Dax Flame is NOT a Genius.

suppose you're talking to an
acquaintance somebody you don't know too terribly well a friend of a friend he doesn't have a degree in the sciences he doesn't have a background in engineering let's just say he's even a failed actor and sometime youtuber and he says to you he has an idea for a brilliant new invention that's going to change the world that's going to make millions of dollars he just needs some startup investment he needs a little bit of capital to get the ball rolling but once it gets rolling this could transform daily life for millions of americans coast to coast and generate a lot of revenue okay okay okay i'm i'm listening what's this idea he says this is an amazingly simple idea it's so simple that i can't believe someone else didn't come up with it yet now you should be more suspicious not less because they say okay what's what's what's your idea doesn't it bother you that every day you have to recharge your cell phone would wouldn't it be better if we had self recharging cell phones wouldn't that be better i can't believe someone hasn't has that already if you give me the money i'm going to bring this hey what what do you mean could you narrow it down for me a little bit like do you have blueprints do you have a schematic like what is this technology or no no just just put the money up now put the investment now and in fact he tells you he's gonna make a documentary movie showing the progress of this building they're already filming in fact they're talk he's talking to you right now and there's a videographer recording this now you're staying there looking at him like okay you're so confident in the great success of this idea that you got a video but you don't have a blueprint you don't have a patent you don't have a background so there's there's really nothing more to this idea than like a two sentence pitch and now i'm asking you what is the idea are you talking about a cell phone with a solar panel on the back are you talking about a cell phone with a pair of legs that walks itself over to the uh the outlet and plugs itself into is that what you mean by a self charge that says no no it's just you know it's such a bother having to recharge yourself we should have we should have cell phones that charge so what so what does it plug into oh no it doesn't it doesn't plug in anything it just it's just for charging itself look brad the laws of physics can't be suspended you can't just call for an exception to the laws of physics so that your stupid idea can work and you can make millions of dollars in this documentary you're filming can have a happy ending that's not the way reality on planet earth goes there has to be a source of electricity you can't just say you're going to invent the cell phone that has no source of electricity that that's ridiculous right and a good friend a good friend would take the time to ridicule the idea to make him realize how ridiculous it is a few of you will have already figured out who and what i'm talking about here i'm talking about internet personality dax flame um years ago now we saw the movie the disaster artist and we saw it on an airplane it's pretty much the only circumstance i've watched conventional cinema and if i'm uh trapped on an airplane and too tired to get reading or research done on an airplane watch this film the disaster artist the disaster artist is a comedy but really it could be played as a tragedy it could be a tremendously dark and dismal film because what what is the disaster artist about it's about a mentally disabled man it's about a man who has had a life-changing brain injury he has difficulty speaking some of you might know this is commonly talked about in the press one of the side effects of brain damage can be so-called foreign accent syndrome it's quite common with car accidents to get your head caved in and situated get a serious concussion or brain injury such that you're just struggling to speak your own native language but because of that brain damage it sounds as if english is your second legend it sounds as if you're talking with an accent this guy is badly brain damaged he has a lot of money in the bank he's in hollywood he says he's gonna make a movie and everyone enables him this guy is like the worst actor and the worst screenwriter imaginable but everyone is taking his money and everyone is encouraging him right from the the the coaches and the agents and the people who selling license renting the equipment the film everyone around him the actors he employs everyone's taking his money everyone's encouraging everyone's saying you can do it you're gonna be great you're good at this right and you know not one person is honest with him and says look how can you be the lead actor in a movie you can barely speak in complete sentences you know if you're going to invest millions of dollars in making a film you had millions of dollars to his name maybe you should for your first film project invest with someone who's an experienced and proven writer an experienced and proven director maybe even some experienced and proven actors even if they've only had small scale success maybe you should work with people you know what they're doing maybe you should have people around you who can criticize your script and tell you what's wrong with them criticize your act they can tell you what's wrong maybe you shouldn't just be surrounded by yes ma'am this was a really mentally limited guy and you know what this film is based on uh the disaster artist is a true story that resulted in one of the worst films ever made being released in theaters it's called the room it's much laughed at and mocked and i know i know people behave today as if that movie the room had been produced as a comedy in the first place but it wasn't it was it was a serious drama that is so bad it's so awful that people laugh at it not with it right it's this seriously mentally disabled guys attempt to write a script and perform and employ all these people and pay all this money and he made their lives miserable making the film too and i get it i mean it's it's so absurd you can now take this and present it as a comedy but really it's a tragedy um i i do not know if dax flame identifies as mentally disabled if you google this guy's name of course there's always been speculation that he's somewhere on the spectrum for something like autism that he has some kind of inborn mental disability and we've been able to see thanks to youtube how his behavior changed from his teenage years to his adulthood now but if he's not disabled he is a very very stupid guy and he came out with this idea here on youtube um an idea so simple that he couldn't believe nobody had ever done it before right and what was this idea why should you have to go to the grocery store to buy lettuce why should you have to go to the grocery store and buy broccoli and other green vegetables why can't you just have a basket with dirt in the bottom sitting on your kitchen counter and you chop up some vegetables and then the next day they've regenerated and there are more vegetables so what i was watching is his concept video his pitch where he's explaining this i was thinking okay so is he selling like a delivery service where you sign up and every day or when someone comes and delivers new is that the point like he can't really be so stupid that he's unaware that the reason why you have to go to a store to buy vegetables is because they're grown on a farm like he can't be unaware that lettuce requires a farm and rain and sunshine and time to like it doesn't generate in 24 hours like on your kitchen count like how could he possibly be missing these pieces of the puzzle he really is that stupid whether he's mentally disabled not he really is that stupid and he went ahead and he made a documentary where he interviews all these people who are enabling him all these people i i don't know if there was a single person who told him he was an idiot or if there was a single person who even challenged him saying look why don't you have some respect for the specialists in this field why don't you have some respect for the people who actually studied at agriculture or agricultural technology or related fields of engineering at texas a m why don't you respect a humble farmer you you know go talk to somebody who never even went to high school but he spent their whole life farming lettuce and they can explain to you why lettuce won't grow on your kitchen counter under a heat lamp this is just not remotely viable or how many heads of lettuce do you expect per annum per year to generate this is there's so much wrong with this idea it's just laughable but nobody's laughing you know now i'm not going to say this guy has millions of dollars he has some money and he has some fame and he was able to translate his fame into money he did basically a kickstarter he did crowdfunding he asked for donations one smart thing he did was he didn't promise he'd actually mass produce this thing he just asked for the donations to pay for the documentary that was going to follow him on his journey to make this magnificent new invention an invention that absolutely could not possibly work any more than this impossible notion of a self-charging cell phone um okay what what does a real friend do in those situations if you guys been watching my channel for a long time you know how i feel about this if you have a friend who wants to be an actor and they don't even have a good speaking voice they can't speak in whole sentences you know whether it's due to a mental disability or a stutter or whatever you got to say them look unless you're planning to be a mime unless you're by an act do silent film like you know you really gotta check yourself this dream is not gonna become a reality you've really gotta think this through if you have a friend who wants to be a fashion model and they're only five foot four i mean oh well look you know if you want to be a basketball player and you're five foot six and 300 pound whatever it is you should have friends in your life who really talk to you honestly about the gap between you know in order to dream you've got to be asleep do you want friends who are going to lead you deeper and deeper into that kind of dreaming self-deception or do you want friends who are going to help you to be awake be alive and and live in the real world and all of you now sitting here and watching this video may say oh i want option b i want friends who will tell me i'm wrong when i'm wrong and that i'm being stupid when i'm stupid and then i'm too ugly or untalented or you might say that right now in the context of this video but in your real lives how many facebook groups have been kicked out of for saying the most mild well-mannered well-intentioned critical thing imaginable like the human capacity to hear criticism to hear contrasting points of view to hear someone tell you you're wrong you don't know which document here's a link to an article that provides the information you don't know the human capacity to hear criticism do tolerance to invite criticism dissent and contrasting views it's terrifying how limited that is and that's why our species for thousands of years toiled in despotism we were ruled by kings and tyrants and you know this thing called democracy here and there you know experimentally sometimes failing sometimes stumbling one of the most fundamental ideas is just you bring people together on a council and really have them criticize and debate one another's views and guess what nobody thinks of that as friendship and it is it's the most the most wonderful kind of friendship you could have would be a productive collaborative rivalry where people really can't tell you that you're wrong so the next chapter in the dax flame honesty tragically um is that he got on board with another larger more famous more affluent youtuber this youtuber shows up at his house and interviews him and he says well look what do you want to do with your future what's going on with you and daxflame says he has a great idea he's gonna he's gonna do a game show and this guy dex flame again i don't know if he's actually disabled i mean he's the only human being on earth who would make a worse game show host than vegan gains he talks with flat affects he can't make icon he says oh i've got this great idea for a game show and guess who the game show host is going to be it's going to be me it's going to be me with my tremendous level of personal charisma and conversational ability chit-chatting people on camera and of course everybody just enables them nobody says to look if you want this to be a successful game show look in the mirror watch your own youtube videos you know who on earth could be a worse game shows you can put out a casting call right now you can compete against the other people who will show up at a casting call in los angeles for the role of game show host on a new game show you're going to be 10th and out of 10 you'll be 99th out of 99 however many contestants we have how many competitors we have to come to this game shows you are going to be the worst applicant for this job you know a real friend would say that but no as in that film the disaster artist he's surrounded by yes man he's surrounded by encouragement and what are they really encouraging him to do they're encouraging him to live in a dream instead of live in reality these aren't the same people but they're the same type of people who said wow what a great idea why can't people just grow vegetables like broccoli and lettuce on their countertop why hasn't that already been invented why can't that just be mass-marketed why can't you just start asking for hundreds of thousands of dollars in investment and you know why just take this idea and run with it you know that's not really any more kind than if someone tells you they're going to walk across a bridge and you know the bridge is out you know the bridge is going to collapse under their feet that you just encourage them you know to to get out there and and keep on walking so look i mean what's what is the conclusion of this video i mean what is the conclusion of this video people say they want friendship but what they really want is flattery and it's especially on the internet i see that playing out again and again and again that people and obviously this is uh associated with celebrities but we see this with people who have no fame and no money no fortune to their name on the small scale it seems like everyone tries to surround themselves with a coven of followers that's the term we use on the internet of uncritical adulation where they're not hearing these things they're not considering you know uh contrasting perspectives so that's it this is my commentary on the rise and rise of dax flame um [Music] i guess for members of the audience and for people who literally donated money to support this guy maybe the fantasy is that a complete idiot can see can succeed that anyone can live their dream and that by helping someone like this live their dream they're vicariously living out you know their own dreams um maybe it's just too uncomfortable reality to recognize that no you know there are people who have degrees in electrical engineering there are people who study and master the science of hydroponics and agriculture and all of these things and you know you know maybe instead of this idea of clinging to your dream you could really have a kind of respect for the accumulated knowledge and wisdom of centuries and millennia however imperfectly that's accessible to you that farming happens the way it does for a reason and that if you're going to contribute something to that great development of of culture and agriculture and technology you're going to first have to walk in the footsteps of those people who came before you and learned what they learned and learned some of it the same way that they learned it you know before adding on your own little innovation you know at the end of that that grand process of thousands of years and i can even say that about cinema i can even say that about politics and i can even say that about youtube why do i read aristotle why do i read about ancient politics and the history of great political movements that have failed before me most most of what i study in politics is failure it's a history of disaster and and failure all kinds of grand plans and schemes including with communism these schemes to transform agriculture overnight you know when millions of people starve to death oh we're just going to throw away the textbooks in agriculture we have this great new idea of how farming can be transformed communism was full of exactly that kind of reckless innovation that led to nowhere but sure even in even in filmmaking you know you could look at somebody like the subject of the disaster artist in the rooms or for the guy's name or you could look at dax flame himself and say look you know maybe there's really something in the history of cinema maybe there's really something that people are learning in these university programs maybe there are technical and artistic maybe there are elements here maybe you need to have the humility to walk in someone else's footsteps even if you have the money even if you have millions of dollars or you have the fan base you have the fame you have support just go and start making your own feature film um maybe you should go and be the assistant to the assistant to the director of photography maybe you should be an intern and stand on set maybe you should learn how it's done um maybe you should maybe you should learn from people who already have this conversation respect those who came before you so i mean i guess that's uh that's a conclusion i hadn't thought of before press record in this video but when you think about that relationship of people living um as a dreamer only beholden to their dream i guess bundled up with that is a kind of contempt for um the accumulated wisdom of the waking world of those of us who are awake those of us who have empirical experience those of us who've accomplished something before you know no no no i'm going to cast aside all the things you people did wrong i'm going to with my great new invention my great new idea i'm going to change the world as opposed to having the humility to say look i'm going to walk in the footsteps of all the people who came before me before taking my own small step further offering something innovative that builds on the past that isn't just denying it or in effect denying the laws of physics