TRANSCRIPT
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The Rabbi Daniel Lapin Podcast
Episode: Get Smart: Three Foolish Fallacies and One Big Truth
Date: 01/26/24 Length: 1:18:32
Daniel Lapin 0:00
Greetings, happy warriors, and welcome to the Rabbi Daniel Lapin show where I, your rabbi reveal how the world really works. Thanks for being part of the show. And before we get going with everything waiting for us today, I remind you to please subscribe and become a part of the show, you might also want to join the community of happy warriors. And all this can be done at our website at RabbiDanielLapin.com. So don't miss the opportunity of being part of our community subscribe to the show and become a happy warrior. One of the things happening at the moment, obviously, is that, you know, my people are going through a tough time, there's no question about it, this has been a tough few months for the Jewish people. And in Israel, particularly where I have family, and friends, there's a whole lot of mourning going on there. There really is. A lot of people have died since October the seventh at this, at the present time that I'm recording this, over 1500 people have died so far. And, you know, you might say, well, you know, 1500 people out of a big country, it's not like that, in Israel, every body knows somebody who is in mourning. Everybody knows somebody overtaken by grief. And it's very different, you'd have to have, you know, 9/11 killed about 3000 Americans, if you didn't live in New York or Washington, the odds of actually knowing anybody who lost somebody directly, not high. And even if you lived, you know, if you lived in Washington, DC or New York, you know, more than 10 million people 3000 people died, the actual odds are not good. As a matter of fact, for the for it to be something similar numerically to Israel. You need something like 100,000 Americans to die, and distributed around the country.
Daniel Lapin 2:26
And even that wouldn't be a parallel, I'll tell you why. Israel is a very connected country. It's very different from the United States of America. If you go to a coffee shop, and when I'm in Israel, I'm usually working on a book. And Susan, and I would be sitting in a coffee shop for a few hours writing. And by the time we left, guaranteed, we're going to have three, four or five new friends, people stop at the table, what are you doing? Somebody stops and says, you know, where you from? You look familiar, or somebody else says, are you two doing email to each other? You know, and before you know, we are you talking and you find out, you know, somebody in common and where you've, I'm telling you, you you've exchanged emails, it happens all the time. It's one of the reasons that Israel is such an entrepreneurial success. It's why its stock exchange is doing so well. It's why it's startups are doing so well. Because don't forget, doing business is easier when there are a lot of people who know you, and like you, and trust you. And if you're an Israeli, you know a lot of people and you're you're meeting new people all the time and, and like constantly, people are introducing you to one, it's a very connected country. America used to be that way, I think, but it's lost a lot. And, you know, you'll now see two people at a coffee shop in in the United States and two of them are on their phones, you know, talking to other people or texting to other people looking up Google with by themselves. It's, there's a lot less connection going on a lot less. It's been years since anybody approached me in a coffee shop or I approached anybody else the last time was somebody who came to ask me where I got my hat from. And that was a good couple of years ago.
Daniel Lapin 4:44
So it's very different and and it's been and continues to be a very difficult time. Now one of the propaganda attacks against Israel, and you constantly hear this is the number of children killed in Gaza. Now, nobody knows the numbers because you cannot trust the Gaza authorities to give numbers. And the Israelis probably don't know. But the numbers are not the issue. And Andrew Sullivan is a left leaning commentator, who's an interesting guy. And he wrote when you look at the impact on children, even if the numbers are inflated by the Palestinian Ministry of Health, far more have been slaughtered in Gaza in three months, as in the entire Iraq war over eight years. This was predictable. Gaza's population is strikingly young, at 47%, or under 18, compared with 22% in the United States. And what's more 15% of the population are toddlers, any full scale war, ineluctably becomes a mess, intense infanticide. And that is what in front is in front of our noses right now. 1000s of dead children. That's what Andrew Sullivan wrote. And I'm going to deal with that. Now. I'm not saying that he's wrong. The numbers, I don't know the numbers. He may be right, he may be wrong. But what I am saying is it's utterly irrelevant what the death of children is irrelevant. And it's not what I said, let me explain. It goes without saying that anybody who has ever held the young child in their arms, even if it's not your own child, but if it is doubly, people who have connected with little children feel almost unbearable pain, at the thought of a small child being hurt or killed.
Daniel Lapin 6:54
In my extensive marriage counseling and marriage coaching experience, I can't tell you how many people have sat down in my study, and started off sometimes it's the man speaking sometimes it's the woman speaking. But either of them or both of them say things are very bad, but between us, but for the moment, we're staying together because of the children. And my answer to them is nearly always the same. Listen, I'm not going to send you a metal in the mail. Because you're not really doing it for the children. I'll tell you what, you're doing it for yourselves. Because you cannot stand the pain that you see in your children's faces. When you fight. You cannot stand the pain you see in your children's faces. When you're separating, or when your children know you're going to get a divorce. You can't take the pain. It's not because you care about the children. You can't take the pain that saw. That's what it is. Yes, that is true. Normal people feel pain. When children have pain or death inflicted on them. One of the saddest places in the world to visit is a children's hospital. Right? We all feel that. But in wartime things happen. People die. Men, women, children, old and young, left handed people and right handed people, people with brown hair and people with black hair and people with no hair at all. Because war is non selective. In February 1945, and you'll see where I'm going with us in a moment in February 1945. Dresden was bombed by the Royal Air Force, and at least 25,000 people were incinerated. It could have been 100,000. The damage was so enormous, that records were destroyed. And the The destruction was so complete that nobody really knows how many people vanished in a few days in Dresden.
Daniel Lapin 9:17
Two months later, march 1945, General Curtis LeMay sent his b 29 bombers to bomb Tokyo. Now the population density in Tokyo is about 100 and was 150,000 people per square mile. And they bombed about 15 square miles. And because the houses and buildings were mostly wood, and because the bombing was so dense, it became a huge conflagration. Many people died from being fixated. There was no air because the fires sucked up all the oxygen How many people died at least 100,000? It could easily have been 300,000. But a lot of people, how many little children died in Dresden? We don't know. But obviously plenty. How many little children died in Tokyo? We don't know, obviously, a whole lot. So you might say, Well, fine that was then this is now where we're better now we don't we worry more about killing children. So, what I want to explain is there is such a thing as misplaced compassion. There really is. So when compassion How can compassion ever be bad? Let me explain. All human characteristics need to be modulated. And characteristics do not exist in isolation. They exist with their opposite on a spectrum line. So for example, generosity, and miserliness are at opposite ends of a line. Should we always be over the generous end and never at the miserly end? Well, if you are excessively generous, then you will be generous with things you shouldn't be, you will give away too much. You will give away money and things that your family needs, where your higher priority resides, where a greater responsibility rests on your shoulders. And so you have to steer your way down this highway, where one curb is, is miserliness.
Daniel Lapin 11:32
The other curb is generosity. And you you make your way and we get biblical guidance. 10% of your income you should give away. Well, if 10% is good, maybe 80% is better. No, that's not correct. That's over doing generosity. Yes, you can overdo anything. You can overdo miserliness. And you can overdo generosity. Hard working is good. You should be a hardworking person. Well, hardworking doesn't exist alone. It's on a spectrum line, hard working at one end and idleness and indolence on the other end, and you got to steer an avenue. Sometimes, you should stop working and smell the coffee, play with your children. Go on a hike, do something that's not working. Other times you will be working hard. You got to steer a course, in the same way we drive. When you drive. Intuitively, you don't fix your gaze hypnotically, on the stretch of road immediately in front of your headlights in front of your grill. Your eyes are sort of looking at the sides of the road. And you keeping either extreme in mind. And that way you steering down the middle. That's kind of like what is caring about your appearance very important to care about your appearance. Yeah, it absolutely is. The other end of that spectrum line is slovenliness not good to be slovenly, certainly should care about your appearance. Have you ever seen anybody over care about their appearance or ever seen body who can't walk past a mirror without taking a good long look at themselves in the mirror? Have you ever seen a man who takes a very long time to get ready? He grooms himself incessantly. Yeah, you can overdo care about appearance, just as you can overdo slovenliness you got to steer a course in between. And so my dear friends, happy warriors. Compassion is on a spectrum line. Compassionate one end, cruelty at the other end. You don't want to be cruel. But you can also be overly compassionate, really, sure.
Daniel Lapin 13:54
Imagine a parent who can never discipline a child or punish your child. If the child has earned a consequence. And a person that you don't, I'm a compassionate person, I just cannot discipline my child it does. It's not in me, you will raise a monster and your child will grow up not loving you for never teaching right and wrong. Your child will grow up hating you and spending 1000s of dollars with therapists telling the therapist how you ruin their lives. Parent owes a child a certain degree of cruelty. In other words, you may say, well, it's not cruel. It's out of my love. I discipline my child I know. But I'm talking about the characteristic. The human carrier tourists that you employ. If you have to punish your child is cruelty. It's obviously in modulated amounts and style. I mean you're not being cruel, but you're exercising the characteristic of cruelty. And other times when you take pity on somebody, whether it's it's following you, you may be exercising compassion, but overdoing the cruelty and turns you into a tyrant and a monster. And overdoing compassion is not a way to run your life. And so yes, killing 100,000 People in Tokyo in March 1945, killing 60,000 People in Hiroshima in August 1945. Was that cruel? Well, it was in between. It had to be done. Why did it have to be done? It had to be done because many, many more people would have been killed, had not been done. The invasion of Japan, which was the seemingly the only way to stop the incredibly fierce fighting of the Japanese army in World War Two, that would have required the invasion would have cost several million lives it was estimated. So yes, obviously, one can point at cases of people who died in Tokyo in Hiroshima. And it's horrible, you can point to people who died in Dresden, right? They didn't start the war, Adolf Hitler started the war. That's right. But you are part of a community. And it's really important to break away from the secular, progressive, materialistic model, where the most important element of society is an individual. And you've got to realize that there is also a group, we are part of a family and a family is very important. And we've got to understand we're part of a neighborhood in the community, we're part of a country. And when our country's leadership does things we all wrong things, bad things. When the Biden administration printed money without limit during COVID. A lot of people say, Oh, how compassionate they're being they're providing money for all the people who are losing and hurting? And yes, we all did, we all hurt. But it's not compassionate. Because the amount of money that we're all losing month by month through inflation, which is probably by my estimations running over 10%, still I know that's not the official government figure. But if you actually look at prices, and compare them to last year, the year before and four years ago, yeah, about 10%. Inflation is about right. Well, that isn't compassionate. So sometimes, you have to be firm. And you have to move across the spectrum line, away from the compassionate end, in order to do the right thing, which in the end will be the right thing and will be compassionate.
Daniel Lapin 17:58
And let me let me explain. Whatever happens to children is mostly caused by their parents. That's one of God's ways of regulating parents. Like I said, it's very hard for parents seeing their children suffer very hard. It's really painful. If you've never had children, yet, you don't know what I'm talking about. It is truly, truly painful. It's suffering beyond endurance, when your children are in pain when your children are suffering, and there's nothing you can do about it. Because one of the most musical sounds I ever had in my life was our seven children from time to time saying, Daddy, come here, I need you. And there's a problem and I can solve it. I can make it good for my children. It's music. And conversely, when you cannot make the suffering go away for your children. The pain for you is close to unendurable. And so in order to stop people doing really stupid and destructive things, God said, look, it's going to impact your children. That's right. It's going to impact your children. I call it the Al Capone principle. Imagine Al Capone had a son called Fred Capone. And one day Fred wants to apply for a job in a bank. And they call him in for an interview. And the interviewer looks at the paper the application and says Fred Capone. It's not a common name. No relation to our I take it. Well, I'm afraid Yes, he was my father. The notorious gangster Al Capone. is the father of the guy applying for a job in your bank. Look, you're not going to give him the job. Nope. because you assume is also a crook. But if anything ever goes wrong, your boss, your board of directors will jump all over you saying, what were you thinking hiring a son of Al Capone? What are you thinking? So you don't do it. It's just not the safe thing to do. So yes, Al Capone, a choir boy, a Knopf, our Fred Fred Capone a choir boy, a nobleman, an honest guy, a man of unquestioned integrity, but he doesn't get a job in the band. You know why? Because what his dad did? That's all. Is it?
Daniel Lapin 20:35
Fair? I've told you before there is no word in Biblical Hebrew. For the word fair. Fairness does not show up in the Bible, not one single time. There isn't such a thing as fair. There is right. And there's wrong. There is such thing as equal or equivalent. That fair? No, that sort of thing is fair. So yeah, it's, of course, it's not fair that Fred Capone can't get a job because of his dad, he never did anything wrong. He was an innocent child. And you can think of for yourself, of many, many, many other similar examples. One of the most destructive things you can do for a child is raising your child in a single mother household. Having a child if you're not married to the father of the child, and you don't intend to be married and raise the child together. It's one of the cruelest things you can do to that child that meet me, let me just state that explicitly. There is no way around it. We know so much about the pathologies that afflict children who are raised by single moms. And yes, they are single moms who do heroic, wonderful jobs. But the country in the United States of America, the overwhelming majority of violent crime is committed by men who never knew their fathers. Right? This is a reality. This is not just me saying this, I'm sure you don't like me to say it's a reality. Fair, that's not fair. It's got nothing to do with fair. That is reality, America is being destroyed, if you are violently attacked, it's going to be by a man who never knew his dad, because his mom wasn't married to his father. If you are assaulted, if your car is stolen, if you're a victim of a crime, the odds are nearly 90 something percent, that you are the victim of a man who was raised by a mother without a father, it's as simple as that. The not that this has any correlation with what I just told you. But your odds of finishing high school is close to zero, your odds of getting any kind of an education close to zero, your odds of being involved with the criminal justice system very, very high, your odds of yourself going ahead and having a child out of wedlock and perpetuating the destructive cycle, very high.
Daniel Lapin 23:04
Look, it's really one of the worst things you can do is to what remember, we used to call it illegitimate. Bringing an illegitimate child into the world is a cruel thing to that child. You really care about children, you ought to make sure this stops happening right at the moment. Over 40% of children born in America, in 2024, are going to be to single mothers. Think about what that means for the United States. The statistics in many other countries are also high. Not all, but it's particularly bad in the United States. 40% of all children born in the United States in 2024 to single moms think about what that means. And so, you know, some some of those may well say, Well, we're in a committed relate. Look, I'm talking about married and not married. There's a huge difference between being married and shacking up with somebody there's a huge difference between having a wife and having a girlfriend is a huge difference between being a girlfriend and being a wife. There's a huge difference between being a husband and being a significant other. Huge difference. So I'm telling you all of this because the rate in illegitimacy the rate of children warm to single moms has climbed meteorically since 1960s. So what's happened? What has happened in the last 60 years? It's actually even less as climb meteorologically even later since the 70s. But what's happened? Well, one of the things that happened is we d stigmatized illegitimacy, I'm using the word deliberately, even though it's hardly ever used anymore. Today, an illegitimate child was a child born to a single mom Ariat we had another word for that childhood Boston it, but we don't use that it's not a nice word. But illegitimacy. And so what used to happen is that young guys and their girlfriends, were very fearful of bringing a child into the world, because of the stigma attached. And girls who fell pregnant very often was sent away to family members that had the child child put up for adoption, they came back. And then all of a sudden, compassion took routes, the dangers of unmodulated compassion, ways, where's the compassion for the child, it's not the child's fault, Child's innocent child was just born into this world. And so we d stigmatize the stigma of illegitimacy no more use of that word. And you can measure and watch the climbing rate of illiteracy from that moment in American culture. And then, it used to be that, you know, everybody knew the that single girl in the high school in the next town who got pregnant was very rare. Because it was it was bad. It was life changing for everybody we all knew, let alone bad for the child, it was bad for the girl. And it was embarrassing, the boy was very often forced to marry the girl. And it didn't happen so much because of all of that. But we said, No, we got to be compassionate to the child. And we de-stigmatized the stigma. And we put in daycare centers in high school, so girls who got pregnant could still come to school and put their kids when they had their kid, they could finish high school because the kid, all of this was done, because you got to be compassionate to the child. My friends, you do happy warriors. It's not compassion. It's misshapen compassion. It's wrong. Because you got to care about society as well. You've got to care about the future, you've got to care about the victims of the crimes that will be perpetrated by that innocent little boy, who nonetheless, is being started off on life in a way that almost inevitably will have him behind the gun facing a truly innocent victim, who may well end up murdered. Yes, these are simple realities.
Daniel Lapin 27:32
And obviously, a progressive government did all in its power to try and make sure that the child of a, an unmarried woman who has six other children from six other unknown men, that that child should have exactly the same start in life, as the child brought up by his mother and father, in a loving family with five siblings. You can't do it. But the government has done everything in his power to try and make it a level playing field so that every single child, right, no child will be left behind, said George W. Bush, no child will be left behind. Yeah, listen, you're a big powerful government in a big powerful presence, nothing you can do about it. Go on, if you can do something, stop the 70% of children being born to single moms this year. And then you'll be able to stop the trouble. And then you will be able to make sure no child gets left behind. Every child that is brought into the world by a loving mother and father are married to one another. Yeah, then no child would be left behind. There will be some because there will be some you they always are right and millions of people, they will be some dysfunctional families. And there'll be some abusive parents things happen. But by and large, well, you won't have a 70% of children born in America being doomed. So there's an example of where we use compassion. You got to care about the children. And so we did. We took away the stigma. And it just didn't matter. No, no child was ever any more embarrassed by finding asking, What's your father's name? Where's your father? No more embarrassment. Done. We're a better society for it. Right? No, because when you misuse compassion, it's another way of ultimately destroying the society. And this really needs to be understood very clearly.
Daniel Lapin 29:37
And, and so that's how it is when when children are killed in war. It's horrible. There's no question about it. But when young married couples are killed in war, that's pretty horrible as well. And when a woman is killed, leaving her elderly husband a widower alone. That's pretty terrible also. And so we must stop allowing ourselves to be compellingly emotionally manipulated by the argument of the children. Right? You know, who should think about it? How much should think about it, your notion, think about all the people of Gaza, who are perfectly happy to let Hamas take over the running of the country. That's all. Now, again, I'm not I'm not saying it's wonderful, it isn't. But the idea that we must fill ourselves with great, feverish indignation at the children being killed. I'm sorry, this is cold war. It would be nice if we could make it all go away. But it's happening. And you know, what, when Assad killed hundreds of 1000s of Syrians during his successful attempt to preserve his power. And they were all Muslim children, by the way, lots of children there. Did you hear anyone crying about who's killing the children? No. Because normal, healthy people understand that war is hell, and children are among the victims. In an ideal world, wouldn't it be nice if we could insulate children from all the bad things brought upon them by their parents, but we can't, whenever children are invoked, be aware that there is an attempt to manipulate you for political purposes. In the United States of America, you will very often hear, Oh, we've got so many children in poverty. Again, exactly the same thing. Compelling emotional manipulation. Children in Poverty. No. It's the parents who are doing something wrong, by the way they aren't parents is usually only one parent, a woman, a mother. But you can't change policy in order to fix up children's poverty without fixing up the circumstances that created that poverty in the first place. Yes, of course, it's meant to manipulate you emotionally. Because the thought of children suffering is intolerable for most normal, healthy people, we get that that is perfectly normal and perfectly natural.
Daniel Lapin 32:32
So what Israel is doing in Gaza, they deemed to be absolutely necessary in by the way, exactly the same way that Hamas decided rationally, coldly calculatingly that what they had to do on October, the seventh had to be done. And I recognize that those are not entirely dissimilar situations, nations go to war. And the nation of Hamas and the people of Gaza went to war on October the seventh, they did. And I have told you before I disagree with the notion of saying, Oh, it was so terrible, because they brutally killed children. It looked, yes, that's what happens in war. Now, admittedly, certain types of human beings are more capable of killing in barbaric and cruel ways than other types of human beings. That is true. But to say that what happened on October the seventh was wrong because it killed the children. No, because there is no framework in which to define wrong. These are two separate nations that went to war. One went to war and the other, and there is no common moral system for the two nations. And therefore there is no such thing as saying they were evil in what they did. They went to war. That's what they did. Now, your job is to make sure that you do whatever it takes to make sure they can't do it again. In other words, the role of deterrence is very important here as well. Really important to understand. And so, yes, are children going to be killed in Gaza? Absolutely. And so will people who are left handed and so will be totally utterly innocent people. Right? The the blind beggar in Gaza City who never hurt anybody, he's going to be killed also. Fair? What's that got to do with it? It's war. It's hell. It's horrible. Innocent people die, and the guilty people die. And maybe you get to the point where the government says, You know what, let's not do this anymore. This is not working out well for us. But unless you get to that point, more people will be killed. So yes, a lot of people being killed in Gaza right now. You know why? So is that in the future? There won't be a whole lot of other children being killed proudly, but Hamas who will film the their murderers and boast about them. Right? That's their way of waging war. That's their way. Right? And they're, you know, the whole idea of an International Court of Justice. It's a joke, and I'll explain why it is and so hilarious joke. And it's a joke in the same way that an American court without a law enforcement apparatus is utterly meaningless. We're seeing that right now, in cities like San Francisco, many other places where law enforcement is, for reasons we all know, unable and unwilling to take care of shoplifting and assaults and, and robberies and, and murderers, they're not able to do anything about it. So the fact that the court convenes and decrees that the person who did this as guilty, and then they let him out on the street again, because of the the progressive policies that are being applied in the American jurisprudence and law enforcement community. Right, it comes out to be nothing. You know why the International Court of Justice in the Hague is meaningless and a joke, because it has no army to enforce its judgments. And many countries are not even signatories and treat it as if it is the joke that it really is. So we've just got to understand then, that anytime you hear children invoked the plight of innocent children know that you're being manipulated emotionally, for political purposes. It's as simple as that. Let's take another look at another area of propaganda that is fired off at Israel almost uniquely in Israel, I should tell you, by the way, I don't recall any questions of proportionality being applied to America's wars with Iraq, America's wars with Afghanistan, America's struggle with the Hootie pirates right now, proportional really? No, it's proportional is not something you will hear a lot of unless it is Israel, who is responding to an attack and trying to defend itself.
Daniel Lapin 37:38
And so let's try and understand what this doctrine of proportionality is. Go back to World War Two, was it the role of England and America to beat Germany in Japan and win World War Two, and to stop the conflagration that was enveloping the entire world or wasn't to avoid any disproportionate actions? Look, there are outlaw actions that can cause you to forfeit the protection of the law. That is why people who broke the law in the good old days used to be called outlaws. And that is because when an outlaw robbed somebody took his money, and the sheriff then came along and shot him dead. The Outlaw was not able or his family were not able to Hey, what's with the proportionality? Why did was relieving him of a few dollars? So take away dollars from me, I didn't hurt him. I didn't take his life. Why did you shoot me? Because proportionality is a rubbish doctrine. It has no basis in reality, it means nothing. Just think about if your house was invaded, and somebody is attacking and beating up your family, and you walk in and you got a gun in your hand, is your first thought I got to be careful to only be proportional here. No, of course not. That person has forfeited his right to any consideration at all, by his flagrant breaking of the law attacking your family. You shouldn't did. That's all. Now, I'm not denying that you may not need a good lawyer afterwards. And I'm not denying that the wise thing to do is not to talk to the police one word until you have a lawyer with you. But as far as the action is concerned, you stop the assault anyway possible as quickly as possible.
Daniel Lapin 39:47
And so, this entire doctrine of proportionality didn't exist before so called progressive times. The first we see of it, I am not able to find In any talk of proportionality before, about 1975, there was something called the Rome Statute. And then in 1978, there was an additional protocol to the Geneva Convention. And the attempt was made to try and define disproportionate use of force. But remember that the whole idea of deterrence is undermined by the notion of proportionality. It's a way of preventing any decisive military victory. If a criminal knows or a criminal state knows that the worst that can happen to them is what they are doing to others. No more no less, there is no deterrent factor at all. The only deterrence exists in the bully knowing that once he unleashes the forces of retaliation, there is no limit. Because proportionality is rubbish. This doctrine of proportionality encourages rogue states to attack stable democracies, since only they would consider themselves bound by wrongheaded notions of proportionality. One of the lessons that we boys learned in elementary school is that when you punch somebody in the playground, you unleash the unknown, you have no idea what he and his buddies might do back to you. Now, if there was some kind of school rule of proportionality, that one blow from an assailant warrants only one equivalent blow from the victim who probably has been weakened by his attackers pre emptive blow, there would be very little discouragement for bullies. That's pretty straightforward, right? Complete nonsense, this idea of proportionality. The only way to deter bad behavior, bullying behavior, whether by an individual criminal or by a rogue state, is by them knowing that they are unleashing the unknown, anything could happen. And and that's one of the reasons why the way world war two ended was with Churchill's insistence on unconditional surrender, we are going to hit you so hard, right? Japan never said, Well, we've ever used an atom bomb against you. Well, they probably would have if they had it. Germany never said, Oh, we never will use we've been well, they wouldn't bet doesn't matter. We will do whatever it takes to end what you started. As soon as you introduce the silly nonsense of proportionality, you make sure that you're never going to end it. So please think about that. While we're at it, another thing to talk about. I've talked spoken about the fallacy of the children. And I've spoken about the fallacy of proportionality. Let me speak for a moment about the fallacy of the United Nations Refugee organization called UNRWA, un or WA, created explicitly for Arab refugees in the Middle East. And you should know that the truth is that the amount of money that the Union United Nations spends on Anwar, is about 10 times more or more than 10 times more than it spends on all the other refugees in the world. UNRWA the United Nations organization dealing with Arabs in the Middle East, employs over 30,000 people. How many people are employed by the United Nations for all the other refugees in the world? 10,003 times more staffers, more employees used for the Palestinian organization than for all the other refugee agencies of the United Nations in a whole world. It's pretty amazing, isn't it?
Daniel Lapin 44:34
So yeah, so you're not you're this United Nations Relief organization is created in 1949, just after the Israeli war of independence, to deal with the needs of the Arab refugees from the 4849 Arab Israeli war of Israeli independence. And you got to remember that it was the United Nations decree that formed the State of Israel. At that point, five Arab nations launched an attack, which they were sure and so as the rest of the world would wipe out the fledgling nation that had just been declared, the day before it was attacked. They declared the existence of Israel and five Arab armies attack. And Israel has to defend itself. And so through that, the refugee situation was created by the Arab attacks. And the rule should always be that if you attack, you unleash the unknown. There is no do overs after that. Because the only there is no other way to help maintain stability, and discourage the bullies of the world. And so, the UN RW UNRWA provides humanitarian assistance, and contributes to protection of refugees. By the way, there were 700,000 refugees at most, that left Israel voluntarily or involuntarily in 1948 49. And that's about a very similar number. Well, a little less of the number of Jews that were evicted and turned into refugees at the same time from Arab countries, Morocco, Libya, Tunisia, Syria, Jordan, they throughout hundreds of 1000s of Jews, were was the United Nations agency to turn them into perpetual refugees. Thorns in the side of the Arab world didn't exist. They all came to Israel, they were absorbed, became happy, healthy, productive citizens. That's what happened. So the Arab League has resolutely prevented the transfer of the Palestinian refugee issue to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. So the Arabs in the Middle East are the only people in the world who have a special United Nations Organization to take care of them. All the other refugees are under the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the UNHCR, and they managed to look after all the refugees of the world with only 10,000 employees, although that's a lot. Whereas taking care of the refugees in Gaza, 30,000 United Nations employees. Now, there's something that's really important to understand. Oh, here's the figure by the way, the Arab Muslim states expelled 1.1 million Jews.
Daniel Lapin 47:56
In the aftermath of the 1948 War 1.1 million, the number of Arabs that became refugees was 700,000, so more Jews became refugees. And now in Gaza alone, though, 700,000 in 1949, became 2 million, and they're still refugees. to Jordan, embrace them and integrate them. No. Egypt, no. Lebanon, no Syria, no. United Arab Emirates, no, Saudi Arabia, no. There, they are kept as an abrasive scab, perpetual refugees, recipients of money from the taxpayers of the Western world. And there's something interesting here to be aware of, you might wonder, why would the United Nations Relief organization which has so many 1000s of employees in Gaza, they got to know what's going on? Why would they be so much on the side of the Arabs? Why do they not report to the United Nations? You know what, Gaza has an extraordinarily high number of hospitals. But more more than any Western country, the numbers of hospitals per population is very high. And what's more, these hospitals are being used as munition depots and terrorist training operation centers. They're not just hospitals tell the United know, UNRWA did everything in its power to help Hamas. And I understand this because there's a very important principle we should all remember and recognize and understand. And that is the idea that you end up loving the people you help more than you end up loving the people who help you if you You are the recipient of goodness and kindness. You don't necessarily love the people who give it to you, on some deep level you resent them. And you can see this most easily with parents, parents love children much more than children, love parents, parents love children unconditionally. Children do not love parents unconditionally. Many, many, many more children are going around, oh, my parents were abusive. You don't hear that many parents say Oh, my children were abusive. You have children, sitting and talking to therapists at $150 An hour how my parents ruined my life. The truth is children, ruin parents lives much more. But you don't hear parents doing. Chip. Parents love children much more than children love parents. You know why? Because parents do more for children than children do for parents. Parents give more to children than children give to parents. It's a general rule. You end up feeling close to those to whom you give, not from those whom you take. And so it makes perfect sense that United Nations employees who do nothing but give to the Hamas of Gaza. Morning to night, they're giving them resources, they're giving them money, they're bringing them food, they're bringing all kinds of good things all the time non stop. Obviously, they end up feeling close to them. They do. See, that's what happens. And so it was an inherently wrong and unstable situation to begin with. But one which dramatically favored the Arab world. And so I have to ask you a very simple question. Why is Israel different? Why is it that we've got to preserve the body of refugees and let them multiply in increasing numbers, because they have a grudge against Israel. But there are so many other refugees that have grudges, so many, a million afghanis in Pakistan, so many all around the world, work is done to get them home or to integrate them as quickly as possible, not the ones in -- why? in order to create an impossible situation for Israel. Am I being paranoid? I don't think so.
Daniel Lapin 52:27
Because I want to explain to you what one of the root causes of anti semitism is. Oh, it's an ancient disease. And listen, I've heard all the stories of anti semitism. But there's one main underlying reason my friend, my happy warriors, and that is helped greatly if you understand that the left leaning progressive elite leads the struggle of anti semitism. Jew hatred, is nowhere more ardently felt than on the American University campus. That's where it comes from. always been that way. Why? Let me explain. This is a very deep explanation. But it's very brief. And it's it's pretty straightforward. It probably warrants a little bit of thinking about, but here it is. There's a big problem with Jews, happy warriors. And that is Jews prove the existence of God. So simple as that I've just given you the great dark secret of anti semitism. People hate the Jews, because you cannot be an atheist. Legitimately as long as they are Jews in the world. It's as simple as that. You only have to ask yourself, first of all, where did these people come from? And why is it that 3000 years after they make an appearance in the world? They are still putting Mezuzahs on their doors, just as a book that shows up 3300 odd years ago, said humans do. We're still doing it. And millions of Jews around the world millions now there's only about 15 million in total. And that's a very, very generous number reality on my opinion. Maybe 11 or 12 million, maybe 10. Probably more likely, but there are still gonna be millions of Jews, who in a couple of months time will observe the holiday of Passover. And you will not find the most microscopic morsel of bread in their houses. You know why? Because there's a book that showed up 3300 years ago, which says that You mustn't have any leaven in your homes. And that means bread. That's one example of leaven. It's pretty amazing. The existence of Jews in the world proves that something monumental happened 3300 years ago. Was it a revelation on Mount Sinai was the appearance of the Torah. We can have all kinds of interesting conversations about that. But one thing is clear, something supernatural and abnormal, is responsible for the persistence of a people that like all other nations on the stage of world history have vanished one after the other was the Babylonians. And it was the Sumerians. And it was one off the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Jebusites. All gone. And the Jew, still here, still adhering to a value system. That has not changed in 3300 years. So it's as simple as that. Would the secular progressive elites of the world be relieved if Israel vanishes? Yes, they would. And they will be even more relieved if all the Jews on the on the planet vanished? Do they reserve a special hatred for Jews? Sure, because Jews stop you deep down, being convinced that there is no God. Only if all the Jews vanish, can you comfortably settle into an atheist somnambulance that allows you to think of yourself in animalistic terms in terms of evolutionary biology, in terms of eliminating moral systems.
Daniel Lapin 57:15
Take the New York Times. For instance, New York Times I've been looking at this for the last couple of years has been pushing something called polyamory you know what polyamory is? polyamory is when you can't find you are so thoroughly and wholesome and pleasant and and hygienic, that you can't find a good looking man to marry you. You end up marrying three or four horrible men, or you're such a hopeless male, that you can't find a quality woman to marry. You see, you end up marrying two or three horrible women. That's what polyamory is. And I will tell you the terms in which it is phrased in, in in terms of sort of New York Times, enthusiasts and believers, very simple. They think of it polyamory as an I'll read to you, if you don't mind. What they say. polyamory, like any relationship model has its complexities and varied perspectives. It's crucial to respect individuals choices, and emphasize consent, communication, and mutual respect. polyamory can foster empathy, trust and understanding, but may also pose challenges. Societal acceptance, and inclusivity are essential for promoting tolerance and breaking down barriers. Ultimately, the value of polyamory depends on individual experiences and values. That's right. The New York Times is trying to shatter traditional marriage. Why? Because like Jews, traditional marriage is evidence of the authenticity that the Bible played in the role of many, many, many people. That's right, monogamous. Marriage is a biblical idea. Prohibition of homosexuality, a biblical idea, prohibition of incest, a biblical idea. And so all of these things promoted by the atheist and secular left as an attempt to gain the comfort. When I say comfort, the comfort of being an atheist, it's an incredibly comfortable existence. Because there is nobody looking over your shoulder. There is nobody demanding more of you then you are willing to deliver. There is nobody saying it's wrong to follow your instincts. polyamory loving lots of people, oh, what could be wrong with it? By the way, it's interesting that the pictures that The New York Times routinely uses to illustrate the story it very, almost never that I could find, showing pictures of the actual people involved. Or models, all attractive looking models practicing polyamory, you know why they didn't use the pictures of the actual people? Well, all you got to do is research on the internet, the people who actually do live polyamory, and they're not many of them. But there's some of them, they all seem to live in Portland. They are all how, you know, I don't want to hate on the people, right? They're all obese, extremely ugly looking people. I'm sorry. That's just how it is. But it's just so funny. That as part of its propaganda movement, to try and persuade Americans, that traditional marriage is dead. They have to lie and use pretty people, because the real people doing this are really not attractive in any way at all. So yeah, it's, it's in a way, it's hilarious. Yeah.
Daniel Lapin 1:01:21
The reality is that the secular materialistic elite would love every last Judah vanish off the surface of the earth. And that task would be greatly assisted if they could get rid of Israel. And that is the goal. It really is. Because that way, the world is a more comfortable place. There doesn't have to be a god requesting all these rules, and prohibiting polyamory. Do you know, the the, the left would argue that an open marriage is fine, if everybody is communicating honestly and respectfully. That's the language they use. And so if a husband and wife agree to have affairs with other people, and everybody is in the know, and everybody is communicating, honestly, and it is with the consent of everybody involved, the secular lead would say, it's fine. And what fun that would be, let's put a cap on marriage. Let's make it an open marriage. And it's all great, because everyone agrees. So what's wrong with it? There's only one thing wrong with it. And that is that the Bible says don't do it. It's a sin against God. Do you see how nice it would be if we could really persuade ourselves that the Bible is a meaningless, antiquated irrelevancy? It'd be great if we could do that. Because then we could really enjoy all the bad things we'd love doing. But deep down now, as human beings, we can't, because deep down, we have to constantly try and persuade ourselves through the pages of the New York Times, we got to persuade ourselves that all this stuff is good, and it's okay. Nothing wrong with it.
Daniel Lapin 1:02:02
But the trouble is deep down, we know there's something wrong with it. And as long as there is a single Jew left in the world, everybody will always know there is something wrong with it. Because that Jew is a reminder of an Abraham, well, Abraham never existed. Well, it's a bit problematic, because even the Arabs will tell you that Abraham existed. And, and then, a few years later came Moses and the giving of the 10 commandments, and the Five Books of Moses, and then later on the rest of the Bible, and all of that changes our lives hugely. Because no matter how dissolute you are, you cannot deep down persuade yourself that there is no ultimate morality in the world. Because deep down you know, that every single walking Jew, whether he likes it or not, whether he himself is an atheist. Each walking Jun is a walking testament to the reality of a Judeo Christian morality system, which is horribly inconvenient for those of us who want to have a little fun. That's how it works. And Judeo Christian says, yeah, it makes an enormous difference. It comes with costs, you can have all the fun you want, but it also brought huge benefits, namely, civilization. And I'll tell you where you see that most So significantly, in my view, and I've often been interested in this, and I've written on this recently in a thought tool. You know, there are a few islands around the world that have an international border, cutting through them. My son and I, a little while ago took a sailing trip in the Caribbean. And one of the islands we sail to was St. Martin. And St Martin is, depends where you land on the island, you're either in France or in Holland, because there's an international border running right through the island. Cyprus is like that as well. I think, Ireland I was in Ireland, there's an international border separating Northern Ireland, which is British from South Island, which is Irish. But the most interesting one to me is the Caribbean island of Hispaniola. And the reason is because in none of the other examples I mentioned, does the border so starkly divide between developed and primitive? The border between Haiti and the Dominican Republic divides between hopeless pity for sad, Haiti, and the modern, prosperous Dominican Republic. You can go on vacation in the Dominican Republic. And you can drive from the airport to any one of a number of beautiful resort hotels, plenty roads, plenty cars, plenty hotels. And guess what? Those hotels enjoy uninterrupted electricity and clean water and working sanitation. Across the board in Haiti, not so much. It's got less than 1/10 of the roads of its neighbor. Crime in Haiti so bad that the United States Department of State Department actually issued a travel advisory about six months ago. It reads do not travel to Haiti due to kidnapping crime, civil unrest and poor health care infrastructure. Yeah, you should definitely take a vacation in the Dominican Republic. But you'd be crazy to do that in Haiti. It's a bad bad situation in Haiti. And yet the two nations have the same meteorology. And the same, they are on the same island for heaven's sake. And they've got the same slave colonial history. Haiti was France, Dominican Republic was Spain. And
Daniel Lapin 1:07:41
by the way, this is I'm not the first person to notice this. You will find United Nations studies and university studies and scientists studies all trying to explain how can two nations that are so similar, have such different outcomes? It's it's hard to understand. And they all focus on external things. Well, Haiti has too many mountains. So that's why it's poor. I've been to Switzerland, Switzerland is God many, many more mountains in Haiti. And Switzerland is doing pretty well, thank you. And the, they say, well, agriculture is harder. There's less arable land to grow things in Haiti. And that's why it's poor. Dominican Republic has got more land. Tell me, do you think Haiti has a harder time with agriculture than Singapore? Or Hong Kong? Or Monaco? No. And those countries are pretty rich. So why is Haiti so poor? Well, France was a terrible colonizer. What and Spain wasn't. And in any event, what about the islands of French Polynesia? They they're in pretty good shape? Or how about Martinique or St Maarten, the half of St. Maarten, that's French in the Caribbean. So you can't blame the French because for the state of conditions in Haiti, so how can you explain the crime and the squalor in Haiti? Right next door to the success of the Dominican Republic?
Daniel Lapin 1:09:18
And I want to tell you what the answer is, it's nothing external. It's not the weather. It's not the mountains, not the French. It's something internal. And, and I want to illustrate that shocking notion, with a lesson from the Bible. There are 72 verses in the Bible, in the longest chapter in the whole five books of Moses. It's the Book of Numbers, chapter seven, longest chapter in the whole Bible in the whole five books of Moses. And if you look at the 72 verses from chapter seven, verse 12, all the way through to Numbers chapter six. Haven't verse 83. Take a quick glance, and you can take a quick glance, because you'll quickly discover that those 72 verses are made up of six verses repeated identically 12 times 12 sixes of 72. Each sequence of the six verses, details, the gifts brought by the prints of each of the 12 tribes, and every one of the 12 princes brought exactly the same gift. I don't know about you. But I know how I would have written that I would have said, and here follows the list of gifts brought by every one of the 12 princes whose names are listed in the appendix. Instead of 72 verses, it could have been told in six or seven verses. Why repeated 12 times same information. And ancient Jewish wisdom answers this baffling question because it seems to be such a waste of ink. And, and you know, you've heard me say before that ancient Jewish wisdom insists that there's not a single unnecessary letter in the Torah in the Five Books of Moses. So how can they be that many 66 redundant verses? It's crazy. What's going on here? And the answer is that although the gifts were physically identical, every single one was spiritually distinctive, right? We live in a world that is both physical and spiritual. If I bought a pen, at the local stationery store, but my young daughter gave me the same pen for my birthday, do you really think those two pens are the same to me? Right? One has a spiritual characteristic. Now there is no laboratory in the world that can measure the difference between these two pens. But I'm a human being and I'm part spiritual, as well as physical. And the spiritual part of me knows there's a world of difference between those two pens, I treasure one, the other is disposable. A gift may be the same as someone else's gift. But the giver imparts something of himself in that gift as well. And so these 72 verses are all repeated, not in order to show us that they're all the same. But to emphasize that each one bears a distinctive spiritual characteristic of each different distinctive donor. That's what we, we got to understand. Imagine, you know, imagine, two little, two little children come along, and they each decide to give Susan the same they didn't realize they got some give her each one gives her chocolate, and they're so happy to have given her a chocolate for her birthday. And then they see they each gave the same thing. When they realize they both gave mom exactly the same thing. They'll be upset. Because now there's nothing distinctive about what they gave. What would Susan have done, she would reassure them, that each of your gifts is precious and unique because it came from each of my two precious and unique children. And you know what? She'd be telling them the Absolute Truth. The uniqueness comes from the spiritual interior, not from the physical exterior. And the same is true for Haiti and the Dominican Republic. It's not the weather, it's not the mountains. It's not the French, it's nothing like that. It is an internal value system. The physical roots of the Dominican Republic and Haiti are almost indistinguishable. Their weather and material realities are almost indistinguishable. But the very different results flow from an all important spiritual distinction. What is that spiritual distinction? In the Dominican Republic, about 75% of the population, maybe more is Christian. In Haiti, the Christian proportion of the population is far far lower. The balance practice something called voodoo. And what is more, it's even more serious that most of those who profess Christianity blend their Catholicism with the practices of voodoo.
Daniel Lapin 1:14:51
Now, I want to stress you have to know not all religions produce the same kind of societies right Islam produces one kind of society. Christianity produced Western Europe. Now, I don't know about you. But the last time I checked, there are many, many, many, many more Muslims living in Europe than there are Europeans living in Muslim countries. In other words, people vote with their feet. The civilization that we call Western civilization was created by Christianity. And apparently, it's much more desirable, then societies that were created by other religions. Also, we should know that in order to be a religion, it has to answer the three chief existential questions of humanity. Number one, how did we get here? Number two, where are we ultimately headed to? And number three, what are we supposed to be doing while we're here? Bible based Judaism and Christianity explicitly answers those three questions, and thereby, inspired its devotees to build and sustain the civilization whose benefits we cherish. And also, I'm afraid we sometimes take for granted. On that basis, I want you to know that secular materialism is also a religion, because it also explains where we came from. And lengthy process of unaided, random materialistic evolution. It also explains where we're going to total destruction by climate change, or meteorol. Who knows what, what are we supposed to be doing in between building a one world government so we can eliminate war and take care of the children? So yes, secular materialism is a religion. Islam obviously, is a religion. Voodoo, not so much. It doesn't even attempt to answer those three questions. And I believe that that is what shackles Haiti to failure and hopelessness. Yeah, it's, it's, it's sad and toughen. Heaven knows it's not fair on the children in Haiti, right? Which kind of brings us full circle. Ladies and gentlemen, happy warriors. Don't forget to sign up and become a happy warrior. Subscribe to the rabbi Daniel Lapin show. And let me hear your comments. Let me find out how you react what you think about the topic of essay topic, because in a way, I've been talking really about one major overarching topic, but you could say the topics if you prefer of today's show, thank you so much for being part of the rabbi Daniel Lapin show. I really appreciate it. I really, really do. And I mean it. And I also, thank you for all that you do with your friendship and your support. And I want to wish you a fantastic week of growth onwards and upwards, with your families, with your friendships, with your finances, with your fitness and with your faith. Until next week, I'm Rabbi Daniel Lapin. God bless you.
