[Music] Hey fell and tears, those of us like our spirituality with a twist. So we are in the midst of this series. We took on the idea of a very serious series about cults and cult psychology. Um and we're kind of heading into its final rounds looking at a little thing called charismatic authority. And to do that we're going to look look at from the perspective of the great sociologist one Max Vber and how charismatic authority conflicts with other types of authority. So we're again we we kind of looked at the world around us if you haven't like been with us for this series and we said okay well this world's looking pretty [...] up. We diagnosed cult and we didn't want to leave it there. We were talking about that just off mic Daniel. the fact that you just want to throw a word out there. You want to go through and say, "Okay, here's what the word means." Right?

So, we said, "Okay, let's go through and like really look at this whole idea of cult and cult psychology through the social sciences." And so, we did things on conformity, social psychology of conformity. We did things on social cohesion and the sociology of that. How do you kind of like force groups together and maintain people in groups? And then finally, we're into this whole idea of like how do you impose authority on others, right? Especially

how do you how do you impose authority on others?

Did I not say impose? I meant to

Okay. Yeah. You said how oppose. Yeah.

Oh, no. Impose.

Yeah. How you impose? Yeah. How do you

Sounds like a Freudian slip? Then how are we going to impose it? I was already jumping ahead.

You already jumping ahead. Yeah. Yeah. How do you impose authority on others? Yes, for sure.

Yeah.

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All right, Max Weber. So, um, great sociologist. I can talk a little bit about him just so people who would have can have some context of who the guy is. Um, I found him really fascinating to learn more about. I didn't know much too too much about him. And we're not going to be able to talk too much of his life here, but I'll share a couple little snippets because he ends up being one of those kind of fascinating characters. So, he's born 1864, dies in 1920. It seems like he dies of pneumonia, possibly after like the Spanish flu outbreak. So his life is cut kind of short. Um I would say then he had kind of these crazy fascinating lives lives overall. He grew up in kind of a complicated family. From his father's side there was a lot of politics, culture, academia, political you know activism kind of a person. And then from his mother's side I think like nobility, money, religion and conservatism. So there was this definite tension in the family he grew up with. He's kind of famous for what you would call like a conflict model. Uh you know thinking about sociology and psychology in terms of like conflict is the most kind of primary thing in what he talks about and probably he grew up in conflict or something right in these complicated parental relationships. Another thing that's kind of weird about him weird and interesting is that he went through a real crisis of like what seems to be kind of a psychological breakdown or mental illness. he had some estrangement from his father. In my research of this, it's not obvious that he grew up kind of being feeling closer to his father than his mother and then maybe he decided that his father was abusive of his mother in some ways. Again, I'm not historian of all of this, but something happened there. So, he kind of cut ties with his father. Then his father died a couple of months later.

So, he seemed to have some kind of psychological break and uh he kind of quit everything for a while. I think he was like legitimately like, you know, like institutionalized for a while and then eventually came out again and he was very academically and politically active before those events and he kind of eventually found his way back to it and he became this very like a active political sociology academic person. He was traveling around the world. So he kind of seems like it took some years though for him to snap out. So, it's kind of interesting story that way. In terms of stuff that we all like also like to talk about in terms of relational stuff, he's a little bit similar to the episodes we did on Carl Jung. We sometimes talk about uniqueness versus exclusiveness or polyamory versus monogamy. And he definitely seems like he was a polyamory kind of a person too. So, I was like, hm. And he wound up like dedicating he has like four major works. He dedicated one to his mom, one to his wife, and then two to other ladies who were like big people in his life, too. So, a little bit similar to the some of the Carl Young episodes we did before where he was obviously outside the box in many ways, including how he conducted his personal life. So, anyways, kind of a fascinating person. Um, a lot going on with him. Again, I didn't know too much about him going in, but there's a little bit of context for who he is. Um there's so much to talk about potentially with him, but we're going to focus in on this idea of charismatic authority because we're trying to talk about culty stuff, right?

That's episodes.

And um I think the thing is you have to like understand how he thinks about authority. So he talks about charismatic authority, but then he also talks about these other kinds of authority. So in order sort of to get what he's talking about, you almost have to kind of cover all of it. And I think like in terms of what's we I think is happening in our worlds now relative to what I think he makes understandable is there's these major clashes in terms of like styles of where authority is going to come from and they're like really clashing very badly. So we'll try to give some context for it as we go through. Um okay so we'll get to the types of authorities. Overall he uses this kind of crazy phrase. He talks about what he calls legitimate domination. It almost sounds like it's some kind of subdom thing or something. Legitimate domination. What he means by that is kind of odd, you know, because it's a strange phrase, but it sort of suggests that no matter what kind of authority you're dealing with, there's some aspect where it's like trying to dominate you and control you, right? So, it has a kind of a dark undercurrent to it regardless. And he seems to look at that kind of like across the board. I think that vibes with some of our dowist and tantric ideas that there's always a dark element potentially to authority over other people. So I find that kind of interesting. Does that make sense what I'm saying there to you Daniel?

Yeah.

And um you know like one of the things he's really famous for and I'm not sure if you have heard this phrase before too Daniel but this idea that monopoly on violence is one of the defining concepts of the state or one of the defining concepts of authority. Have you heard that thing before?

Yes.

Well that's Max Vber. Okay.

So that's his that's him, you know, and so some of the things I think famous things like that do trace their way back to him some way or another. That phrase is really famous, right?

So maybe this idea that behind any authority there's always going to potentially be some violence behind it,

right?

It's almost required.

Yeah. And it's kind of like again like people will talk about him there's a darker element but a darker maybe realistic or anonymous element. ominous and honest.

It's a heavy it's a heavy kind of truth.

Yeah. It's a tough truth. It's a tough love, right?

Yeah. So, okay. So, anyways, to understand this charismatic authority, which is the most direct culty thing, and I'm again, I'm interested in your opinions on this, Dan, as we go through it because then we get to wrestle with, okay, what's actually happening in the world around us, you know, uh to get it though, you almost have to talk about these other kinds of authority. So, we'll kind of break them down, kick them around a little bit for y'all, and then uh we'll all walk away better educated at the end. For me, it's been really interesting learning this. Again, I found it to be helpful in talking with friends, right? Like the friend I was estranged from and uh hopefully be helpful for other people, too. Uh all right, so the first of these he has is what would be called like a legal authority or a bureaucratic legal rational authority. This is maybe the best one to start with because it's the one that we would probably most associate with the United States as we probably would have previously or always thought about it as. So this is the idea that you have um what we probably recognize as traditionally how we would think about some some place like the United States as a bureaucratic legal rational kind of authority. And then like trying to take it apart there's these few major concepts that get part of it. One is the idea that people come to some kind of collective agreement on what the rules are of the authority, right? And then once they do that, then they sort of internalize them and that becomes part of the feeling of the community, right? We've internalized the what is legitimate authority and we've kind of come to some collective common agreement around that. And then what happens in this is then you have bodies of law and rules that are sort of rational, abstract and consistent, you know. So it's very important that they're consistent and they're held. There is also an element of them that is a little bit again more abstract and you reason your way through but we all come to some sort of collective agreement on like that we're going to follow that. And then one of the important parts of that is that the officials and the rulers, the people who are in power are subject to these rules as well. So they apply even to the people who are in authority, right? They're not

supposed to

should if you're in this system.

That's a question, right?

And we'll talk about like again he's interested in how these different things clash and they're going to fight each other. So I mean it is something where he's acknowledging and I think one of the ways of we're trying one of the ways of looking at the world now would be there's a clash going on. So um then the other part that's interesting about it would be that the rules are obeyed not the ruler. The ruler doesn't only has powers by the fact that they're an instrument of the rules. M

rules are the things that you're following and then in theory in an archetypal ideal sense and he recognizes Vber does that these are archetypes you know they might not be perfectly there but you know you get something that's predominantly this way you don't pledge allegiance to the ruler you pledge allegiance to

the rules

the rules and our collective agreement that we've decided to follow these things then the other big thing about this there's these sort of five big ideas here is that people then are placeholders in the order it's impersonal right you take on a position and then again you obey the position not the person so it's not ties of like personal loyalty to others it's uh uh authority that deres from the idea that you know we've all bought in and this person is occupying a position and so we're going to respect that position and follow it. So anyways, I I'll break it there. What do you make of it so far?

Yeah, it sounds like

we've talked about this. You know,

sounds like an idealistic view of a bureaucratic elected society, right? Yeah.

Where somebody would be put in a position of some authority or uh legislation and then based on them being selected for that, we honor their selection. But and that we listen to them because they're in that position, not because they are who they are, but because they've been placed in a position that is granted authority, i.e. that position is talking for itself via the uh body and mouth of a human being. But it's the position, not the person. I was interested in this when I was researching it out and prepping it because I kept thinking, well, Daniel was in the military

and it does come up with this idea that military things are kind of like this, too. So you can have

structures that are you know not just like the government or something or the DMV or something but other parts of you know the structure of things that will have that and I kept thinking about you like that's how it is militarily speaking right

yes but then inherently you have okay you have inherently built within this is the person who who achieved that position because those positions are not just thrown about

they're not Yeah.

Handed out like candy on Halloween, you know, like you have to earn them. So even though Vber is saying like it's the position, not the person, the person is still in the position and that position has to be earned one way or another. Therefore, the person achieved or did something in order to be awarded that position. Therefore, that person probably is worthy of at least acknowledgment of said accomplishment. Do you know what I'm saying?

Yeah. Yeah. No, and he gets to that too. Interesting. Like you're kind of like he does say stuff about that because in a certain sense this thing is more likely to create something like a meritocracy. And so the people who get to the positions you can be like okay I can respect this person also because they probably through expertise, talent, training, experience have gotten themselves to this place.

Totally.

So now I can respect that person kind of almost doubly, right? I can respect them because I'm going to respect their position within this thing because we've all agreed, okay, we're going to show mutual respect to one another on that.

Yeah.

But then also, okay, you've got to this spot, you know?

Correct.

We can trust that it's earned.

Correct. Okay, I can put confidence in you, right? Because you've earned that position. Like, yeah, I think it's very true. And he says that this kind of authority will tend to produce meritocracy, the most likely one to do it, right? I think that and I think that's most easily seen at least from my perspective in the military

because you have to have you know you yeah we're all wearing the same uniform but you know on the you know US Army and whatever on one side or whatever whatever you're in and your name on the other side but you know your rank and you know if someone outranks you they've been there long no one handed them that position because they were related to somebody else, you know, they didn't they don't look the part because there wasn't, you know, and I mean, I don't mean to to to add this into it, but it's coming to me right now. You also have to be physically active. So, there's not you can't like loaf it. You know what I'm saying? Now, that's not to say that people aren't people can't be valid for certain positions because of disability, right? You know, the most great the greatest example would be Stephen Hawking or something like this. You know, you're saying, "Oh, guys in a wheelchair, obviously an idiot." No, not par quadriplegic, get him out of here like ter No, I'm not saying that. I'm just saying in the context of the military, you still have to be a viable soldier, right? all despite the ranks. Obviously, you're if you're up in your, you know, 40s or 50s, like, you know, you're probably not going to be as spry as you were when you were 21, obviously, but there is still that element of you made it all the way there and now you're wearing the rank. You're in a command position. You you earned it. That the assumption

you had the chops to do it, right? At some point, you had the chops to do it, right?

Correct. Correct.

That creates a kind of a mutual trust then, I would think. Right. You can look at that person and go, "Well, he's not just a hollow placeholder in this thing." If it's really mecratic, he got there for a reason. Now I can put more trust in this person.

Right.

Exactly.

Yeah. It's interesting like it's once you get the I kind of this I mean on some level you say, "Okay, that's pretty clear what he's saying." But like when you actually frame it all out and you make it kind of specific, there's a certain power to what he's saying, right?

Yeah.

Yeah. So especially it's like Capricorn for Daniel 10th house sun for me you know if you know a little astrology right that you kind of can get to the idea like okay I can respect that this person got to this place all right

so additional features of this thing once you get past those main ideas is that in general you want the rules to be written so that we can all feel that we're bound and kind of complying and we're knowledgeable ahead of time and we always see that there's a record of things, right? So, I guess in the military, you'd have orders and the orders aren't just like, "Hey, I told told Todd what to do."

Yeah.

No, we gave an order. We know what it is. If something gets [...] up, then okay, we're going to have a record of what happened. It's not just told this other dude and then he says he doesn't tell me that,

right? There's too much at stake actually. Right.

Yeah. So um again then there's kind of a structure to things which could be hierarchical but everyone has their individual responsibilities right and there should be clearly defined then it gets to what you were talking about that there should be some kind of special training or expertise. You didn't get to that place just because you knew so and so, right? You didn't get to that because you donated to this thing, right? Or bought this person off or um there's again a nepatism or something like you got to that because it was somehow earned, right? And when he's talking about this then this creates a different you know a whole set of different relationships. Like for example, you have to like watch out for like conflict of interest. Your personal gain should be kept separate from your responsibilities to what's happening. You need to cut those two things apart.

The emaluments clause.

Yeah.

Ah. Oh, okay.

That thing.

That thing. Got it. Okay.

Yeah. That thing.

Yeah. Yeah. Ah, that's old news.

Yeah. So, you split that. You don't you don't create that conflict of interest. And what's interesting about it is the farther you get away from it, his point will be you're getting farther and farther away from this.

Then you're in some other kind of authority. You've lost this, right? Mhm.

Um and so then he says in the end this kind of way of organizing things, this kind of authority is the most efficient because in a certain sense it's rational and in a certain sense therefore it is rational because it's based on knowledge, rationality that you can trust that people have earned their places, right? And um uh and that's the style of authority that tends to get the best results. things will work the best when you have this context, right?

You can get more buyin from people, you can put more trust in people around you.

Um, and then he also says, and this is an interesting point, but he says this tends to create kind of a social leveling because the closer you can get to maybe this as an archetypal ideal, the more you can have people who will will prove themselves based on their merits and you can trust that people will more likely earn the places that they are. So it, you know, in an ideal world, it will produce more leveling. People who are maybe start off a little bit lower have more chances to get higher in this kind of thing. That's idealized.

We all know that these things can be imperfect. But the closer you get to that, the more you give people a chance to earn their positions based on merit, right? I know. What do you think about that part? There's a certain truth to it, I guess, right?

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. If you can get close to this, if you can take out elements and racism and these kinds of things compared to other things, the closer you can get to it, the better you'll get to people, you know, having the the possibility of things leveling out in this way. Okay. So, those are the kind of the the ultimate framework of this, right? We can recognize this as sort of almost like an American ideal in some ways, too. I mean, what do you think? Kind of. Right.

Yeah. Yeah. And um you we're recording this weirdly enough on July 3rd. So we're like right before the big American day for what's left of it. Okay. The risks to this kinds of things. There's always going to be potential that that more um darker side. And he's honest about this. So he says on the one hand you can get domination by experts potentially, right? Like a putoaucracy of experts could take things over. The other part would be that this system can feel kind of impersonal that uh you know you kind of like it it develops sort of an impersonal quality to it when you're going through something that feels more bureaucratic or something. But did it feel that way in the military at all? Did it feel impersonal or how did that feel actually? I never been in the military so I wouldn't know.

In what way

did it feel like you were like did it feel cold or impersonal or something or was it not like that?

Was what not like that? your experience like was it like did you feel like okay this is a cold and personal system or did you feel like like

like on a collective or as like on

as an individual I guess as an individual did you feel like a cog in the machine and it was impersonal or did it not feel that way? I mean, when you're part I mean when you're part of the when you're part of a large group, yes, you are a cog. That's the point,

you know. But then when you're being dealt with one-on-one, it that's, you know, I guess it's both. I don't know how to there's not really a great way of putting it, but it's both. You have a job to do, so you are that thing. You do that job.

Mhm.

You get it done. Period. That's it.

Personal responsibility, right?

Yeah. If you can accomplish it, then you will get praised and recognized for doing it. If you don't, you [...] up.

Yeah.

Get it done.

That's,

you know, that's it.

So, it's kind of weird language to use because it's like, okay, impersonal or non-personal, I don't know. I just had to do the things that was being asked and there was obviously clear expectations and correct

that was how I understood things and it was accurate that I understood it that way.

Yeah. I mean you know when you go above and beyond then you might be recognized for that extra bit but to do what it is that you're supposed to do you don't get rewarded for that like that's that's the mission

you know.

Yeah. Yeah. Makes sense right. So it's really it's a it kind of transcends that question on some level, right?

Yeah, it does.

Yeah. It's not personal impersonal. You got to do this [...] We need you to do it,

right? You're here because you were trained to do that thing and therefore you've made it to this point. Therefore, you have proven some amount of proficiency to somebody. So you're here. So I believe that based on what it is you're proficient in, you can do that thing.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Do it.

Was there like I mean again I've never been in the military so I'm just curious about this. Was there like some element of like psychological understanding in like like how people were interacting? Do you have moments of bonding with people who might be higher up in the hierarchy to like

Yeah.

create Okay. So yeah and

in int personal I guess on some level

no of course not no bonds are very strong because you are in it with people. you're you're in it, you know, and even those who are in the command position and not necessarily on the daytoday grind of your workers in the sense, you know, like your foreman and your construction folk, you also cannot be so completely devoid as to lose the respect of the people who you are leading.

Yeah.

You know what I'm saying? So you can't have people be complet you can't have people be completely impersonal because that your your morale will be low that you won't get you know you would rather have things done with with gusto you know than with displeasure. Of course it doesn't matter because the job will needs to get done full stop. However, why would you want people to be dragging themselves through when you can do it with better morale and you'll have better outcomes because you are managing people and people are not autonomously just doing without emotions and without familial ties and do you know what I'm saying? Like that's not

I would see that would be part of like the expertise and the qualifications of the person, right? If you couldn't do that, you'd be a shitty leader.

Correct. So then you know like the fact that you're able to take on that role means somebody thought you were able to manage those different demands, right?

Yeah. And some people

I can make people responsible. I can also boost people up when I need to. I can create morale when I need to. I can get some ads when I need to. You know that that's part of your expertise, right?

Yep. Yep.

Yeah.

And people people generally want to know that you'll go to bat for them.

Yeah. any and as military or not, but they want to know that you're willing to, you know, help them or or you know, they like that they'll they'll they'll go to you mean you're literally going to war with these people. So whether the war is justified or not, that's a different story. But your job is your job.

That's a different kind of authority.

Yes, it is.

Yes.

Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, did you watch any of that stuff like uh Band of Brothers or any of those kind of military things? Did you watch those kinds of things?

Yeah. There's a whole one where it's like the dude who used to be on Friends who was Ross and he's just a complete [...]

Yeah.

And he's kind of like I can't remember what his rank is where he's a sergeant or whatever he is and everyone knows he's a [...] and it's Yeah. Obviously it's an interesting thing to watch. I think that you know the Do you remember those episodes? Is that Anyways, he's a

I can see it in my mind. I could see some of the episodes in my mind but I not I can't I don't remember. But it gets to that point of like if you don't have a person who's competent in the position, if it is, we're going to have to go in a little bit, but previewing other episodes we'll do on these things. We'll work our way through and contrast these things as we go. But um you know, if you can't trust that the person has earned it, you're not going to be able to trust them.

Yeah. Yeah. Back to the point back to Favor's about this being a meritocracy essentially.

Yeah. All right. The other part of this just for our podcast and maybe it's the one thing we'll do and then we'll close the episode up. I probably have to like

Yeah. Yeah.

We'll deal with the other kind of authorities as we go along.

Yeah, that is fine.

Yeah. But for the pod, you know, there is a risk, you know, we we talk about Asian spiritual ideas and there is a risk of like the confusion problem, I suppose.

Say you have to open that up a little bit.

Yeah. Yeah, I will. I was just throwing it out there as a word. I didn't expect it. But the confusion probably be something like I make all these rules and I make all these things and if those rules don't really work right, I end up with a dysfunctional system

and then a Dowist would come in and say, "No, this is too rigid. You're imposing too much artificial conformity on people and it's going to [...] things up."

That's probably like the counterargument from like an Asian spirituality point of view. And I take that seriously obviously personally. you know, if it doesn't work right, you're going to have problems with it. And the Dowist challenge this a lot. So, that's probably one of the major things I would see to add to what VBR was talking about. I know what you think. I mean, we obviously we talk about this problem a lot in different ways and it's sort of a weird balance point then again because I thought about you being in the military on the one hand, we've had these conversations. You need to have a certain structure to make things work. You do think

Yes.

You know, if you can't put the structure in, nothing's going to work, right? Mhm. And then there's the Dowist kind of point of like, well, if you put too artificial of a structure in that's too rigid and doesn't allow things to flex enough, well, then you'll kill the spirit of things and then it [...] won't work. So, that's probably a critique.

Yeah.

Have that would be Chinese.

Vber Vber wrote things about Chinese culture. We're not doing stuff on that for the nouns at all, but I'll probably peique that at some point just to see what he said about that. M

but just to bring up like you know it's one of the dowist things that we talk about. So that might be another problem of this kind of thing

the you it's you almost have to have something to break out of. You know we've talked about this before. It's been a long time but you meaning the confusion folks saying you need rules and structures and and lines and boundaries versus the Dowist people who saying no we need free flow. you need to be in tune with the natural course of order. Um, you sort of have to have a balanced dance between the two because people are different and some will require one or the other to bring them balance and some will require one or the other to bring them liberation. So as as examples, you know, people who are feeling way too confined by the pressures of society or familial pressures or whatever, you know, if they don't have the sense of opportunity in the vastness of what could be, then they might feel very stuck, very very stuck,

you know, and not happy. Simultaneously, if somebody is in a place of deep despair, a depression if you will, right? And life is just sort of like seemed to escape them in some way, and now they're just sort of lost, floating, living in the basement of their mom's house of some type, you know, or or couch surfing with friends or relationship to relationship, just not really having their own sense of two feet on the ground. structure will help that person, you know, routine will help to bring them back to center, you know, in order to be able to help get them going the next day. You think of people who are depressed or people who have addiction or something like this, like you need to just be kind of like moment by moment. and this removal of any sort of rules, regulations, boundaries, it that the possibilities are infinite, yes, which is wonderful, but it's also scary for those folks because they're not they're not rooted in anything. They're just sort of floating by as things go along. So, I think together if you can find a balance between both of those, then that that's ultimately the the kind of like best kind of way for me, but I'm always going to take that cuz damn Capricorns want all the things. You know what I mean?

I tend to think of it like a little bit like a stages of the growth of a person. If your totally chaotic and [...] up, you need to put some stability on there.

Right. Otherwise, things will be too chaotic and you're almost like falling out the bottom of the barrel or something. Right.

Exactly. Yeah.

To hold your stuff together. Once you get to that point, okay, I can hold my stuff together now. I can think about jumping out a little bit. Right. I could be the fish jumping out of the water or the little bird that wants to fly up some more, right? And then I'm transcending a little bit more, right? And I can kind of start to play with the idea that I can transcend or play with some of this structure and get above it, then you're a tantric or a dowist or something, right? But if you can't hold your [...] together, that's true, right? It's hard to leap from total chaos to like up in the sky.

Throwback to develop over time, right?

Throwback from a book from a really long time ago, Eric. I don't know if you've ever read it. audience. I'm not sure if you're even tuned in at this point, you probably had the top three percentile of attention span of human beings ever. Um, Jonathan Livingston Seagull.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh-huh.

Yeah. So, for those who haven't read it, it's a very short read and there's pictures. It's like a 100 pages. Uh, Jonathan Livingston Seagull is exactly what you're talking about, Eric. Like wanting to fly a little bit higher and Jonathan Livingston Seagull is a seagull who wants to be an eag who wants to fly like an eagle,

you know.

Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Right. If you remember that. And so he gets uh flight lessons from like these like ascended birds, you know, and he is able to eventually, you know, spoiler uh fly in very specific patterns and transcends, you know, he's not just a normal uh seagull, but yeah,

I can't remember if like my dad always liked the old school singer Neil Diamond. He had to do a whole album on that.

Maybe I wouldn't remember like I think I remember driving in the car and I was like, is this Jonathan? Is this what this is supposed to be about? That might be a thing. I'll have to double check. One more thing before we totally check out and it'll it'll be the capper on the episode that will lead into the next one for anyone who hung around like you said.

Introduce it next time is like part of the reason why these things exist though. Why you have this legalistic rationalistic thing? If we go to like Chinese culture, Asian culture, right? Why did Confucious do this? Because it's how you hold [...] corruption down.

Have this the corruption goes crazy.

Yeah. So, you know, I'm a dowistminded person, but I can and I talk about it with students in my Chinese medical classes, but you have to like give respect to what he was trying to do. He said like can't hold corruption down until we get some buy in and consent about this otherwise this stuff is going to run psycho.

And I think that gets us to the moment where we're at now in like our own little land of the USA, right? like you need this kind of thing in order to hold that stuff at bay otherwise you'll get such abuses of power

right

which supposedly supposedly nobody likes

supposedly

yeah in theory

in theory I don't know

yeah but Vber's point will be previewing episodes to come will be if you take a step back and really try to understand this is what we're doing and even in the Asian context okay what's Confucious trying to do he's trying to come up with something where you can get control over abuses of power and cor and corruption. That's what he's trying to do in China, right?

You know, because you all these [...] warlords and all these like uh corrupt people, you know, we have to get them in check and that's why you come up with a system like this. But when we get to other sources of authority, they're going to try to fight this.

Yeah.

And that'll be the that's the foreshadowing of episodes to come and another three and a half years of our lives. But that's the question, right?

Yeah.

You know, how do these authorities fight one another? So, to be continued.

Yep. All right, brother. Well, thank you so much.

Thanks, Daniel, for the live conversation.

Yeah, of course. Audience,

sharing about your military experiences, too. I was curious.

Yeah. Yeah. Audience, thanks for tuning in. Uh, as always, you know, like, comment, subscribe, hit us up, jinantra@gmail.com. uh leave a comment in the YouTube section, hit us up on the Graham, the Jin and Tantonra podcast or if you know us, feel free send us a text message or an email or a handwritten letter because those actually to be honest are the best. Everything else is great. We'll take any of it. But uh those are the best. Top of the line. Let's go old school, not new school.

Yeah.

For Eric, this is Daniel. We'll catch you guys in the next one. Peace. [Music]