Ep. 357 — Freedom vs. Government: Which Side Are You On? | Fireside Chat

Hello everybody. Dennis Prager here with episode number three, five, seven. I probably did. I've probably done wow. Every time since 88, three, five, seven. Hi everyone. Chance to give you some thoughts about life and then take your questions. Mr. Tubbs is in bed. Is he now? Oh, he's moved. He's moved out of bed. Okay. What can I do? We work very hard to get him into bed, but gradually it's working out. The late Otto spent years at the fireside chat. He Otto was so trained, or if you will alert, depends on your perspective. When he would see the crew come in, he went into the bed setting up the lighting. All right, everyone. I have some thoughts for you. Uh, I, I very rarely talk politics and even this. Obviously there's a political aspect to it, but it's, it's not politics as such. It's, it's a much larger issue than just politics, but it obviously concerns politics. Okay. So I've explained why I'm veering toward that direction. So there's something you should know that will be very helpful in understanding. How you want to vote. I'm not telling you how to vote, obviously, but if one of your most important decisors, that is decision makers is freedom, what you should, what you should understand is the almost always conservatives will value freedom more than the left. And I have proof. This is not an opinion. I have proof. Conservatives are for smaller government. The more you move left from liberal to left, you, the more they are for bigger government. Now, are you more likely to have more individual freedom with a small government or a big government? It's, it's very rarely put that way, but that is, that's everything. A hundred million people were slaughtered in the, in the, talking civilians, not talking about combat deaths were slaughtered in the 20th century. A hundred million. There's no way we can wrap our heads around that number. It's hard to wrap our heads around a hundred, a hundred million, but at least intellectually, you could know what a staggering amount of horror and evil. And remember for every one of them, think of the ripple effect, the friends and the relatives and the community in which they lived, how terribly they were affected lives ruined because of the one of the 100 million that was killed. All of those killings was done by big governments. That's, that's, that's really important. There's one, uh, numerically small exception. It was horrific and it's evil. The Hutu genocide of Tutsis in Rwanda at the end of the 20th century. So I just, I'm just saying that because I want you to understand. I, I really am crazy about the truth, but the truth is without big governments, you can't have big evil. You can have little evils, murderers, rapists, and extortionists pimps. I mean, it is a whole or really trafficking. And, and, and so I, I want you to understand that big government means less Liberty by definition. It has to, there's a finite amount of space. And if, as the government takes up more space, you take up less space. That's why I came up with this phrase 20 years ago, the bigger, the government, the smaller, the citizen. We even made bumper stickers at PragerU that said that the bigger, the government, the smaller, the citizen. So something for you to read when people say that this candidate is a threat to democracy. Okay. Is the candidate conservative or is the candidate on the left? If it's about a conservative, the odds are it's not going to happen. It can't happen. You can't do that much damage if the government is not that powerful. That is why the founders of the United States who created the, the freest country in the history of the world. That's why the French gave America the statue of Liberty. The, the iconic symbol of the American revolution is the Liberty Bell. Liberty is on, on, on all our coins and all our money in the United States. People came to the United States in staggering numbers because they wanted to be free. They were leaving big governments. In some cases, you know, enormous governments like the czars, Russia. The government controlled everything. The government controlled you. You were a surf. Well, they were the nobleman, but they were part of the state apparatus. You, you, you want a free society. You should, you should vote for those who want to make the government smaller, not the ones who want to make the government bigger, but people don't. Because as I've said, I think I've said it on the fireside chat. I'm sure I have. I just don't obviously remember when, but I know I've say it almost every day. Well, every week on my radio show, human beings are not programmed to yearn to be free. They are programmed to yearn to get free things to be taken care of. Most of humanity prefers to be taken care of them to be free. When you think about it, even that is so amazing. It shows you how little people think about it. What is the thing that people most rue, most fear about getting older that they'll have to be taken care of? Because why means that I don't have my, I don't have liberty or dignity to be taken care of is to lose your dignity. We don't, we don't speak about dignity because it doesn't comport with big government, if the government gives your child breakfast and lunch at school, you have lost your dignity to a certain serious degree as a parent. You don't feed your child two out of their three meals. The state does that. That should bug every parent, but people don't think that way. Oh, take care of me. But then they don't want to be taken care of when in their, in their personal life, they know how demeaning it is. Small government is, is not a sweet little virtue. It is the essence of a free society, but the government has been growing and growing and growing. And in Europe, the governments have already grown. They already grew way before the American government grew partially influenced by Europeans, especially Germans, because Americans would go to Germany to get their PhDs, then they'd come back, teach students and influence them. You'll find this of interest in the late 19th century, the, the head of Germany, I believe it was Bismarck, had a, had a very interesting way to prevent Germans from moving to the United States. A vast number of Germans moved to the United States, perhaps the most famous one, maybe not the most famous, but I think he is, is a former president of the United States, the head of all the allied forces in World War II, Dwight Eisenhower, Eisenhower, that's not an English name, it's a German name. So many Germans were coming to the United States. And so he decided he's going to create something called socialism. He'll take care of people so they won't want to leave Germany. It's a bribe, but it's a bribe with the devil because the trade-off is horrible. I'll, you get, you take care of me. I'll give you me. So the next time you hear that a conservative is a threat to democracy, a threat to liberty, just know it's almost impossible. Conservatives want a smaller government. The real threat is from those who want ever increasing government. Okie dokie. There you go. Hello to you. Hello. My name is Juliana Moon and I'm 15 years old. I was born in America, but when I was seven years old, my family moved away to become missionaries. So I've lived in Asia ever since. I currently live in Chiang Mai, Thailand. My question for you is what are your thoughts on traditional public schooling versus homeschooling? Which do you think offers a better starting point for both social life skills and getting a good career? Thank you. Well, thank you. For the record, I was in Chiang Mai. And Chiang Rai, they were both two of the most fascinating places I ever visited in Northern Thailand. So I know where you are, which is a wonderful feeling. It's one of the reasons that I wanted to get to as many countries as possible in my life, and I've gotten to 130 was when I was in high school, so much happened in high school when I was in high school. I remember I was hearing on the radio, that was a big thing, radio, got a lot of your news or TV, obviously, and I would hear that places, and I remember as a kid, there were a lot of battles between Turks and Greeks and Cyprus. So I often heard about Cyprus. I knew nothing about Cyprus. I couldn't identify where it was on earth. And I remember saying, I have to get to Cyprus. I don't want it to be a name. I want the picture. What is it like to walk down a Cyprus street? And there's a big difference. I know where you are. It's not a name to me, Chiang Mai. It's a reality to me. It's the beauty of travel. Okay. So let's see again. All right. So what are my thoughts on traditional public schooling versus homeschooling? It's sort of like asking me, would I prefer a massage or a bee sting? Let me think about that. The massage is homeschooling. The bee sting is public schooling. I'm sorry to say it. It wasn't always true. When my parents went to public schools in the United States, they learned a lot, including to treasure the United States of America and liberty. And they learned a lot of math and science and music and art and grammar and literature. It was great. It was a great thing. Not anymore. Most public schools and most private schools, not an anti-public school rant. Most schools are awful. They're not just failures in terms of teaching. In Minnesota, the latest statistic is that half of the students are not at their proficiency level of their age or their grade in science or math. Half. I wish they would do one on reading comprehension or ability to write a sentence. How about this? Ability to define a sentence. I'll bet most, most graduates of high school cannot define sentence. A sentence must contain a subject and a verb. That's it. Fish swim is a sentence. Fish nice is not a sentence. That's it. It's very, yeah. I am now giving you the definition of a sentence, but if you don't know what a sentence is, you will write things. You will write essays, compositions, whatever they're called. You, you will write them without sentences. Many of the sentences will not, they'll have a period at the end, but they won't be a sentence. So I'll bet you more homeschooled kids can write a sentence. If I say write a sentence and would know what I'm talking about, then kids in the most prestigious public or private school. So to me, there's no question. The, the corruption, I mean, I, I felt this when they started teaching sex education at school, what is their business? I didn't learn sex ed at school. Amazingly, I want you to know, even by seventh grade, I knew how babies were made. You know, who told me my parents beyond that, what exactly should you be learning about sex education? Because this is a family broadcast, I won't tell you the details of what kids have been learning. Forget LGBT, well before LGBT sex ed started when I was a kid and I didn't understand that. Why, why is it being taught? And by the way, remember there's a finite number of hours in a day in a school day or any day. So if you're going to teach sex ed, then you're going to not teach something else like the definition of a sentence or for that matter, music or art. How many, how many kids are in a school band as compared to, to 50 years ago, the school orchestra. So anyway, I'm totally pro homeschooling. Uh, what do you think offers better starting point for both social life skills and getting a good career? Thank you. Okay. So better starting point for social life skills. I know what people think, and it makes sense to go to, to go to school. You get better social life skills than you do homeschooled because you interact with more people at school. But I'm not sure you develop that, that many more skills. First of all, it is not true. I know the word homeschooling still has people thinking they're at home all day just with their parents or one of their parents, it's not the way it works. They're with other kids. The vast majority of homeschoolers are with other kids. And the, and the social skills that are being taught today are minimal. They're really texting skills, TikTok skills, Instagram skills, and getting a good career. My, my take on who gets a good career is as follows. And I lived this. You could ask my two sons. I raised my boys and I didn't know if it would work, but this is how I raised them. Character is more important than grades. Character is more important than school. It is because that is just a more important value. What is your character? How fine a human being are you? But there was another reason. I believe, I believe that if you develop a good character, good character traits, you were more likely to succeed in the long run, bad guys succeed in the short run, not many succeed in the long run, in the long run, your character will see you through even professionally. Thank you for that. All right. Prager United folks, PragerUnited.com. You become a member and you help make everything we do, especially or including the fireside chat free. Everything we produce at PragerU is free, but somebody's got to help us so that we can pay the bills. But you get a tremendous number of benefits in Prager United. So that's why I'd like you to just visit PragerUnited.com. One of the little perks is you get the first question after the video question. This belongs to Chris in Santa Ynez, California. Hi Dennis. I own an e-commerce business and like most, we have become seemingly reliant on using social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram and YouTube to reach our audience. In light of their behavior over the years, I'm finding it increasingly hard to sleep at night, knowing we help them profit and retain users in any way. Do you think it's wise for businesses to leave these services? And what alternatives might you suggest for a business to thrive without supporting the social media dictators? Thank you for your time. Well, this is not my area of expertise. I don't run a business. I look, your question, so to speak, keeps me up as well, but thank God nothing keeps me up when I, when I go to bed, I go to bed, I go to bed very late, but I do fall asleep. So I am troubled, however, with the question of what, what product will I buy and from whom, which is on the same basis. I don't want to support places that violate my, my most profound values. There were times when there's no choice. For example, Delta airlines announced that they would no longer say, ladies and gentlemen, when the pilot or a flight attendant gets on the intercom of the, you know, the microphone system of the, of the airplane, because it's not inclusive. Okay. That's absurd. It's absurd. So Delta has announced it's woke, uh, compared to however, compared to United Delta is downright anti-woke. United is, is profoundly woke. It's it's saving half the spaces of its flight school for blacks and women. So I think is demeaning to blacks and women, but that's a separate issue. So do I fly Delta? Well, but if I don't fly Delta, whom do I fly? United. And then if I don't fly United, then who do I fly? Americans. They're all, they've all been taken over by, by people with values I don't hold. So if you're, if you're going to be pure in that sense, and I admire anyone who is, they won't fly, they won't advertise their business, and then we're not going to do much good for the world. So where, where you can do it like Bud Light learned, learned a lesson, uh, for, for good reason, but Bud Light is not alone. Gillette did a similar thing, celebrating young people who quote unquote transition to the other sex. So try to patronize good companies that might be easier than to not do business at all with the not good companies. Julia 42, Rockland, California, USA. Dear Dennis, I would like to know how you would respond to the question. What are your preferred pronouns? My son just entered high school and I would like options for him in case he has asked the question. So I have an answer. What is your preferred pronoun? You should answer whatever you want to call me. That's it. Do we have any problem in normal life? Do you have a doubt as to whether you should say he or she referring to the person serving you your meal in a restaurant or attending to you on a plane or flying your plane or teaching your kid? How come we have never had this issue? Gee, by the way, I will admit maybe five times in the 20 years I'm with my wife, I think maybe five times we have looked at each other and said, is that a man or a woman? Maybe five times in the tens of thousands of people we've interacted with. There was a case in Denmark. We had a meal and, and the, the, the person serving us was obviously a man. I believe he had facial hair and he spoke like a man looked like a man. He was big, like a man. He was tall, like a man, but he wore, he wore a skirt. So he was, he was really what we used to call a cross dresser. I don't know. I don't know if he was transitioning in, in, in his mind and I'm not mocking him, but that I, I call people what they look like you all do you, you, you don't have a doubt 99.9% of the time you meet a stranger, am I speaking to a male or a female? So the, the whole preferred pronoun thing is just, it's just make believe. So what is my preferred pronoun? Whatever you feel is accurate. That's the answer. I don't think I've encountered anyone who ever met me who didn't know who I was at all, who thought, gee, is that a here or she, is that fair? Now, Jeff, I will admit it's a toughie does have a beard, does wear men's clothing, does talk like a man. So why say he, from the first day I met you, I referred to you as he, I would say to my wife, is he here? I never said, is he or she here? And you never told me, I just want to say he never told me that he's a he. Okay. That's the way life works except in schools or wherever else. The unclear AKA woke work. How's our timing? Okay, great. Reba, 16 years old, Minneapolis, Minnesota. What are the top five books you think a young conservative should read? Go to my website, Dennis Prager.com. And I have a list and we just refreshed it. I think I now have 15 books up there and I think you're 16. I think you could understand all 16, all 16, all 15. You're a 16 that's 15. So that, that would be the answer. What I did not put on the list because it would look odd given that I wrote them. But I would beg you to read any of my books. The one on happiness, the think a second time 44 essays. So little bites of my ideas on 44 subjects, still the best hope the case for American values around the world, universal values, and it is a book about American values, left-wing values, and Islamist values. It's a really important book, still the best hope. And of course my Bible commentary, even if you're an atheist. Cause that'll change your life. Cause it'll, it'll teach you about life. It's called the rational Bible. That plus the list that I have at Dennis Prager.com. The fact that you're asking at 16 suggests to me, I would love to know if you're homeschooled. If I had to bet on it, I'd say yes. Sarah, also 16, you know, Sarah, you and Reba should definitely meet. Cause people need kindred spirits. Boys need good boyfriends. Girls need good girlfriends. I'm a big believer in that. Nashville, Tennessee. There's a Nashville, Minneapolis flight every day. I'll bet there is. Dear Mr. Prager and Fireside Chat, episode 343. You stated that success is made of having good friends and raising good kids. I wholeheartedly agree, but do you have any advice for finding said good friends, she writes well at 16, especially in places where others already have established relationships. Thank you. That is so interesting. I know. I think I know exactly what you're referring to. You came to a new place and there are already in high school clicks. Is that right? Do you infer the same thing from what she, what she, yeah, I'm sure that's what it's about. Well, let me tell you first. What I don't think you should do is try to be popular. It's, it's fine to be popular. Don't, don't get me wrong. That would be stupid for me to say it's a bad thing to be popular. But if you aim to be popular, you, you won't be real. You will always be asking you, how do I act so that I become popular? Be yourself. Hopefully there's an element of being charming in your, in who that is being yourself, be yourself, and there's no question someone will gravitate toward you. It's in, it's inconceivable that it wouldn't happen. Good people draw good people. It's just the rule of life. I'm a hell of a lot older than you. I knew it when I, well, I intuited it your age. I don't think I knew it. So it's my job being older than you to tell you that's the job of older people. That tell me this is the way life works. That way you can learn without having to suffer through mistakes. You'll still make mistakes, but if you can avoid gratuitous mistakes, that's a, that's a blessing. But you, if you are true to yourself and, and, and, and welcoming, I mean, you should act welcoming and, and have a warm personality. That's all, that's all important. That's not fake. You will draw people to you. That's just the way it works. But if your aim is to get into the click of popular girls, then that's not a good one, then it probably won't work or you will lose you while you're on the road to becoming one of them. Is that it? They do go fast. I have to say, so remember my point on freedom and smaller government, it's really big and all the questions and share this, if you will, with others. And thank you for being with me and I'll see you next week.