{"id":3047,"date":"2021-09-04T03:42:53","date_gmt":"2021-09-04T03:42:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/?p=3047"},"modified":"2021-09-04T07:45:48","modified_gmt":"2021-09-04T07:45:48","slug":"mr-wizard-part-4-back-to-school","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/2021\/09\/04\/mr-wizard-part-4-back-to-school\/","title":{"rendered":"Mr. Wizard Part 4: Back to School"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">I share a fair number of videos from Prager U, which of course is not a \u201creal\u201d university. But then again, since \u201creal\u201d universities now offer courses in tree climbing, television watching, and lesbian midget basket weaving, I\u2019m not sure that\u2019s much of a criticism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">Anyways, the Prager U videos are short little summaries on various topics told from a conservative viewpoint. I mostly agree with them, though not always. But when I find something interesting I pass it along in case someone else might too. Nothing nefarious about it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">Social media 101.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">But for some reason these videos especially annoyed Mr. Wizard. That could easily have been cured by simply continuing to scroll down the page, but Mr. Wizard was still on a crusade against me, whose purpose only he knew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">One of these videos was a Venezuelan guy talking about how he thought socialism had ruined his country. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<div class=\"video-container\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/bKhR9i5CGkA?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/div>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">To this Mr. Wizard responded with, \u201cWell, socialism isn\u2019t all bad, people like fire departments\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">What?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">Of what possible use was this to the guy in Venezuela? Hey man, totally sucks that there\u2019s no toilet paper and you\u2019ve got to chase pigeons to eat, but hey, people like fire departments!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">But of course the comment was not directed at the guy in Venezuela, it was directed at me. Did Mr. Wizard seriously think I was unaware that people like fire departments? I guess he was just regurgitating the Bernie Sanders view that fire departments are inherently socialist.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">But is that true?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">For if socialism means, as Marx put it, \u201cpublic control of the means of production,\u201d then the answer would have to be \u201cno.\u201d The fire department is not a means of production. It is a means of \u201cprotection.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">The fire department is not involved in the transfer or production of wealth or property. The fire department \u201cprotects\u201d private property, it does not redistribute it. The fire department maintains the social and economic order, it does not seek to revolutionize it for any ideology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">And the method of funding is irrelevant. Fire departments have existed under every form of government and economic system since at least the Roman Republic. Long before Karl Marx was even a gleam in his father\u2019s eye.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">But did I really want to get into the history of fire prevention or character of socialism with Mr. Wizard?&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">No I did not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">I considered replying with the much shorter, \u201cWell, capitalism isn\u2019t all bad, people like donut shops\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">But I was pretty sure the point of the sarcasm would be missed, and that I would be drawn into yet more time-wasting activity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">So I just deleted his comment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">There were more videos. More comments. And more deletions. Not because I had no response, but because I did not want to spend my time responding, or even feeling a need to respond. I thought my time better spent down at the pool hall. So that\u2019s where I went.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">One day, and I suppose fueled by the constant deletions, Mr. Wizard walked into the pool hall and said: \u201cThe world can\u2019t be explained by a Prager U video.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">Wow.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">Perhaps Mr. Wizard should be renamed Capt. Obvious. He thought that was something I didn\u2019t know? Why in the hell would he presume that the sum total of my world view was formed by Prager U? Because I posted a few videos?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">But perhaps more importantly, why in the hell did he care so much what I thought about anything? I had no idea and didn\u2019t really care. But there he was right in front of me, so I guess I had to say something.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">I said, \u201cThose videos are not to explain the world, just to give fair hearing to points of view some people may not have heard before.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">\u201cYeah well, I thought you should know that there\u2019s more to the world than Prager U.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">What the fuck? I just fucking told you that I am aware of that you shit-for-brains little prick. You have no idea what I read or watch or listen to and you don\u2019t even have the good sense to ask. This is why I don\u2019t want to talk to you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">But he was still standing there, so I didn\u2019t have a choice for the moment. I said, \u201cHey man, you don\u2019t have to look, like, or agree with them. Nor does anyone else. But, in order to truly disagree, one must know exactly what one is disagreeing with, as expressed by someone who actually holds that view. That\u2019s the purpose of the videos.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">So I\u2019m standing there looking at the pool table like a long lost lover, praying that Mr. Wizards query has been answered to his satisfaction, and I could go back to my game, but the next thing out of his mouth was:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">\u201cYeah well, there\u2019s other points of view out there.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">Oh fuck off, just fuck off, is what I wanted to say, please stop wasting my time telling me things I already know you annoying little fuck. But that seemed both kind of rude and certain to prolong the agony, so I settled for, \u201cOkay thanks man, I\u2019ll keep that in mind.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">Finally, Mr. Wizard walked away with a self-satisfied grin, like he had finally set me straight. Victory was his. He had saved me. No more would my mind be a slave to the evil cult of Prager U.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">Free at last! Free at last! Thank Mr. Wizard almighty I was free at last!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">But of course, one can never be too free. And so emboldened by his recent \u201csuccess,\u201d Mr. Wizard would soon return to free me even more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\">I could hardly wait.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-black-color has-text-color\"><a href=\"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/2021\/09\/04\/mr-wizard-part-5-the-life-coach\/\">Continued in Part 5 ><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I share a fair number of videos from Prager U, which of course is not a \u201creal\u201d university. But then again, since \u201creal\u201d universities now offer courses in tree climbing, television watching, and lesbian midget basket weaving, I\u2019m not sure that\u2019s much of a criticism. Anyways, the Prager U videos are short little summaries on various topics told from a&#46;&#46;&#46;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2946,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[21,1],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/iu-59.jpeg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Jba6-N9","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3047"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3047"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3047\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3065,"href":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3047\/revisions\/3065"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/dennispresiloski.com\/portfolio\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}