Transcript
Speaker: Hey everybody, welcome to the exit podcast.
Speaker: This is Dr. Bennett.
Speaker: I got Brett Kane here.
Speaker: Brett is an exit member, a writer and poster beloved in our corner of Twitter, gentleman of leisure, soldier of fortune.
Speaker: He also runs our content creation call on Saturday.
Speaker: So I wanted to get him on, just talk about his experience in publishing and what it's been like to be on that call.
Speaker: So welcome Brett.
Speaker: Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker: This is an absolute honor.
Speaker: Great to have you.
Speaker: Great to have you.
Speaker: So, yeah, tell me a little bit about the content call.
Speaker: What's that been like for you?
Speaker: You know, the content call, it's been really great to see the variety of creators that we have in Exit.
Speaker: because you have guys who are really well-versed in entrepreneurship, who are trying their hand at writing a book, for example, or you might have someone who is really into the fitness side who wants to expand with a YouTube channel.
Speaker: I thought that we were going to have a little bit more narrow in terms of just creative writing
Speaker: But it's everything from podcasting to videography.
Speaker: And we've got lots of artists.
Speaker: There's so much.
Speaker: And it's really cool to see.
Speaker: And I think that having, well, you've talked about this before on the podcast today.
Speaker: that when you have a lot of kids, they're easier to manage in groups.
Speaker: And I think when you have a lot of creators, it's easier to fuel those creative fires in groups.
Speaker: And that's what I love about the call.
Speaker: Yeah, it's way easier to...
Speaker: Like, um, first of all, just the effort of, of reading all the content, there's so much to read.
Speaker: And so having, being able to kind of split the workload and have, and have people read each other's stuff and offer critiques that way.
Speaker: Um, it's a really easy way to, to be useful to each other.
Speaker: And, and, and you do, you get, you get radically different takes, um,
Speaker: And, but, but they're like, I was sort of expecting lots of, lots of takes and not always necessarily good takes, but they're, but they're great.
Speaker: Like it's a, it's a lot of feedback that wouldn't have occurred to me and, and different directions to take, you know, work of fiction or, or different sort of
Speaker: personas you could put on for like, like one of the guys is doing his his YouTube channel focused on fitness and the different personas you could put on to attack that problem.
Speaker: It's really it's really fun to talk to the guys.
Speaker: Oh, absolutely.
Speaker: And it's, it's really cool to see because I think it's it's taking people out of their comfort zones.
Speaker: And it's also
Speaker: right in the middle of some people's comfort zones, but everyone's getting a good stretch.
Speaker: Everyone's trying new things.
Speaker: Everyone's getting some good ideas.
Speaker: And it's, you know, it's a highlight of my week.
Speaker: You know, I would love to see even more people on there.
Speaker: And we get guys who, who aren't necessarily creating too much of their own, but they want to be there in, in a support role.
Speaker: which is really cool to see and we get guys who are very consistently you know reading everything critiquing everything and that's that's been awesome to see I and everyone I think has gotten better in a very short while in terms of of their output and and also quality of work.
Speaker: Yeah, and I chose you to run that call because you're a published author yourself.
Speaker: You had a deal for a while with Deseret Book to publish your content.
Speaker: Tell us a little bit about how you got started in that game.
Speaker: Yeah, that's a great question, you know, and I feel so bad talking about this because it literally fell into my lap.
Speaker: And I know that's not the reality for most writers and in fact, better writers than me.
Speaker: I think it just came at the right time.
Speaker: So I had been working on a story.
Speaker: I had been posting a couple of chapters here and there on something called Wattpad and
Speaker: one of my other published friends saw it and said, Hey, you know, this is publishable.
Speaker: So she got in touch with her publisher and they wanted to publish it just as an ebook.
Speaker: And so we were working on a deal there.
Speaker: And then at the same time I had sent out the manuscript to, to a desert book and their sister company covenant communications and didn't hear anything back.
Speaker: And I thought, Oh, well, that's too bad.
Speaker: But then six months later, they reached out and said, hey, we want your book.
Speaker: I said, great.
Speaker: And so I got an editor.
Speaker: I talked to some of the people there.
Speaker: And I've got to visit them at their headquarters in American Fork a couple times.
Speaker: And yeah, I had a great deal.
Speaker: They've published two of my books.
Speaker: They're still for sale, but a little bit of a falling out.
Speaker: So they're probably not going to pick up.
Speaker: my next couple books in this series.
Speaker: So it's, it's a kind of a thriller mystery series that I've got going.
Speaker: Well, I know you said that it fell into your lap, but I mean, you were also producing the content and you were networking with people who were connected.
Speaker: Like, I mean, it wasn't, it wasn't effortless, right?
Speaker: Yeah, that that's true.
Speaker: And, and I thought it was a,
Speaker: pretty good story.
Speaker: And what I've, what I tell everyone to do is get really good at the elevator pitch.
Speaker: You know, if you can, if you can sell something in 30 seconds or less, that's the way to do it.
Speaker: And, and it doesn't have to be complicated.
Speaker: It just has to be interesting.
Speaker: So I wanted something that was in the genre, but a little bit different because desert book has tons of
Speaker: you know, murder mysteries and thrillers and certainly on a more national market that's, you know, a dime a dozen.
Speaker: But I wanted someone who was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who, you know,
Speaker: knew how to fight, but didn't have, you know, all these vices, you know, you see a lot of these kind of hard-boiled detectives who are on their third divorce and are, you know, addicted to cocaine or, you know, just all these kind of cliche things.
Speaker: And I want something a little bit different.
Speaker: And certainly the publishers had me change a few things.
Speaker: And they had just a great team of editors, really cool cover designers.
Speaker: But yeah, I wanted to ask you that too.
Speaker: How deep did they cut you up when they edited you?
Speaker: Oh, you know, really, really not too badly.
Speaker: My editor, Cammy, is awesome.
Speaker: I'm still in touch with her.
Speaker: And there's a lot of people on that team who I still really like.
Speaker: So it wasn't too bad.
Speaker: Like there was, you know, I'll try not to spoil anything for people who might not have read it.
Speaker: But there is, there's a final fight.
Speaker: And originally, I was going to have
Speaker: my main character kill this bad guy and they're like that's a little gratuitous so I was like okay I'll you know I'll go the Batman route and like that's his one thing is he doesn't kill anybody and I think it made the story better and I really like fighting so I had a lot of fight scenes and and Cammie my editor one time she asked me she's like does everybody need henchmen I'm like well I guess not and so
Speaker: There were a couple of fight scenes that I took out and I think any changes they recommended were improvements.
Speaker: So I think it's a much better story because of them.
Speaker: So I think it is good to have editors who aren't necessarily yes men and taking those suggestions and not being so stuck and so rigid.
Speaker: Well, what you mentioned, the two things that you mentioned were like plot beats, like story elements.
Speaker: Did they have a lot to say style-wise?
Speaker: Great question.
Speaker: No, they really didn't.
Speaker: Mostly what they would do is they would have me look at the feedback and then they would have a team of beta readers.
Speaker: And it was pretty conflicting.
Speaker: I mean, obviously there's no way to please everybody.
Speaker: But some people really liked the first person narrative style.
Speaker: Other people didn't.
Speaker: And so it was, there were times when I said, you know, I'd actually really rather keep this.
Speaker: And then there were times where, you know, we would kind of push back and forth.
Speaker: But overall, they were very true to the story.
Speaker: Sometimes, you know, I thought, hey, I'd like to go, you know, third person.
Speaker: And Cam was like, well,
Speaker: it's a series and it's already been in first person.
Speaker: So stick with first person.
Speaker: So things like that, where they're, you know, recommending not branching out too far, but stylistically, no, they, they, they liked it.
Speaker: And then they were also very complimentary of improvements from the first book to the second.
Speaker: So that was cool to see.
Speaker: It's a very organic and it's cool to see things grow.
Speaker: Did you get a sense that they were,
Speaker: hungry for content or were they like, you know, our way or the highway?
Speaker: You know, they, they, I mean, yeah, yeah, no, I, I mean, they, they get so many submissions.
Speaker: So I, I don't think that they were, were so desperate that, that they,
Speaker: David Price- Needed me and they're they're pretty flexible, and if I could sell it, I said, well, you know I get what you're saying, but the reason I want to keep it is you know, a B and C yeah and I think so it was a very collaborative and and.
Speaker: David Price- I mean we we'd message on.
Speaker: you know, via text, we'd send emails, you know, we'd call, visit in person.
Speaker: So it wasn't like a faceless organization.
Speaker: And that's why I appreciate a little bit of a smaller organization.
Speaker: publisher and I think smaller publishers is really the future you know you have like the big five that and anyone could name off the top of their heads but I really view publishing kind of like uh the video industry and you know you get these huge publishers and they're like Hollywood video or blockbuster and then you get in these little you know uh
Speaker: smaller publishers that are like the Netflix, you know, when it started out.
Speaker: And I think eventually we'll see a lot more in, and even self-publishing is a certainly viable option and it's not stigmatized like it used to be.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: The quality of, of self-published stuff and the, and the value of the big publishers as a gatekeeper has really collapsed.
Speaker: I mean, I don't know how much, you know, guys like BAP and Mike Ma,
Speaker: and Mystery Grove.
Speaker: It's tempting to feel like kind of the whole world revolves around our little corner of Twitter, but I really do think that those guys have kind of blown a hole in that wall and lots of people are coming through it.
Speaker: As a matter of fact, like the last three books I think I read were self-pubs from friends of ours.
Speaker: And so I'm reading, I finished The Glass Factory by Braxton McCoy and did that interview with him.
Speaker: I just started Breakfast with the Dirt Cult.
Speaker: Have you read that yet?
Speaker: Oh, no, I haven't.
Speaker: I need to get on that.
Speaker: I think that's very much in your lane.
Speaker: Yeah, I'll have to pick that up.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: It's another GWAT war memoir.
Speaker: Um, but, but, uh, but BAP talks about it very highly and other friends of mine that are, that are vets say it's really good.
Speaker: So that's, uh, that's what I'm digging into right now.
Speaker: He's I'm only on the first chapter.
Speaker: He's, uh, he's fallen in love with a stripper and it's, uh, it's well written.
Speaker: It's really good.
Speaker: David O' You know it's really cool a Jocko willing obviously you know prolific author and a lot of his publishers you know didn't like the direction he was going with kids books and you know he started his own publishing company and and.
Speaker: It's cool to see and I think there's a lot of value in diversifying and even if you're not like the people listening to this don't consider themselves a writer.
Speaker: I always tell everyone, everybody can write and everybody can draw and even if it doesn't become a New York Times bestseller.
Speaker: It's, you know, wholly yours, it's wholly unique and no one else is going to be able to recreate that perfectly.
Speaker: Well, so Jordan Peterson has this take where he says that writing is indistinguishable from thinking.
Speaker: And which is pretty rough on all these people that don't feel like they're very good writers.
Speaker: But I think there's something to that where the challenge of writing, I don't think it's indistinguishable from thinking.
Speaker: But I think that it is a particularly organized form of thinking that you can learn how to do and that's super valuable to learn how to do.
Speaker: Especially this like discursive, like thinking about an argument and then anticipating responses to it and responding to those responses and so on and so forth.
Speaker: Having a conversation kind of inside your own mind
Speaker: about a topic can really help you, you flesh it out.
Speaker: And like when I, when I write for the sub stack, I'm almost always, I don't know where I'm going.
Speaker: And, and the writing is, is partly like, I'm trying to create some content for other people to read.
Speaker: But a big part of it is like, I need to, I need to vomit this out onto the page so that I can look at it.
Speaker: and, you know, get visibility on where I'm actually at on this.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: It really helps you detach, you know, if you have all these ideas, you know, swarming in your head, as soon as you kind of concentrate those and get that out and make it tangible, it's really cool.
Speaker: And if you read, you know, books and think, oh, man, I wonder what the author was thinking when he or she wrote this.
Speaker: And
Speaker: And even, you know, look at the scriptures, for example, you know, in the Book of Mormon, we have second Nephi chapter four, and it's often called the Psalm of Nephi.
Speaker: And it's kind of a prayer.
Speaker: It's kind of a journal entry.
Speaker: It's kind of, you know, but it's really almost like a stream of consciousness where he's thinking and he's like talking himself through just having lost his father and all the
Speaker: the difficulties that he's dealing with.
Speaker: And that's why I think journaling is the best catalyst for writing either creatively or if you're writing an article.
Speaker: And you yourself are a phenomenal author and you're one of the smartest men I know.
Speaker: So I'm really glad to read anything you write.
Speaker: Well, I think journaling in particular
Speaker: there's something about taking for me, it's about, it's about taking a memory and like carving it in ruins on the rock, like to take, to take a memory that I know is going to decay in my mind and making it as hard and crisp and permanent as I can on the page.
Speaker: And it's,
Speaker: It's interesting because, you know, abstract thinkers and concrete thinkers write very differently.
Speaker: And I don't know if you remember when Adam Ebertz, a mutual friend of ours, told his story about burning down the palm orchard outside his high school.
Speaker: He's a concrete thinker, and they're very, like, present and in the moment and good with details.
Speaker: And...
Speaker: I am, I am extraordinarily like absent-minded and like, I'm, I'm the type of guy who will be driving somewhere and, and like sort of come back online and realize that I don't recall anything of the last like 30 minutes of the drive.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, um,
Speaker: And so like for me, accessing that kind of detail is really, really difficult.
Speaker: And it's easier for me with personal detail, like details of things that my daughter said or details of relationships and how we're feeling.
Speaker: But like trying to remember the exact like color of the water or the
Speaker: the smell or you know what I'm saying?
Speaker: Like that's really hard for, for, for me to capture.
Speaker: And I really try to do that when I journal.
Speaker: And that's like, it's, it's, it's, I don't call it like, I think a gratitude journal is kind of a, I don't know, it's kind of girly, but, but, but there is something to acknowledgement.
Speaker: that you're in a moment that's not gonna come back.
Speaker: And that you'll lose it if you don't write it down.
Speaker: That's really true.
Speaker: And for me, and I'm sure this is true for lots of other people, it's discouraging if let's say you started out at the beginning of the year and you were really good and you wrote every day,
Speaker: Oh, but then, you know, a couple of weeks, a month or two, you know, has gone by and there's so much that you wish you had recorded and you kind of want to backtrack and, and recall everything you can.
Speaker: Oh, but then, you know, new stuff is happening.
Speaker: So you're just kind of stymied and, and, you know, you don't have to catch every single raindrop.
Speaker: You just have to fill up a bucket, you know, like, and so I think that, and it's interesting.
Speaker: My, my brother-in-law told me what,
Speaker: when I went to serve as a missionary, he told me to write every day.
Speaker: And I tried to do that.
Speaker: And sometimes I would only get like one sentence and like fall asleep.
Speaker: And you can see like the line from the pen on the page.
Speaker: Sometimes I just wrote today was a good day and that's it.
Speaker: And that habit is really strong.
Speaker: I would say, I would say partway through high school, all of my mission, and then probably for
Speaker: maybe until like a year into my marriage, I was, I was pretty good about writing every day.
Speaker: And of course I just had more time.
Speaker: So now it's more like once a month, but well, and I also, it's funny because like, I have so much more going on.
Speaker: And so there's so much more that I wish I was, you know, I got five kids.
Speaker: And so like,
Speaker: when I think about all the things that I could capture about each one of them, like they're a whole like world under themselves.
Speaker: And I had this moment on the plane.
Speaker: We, I just, I just flew to the Bay area for a, for a meetup with the guys.
Speaker: And I was looking out the window and it was like, it was clouds almost the entire country.
Speaker: I flew from DC to the Bay and it was clouds almost the entire way.
Speaker: Couldn't see land at all.
Speaker: And I was thinking like, this is a view.
Speaker: How many people in history got to see above the clouds, got to see this view, this, like it, I remember when I was a kid, the first couple of times I flew, it was like being in a different world.
Speaker: Like there's different land masses and different, like it's, it's, uh, well, anyway, I, I, uh,
Speaker: I thought, you know, I'm not going to watch a movie.
Speaker: I'm just going to watch these clouds.
Speaker: But it was a five hour flight.
Speaker: And you realize that like, you just don't have the capacity to appreciate.
Speaker: So one of our guys in the group just had a baby.
Speaker: And he's like feeling really overwhelmed with, with being a dad and all the things he needs to do.
Speaker: And I can distinctly remember my first kid and, and, and being like, I have to be making eye contact with this kid nonstop so that I can remember this so that I can capture this.
Speaker: Um, and the fact is, you know, in hindsight, they're just like all my other memories.
Speaker: It's, it's, you know, little bits and bobs, little images, little words.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: You're not big enough.
Speaker: This stream of beautiful things, no matter what it is, is just gonna pass through you and you're not gonna be able to capture the whole thing.
Speaker: And so you just sort of have to content yourself with accepting the piece of it that you can accept and being grateful for it.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: And I mean, what a beautiful,
Speaker: example because you know today your kids are never going to be the same exactly the same as they are today right now or right now and like those clouds there's never going to be an exact formation of those clouds uh
Speaker: like what you saw, you know, mountains are always beautiful, but, you know, generally they stay pretty much the same, you know, the forest, you know, the ocean, it's always changing, but, you know, you kind of get a similar coastline, but clouds especially, and that's one of the most beautiful things.
Speaker: Dieter Fuchdorf, you know, he talks a lot about how when we create, you know, that is a very godly thing to do, a very godlike thing to do, and, you know, I think sometimes we try and
Speaker: hold on to things too tight.
Speaker: So it does end up slipping through our fingers instead of, you know, just like cupping our hands and trying to drink a little bit of that water.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But that's the beautiful thing about God is that the past, present, future are continually before him.
Speaker: And for us, it's not like that.
Speaker: And that's one of the values of journaling.
Speaker: Sorry, I cut you off there.
Speaker: No, but it is, it's a connection to
Speaker: it's not well, your journal is not eternal.
Speaker: It's not infinite, but it's you reaching out for the infinite.
Speaker: You know, it's you, it's you trying to make it eternal if you can.
Speaker: Um, and I think that's, uh, that's an interesting little piece of like our theology that I think is different from the mainstream is like the idea of the idea of reaching out for the infinite and the eternal reaching out to, uh,
Speaker: to try to understand God and try to be like God is, I think a lot of them view that as hubristic and we're like, no, that's just, it's like, I want to be like dad.
Speaker: I want to, you know, that's, I want to be like him when I grow up, you know?
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, and, and that's the cool thing, you know, like our, our reach does exceed our grasp and, and that's, that's a beautiful thing.
Speaker: You know, I look, I look back at my journals and like in high school,
Speaker: And it's so funny because what I thought was so important to remember, you know, is, is really not, not that important nowadays, but, but it wasn't important to me then.
Speaker: Like, I remember like transcribing text messages that I got from girls, you know, because like, oh, I, cause I knew I couldn't keep them on my phone forever, but it's like, oh, wow, this, this girl that I like, you know, she,
Speaker: said that.
Speaker: And of course, you know, it's, it's meaningless nowadays, but I think it is going to be valuable.
Speaker: You know, I read my parents' journals from when they were in college or whatever, and it's interesting to see.
Speaker: And that's, you know, I look at all these volumes that we have of correspondence between famous people, you know, we have their journals or their letters that they wrote.
Speaker: But we don't really have that for ourselves in terms of
Speaker: You know, we probably haven't kept every single birthday card that we've received or, you know, people who have gotten a note from us probably didn't preserve that.
Speaker: But things like this podcast or our journals are going to be of more value for our children and our posterity, I think, than even, you know, our tweets or our Facebook posts or whatever.
Speaker: Well, that's an interesting segue because I wanted to talk to you about the experience and I don't know how much you want to talk about sort of getting canceled, but there's two sides to that coin, right?
Speaker: One of which is that your thoughts and your visions and your dreams and aspirations can be immortalized, but also all of your goofs
Speaker: And all of the things you said that could potentially get you in trouble, whether you stand by them or not, are immortalized.
Speaker: I was talking to a client this morning about the inhibitions that come with posting under your real name.
Speaker: Because you're thinking like, I'm going to, you know,
Speaker: my daughter's going to see this, you know, or, or my boss is going to see it or whatever.
Speaker: And I think, um, there's definitely, and I, you know, I know that you've always been Brett Kane, like from the beginning.
Speaker: Um, but there's definitely like things you learn from like taking a
Speaker: driving down the switchback at 120 miles an hour and being like reckless that are, that are easier to learn, I think when you're a non.
Speaker: And so this client of mine, I was like, you know, if you, if you want to learn how to be like wild on Twitter and, and like, and like uninhibited, you know, and, and, you know, goof around with the fellas and,
Speaker: you should probably try an Anon account.
Speaker: And I wanted to get your take on the eternal Anon versus face fag debate.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: And to go back to kind of the first question, and I feel bad saying that I got canceled because certainly I
Speaker: anything I've ever dealt with pales in comparison to, you know, the things that you and some of our other friends have gone through with very significant impacts and far reaching second order consequences.
Speaker: Well, OK, OK.
Speaker: But you but you love to write and you had achieved this dream of being a published author that a lot of us, you know, including myself, have have really wanted.
Speaker: And that got taken from you, so I don't want to minimize that.
Speaker: I appreciate that.
Speaker: Yeah, and, you know, it definitely inspires me to do more and to work harder.
Speaker: Orson Scott Card, he taught one of my creative writing classes, and...
Speaker: And he actually swore at me.
Speaker: He read some of my stuff.
Speaker: You know, this was years ago, but he said, like, this is crap.
Speaker: You know, he didn't say crap, but it was it was the exact motivation I needed to do more.
Speaker: And this is the same thing.
Speaker: You know, and obviously, you know, you're a good example of, you know, not, you know, withdrawing into your shell and and.
Speaker: and cowering under the onslaught, you just picked up and did something different and did something better than what you were doing before.
Speaker: So that's the way I want to go with this.
Speaker: But yeah, I think the Anon and the FaceFag is, it's two sides of the same coin.
Speaker: I've got a lot of friends who are anonymous and I think that there's utility in that.
Speaker: um but but i always get excited like when i feel like i know these people in real life and i've always been very open and that's just my personality but like i've i've posted my cell phone number on on twitter you know multiple times and and giving it to to random people and to uh to pick a fight if i remember correctly yeah yeah absolutely yeah it's like here's my here's my number let's meet me at this corner and we'll we'll settle it
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And, and always friendly.
Speaker: Like I, I think friendly fights are, are something that, uh, need to come back if, if we're going to reclaim society.
Speaker: And I think from, you know, for kids, especially, uh, they should have friendly fights all the time, you know?
Speaker: And I, I think that it would definitely help adults get in better shape if they knew that, you know, they might have to, to scrap with, with one another at a given moment.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: You mean friendly, but like to settle disputes.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: And when I say friendly, like whenever I fight somebody and I've fought people in the ring, I've fought people out of the ring, I'm never looking to maim or even really hurt them.
Speaker: You know, I just I love to fight and it's not even enmity.
Speaker: But did you ever see the movie Kingdom of Heaven with Orlando Bloom and Liam Neeson?
Speaker: been a long time there's a great line you know and we've got obviously the granite mountain movie podcast we'll have to to talk about this one but there's a part where these bad guys are trying to arrest the character balian uh and there's they say oh he killed a priest and then there's this german you know super super strong guy and he says uh
Speaker: I say he's innocent of the charge.
Speaker: You say he's guilty.
Speaker: Let's fight and God will decide the truth of it.
Speaker: And I think that is how like we should settle everything.
Speaker: Like let's fight and God will decide who's right by who wins.
Speaker: And I say that kind of tongue in cheek, but, but I, I really do think that.
Speaker: And, and so far nobody has taken me up on settling scores, you know, with, with fisticuffs, but,
Speaker: But hopefully, I'm very hopeful.
Speaker: So I will continue to post my number for friends and foes alike.
Speaker: But no, I do think anonymity is useful.
Speaker: I think being yourself is also useful.
Speaker: And we need both.
Speaker: We need anonymous people.
Speaker: We need people who are face fags.
Speaker: We do need
Speaker: both and it's great to see I'm in a number of group chats with and pretty much everybody's anonymous and then I'm the only one that's like oh hi you know and it's fun.
Speaker: So yeah I think for me and you know I still I still am Dr. Bennett in most contexts now
Speaker: If somebody asks me for my name, I'm not going to be like, oh, I'm Dr. Bennett.
Speaker: That's ridiculous.
Speaker: And I'm starting to meet a lot more people face-to-face professionally.
Speaker: And so I'm not sure how big of a pain it's going to be to kind of maintain those separate personas going forward.
Speaker: But...
Speaker: I still like to post as Dr. Bennett because he's like, he's a little bit different than me.
Speaker: He's like a, I don't know.
Speaker: He's like a different place that I get to go to.
Speaker: And I think I would, you know, and it's not that I'm like embarrassed by what I'm saying as him.
Speaker: It's more like,
Speaker: for whatever reason, when there's my name and my face attached to what I'm saying, it's almost, it's almost the opposite.
Speaker: It's not that I'm embarrassed by what I'm saying.
Speaker: It's like, Kevin Dolan is not really cool enough to sell this.
Speaker: Like, like, uh, you know, Kevin's like in his thirties and he's got kids in a mortgage and he's balding and like, it's very like kills the, uh,
Speaker: it kills the, uh, the mystique, the mystique a little bit.
Speaker: And, and I, you know, I'm trying to stay in good shape.
Speaker: Um, I'm trying to get like my aesthetics dialed in.
Speaker: Like, I definitely don't want to be one of these guys who's, you know, totally not aspirational in his personal life.
Speaker: Um, you are very aspirational.
Speaker: You, you look great.
Speaker: I mean, you've got five kids, you're, you're working every day and, and, and you do look good, man, for real.
Speaker: You got, so you got nothing to worry about in, in that arena.
Speaker: Brett's here for Physique Fridays.
Speaker: We're all posting Physique.
Speaker: It's good for the group.
Speaker: I feel like there's good bonding in the group because there's an acknowledgement on the one hand that we're really aspiring for something.
Speaker: It's not like a Homer Simpson, like we're all going to be fat losers and just accept that we're fat losers.
Speaker: But there's definitely this vibe of like,
Speaker: there's no superheroes in here, you know, like we're, we look, we're regular guys and we look like regular guys, but we do, I will say we look like regular guys who are making an effort.
Speaker: So that's really valuable to me.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: And, and I, I like that.
Speaker: And I, I, I'm glad that you,
Speaker: have kept up with Dr. Bennett.
Speaker: Cause I mean, you know, earlier I mentioned Jocko and Jocko is not even his given name, you know, but that that's, that's who he is.
Speaker: And, and like my, my character, Frank Sawyer, people ask me like, Oh, are you Frank Sawyer?
Speaker: I'm like, Frank Sawyer is cooler than me.
Speaker: You know, like he's, I wish I were that cool, but a lot of the things that
Speaker: he does in the books are things that I've done in real life, to a certain extent and not as grand.
Speaker: But yeah, I think that having these heroes and having these avatars is good as long as there is some integration in there.
Speaker: Because obviously, like you said, you're not embarrassed
Speaker: to say like anything you say posting under Dr. Bennett, I know you would say and back up as yourself as well.
Speaker: So I don't think that they're completely divorced.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: And I mean, admittedly, there are definitely things that I said before I was doxxed that I would not have said for public consumption.
Speaker: but I absolutely would have said them, you know, to anybody that I respected enough to say what I really thought, you know.
Speaker: You know, obviously, like, and this was a few years ago, but when one of your posts was shared on Tucker Carlson, do you wish that it had been shared under your real name so you would have, like, gotten some, you know, notoriety that way?
Speaker: Because posting anonymously, it also strikes me as someone who's very humble, you know, like,
Speaker: I worry that I exaggerate my own experience and importance and I'm too vain by posting it, you know, under my real name.
Speaker: And I think there's a lot of humility that comes with anonymity as well.
Speaker: I don't, I mean, I don't think it's humility, but I do think that it's focusing on ideas, focusing on, you know,
Speaker: mold bug talks about this in his, in his, his turn on the, on the bat podcast.
Speaker: He talks about how, when it was, you know, back in the old, old days when it was used net, it was like, everybody was a non and it was, and it was precisely for that reason.
Speaker: It wasn't because people wanted to like use slurs or whatever.
Speaker: It was because it didn't matter who you were.
Speaker: And like, and, and the idea that you would like drop who you really are, uh,
Speaker: like your IRL status gave some like credence to your ideas was really like, that was a big social no-no in that sphere.
Speaker: It was like, no, you're just gonna talk.
Speaker: And if we like what you say, then you're cool.
Speaker: And I don't care if you're a brain surgeon or if you're Jeff Bezos or whatever.
Speaker: Yeah, that's interesting.
Speaker: I like that a lot.
Speaker: And I think-
Speaker: It's interesting because like, it's an inversion of typical, like a non discourse, which is like, oh, he's a non because he's, he's a fat schlub, who, you know, lives in his mom's basement, he has no, he has no real accomplishments.
Speaker: And that's why he wants to be anonymous.
Speaker: And I don't think that's the case at all.
Speaker: Every single
Speaker: Every, I mean, without exception, almost.
Speaker: I can think, okay, I can think of one or two exceptions.
Speaker: But almost without exception, the guys that I have met online who are like, their avatar is like some chisel-jawed, cool-looking guy.
Speaker: They're all chisel-jawed, cool-looking guys in real life.
Speaker: That's just different, just different jawlines.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: glasses basically but they you know they've got great jobs they've got kids they've you know um they're they're not a non because they're losers and i think and i think the the early days of the internet um because it was sort of a thing that you just sort of like definitionally you were you were above median like socioeconomically just by virtue of the fact that you were on the internet
Speaker: And so there just wasn't this, there wasn't this suspicion that Anons would be losers because nobody's a loser.
Speaker: So the only reason that you would want to get your name out there is to like chase clout or, or, or, or try to like, try to like get extra points because of your, you know, letters by your name or something.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: And one thing that,
Speaker: I just I should have talked about this when we were talking about journaling, but the interesting thing and I think that, you know, I whenever I'm thinking like, oh, is this a good thing to tweet or not, or should I share this experience or this picture or whatever it to me, I look back and I read some of my journals and the things that like from my missionary service that I wrote down in my journal are not the things that I remember.
Speaker: you know, just off the top of my head, but, and the things that I remember, I, I really didn't write about, you know, so it's, and, and I think that, you know, if someone says something cool online or that you resonate with, or, or that's insightful, then that's an indication that, oh, this person is, is probably cool and, you know, insightful in real life, because otherwise they wouldn't be able to, to say things that, that we like.
Speaker: Yeah, I almost think there's an analogy to draw there.
Speaker: So like when I, before I had kids, my journal was very confessional because I thought it was for me.
Speaker: Like, I was like, I want to remember everything and I want to remember it very, very honestly so that I can learn from it.
Speaker: And then I had kids and...
Speaker: not that I became dishonest, but like, I got a little more careful about how I talked about things.
Speaker: And I guess what I would say about that is, and this is comparable to the Anon versus Doxxed experience that I had.
Speaker: The stuff that I said when I thought I was just talking to myself
Speaker: I stand by all that stuff and I'm actually glad my kids will have it to read.
Speaker: I just would be embarrassed to have them read it like right in front of me.
Speaker: If that makes sense.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: So like, so like I'm going to keep them.
Speaker: They can have them when I'm dead.
Speaker: And I'm glad that they can have them when I'm dead.
Speaker: Like I'm not, I'm not, I'm not upset that they're going to read that stuff.
Speaker: it's more just like kind of cringe.
Speaker: And I'm like, ah, just, you know, wait till I'm out of the room.
Speaker: That's, I like that a lot.
Speaker: That's really cool.
Speaker: And, and I think that it's the same thing with like what I said when I was a non versus what I said, docs, like, would, would some of that stuff make a lot of awkward conversations with some people that I care about?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Because you, you, you,
Speaker: someone that you can share your entire self with and everything you think, that's not just like a good friend.
Speaker: That's like, that's like an intimate, like a best friend.
Speaker: You're, you're edited around everybody else.
Speaker: And so, and that's, that's what I think is so scummy about doxing is that it's like this, you
Speaker: it's like your boss deserves to know like the shit that you would put in a diary.
Speaker: Like it's, it's, it's his business, what you write about anonymously.
Speaker: And that to me is like, like in this whole bring your whole self to work thing is like, it's like, it's like prostitution.
Speaker: It's like, it's so disgusting to me.
Speaker: Yeah, I completely agree.
Speaker: And it's,
Speaker: I don't know where this sense of entitlement comes from, from, you know, the, these people who are doxing or, or, or even employers who, who feel the, the compulsion or the right to scour the interwebs for any dirt.
Speaker: It's very strange.
Speaker: I honestly don't think employers want to.
Speaker: I think employers want,
Speaker: And this is one of the things that I think there's actually a pretty straightforward policy solution to this, which is, I think it should be explicitly illegal to terminate someone's employment on the basis of things that they said anonymously.
Speaker: And the reason for that is that it's clear that it is the employee's intention
Speaker: to not be connected to their workplace, right?
Speaker: They, by definition, they can't be speaking on behalf of their employer.
Speaker: They can't be spilling beans about things that are going on at work.
Speaker: Cause that would be like a crime.
Speaker: Like that would be illegal to do.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: If it's just opinions, because I actually think, I actually think the vast majority of companies would, would very strongly prefer opinions.
Speaker: not to be allowed to fire those people because then they wouldn't have to like, because then when the, when the, when the cancel the, the mob comes, uh, for this employer employee, the employer can just say like, you know, um, gosh, what he said was so despicable, but my hands are tied.
Speaker: I can't fire him.
Speaker: It's against the law.
Speaker: So sorry, move on.
Speaker: And yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: They don't, and they don't, they don't have to, um,
Speaker: They don't have to express any kind of approval for what was expressed.
Speaker: You know, it's just against the law to, to fire them.
Speaker: And so that I think would, honestly, I think it would probably lead to some massive downsizing and some HR departments.
Speaker: Cause that's like kind of the reason those HR departments exist is to, is to just enforce these ideological rules.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: I mean, you'd still have them there for like sexual harassment and like in people, people running their mouths in the workplace.
Speaker: But like, that's a qualitatively different thing.
Speaker: Definitely.
Speaker: That's a really cool thought.
Speaker: I had never considered that.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: It was actually, I think it was Tyler, one of the guys in the group who I was going to interview Joe Kent.
Speaker: And he said, hey, would you run that by him?
Speaker: And I actually, I think I actually did, but it was after our audio cut out.
Speaker: So I didn't get to ask the question, but I definitely, it's very fashionable in our corner of Twitter to say that like there's no policy solutions whatsoever.
Speaker: But I think that one would work.
Speaker: And I think it would get, I think, yeah.
Speaker: I think you could get enough like normie Republicans to sign on.
Speaker: I think so too.
Speaker: You know, like Joe Kent, who's, who's awesome.
Speaker: And Eli Crane, who's also running for Congress in Arizona.
Speaker: He, he came on the Ironside podcast and he asked me, you know, who, who else had come on.
Speaker: I told him that Joe Kent had been on and he's like, yeah, he's like, I think that me and Joe Kent are like some of the only guys that,
Speaker: in our sphere who would do a show like this, you know, because I mean, I think they have a lot of integrity and, you know, they're both very outspoken about their faith in God and being family men and that they're just not, they're not, you know, worried about every single thing that, you know, you or I have ever said that could reflect poorly because like that's just not even a consideration for them.
Speaker: And it's certainly not,
Speaker: or it shouldn't be a consideration for our friends.
Speaker: I don't look at every single tweet of yours and decide, oh, yep, can't be friends with him anymore.
Speaker: And obviously I agree with everything you do, but I had that experience just over a year ago.
Speaker: A couple of my best friends that I had grown up with and known for 20 years.
Speaker: And I had tweeted that pornography makes you gay
Speaker: And they, they texted me and broke up with me over text message.
Speaker: And, and we live in the same town and like, they have not talked to me in over a year because of that.
Speaker: It's just, it's so funny.
Speaker: And, and I think that it's, it's a really good way to, and that's what I love about exit.
Speaker: I mean, cause we've got guys all different backgrounds, you know, all different faiths, uh, all different interests, but we're all cool and we all love each other.
Speaker: And, and, uh,
Speaker: I think that's a good thing.
Speaker: And I like, it's so funny that some of our best friends that we make is over the internet nowadays.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I, I was in, when I was in the Bay this week, I, or last week, I got to see a physical community that was a lot like the thing I want to build.
Speaker: And it's so interesting because like, I feel like at Exit we have a couple of the pieces of the puzzle.
Speaker: And this physical community has a couple other pieces of the puzzle.
Speaker: And I'm really chewing on how do you bring it all together?
Speaker: How do you make it one thing?
Speaker: And this was not like a doomsday compound.
Speaker: This was a very fashionable neighborhood in like four blocks from the beach in California.
Speaker: And like a very artsy happening place to be.
Speaker: But looking at, first of all, how much the political landscape has changed
Speaker: and political landscape, that's not the right word.
Speaker: The cultural landscape has changed so much because these are guys who are, they have very blue-coated careers and interests, but like getting shut down by COVID, seeing what happened in 2020, like a lot of people are, are,
Speaker: I'm looking for a better word than radicalized, but basically radicalized and are looking for answers outside the mainstream narrative as far as like, you know, how like we clearly the democracy has been fake since at least 2020.
Speaker: How far back does that go?
Speaker: You know, how fake has it been for how long?
Speaker: um a couple of these guys a couple of these guys got um got shut down for covid and then like didn't get they were they were like newer restaurants and they didn't get funding because they didn't have like the uh the receipts to show it's kind of like me trying to get a mortgage right now when i'm i've been self-employed for like nine months because i can't uh
Speaker: They want like two years of payment history before they'll give you a loan.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Similar thing.
Speaker: So basically the, the, the local government and the federal government hung them out to dry said, you know, you can't do business and we're not paying you anything, you know, go sit on it and rotate.
Speaker: And, and I don't, and I don't think these guys were particularly like conservative guys before necessarily, but now they're,
Speaker: Well, they're reading the same books we're reading and they're following the same guys on Twitter and they're talking about a lot of the same things.
Speaker: And it's, it's, it's pretty wild to watch.
Speaker: That is, and, and that, and that's what, what's encouraging too, you know, it's, and yeah, I, I would love to find a better term than, than radicalized, but, but I mean like that, that's, that is it.
Speaker: And it's, it's in a very,
Speaker: constructive way.
Speaker: You know, in the Old Testament recently we read about Joseph who was sold into Egypt and
Speaker: You know, so very bad situation, basically doxxed by his brothers, you know, and then, but he just goes and he makes the best of it.
Speaker: He gets a little bit of ground and is running Potiphar's house.
Speaker: Oh, then he gets, you know, lied about.
Speaker: Me too.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: And then gets thrown into jail and then does really well for himself in jail, kind of runs the place, you know, gets in, you know, makes friends with the guards and helps out these other prisoners, interprets their dream, and then ends up, you know, basically being second in command of Egypt.
Speaker: And so I think that it's very constructive, you know, and I like that distinction you made.
Speaker: And you talked about this also a little bit with Tiffany Langford on the podcast, that, you know, it doesn't have to be
Speaker: you know, a contiguous plot of land and everyone's living on top of each other behind, you know, a 20 foot wall.
Speaker: It can just be, you know, like regular guys who have a good sense of community and care about each other and are reliable.
Speaker: And then you can really make some waves.
Speaker: Yeah, man, that's my goal.
Speaker: We just, in the exit weekly group call last week, we read Concrete Jungle, did a little book club.
Speaker: by Clay Martin, and we're doing his follow-up Prairie Fire next week.
Speaker: Yeah, I'm excited about that.
Speaker: I prefer Prairie Fire even to Concrete Jungle.
Speaker: Sorry, I cut you off, but yeah, great stuff.
Speaker: Well, yeah, I mean, it's definitely the situation you'd prefer to be in, right?
Speaker: So Concrete Jungle is about how do you essentially escape a collapsing city, right?
Speaker: And prairie fire is sort of how do you make a stand out in the country?
Speaker: And, you know, obviously you'd prefer to be making a stand rather than, you know, fleeing for your life and like trying to, trying to eat your canned food cold so that you don't attract starving people.
Speaker: Like that's a, that's a pretty dark situation to imagine yourself in.
Speaker: But one of the things that he talks about is, is creating an operational detachment, an ODA.
Speaker: And, um, that's essentially, I, you know, my, my, my dream, my dream dream is a full tribe, a full community that's, that we run with our rules, you know, and, you know, we decide, you know, what is, uh, what is allowed in that community and what's not, um,
Speaker: But my intermediate goal, my vision for like the next five years is to get to a place where I've got an ODA, basically to know who I can lean on if I really needed it.
Speaker: And that's what they've got.
Speaker: These guys in California, there's an intensity to their...
Speaker: to their commitment to each other because of this like siege mentality.
Speaker: They know that they're like alone and they're behind enemy lines.
Speaker: And so, yeah, I'm a, I'm, I'm officially a, a Californian respecter at this point.
Speaker: I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna talk crap about Californians anymore.
Speaker: As long as they don't move here.
Speaker: Well, that's, that's a high praise.
Speaker: That's interesting.
Speaker: I'm going to have to restate my opinion on California then too.
Speaker: That's a, that's good info.
Speaker: We need to get you down.
Speaker: We need to get you down for the next meetup.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: Well, that's what I love about exit.
Speaker: I mean, look what you've done in such a short amount of time.
Speaker: You've brought people together and are actually doing something productive, constructive, creative, helpful.
Speaker: You really are making a difference.
Speaker: And I know I speak for all the guys when I say that
Speaker: you do a good job of making all of us feel important.
Speaker: And it's not just, you know, it's not a facade.
Speaker: You're not pretending.
Speaker: I mean, you actually do care about us and you actually do value our opinions and experiences and inputs and actually go out of your way to help us.
Speaker: And I think that's,
Speaker: that's so cool.
Speaker: And you, you really do embody that leader servant.
Speaker: And so I know your dreams are going to come true.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: It's enough sponsored content, Brett.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And it's so funny.
Speaker: I'm, but I mean it all and guys, guys laugh, you know, like they, they say like how,
Speaker: kind I am or whatever but I mean like that's that's been me my whole life is I really do love you guys and I I love everybody like even the haters and the losers that's what he says that to all the girls that's what you got to know about Brett if he's if he's charming you up well Brett this has been a really fun conversation I uh
Speaker: I love having you in the group and having you run that content call.
Speaker: It means a lot to me to have guys like you in the corner and helping the guys out.
Speaker: If you want to follow Brett Kane, it's just Brett W. Kane.
Speaker: Kane is in Kane and Abel on Twitter.
Speaker: Anything else you want to publicize?
Speaker: That's it.
Speaker: If you guys want to pick up my books, there are a couple more of them for sale before they sell out and are no longer available on the shelf.
Speaker: So I'd really appreciate it.
Speaker: And
Speaker: We got to find a way to get money in your pocket without paying those guys.
Speaker: Yeah, Amazon, actually, I know Amazon's horrible, whatever, but that actually helps out a lot if you do get it on Amazon.
Speaker: And I've got a couple copies, so if you can't afford it, I'd love you to still read it.
Speaker: So hit me up and I'll send you a copy.
Speaker: I'm going to post an Amazon affiliate link to Brett Cain's latest novel so you guys can all go buy it and we'll both get a little bit of cheddar.
Speaker: Thank you so much.
Speaker: This has been a pleasure.
Speaker: Great talking to you, man.
