Rich Zeoli: Animal Farm by George Orwell | The Book Club | PragerU

[music] [music] Welcome back to the book club. I'm Michael Nolles. This month we are reading Animal Farm by George Orwell. All novels are equal, but some novels are more equal than others. I am joined by the host of the Rich Zoli Show. Can you guess his name? >> That would be Rich Zoli. Rich, thank you for being here. Michael, it's my honor. Thanks for having me. >> This has been a book on our minds to do for the book club since pretty much the very beginning. And I don't know how this show has been on for years and years at this point. And we are only just getting to it now. But this is a book I I think the first time I encountered it, I was in >> seventh grade or something like that. I think I think most people are. Why did you pick Animal Farm? I wanted to see how it would hold up after the fall of communism because obviously Orwell wrote this book to be a critique of communism and utopia in general. And I have to tell you, Michael, this book holds up >> better than ever really in this day and age because ism, which is really what the book is about, continues to be something that torments our society and torments human nature and behavior. So, and this book has everything. It's got action. It's got guns and gun battles. And it's it's got really great characters. It really is. It has everything. And it's a it's a quick read. >> So for those who haven't read it yet, shame on you. You could read this book in like 45 minutes >> honestly. >> But for those who haven't read it, >> one minute summary, what happens? >> A pig has a dream and in this dream he envisions this society where the animals all are in control of this farm. And uh he talks about all this before he dies and then years later the animals have a revolution on the farm and they overthrow Mr. Jones who's the farmer who owns runs the place. And then they establish their own order, so to speak. As time goes on, there are two pigs who are competing for power and control. Napoleon and Snowball. And then one day, Napoleon winds up becoming the dictator pig, the totalitarian fascist ruler of Animal Farm. And things begin to change. Suddenly now all the seven principles, there's seven laws that they had begin to change. There's propaganda. There's people that use intimidation and violence. Enemies are destroyed. And ultimately the book ends where the animals and the humans at which at one point they said we will never do business with humans are indistinguishable from each other. And there's so many lessons to this book but really at the end of the day it is a great adventure story about power and control. So George Orwell the author is a >> a democratic socialist he would call it. And it's very funny because a lot of right-wingers claim Orwell because he's pro- free speech. is anti-totalitarian, anti-censorship. And yet Orwell in Why I Write, one of his famous essays says, "Everything I've done since the Spanish Civil War is for the cause of democratic socialism as I understand it." >> Yes. >> And I think those words do a lot there because I don't think he understands socialism all that well. But he does see a lot about the human condition. And here he's writing about the human condition through all of these little animals. So it's an allegory. >> It's not a myth. It's not a particularly complex story. These animals map onto real historical figures. So, you mentioned you got this uh this visionary pig, Old Major. Old Major is Marx or Lenin or Marx and Lenin, the the visionary of the ideology of animal communism. Animalism is what it's called. >> And then you get these two other pigs who come up, Napoleon and Snowball. And they're both in power for a little bit, but then there's some sort of a power struggle. Snowball, also known as Trosky, gets sent away. Y >> and Napoleon, also known as Stalin, remains in power. And then they start to rewrite history. So all of a sudden, Snowball, this hero of the of the revolution of Old Manor Farm, he's he actually was a coward. He's a traitor. He's the cause of all the evil in the world. They can't find him anywhere. And as you say, they establish all these rules, but then they start to change the rules. >> So all animals are supposed to be equal. All humans are supposed to be bad. They have their communist songs. No animals are supposed to sleep in beds. You're not supposed to wear clothes. You're not supposed to drink booze. You're not supposed to smoke tobacco. >> But then the pigs start to they start to change the rules. >> Yeah. And this is really important to understand because their promise is utopia and they just you if you just work harder it's going to come to you. It's going to come to you. And history has changed to the point where they forget that maybe it wasn't so bad when it was Manor Farm before it became Animal Farm and the use of propaganda to essentially now with Napoleon who's the Stalin character in the book to glorify him. And he's infallible. He's right. You know if he if comrade Napoleon says it then it must be right. History is rewritten. Snowball, who at one point, to your point, Michael, was the hero, is now this this villain who's every problem they have is blamed on him. So if there's a shortage of food, it's because he snuck in at night and took it. Every problem in society on their farm is blamed on him. And >> even the wind, they build the windmill and but they build it so poorly. The walls are so thin, so when it falls down, they say, "It wasn't the wind. It wasn't our It wasn't our poor management of the economy and the state." >> Yes. >> It was snowball. He snuck in. Yeah. And you have to have a villain like that in society to rally everybody around so that they don't think of the shortcomings of the dictator. The other point too that's really I think good to acknowledge is that when you're looking at something like that, the propaganda value of that, you look about the Soviet Union when they had Chernobyl, massive obviously breakdown of their of their nuclear power plant. I mean this massive radiation spill. They don't tell the world about it because they don't want the world to know because to the outsider you have to glorify this communism. And the same thing in Animal Farm. They use propaganda to make everybody believe that everything in Animal Farm is great. So they're using propaganda internally and they're also using propaganda externally so that everybody just thinks it's it's it's a glorious utopia. It's also important to think about it in the context of a society that exists because there is no way for the people to claim control of anything. You have a dictator and this to in the book he uses these dogs to intimidate and silence other other animals. So they sometimes kill them and they had you know mass executions. He had the purges of all these animals that were loyal to Snowball. So he recreated Stalin's purges in this book and it it's a very scary and harrowing part of the book I think really well done in that sense of warning us and and to your point earlier about him being a democratic socialist. Do you remember in college how many times people would say the problem with communism is that it was never tried right? So you have Karl Marx's vision in the Communist Manifesto and then guys like us would bring up Castro and Shaver and we'd bring up Pod and Stalin and Mao and they would always come back to us and say, "Yeah, but they just never done it." Right. >> That was never true communism. >> Correct. Correct. And I think that was what Orwell's struggle is too. Here you when you read the Communist Manifesto, it's it sounds great. I mean it's wonderful. It's this idea that we could all be equal and everybody could just work according to their means and but it's not practical. It's not realistic. And I think Orwell comes to that understanding that utopia is not real. And once you acknowledge that then it's the whole house of cards falls down >> because this the villains here really are communists. It's not they're not Nazis. They're not >> Mussolini style fascists. Correct. It's the the real bad guys are is the Soviet Union. But the the Nazis and the Western liberals play a role too because one of the rules on the farm is we're not going to sell our product anymore to humans >> until they start to need some grub. And so they decide, okay, the the pigs are going to cut a deal. So they bring in these two humans from the neighboring farms. One is Frederick. Frederick with the German name is obviously Hitler. And the other one is it Pilington? I think Pilington is the western liberal. And so now they're doing business. And first, you know, they like the one, they hate the other. The other one's terrible and evil. And then >> then they flip >> just like, you know, the rip androp pact. You know, they decide, okay, no, actually Hitler's good now. But oh, then Hitler actually betrayed them and gave them false banknotes for for their product. So Hitler's bad again. We got we got to go get Hitler and we got to go. And the conclusion one takes though is for Orwell, all of these groups, the humans who originally owned the farm and would oppress the poor animals and the Nazi neighbor and even the Western liberal neighbor and the and the communist pigs. They're all kind of the same in the end. It's the It's the rulers and the oligarchs who rule for their own private benefit and the ruled. >> Mhm. >> And I think that's why this book holds up so well. Animalism, which is what really is communism, obviously with the time War's writing this, I mean, let's not mistake it. He wrote this to be a really strong critique of Soviet Union communism. This was 1946. Yeah. It was being glorified even in America. And of course, Stalin and Hitler at one point were buddies. And then obviously they weren't. But as you read this book, this could animalism, communism at the time is fascism, totalitarianism. It's whatever is that is used to drive people to take over power in the name of promising them something they can't deliver. Because really, I mean, they run the farm like a fascist fascistic system where it's central government. You know, they at one point Napoleon comes out and says, "From now on, there's no more meetings. me and my my pig buddies, we'll have a committee. We'll decide everything for all of you. That's fascist, right? That's you Mussolini, Franco Franco, still dead. Whatever it is, you know, they're in charge. They make the rules. And also the notion of ism, totalitarianism, where we are not going to give the people the ability to do anything about what we're doing. We're deciding for everyone. So, even though the Soviet Union has long fallen, this book holds up better now because I see so many people in our society in this day and age who would love to be able to control everybody under the guise of giving them a better life. So, they create their own villains in modern society. >> It's interesting, too. I I'm just observing when you're talking about it, you're speaking very much as Orwell might, which is it's it's literally a communist system. You're saying it's a practically a fascist system because it seems to me your view is >> fascism, communism, Nazism, >> they're all all these isms are kind of the same. They're all the same, >> which is which is Orwell's view. I I do think there are some distinctions between them. But I I think that's very much Orwell's conclusion here is even at the end when it's the the humans are cutting the deal in the house with the pigs, he's talking about the humans with their double chin, triple chin, and you got the pigs there. and he says, "You know, I was looking close and I couldn't even tell the difference between the pigs and the humans." >> Yeah. And that's how the book ends right there. Yeah. It's they become indistinguishable. >> There are people today who who have this debate between whether or not Nazism is on the right and communism is on the left. But really, if you look into the systems, they're very similar in terms of their control and what their I mean, it was Nazis were national socialists. That was their party. fascists, the same thing. I mean, it's it's all about convincing the people, give up your liberty, give up your rights, give up your property, turn over everything to the state, and we will provide for you. >> Even though the you know, I've certainly heard that analysis. However, Orwell takes it a step further because that that kind of analysis says, okay, there's control and freedom. You know, there's authoritarianism and liberalism. Say, yep. >> And the Nazis and the fascists and the communists are authoritarian, and we the liberals are are free. >> But Mr. Orwell puts Pilkington in the same boat. >> So, while this is obviously a critique of everything you've been saying, is it not also a critique of Western liberalism for cutting deals with the Nazis and the Communists and the Fascists? >> Yeah, which we did. >> Which we did. >> Which we did. And so the other problem I think with with western liberalism, if we're talking classical liberalism, not modern day liberals, but classical liberalism, is that you have to be devoted to adhering to the principles that you set forward. So let's think about our constitution for example, which is I look at it there's seven rules on animal farm. There's seven commandments is really their constitution and they change it as they need to. So they're living breathing. I was just going to say it's a living breathing document. So you can't sleep in beds with sheets. Yeah, >> that's one of the points you suddenly now it's and and they're rewriting this as they go for their needs versus if you have strict adherence to the constitution and you it's not a living breathing document that changes with the times to justify those in power and their needs at the moment. Then you have to adhere to the principles of classical liberalism. If you don't, then yeah, you are now going to go down the road of all these other isms and there's no difference because you're willing to betray your own values and principles for your own end and to enrich yourself. Well, and as they're adding these, you know, there are certain lines that that seem to be the kind of real motto of the farm. One of which is four legs good, two legs bad, two legs bad, as the as the sheep say. >> By the end though, they're saying no, no, it was never that. It was never really that. It's when the pigs start walking on two legs and really resembling humans. They say four legs good, two legs better. And then the motto of the farm that's so important that it's right here on the back of the book is the epigraph. >> All animals are equal. But they add, >> but some are more equal than others. >> Right? >> Probably the most famous line in the book. Something that that guys like us talk about all the time. We use that in in I mean it's referenced in society often. >> What's interesting is how the animals will think back and go I thought there was a rule against that. I don't remember now. And it's easy to think about in the context of controlling history. >> Y >> if you don't have a thorough command of history and how you're teaching it to children then they will forget and they will believe whatever is told to them. And this is why education is so important because we have a lot of educators obviously there who redefine history for their own purposes or they'll villainize people in history for their own purposes as well. I'm a father. I have a 10-year-old son. Um I actually got the graphic novel of Animal Farm which is authorized by the Orwell estate so that I could have my 10-year-old son read it because he loves graphic novels and it it it's terrific and a really important thing. I worry about this idea of now society embracing once again democratic socialism. We have politicians who are out there screaming about the oligarchy or the oligarchy in the case of Bernie Sanders. Uh and they're selling this to people. And one of the things about Orville is, you know, the animals are all in the house. The pigs are in in the house. They were forbidden to be in the house. They were forbidden to have all the the glories that the humans had. But they're drinking the booze and they're eating the great food and they're sleeping in beds and they're doing all the things because ultimately there are people who will convince the masses, hey listen, you got a really really rough so us. We'll bring you to utopia and they're getting rich off of all that. They're multi-millionaires in some cases. They're billionaires who are convincing the people just work harder, you'll have this one day. And then they're using their large s to enrich themselves and they're having a great life. They're flying first class. They're enjoying life and at some point the the laborers begin to wonder and go what are we doing here? Like what they keep promising all all this stuff to us and it never happens. >> Well, this is the the wisdom of the donkey. The donkey who says when the revolution first kicks off, >> doesn't get too excited, doesn't get too upset, just keeps going about his work, not volunteering to do extra work, just doing his job. And the other animals say, "Come on, what are you doing? Aren't you excited?" He says, >> "Donkeys are very old. None of you has ever seen a dead donkey. And so as all the changes take all the revolutions, all the great new hope right around the corner says, "Nope, it's we work, we toil, we suffer, and that's just kind of how it is." >> Yeah. Yeah. Because that's the reality of human nature is that life is tough, life is hard, and if somebody's out there selling you a utopia, you got to think very carefully about it. Well, what's the trade-offs to achieve this utopia? at the beginning of the book when you got Major out there telling everybody how wonderful life can be. It can be all these things for the animals. We can have all these things. The problem is that it's not realistic. And the reason why it's not realistic is human nature which is Orwell explores this in in all of his books really 1984 and Animal Farm being so preient especially how they hold up in today's day and age. But that's really the question Michael >> is the problem does the problem lie within us and not in our stars to quote Shakespeare >> is it inevitable that that human beings if we are not constrained when given power we will take power absolutely I think the answer to that is yes which is why it's so important for our constitution to be revered and followed because it is the guardrails that curbs that impulse of human nature towards the ism that will control people in the case of the founders ers obviously they're dealing with with a king who is a totalitarian who is an infallible king and they worried that our president could one day become that. So they put in these guard rails and their whole wisdom behind this was if you give people power inevitably they will want more of it and more of it and they will never give it up. We have to adhere to a document that creates rules to constrain human nature. the whims of factions where and and there's the in the book, you know, the Napoleon's very good at stirring up the masses and stirring up the animals and emotion and then curbing that emotion so that we use logic and reason to come to our conclusions. You know, you're making me think of one other way to put some guard rails on human behavior and the previously before we had revolutions and we relied so heavily on written constitutions and legal positivism and everything that's followed in modernity, it was religion. Yeah. >> Religion. I mean, even in even in a divine right monarchy, >> the king had to answer to God. That's that's a big final authority. And there is a religious character in in the book. The the raven, of course. Of course, it's the raven, you know, just [laughter] waiting to devour, pick off whatever flesh they can. And >> but but I guess that's a real oddity for for me as a conservative reading Orwell is they say, "This man is so concerned about restraining government action and these authoritarians." And yet the most reliable constraint for all of history on states he makes fun of. He mocks the raven who's always talking about sugar candy mountain where someday after you work really really hard for your whole lives then you'll get candy and sugar in the sky and so anyway keep working hard right now and it goes flits about. At one point Orwell says, you know, the raven still wasn't doing any work. You know, [laughter] he just goes in and out and so he's really mocking priests, mocking the whole idea of religion. But >> after seeing the horrors of the 20th century, >> communism, fascism, Nazism, all all the isms, >> doesn't that make you think maybe that religion wasn't so bad? Maybe we got to get that religion back here because if you thought religious societies were bad, just wait till you see irreligious societies. It's interesting how the critique of that becomes organized religion in if you were to follow the natural conclusion of things then whenever you've got people in power who are in control and then twist it again. So you think about some organized religions in Orwell's day who were able to manipulate the people in following them with false promises of things and because they they did not adhere to the original document, the Bible, the Ten Commandments, Genesis, the rules, Christ, they manipulate these things to fit their needs and then they tell people, "Follow me down this path and we'll bring you to utopia." We know there are societies that have done that. >> And so maybe it's a critique of that. >> Yeah. Yeah. No, of course he he obviously has a rather low view of uh or organized religion as by the way I prefer organized religion to disorganized religion. [laughter] You know, it's very chaotic really. >> Well, makes the tricky tray easier to understand, right? You know, >> but but yes, he's, you know, he's he's writing this as not just a great novelist for all time or something, but this is this is a political >> person. This is a journalist. This is someone very much writing about the affairs of his day. So then I wonder the fact that the book continues to age quite well after communism. What does that tell us about the affairs of our day? >> Yeah. >> That there will always be people who will strive for power and strive to have that power absolutely no matter what. And there will always be people who will be sheep who will go along with it and just say whatever they're told to say. And until the people wake up and say, "We're claiming this power back for ourselves," that's the inevitable end to every ism, unless people decide we're going to run things. And then the problem is that when they decide to run things, they go back to saying, "Okay, here are our principles." As time goes on, they don't hold on and adhere to those principles. Our constitution is based in religious liberty. It's based in individual liberty. It's based on natural law. It's based on this idea that while we have a tendency towards assuming power, people are ultimately capable of governing themselves. I mean that's that was a very unique idea at the time of the founding of this country. Obviously it was it was revolutionary but that's a that's a positive this idea that we can really govern ourselves if if we have the controls in place. Be it that you believe that that God is there, be it that you adhere to the constitution, be it that you adhere to natural law, then we can do it. The problem always becomes, and this is why the American experiment is so glorious because it's it's worked now for 250 years. These other isms, it doesn't happen that way. And part of the reason is I think fundamentally they're not based on real solid principles. They're based on adherence to a person, an individual. a person or in this case a pig but a human or a animal figure versus principles that outlive the person. It pains me to side too much with Orwell here, but looking at our government, certain wonderful figures exempted uh one uh slightly orange colored figure in [laughter] particular who I think is really excellent for American history. But just looking broadly at our government, >> yeah, >> even in the great American experiment of self-government and all the rest, uh, have we not wound up with some pigs of our own who are stashing all the goods for themselves and rewriting the laws? And I mean is Orwell's critique here not just of communism which it obviously is in particular but is he not is he not taking the the position of the donkey which is you know donkeys are very old and these things happen again and again and again and to quote another great American the fundamental things apply as time goes by. Is this not is this are we really able to escape cycles of history and politics or no matter how innovative we think we are, no matter what geniuses we think we are, no matter how perfect a constitution we have, are we going to end up in in what would call anclosis, you know, the cycle of regimes where those fat pigs are going to come and take our stuff from us again? >> Yeah. Of all the farms in all the world, right? We have people who are literally feeding at the at the TR, right? Who are making they're millionaires. They're multi-millionaires. They're >> Hold on. Are you You're telling me that Nancy Pelosy's stock portfolio doesn't outperform all the indexes because of her financial genius. Is that >> genius? >> She's Yeah, she's the Warren Buffett of Congress. >> You You have a You have a a a guy claiming to be a Democrat socialist who used to rail on millionaires and billionaires, Bernie Sanders. Now he's just railing against the billionaires because he's a multi-millionaire. Uh, yes. And if you think about the 1940s, I wonder if Orwell watched as Franklin Delanor Roosevelt decided to do things like court packing, the expansion of the executive branch running for a third term >> and a fourth term. And a fourth term, right? The massive expansion of the executive state. I wonder if he watches Woodro Wilson did it. I wonder if he watches Woodro Wilson who who was a a socialist and by all accounts all the people around him were. They they socialism had a bad name in Europe at the time of the 19s. So they decided to call themselves the progressives different from Teddy Roosevelt progressivism as you know and Woodra Wilson and the progressives the socialists carve out this idea of a society again and the League of Nations and all the other nonsense which ultimately results in the the presidency becoming more powerful and we go to war. A war that he promised to keep us out of. Here comes the 1940s and is he watching as as Roosevelt is also expanding his own power and at the same time he's he is part of glorifying the communist system in many respects and creating ideas for people at social security and health benefits and all the other benefits that you'll get from our government is Orwell also critiquing that and could see that we're going down this road and you look at it today I mean they'll use concepts to convince people, the 1619 project of privilege, whatever it is, you must adhere to the government and we'll give you scraps. We we'll give you more hay, more apples like they give to the animals at Animal Farm. We'll give you more things. But you got to remember the real the true villain is out there. It's snowball a pig. It's white privilege. It's whatever it is. >> And you want to talk about precience, the the most heart-wrenching moment of the book, which somehow we hadn't gotten to yet. Boxer. >> Yeah. >> The good hardworking horse. He just he'll he's breaking his bones to just work harder and harder and harder and he's going to go retire at age 12 and he injures himself right before he's going to retire. But he says, "It's okay. I've been your hardest worker. I' i've done everything you've told me to do. I've believed everything you told me to believe and now I'm going to my retirement." And what do the pigs do? >> They they give him his healthcare. >> Mhm. >> And his healthcare is to ship him off to the glue factory and kill him. And it it's kind of funny in a dark way when you read it the first time until you realize that's Canadian healthcare today. >> Yeah, >> that's there in the United States in in a number of states that's healthcare today. When you get old and feeble and sick, >> the the way that the liberals want to help you >> is they kill you. Yeah. >> And they call it euthanasia. They say it's a great thing. >> Orwell saw that coming back in 1946. >> Yeah. And the glue the glue truck comes up, you know, the horse slaughter wagon. And they and they tell, "No, no, no. It's just the guy bought it. The the veterinarian, he just forgot to paint it. It's all good. Don't worry about it." It's absolutely true. None of the animals are ever able to retire and live their life after the promises. The promises were not there. Think of how much of our own system right now is is toing towards bankruptcy, pension funds, and also just our our own national debt, how it's crushing. And will social security be there in the future? The these are concepts that we're still even weighing. Will we be able to retire one day, Michael? >> Right. Of course. >> You sell enough cigars? And I hope I hope the answer to that is yes. >> And all all I really need in retirement is cigars anyway. So I get a few Mayflower cigars. We'll be >> You and I could be out the pasture together just smoking away. Talk about the good old days when we had free speech. And >> but Orwell writes about this. He says directly, he says they all were entitled to a pension at the appropriate retirement age. No one had ever actually gotten one, but they were all entitled. This reminds me of Scalia. When I was a student, I got to meet Scalia in the Supreme Court, which was great. >> One of my heroes. >> And Scalia said, we asked him about the Bill of Rights. He said, "Who cares about the Bill of Rights? >> You should be talking about the Constitution, the actual structures of your government." He said, "Every tinpot dictator has a bill of rights a mile long." >> Yeah. >> That that's not what protects your way of life. It's the actual structures of your government, the way the society operates. That's what's that's what's really going to protect your liberties. Orwell is so associated with these ideas that his name has become a term of injury in in English. We say >> well such and such politicians program such and such government is Orwellian. >> Yes. >> That's not even his name. >> No. No. It's Eric Blair. >> Eric Blair. >> Eric Blair. >> What a weak name. >> Blair just doesn't have the same ring to it as Orwellian. >> Did Did he know? Talk about his preference. Did he know that someday his name would become a buy word? He said we can't have people saying blurrerian. Blarian. So what Orwellian? What if you had to give a concise definition? What does it mean? >> When someone says that's Orwellian, it is the idea that whatever the program is, whatever we're talking about, you're going to have to give up your liberty in exchange for the state taking care of you. Securing your safety, for example. You have to give up your fourth amendment rights to secure your liberty. You have to give up your guns to secure your your liberty. You have to give up your speech. We need hate speech laws. Anything that requires you as a person to give up your liberty which is given to you by your creator to the state in exchange for something is in my mind is Orwellian because it never results in more freedom or more liberty. It always results in the state weaponizing that against the people. So whatever liberty we give up in the name of keeping us safe, for example, they'll turn around and weaponize it on us and they'll they'll they'll spy on us >> Orwellian. >> And it it seems to go deeper even than just a kind of authoritarian >> state to to a true totalitarian state. You know, an authoritarian government is kind of like Franco had an authoritarian government where he'd say, "Hey, >> stay in line. Do this. Don't do this. And we'll basically leave you alone." Yeah, >> Stalin had a totalitarian government. Mao had a totalitarian government. You're going to rat on your neighbors. You're going to believe what we tell you to believe. We're going to brainwash you. We are every aspect of life, your most private parts of your life are going to be consumed by propaganda and the state. Such that as as Orwell says in 1984, if the state tells you that up and up is down and left is right and we've always been at war with East Asia, >> you have to believe it. even if it wasn't true 5 seconds ago. That degree of control is really terrifying because ultim someone can throw me in prison. They can't really take away my ultimate liberty because I still have the liberty of my mind, the liberty of my spirit, the liberty of my conscience, you can't make me sin. In other words, >> yeah. >> But if you force me to live in lies, if I am no longer even to use my faculties of reason, the very thing which distinguishes me as human, you have robbed me of even the most basic liberty I could have. >> 2 plus two equals >> five. I was reliably told >> a man can be a woman. >> Certainly. >> You have to walk around with that lie otherwise you are part of the problem. So there are >> I wouldn't want to be hateful. >> Right. Right. Exactly. Right. and your speech must be censured and you can't can't be hateful and you can't put out misinformation or disinformation. All of these ideas when you have are forced to live a lie. Truth for its own sake is so important. When you are forced to live a lie, the society tells you to. So in the case of Animal Farm, it's that Napoleon is right. Whatever he says is right. In the case of Animal Farm, the state says it, it's right. We'll rewrite history accordingly. We'll put up propaganda. The songs that you used to sing where we no longer sing those songs. Now you sing those songs. You'll go and say these things. You will rat out your neighbors and ultimately you will be killed before everybody if you wind up betraying us. You are forced to live a lie. You are forced to comply with that because they can't have free will. You can't have people be free or they will overthrow the system. That's why I don't think it's depressing really in the end because as long as we have the individual liberty to be able to if necessary like Thomas Jefferson talked about to be able to overthrow these systems then we'll be okay. If we can then maintain the same principles we said I don't revolution work out for old man or farm didn't work problem right and that's and the founders would be appalled today if they came back and saw to the to's point how our government is how I mean the fact that the executive article 2 they make the laws now visav rules they promulgate and they tell you oh no it's not a law it's just a rule carries jail time and fines if you break it but it's just a rule it's not a law Michael uh and we have to go along with that lie >> I know I sometimes wonder if if Washington could come back now really many of the founding fathers and they looked around they'd say you know what never mind we'll pay the stamp tax it's okay forget about the tea tariffs all right >> but isn't that like yeah but isn't that like was like with Jones it's like was it was it really that bad when Jones was around when it was manner form I mean I don't know was it that bad like I don't remember so >> well I think we have to leave it there because if we think anymore about how these cycles of politics go on I'm going to become too depressed about every system of government, but we'll have to have you back at some point in the future to talk about some other book. >> Would love that. >> Rich, thanks for being here. >> Michael, thank you. It's an honor. >> We'll see you next time on the book club. I'm Michael Nolles. Happy reading. >> Thank you so much for watching this episode of the book club on Prageru. Prageru is a 501c3 nonprofit organization, so we rely on donations from viewers like you to keep this content on the air. Please consider making a taxdeductible contribution today to help keep this content coming. Thank you very much.