers the social media is the marketing platform
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now there's companies that have adapted to that and they're trying to help you
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get your algorithm tuned up and they're trying to put your website out on front
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and all this and that. But.
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Instead of going and putting yourself in the hands of a couple of well-dressed
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dudes and getting them to make the right catchphrase and give you the right
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look and put your music or your product in front of the right eyes,
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you're doing that yourself just by putting your stuff on the internet.
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And it's magical, folks. It's magical. And it's to be, I don't want to say taken
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advantage of, but yeah, to be taken advantage of.
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A small businessman, like myself, I have to take advantage of the opportunities that I have.
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I can try to make opportunities for sure, but social media is one of the ways,
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and it's the majority way that most people find me.
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Yes, word of mouth is awesome. And in a localized area, the word of mouth works just fine.
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But when you have somebody coming to your course from Oklahoma or West Virginia,
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coming to Georgia to take a course, well, they got that via social media and
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possibly even the word of mouth on social media, right?
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Or the reviews that people leave and things like that.
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So yes, it is to be taken advantage of. Do some people abuse it? Yes.
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Do some people sell out still to, you know, big money,
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corporate organizations and then pimp certain products and tell tall tales in
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order to get ad revenue and such?
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Yeah, of course they do. That's always going to happen, folks.
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The tool is the tool. The tool in itself is not evil.
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Just like the gun. There was a school shooting just the other day.
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And then all the anti-gunners come out about how many people,
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how kids die mostly by guns now.
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That's the highest number of deaths is by guns.
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Well, a gun is an efficient killing tool. The gun isn't, but when it says gun
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causes death, I beg to differ.
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Guns do not cause death. And by oversimplifying that, they're doing a very large
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disservice to the root causes of all these deaths, which has to do with what?
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Anger, mental instability, over-medication, confusion of any flavor, you name it.
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So the gun just happens to be the tool. The internet just happens to be the
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tool for these artists to get their word out there, to get their product,
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to get their art out there in front of people.
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So it's good. It's good. Don't hate the internet. Don't hate technology.
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And some of the people I've heard lately really talking about these things,
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sort of anti-technology, where do you think I heard it?
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Yeah, via podcast, via YouTube.
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They're using it because they're taking advantage of it. It's a tool to be taken advantage of.
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In the 1940s, what would I do? I'd go get a soapbox and stand in the middle
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of downtown Atlanta, hold a sign up, says Osprey Shooting Solutions,
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come get your train in with me, hand out business cards.
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I mean, I guess. But these days, I got the internet.
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And so do you. Let's talk about some of the other artists.
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I've gotten a couple of blogs that I posted on the website, and I'm kind of
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using those as notes. These are things that I feel deeply about.
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I don't want to read the blogs word for word, but I want to hit some topics.
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I'm an artist at heart, folks. I think if I would not have gone on to be a professional
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soldier, I probably for sure would have continued to be a bike messenger for a while.
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I'd probably still be a bike messenger actually, but I'd be a star of an artist
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I'd be out there trying to paint and do digital art and sculpt and all those
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things I loved doing those things as a youth And I like doing them now,
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Creativity people some people never Some people never grow or nourish their
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creativity And then they sit at their office job and they go on and do things
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and they never get their stuff out there.
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And then they kind of go, it just kind of goes unseen or unheard or unexplored.
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And, and people have regrets from that. And that's, that's terrible.
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I think artists, if you take the politics out of all this, artists.
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Some of them are shitty people. I'm okay. Not all artists are good people, I guess.
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But what would life look like without
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art and when i say art i'm
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talking about the arts folks i mean what would life look like
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without music what would life look like without the murals on the walls in the
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in the city or without interesting architecture if you go to soviet you know
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russia never mind the traditional you know the kremlin because that's some pretty
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interesting architecture.
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But if you get that Cold War era architecture in West Germany or East Germany,
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man, that's some pretty miserable, pretty morose stuff going on there.
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Just blank concrete, right?
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Even minimalist architecture with a little flair is good, but what would life look like without art?
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And the goodness about the countercultures in America, the various,
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whatever strand, whatever flavor of counterculture, usually there are artists intermingled in.
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There's always artists intermingled because they're always looking to explore new things.
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And that's the curiosity is the goodness of these countercultures.
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Some people who are not just pushing a counterculture to be rebellion for rebellion's
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sake or just because you don't like the mainstream just because it's mainstream.
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Truly, truly curious people seek out other ways, right, wrong, or otherwise.
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It doesn't, that's not the point. The point is other ways of doing things.
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Because sometimes there's not a
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right or wrong way. There's just an acceptable way for you to do a thing.
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Now, in very technical things, of course, there's a right and wrong way and very technical things.
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But in art as much as anything there
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there's a lot of different ways to express a
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feeling or a thought or a
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word yeah even a word there's many ways
33:17
to express it and and throughout the the artists because i would imagine i do
33:24
imagine it's it's probably hard to make a living as an artist you can you can
33:30
get your stuff on the internet you can sell your t-shirts on store on the internet and stuff like that.
33:35
But to make a living where you can pay the rent and things like that,
33:39
yeah, you still need to get out there and hustle.
33:41
Your stuff has to be seen by people who consume art.
33:45
And what my hope is, is that more people will start consuming art.
33:49
But what these countercultures are challenging is, it's not what they're showing.
33:55
Art talks about life. It talks about circumstances and lost love and injustice and all these things.
34:04
But what the countercultures are truly questioning, they're calling it a question,
34:10
is the systems of how these things are being promoted and distributed.
34:16
How these things are, that's what the counterculture of today is changing.
34:21
How the information is being distributed and promoted, skipping over the gatekeepers.
34:28
That's an important part is nowadays you can skip over the gatekeepers and go
34:34
straight to the consumer, whatever it is you have.
34:38
Now, some things obviously are regulated by government, right?
34:42
But even on the Internet, you can squeeze around, guys. You can wiggle and worm
34:47
a little bit to avoid some of these, especially if you're a small business.
34:52
But they're questioning the way things are done, not what's being done,
34:56
the way things are being done.
34:59
And usually a countercultural movement, if it's a solid movement,
35:04
they do promote individuality.
35:06
What you don't want to get into is a movement that promotes everybody being
35:11
all the same. And that's not a counterculture.
35:15
That's just creating a different culture of sort of drones. We don't want that either.
35:22
Individuality, I think, has always been an American identity.
35:27
And it used to be highly valued. And I think creativity has always been valued.
35:31
Not just American, but I mean, the masters, Michelangelo and Rembrandt,
35:36
to Jackson Pollock, and all the different types of artists out there,
35:42
and the different music and things.
35:45
I think there's always been appreciation. Even curmudgeons like myself,
35:49
guys who sit around grumpy and angry at the world or whatever,
35:52
I love listening to music.
35:54
I love looking at art. It takes you to a different space. It gives you a different mindset.
36:01
So these countercultures, even with the political stuff and even with the off-grid
36:07
stuff, they promote individuality.
36:12
Some promote individual wellness, individual strength. And then by virtue of
36:18
those individuals being strong and expressive and creative, then they're being
36:24
a value to their community.
36:26
And their community is flourishing because of their individuality.
36:31
And that is good. That is good.
36:35
A lot of these countercultures, they, yeah, sometimes injustice or government
36:40
overreach or things like that is kind of a talking point.
36:45
But those talking points become an impetus for dialogue amongst people.
36:52
Even if you and your wife are hardcore red, conservative, one news network,
37:01
and you're sitting around and you're talking about these people,
37:04
about how different and how weird and whatever, what are they after?
37:08
What are they looking for? What are they trying to change? What's the problem?
37:11
At least there's a dialogue there.
37:14
And the key to a good movement, I think, a good grassroots movement,
37:18
a good decentralized, grassroots, countercultural movement is that you're not
37:25
just against the mainstream.
37:28
You're not just against something.
37:30
You're not just a rebel without a clue.
37:33
But you're for something. For something positive. That's the new spin that I've
37:38
learned in my older years, is that you have to be for something positive.
37:45
And so if you can unify people through a positive connection, right,
37:52
expressing your individual liberty and their individual liberty to be different
37:55
as they choose and to express differently, but still appreciate and express
38:00
that we can positively affect our community.
38:03
By being two different, completely different individuals.
38:09
Individuals that at least value creativity, individuality, value community,
38:14
and just value human connection.
38:18
We don't have to be the same for us to connect, folks.
38:21
We don't have to be the same for us to connect. The value of creativity,
38:26
it's beyond just entertainment. It's beyond a pretty picture or a nice song.
38:32
The creativity can help us to reflect to critique social ills and to to just grow as people.
38:43
So the as the countercultures re-emerge in america and they are here folks there
38:47
and the beauty of it is they they kind of coexist you don't have to be on the
38:53
same you don't have to go protest the same thing right you don't have to go
38:58
throw molotov cocktails at cops to live your own protest.
39:03
You can do what you do. And by example, and by defining your own ethos,
39:09
just by the way you live, you can challenge the population to think in a more open way.
39:16
Well, look at this guy. What's he got going on? He seems healthy, happy, positive.
39:22
And then you can challenge the local populace to not be like you, but hey, give it a try.
39:29
Try something different. Open up.
39:31
Consider another idea. Go paint a picture.
39:35
So don't look at counterculture as being bad, folks.
39:40
In the 40s and 50s, we had the beatniks, right?
39:44
The beat poets, Bukowski and Kerouac and those guys.
39:49
And they left some good stuff behind.
39:53
Now, there was a component of communism threaded throughout there, right?
40:00
Communism rears its ugly head all the time. And I've said this before, and I'll say it again.
40:07
Communism on a small scale works, and it works just fine. That's what a community
40:12
is, people who help each other.
40:15
You don't necessarily need to redistribute wealth, but if there's a rich guy
40:19
in a small town, That rich guy usually donates to the local church or donates
40:24
to the food bank, et cetera, employs people and that kind of thing.
40:30
But the beatniks were in my, I say memory, but as a child, I was born in the 70s.
40:38
But I read a lot about Kerouac and from the letters from the road, things like that.
40:43
I like that stuff. But.
40:47
I never equated it with the communism aspect. So here's what I'm challenging you to do.
40:53
Look at these countercultures, distill the politics out of it,
40:59
and just look at the way they're living and what they're doing.
41:03
Now, in the libertarian principles, and I don't mean the libertarian party,
41:08
I mean just libertarian little L principles, don't hurt other people and don't
41:13
take their stuff. That's the mantra.
41:16
Don't hurt other people and don't take their stuff.
41:20
If you distill these countercultures and narrow them down to what they are doing,
41:26
how they're doing it, are they hurting other people and are they taking their stuff?
41:33
If the answer is no, then let them ride. I mean, don't hate on them. Why do you got to hate?
41:38
Let it ride. Watch the off-grid guy.
41:42
If you take pleasure in watching that guy fail, then keep your eyes on him. see what happens.
41:46
If he fails and fails spectacularly, then there's your, I told you so go give him a hand, help him up.
41:53
But I'm going to share.
41:56
If any of you have never seen the documentary called Alone in the Wilderness,
42:00
and it was a documentary of a fellow named Dick Pranke.
42:05
Who I think he was in the financial trades, you know, in the city,
42:10
some city, I don't know where,
42:12
And in his 50s, for a few summers in a row, he went to Alaska all by himself and built a cabin.
42:20
And he built it with handmade tools and just materials that he got from the woods.
42:25
And eventually, he retired and just went up there full time,
42:30
hence alone in the wilderness.
42:32
He had zero technology. He made all his own tools.
42:36
He built his own cabin with no cranes, no loaders, no forklifts, no anything.
42:45
So to think it's not doable, and that was the 50s and 60s, folks.
42:49
That wasn't way back in history when cavemen were digging holes in caves.
42:55
This is modern times. This guy did it, and he did it well.
43:00
So when you're watching these people, just learn.
43:04
Learn from what they're doing. and admire that they have the balls to go out and give it a go.
43:10
The music, I heard some statistic, I don't even know.
43:13
Like at some point in your life, in like your 20s or 30s, you stop listening
43:17
to new music because you've reached your point of stasis, right?
43:22
Like, no, everything new sucks. Everything old is awesome.
43:27
Listen to new music, folks. Listen to new music.
43:32
I hate to admit but we we have sirius xm that's that's as commercial radio as i can as i can bear,
43:40
but i listen to sirius xmu which plays pretty now they have a playlist and you
43:46
hear the same song over and over for several months but at least you'll get
43:49
some new stuff that you you don't always get spotify is pretty good about it
43:53
and and you know some of the other streamers are pretty good.
43:56
But folks, listen to some new music for crying out loud.
44:00
When's the last time you have been in an art museum?
44:04
When? I don't know. When's the last time you've critiqued a piece of art or
44:07
looked at a piece of art for more than a 10-second glance?
44:12
Get out there. Talk to the people who are doing these things.
44:17
Talk to the people who are creating the art and the music. Now,
44:20
some people are just, you know, your typical country guy is probably boozing
44:25
and smoking weed and chasing women. Who knows?
44:29
Now, don't hit me up if you're a typical country guy. All right? I love country music.
44:33
But what I'm saying here is get to know the other people.
44:37
What other people? The other people. Get to know the other people.
44:42
And then check it out. Once you've gotten to know the other people,
44:45
if you hate that person for what they are and what they stand for, then drive on.
44:50
Never talk to them again and move on. But don't
44:54
don't lay the failures or successes of a countercultural grassroots movement
45:02
upon the shoulders of one a-hole that you hate because the world is full of
45:09
individuals. And then I'll leave you with this.
45:11
In the words of Ayn Rand, one cannot claim to be a champion of minority rights
45:18
if one does not champion individual rights because the individual is the smallest minority.
45:28
All right. I appreciate you guys. Thanks for listening. Follow. Share.
45:34
Spread the word. Get on thejunetopodcast.com. make
45:39
suggestions about what topics you'd like to like
45:42
me to explore you'd like to hear on the podcast make
45:46
suggestions about well some of you out there are welcome to come sit and be
45:51
a guest on here now i'm not advanced so you have to come to my house but thanks
45:58
for listening folks get out there do some new things maybe become a counter-cultural
46:03
revolutionary who knows.
46:08
Music.