Woes: Hello. And welcome back to Millenniyule 2021. I’m now here with Mark Gullick, who is, … Well actually, he’s a writer on Counter-Currents. But there is more to him than that.

So Mark would you like to introduce yourself, and just describe yourself for the audience?

Mark Gullick: Certainly! My name’s Mark Gullick. As you can see. I’m 60. Originally from London in England. I say London, England, because apparently there are about seven London’s in the USA. So and there are a lot of Americans down here where I am, which is Costa Rica, when I relocated almost six years ago.

I really came over here for a break, and just kept staying, and kept staying. Was intending to go back at some stage. And then the whole Covid thing sprang up almost two years ago, I guess, now.

And having watched the appalling things that are happening in, well across Europe, and the Commonwealth, and England, now it seems. As well, what Britain, I suppose the UK, I should say. I’ve just decided to stay put here, because as I speak there are, …

The only thing I have to do here in terms of Covid, is wear a mask when I go to a store, or get on a bus. That’s it. There’s no vaccine mandates. There’s nothing. There’s been no lockdown. It’s comparatively free and easy. And yet has the lowest infection rate in the Americas. So they’re doing it right, whatever they’re doing.

Personally, I’ve got a Phd, well three degrees. And all in philosophy. All from the University of Sussex. And yeah that’s me, essentially.

Woes: Hold on a sec. And could you tell us about the different, the three degrees that you have. Describe them for me.

Mark Gullick: Yeah. The the MA and the Phd were in were in straight philosophy. The BA was in philosophy with literature. And obviously a degree was a mixed bag. The Master’s degree, rather foolishly, I did on Heidegger’s, “Being in Time”. Which I don’t think was a terrific idea. Now I look back on it. Because I don’t speak German, either read German.

But nevertheless, it got me it got me conversant with “Being in Time”, which is just a towering book! Sorry, [noise of a motor scooter] motorcycles here don’t tend to have mufflers, or baffles on.

And my doctorate was, my supervisor was a man called Jeff Bennington, who was a friend and translator of Jack Derrida.

Woes: Right.

Mark Gullick: He suggested to me that, … We were talking, I think we’d had a couple of seminars about the body, about the role of the body in philosophy, and I showed an interest in that. And he said:

“Well, …”

Woes: What do you mean “the role of the body”?

Mark Gullick: Well philosophy is generally about, traditionally has been about, the soul, or the mind, or the psyche, or “noose” [sp] in ancient Greek, or it’s something non-corporeal. It’s whatever about us is, not the body. And the body has a kind of, it gets a bit of a bad rap in philosophy! Plato calls it this [word unclear] company. And obviously Christianity, well not obviously, but Christianity is rather harsh on the body. A sort of potted history of, … [was cut off]

Woes: Mark you’ve just disappeared! Are you still there? Oh dear, I think we might have lost Mark.

Mark Gullick: , … I was very under the spell of Derrida at the time. So it was a little bit, …

Woes: Mark, are you using the Wi-Fi from the bar, where you are?

Mark Gullick: I’m sorry?

Woes: Are you on Wi-Fi?

Mark Gullick: Yeah.

Woes: Could you get closer to the router, the modem. Because you just disappeared for about 20 seconds there. [laughing]

Mark Gullick: Oh okay.

Woes: Yeah, thank you. Get as close to the router as possible, that would be very good.

Mark Gullick: Okay. That’s about as close as I can get, I think.

[05:00]

Woes: Okay. Thank you.

Mark Gullick: Okay?

Woes: Yeah, so you were saying about the body gets [sound of roaring motorcycle] Oh my god!

Mark Gullick: Yeah.

Woes: Could you go indoors maybe? I don’t know. I mean, I don’t know about, that’s going to be really distracting! [laughing]

Mark Gullick: Okay. Yeah, listen, there is just no way around this. It’s just the setup here. This is the Third World. And I just can’t do anything about this.

Woes: Ah that’s unfortunate.

Mark Gullick: All I can do.

Woes: Okay, we will persevere. So you were saying about the role of the body. It has got a bad rap in philosophy. And it’s a, …

Mark Gullick: It has got a bad rap. And then it has got a bad rap in classical philosophy, and Christianity. When you start to get onto people like Nietzsche, like Merleau-Ponty, it begins to sort of make it’s presence felt a little bit more. Than it did. I don’t know if you’ve got that, but Plato calls the body:

“The shadow that keeps us company.”

Woes: Right.

Mark Gullick: And there’s a fascinating. I’ll just stop when something goes by. There’s a fascinating, … There’s probably a whole thesis to be written on Freud and the body. Freud started off, … I don’t know if you’re aware that Freud started as a neurobiologist. And I think his doctoral thesis was on the neural system of the catfish, or something similar.

So really it was about, and I don’t know if you’ve got this. But I was very under the spell of Derrida at the time, and deconstruction. And the difference between writing and speech. Which Derrida says sort of allies writing with the body, the dead letter. And so on, and speech with the soul, with fully present communication, signification.

So yeah, that’s my doctorate thumbnail sketch of.

Woes: Right. And we were going to speak about the role of the university. Because you recently wrote an essay that was published on Counter-Currents. I’ve actually forgotten what it was titled. But it was about the “Glass Beads Game” *.

[*Higher Education: Hermann Hesse’s The Glass Bead Game]

Mark Gullick: Yep.

Woes: We can go into that. But first how would you define, … Because I think in our age, in the present age, we don’t really know what the university is for, other than training people for a career. Giving them the knowledge that they need. Very sort of very black and White really.

But I think historically, and up until about 100 years ago, the university was conceived as something more vague than that, more nebulous. There’s more to do with forming a young man’s character. Would you like to go into that?

Mark Gullick: Yes! Yes it was! Well given that the oldest best known universities, are Oxford and Cambridge, which I think really started off around the 13th centuries. I think in those days it was becoming apparent that a locus was needed for knowledge. It wasn’t good enough just for people to pick, …

Because, of course, well when was Gutenberg’s printing press? Fourteen something? 1450, or something like that? And I guess after that with more of a proliferation of printed material, apart from anything else, the university became a place of libraries. You know, became a place where you would have a locus, or a collection of knowledge and information, which really didn’t exist before, I suppose. I mean, after the famous Alexandrian library.

I don’t know if, … Well, what disturbs me is that the university is being seen now, again, as the formation of a young person’s character. Unfortunately that character has been predetermined by some fairly fierce, and sort of neo-Marxist ideology. The classic phrase being that:

“Young people at university are now not taught how to think, but taught what to think!”

Woes: Yes. Yes.

Mark Gullick: Which does completely obviate the whole point of it. But then, of course, that split into two, because there’s the art side, the humanities side. And also the STEM side of things. Which the current sort of wokism, or whatever shorthand we want to use for it, hasn’t affected STEM, because it can’t really. Although they’ve made a good effort to try and say that:

“Engineering is sexist! Mathematics is racist!”

And so on, and so forth. That the hard sciences still manage to resist that.

But the humanities now are pretty much, you know, ideological training courses. You are not going to university now to learn how to think, to get the apparatus of rational thought, post Enlightenment stuff, the use of reason. You’re really going now to be told what you can and can’t say once you leave!

[11:03]

Woes: Well also there’s the conception of education itself. I believe that the roots of the word mean:

“To bring out of a person what is already within them.”

Mark Gullick: Epicavey [sp] in Latin. I’m not sure of the Greek is. But yes you’re absolutely right! To bring forth!

Woes: Yeah, to bring forth! Whereas we now think of education as just basically, indoctrination. Forcing stuff into a person and changing what is there already.

Mark Gullick: Yeah! Yes it is. And absolutely ruinous! Because, as I say, STEM is a different thing, and not something I know a great deal about in terms of the disciplines. On the humanities side. And I’ve been trying to get something into the mainstream media. Although, I don’t think they’ll touch me with a long pole, now. I think they check who you write for, [chuckling] before they even consider you.

But I think probably most of the humanities degrees in most of the British universities, certainly, are near useless now! Except for racking up a vast debt!

Woes: But [chuckling] there’s an interesting contradiction that this Leftist notion of education involves indoctrinating, and forcing stuff into the person. Whereas at the same time they have this notion that man is inherently good. So they’re all about like the sexuality, gender identity. They pretend to be dead against social constructs, and things that are artificial. And yet they have so little interest in what is already there in a person’s mind. The person that they inherently are. And want to indoctrinate. This is a strange contradiction.

Mark Gullick: It is. And it’s a fault line within the whole idea of wokism, or CRT, [Critical Race Theory] or any of the different sort of arms of the huge squid that’s covering education at the moment.

There’s an argument, for example, that race is a “social construct”. Which is not even an argument. I mean, it’s an absurd thing to say. And it negates biology. And so on and so forth.

Except when it comes to White people! When it’s not a social construct! It’s a very definite thing that exists in the world. It’s this clash of intersectionalities, that the Left haven’t quite mastered.

Partly, because they don’t have the post enlightenment apparatus that allows you to parse, P-A-R-S-E, parse different ideas and different concepts.

But the whole idea that, … I don’t know if you read a piece of mine on Professor Kathleen Stock, who became quite famous written. She was at my university at Sussex. And she was hounded out of her job for being what I suppose we call a “gender realist”! That boring old stuff about there being two sexes.

And although you can change if you do have body dysmorphia, or whatever it is, you can’t actually change your sex, your biological sex! Not simply, because people are defined by what they have between their legs, or whether they have hairy chests, or not.

But I mean, men are men, and women are women down to the cellular level! You know, it’s not just a quick, … Your whole DNA is shot through with being male, or female!

And yes, I do appreciate that, well hermaphrodite aside, that’s a separate thing. I don’t really understand much about it. But there are there is biological hermaphroditism, that’s the word.

But Kathleen Stock, Professor Stock simply said in, I think a book others called Material Girls. And in some of her lectures as well that silly men, are men, and women are women! And she wasn’t just debated, or questioned.

This is the thing now, it just becomes a witch trial! Straight away! There’s no room for:

“Well. Let’s talk about this.”

The Left will not debate!

[15:36]

Woes: Well yeah, at this point, they have arrived at an ideology and a doctrine, that they have absolutely no interest in augmenting, except to make it more pure! A more doctrinaire version of itself.

Mark Gullick: Yes! Yes! Yes! And it’s in the end, of course, it becomes the doctrine and the adherence to the doctrine that becomes the important thing, rather than the any intellectual fibre that might be contained within the ideas under question.

So, it’s just happened to another. I was at Sussex. And so was Kathleen Stock. And that Essex, obviously, you know, where Essex is. I assume you do. Although you’re Scottish, I gather by your accent.

Woes: Yes, yes, I’m from Edinburgh.

Mark Gullick: Okay. That’s where you have the brogue, not the rougher, you get more Glaswegian accent.

Woes: Yes indeed.

Mark Gullick: Anyway, there’s another lady called Joe Phoenix. She’s a professor, as well, I think. And the same thing has just happened to her. And funnily enough. This is what I meant by the intersectionalities. Both those ladies, both these professors, both these ladies, are women for a start, which should get you some points, on the intersectionality table. And they’re also lesbians.

Woes: Oh! Even better! [laughing]

Mark Gullick: Yeah! So you’d think that they scored pretty highly. But there’s a pecking order, is starting to emerge now. In the whole, you know:

“Yes, you’re gay. But, …”

And let’s say perhaps that, well I don’t know, Islam has a problem with homosexuality, which in part, it’s quite clear that it does.:

“Okay, well I’m afraid Islam trump’s, …”

It’s like those trump cards that people, the kids play with, in the playground. This is going to trump that!

Woes: Yeah.

Mark Gullick: So intersectionality will eat itself! Or it will certainly it will clash with itself in an irreconcilable way.

There was quite an interesting thing happened in England, oh probably going back a year now, or so.

They decided that it, well they didn’t decide. But they started to teach, to quite small children, I think quite worryingly small children, about transgenderism and LGBTQ. And so on and so forth.

And parents began to gather at the school gates on a daily basis to protest, to demonstrate, about this. But it was Muslim parents. And that was very interesting to me. Two of the great identity groups LGBTQ and Islam. Suddenly, White liberals had to choose between them.

Woes: Indeed!

Mark Gullick: Who to throw under the bus! So it was an uneasy standoff. But because, of course, a lot of people forget that that Muslims, well, sorry that I can’t say a blanket thing like that, but Islamic political tendencies, is not just conservative. It’s hyper conservative!

So somebody coming along and saying:

“Right! We’re going to give your children, Mohammed, and Sunisha, lessons read by a Drag Queen.”

That’s not going to go down well with Muslim families!

Woes: Where do you envisage this going? I mean, is this something, how is the Left genuinely not foreseen this? Or do they have a plan?

Mark Gullick: I don’t think they do have a plan. I think they’re high on the moment. They’re riding the wave of their success. Because the Left pretty much runs Britain now!

It’s very strange. If you look at any certainly on the public sector side, and the private sector are having to fall into step with this now. Any area of British life, academia, the media, the public sector, social services, etc., etc., you’d have a very, very tough time getting a job there if you felt to have any conservative leanings.

So you said something just then which made me think. Yes, do the Left have a plan for this? No. I don’t think they do. But what I do think is, and I use this too much, and I think a lot of people are starting to use it. But Horus, the Roman writer in the Epistles, writes:

“You can throw nature out with a pitchfork, but she will always come back!”

[20:30]

Woes: Right. Yeah. I mean, obviously this is relevant, communism, …

Mark Gullick: Sorry, carry on.

Woes: Well, obviously this is relevant with communism in the 20th century. But there’s also like, now we’ve got the trans-humanist stuff coming in.

And I wonder if this is another example, where nature will just hit back in some way that the genetic engineering that they do will turn out to be fatal lolg. I don’t know! And nature will triumph again. And it’s not that I even want that necessarily. I’m just saying how it plays out.

Mark Gullick: Well that is to venerate nature, of course. But then, on the other hand, I can’t think of anything else to venerate [laughing]! You know, it’s again it was the science fiction writer, Philip K Dick, I think it was. He said:

“Reality is the thing, that when you ignore it, it doesn’t go away.”

Woes: I love this quote! This is a really useful quote. I think it’s:

“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn’t go away.”

[Laughing]

Mark Gullick: Yes! Yes, that’s it. And it doesn’t, and it won’t!

And the trouble is, if you’re going to inculcate a whole generation of students into this strange twisted, non-logic, and anti-rational, type of thought, who are you unleashing on the world?

Woes: Well, exactly! Because they are going to be the managers and leaders of, …

Mark Gullick: Exactly! These students will these students will come out of the university and they won’t be going backpacking in Guatemala. They’ll be the head of your local council, or they’ll be a professor at your university. And eventually, of course, some of them would be politicians. And once that gets into the political stream, wow! That’s going to really pollute!

Woes: I think we’re already there, though. I mean, the generation of managers that we now have, and producers on TV, commissioning editors in the media.

Mark Gullick: Oh that’s true! Yeah!

Woes: They’re already of the mind that there’s no such thing as male and female. There’s no such thing as race, etc., etc., I don’t really know how much worse it could be, 20 years from now. But I dare say that they will find a way to surprise me!

Mark Gullick: Funnily enough, I think the saving grace might be the private sector. I remember reading an interview, … Oh that must have been a dozen, or 15 years ago with one of the heads of, … Now what are they called? CBI, Confederation of British Industries.

And even then, and this is going back to the start of this century, start of this millennium. He was asked about the university students he was having coming, or he and his colleagues were having coming for jobs. And he said:

“To be absolutely honest with you, they are utterly useless!”

Not just because they’ve never been given any behavioural parameters, they’ve never been given any idea that you’re supposed to work hard, and you’re supposed to have some discipline, and you’re supposed to be on time and all that kind of stuff. But also, because they can’t think straight!

You give them a propositional problem, or they don’t have, … Well, I mean, he didn’t say this, but I’ve sort of drawn on that whole idea, that eventually employers will just say:

“Look we’re not going to take people on like this! You can’t think straight! You haven’t got the apparatus of post-Enlightenment reason. They don’t know about the law of excluded middle. They don’t know, cause and effect.”

Funnily enough, I was reading something, or listening to something today, about, … Now I can’t remember where this was, but it has something to do with American academia. And it was a lobby group, a kind of black caucus, I suppose, or something like that in the academic world. They’ll just publish this short piece about:

“Look, the problem with education is its essentially White. And so everything that goes with it is White. And therefore it’s racist!”

Because as, you know, everything that’s now in any way connected with Whiteness, or it’s history is just daubed with a big cross on the door, you know:

“Racism lives here!”

And they were things like, time keeping is a White thing! Turning up on time.

Woes: [laughing] well, yeah.

Mark Gullick: How are you going to do in the workforce? You must have seen this whole thing about mathematics being racist? So instead of trying to up the standard, they drag the standard of the, … They’ve just stopped Advanced Mathematics courses in some universities, because, ….

[25:50]

Woes: Yes. And there’s also the, …

[Audio broke up]

Mark Gullick: Way out performing blacks, and, …

Woes: And similarly there’s the axing of Gifted Schools Programs in America. I don’t know if that’s happened elsewhere yet.

Mark Gullick: Yeah. Yep!

Woes: But they’re getting there. Because that’s like massively White, East Asian, and I guess, Ashkenazi jewish. So that destroys that whole avenue.

I mean, it’s like the destruction of the Grammar Schools, merging them into Comprehensives, or merging them into Secondary Modern [sp] to form Comprehensivenes. Clearly that destroys an Avenue by which the higher could be nurtured. And, …

Mark Gullick: Yes! Yes!

Woes: , … And helped. I mean, it’s really evil.

Mark Gullick: And there’s been a there’s been a key little event in the description of this type of activity, quite recently. Only in the last couple of years, I’ve noticed this. Which is the changing of the word “equality”, which essentially means equality of opportunity. And they’ve changed it into something called “equity”. Which really, when you read it, unpacks as “equality of outcome”. So, in other words, you’ve got to have equality of outcome. Which is absurd!

Woes: Yeah.

Mark Gullick: If you say you’ve got to have a quality of outcome, you’re denying every idea of hierarchy, natural hierarchies, hierarchies of intelligence, the whole IQ argument. Which is a very knotty one anyway, because IQ as good a performance indicator as it is, it’s not across the board for a personality. Somebody with a high IQ can be hopeless at, well, …

Woes: Yes.

Mark Gullick: I know I’m an excellent case in point.

Woes: [laughing] Well! We’re all absent-minded in different ways. But yeah, I know what you mean. But still, it is clearly a useful metric. And it’s interesting how much it is denied. But yeah, of course, the big lie here is that the very people who deny it will themselves be proud that they have a high IQ! I mean, it’s such a, …

Mark Gullick: Oh yeah!

Woes: Such delusion!

Mark Gullick: I know that a lot of the little catch phrases, and buzzwords, and penny phrases, that we’ve come over in the last five, ten, years. But the best one I think the most descriptive one is “virtue signaling”. I think that says exactly what it means! There is nothing better for a certain type of person than to be able to stand there and say:

“I’ve got my medals! I believe in the right things!”

Woes: Of course. But do you not think that such people must always have existed in great numbers? You see, this is an interesting thing for me, because it’s an example of a modern phenomenon that must just be an iteration of something perennial! Surely, people have always cared. I mean, we’ve always had the do-gooders, the moralists, the preachy types.

Mark Gullick: Yeah!

Woes: School moms, the Church ladies and that kind of thing. So I wonder if you, …

Mark Gullick: Yeah, just I was just gonna say that if you look back over sort of 18th, 19th, century novels across Europe, you know, Zola, or Dickens, or Thomas Hardy, or just basically throw a dart blindfolded into a dart board of novelists, and you’ll find it. You will find exactly that social striation. Including people who are not particularly as worthy as they think they are. That they have either the social standing. It’s probably more social standing with what I’m talking about.

In something like Zola’s novels, or flow bear [?], or something like that, then what it’s become now. Because, of course, the mass media allows you to virtue signal to millions of people, not just people in your local church. And the more people can applaud, you the more you’re going to want to parade your inherent goodness.

[30:13]

Woes: Yes. And if with social media an ordinary person could garner, you know, hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of people who can then give them adulation. And it’s a human thing to enjoy adulation. But it does divorce you from the everyday. And, of course, for some people it’s just dopamine. It’s a massive, …

Mark Gullick: Yes. That’s right! Yeah.

Woes: And then they’ll say anything in order to get the adulation in order to continue it coming. And, of course, in our age there is a programme of opinions, like a menu to choose from of things that you can say every day on social media that will get you that adulation! It’s not even a, there’s no mystery to it! I mean, there’s no struggle! There’s no:

“I’ll have to work this out myself, and then bravely say it which will go against the social paradigm. And I’ll be taking a risk!”

It’s completely open. Everyone knows what you’re allowed to say. And what you should applaud, and what you can expect to be applauded for. But then, on top of that there’s then the pretension that it’s not like that at all! And when somebody says, like that they’re pro-gay, or something, then they’re being “brave”, by saying that.

Mark Gullick: That’s right. The people who think they are the resistance, who are, in fact, the establishment, now. And a lot of the, what I heard described as the, “be nice”, no, “be kind” social media brigade, that just say:

“That’s all we need to do! Just be kind to each other!”

They are the most rabid pack of snarling, snapping, wolves, if anybody steps outside of the, …

Woes: Absolutely! Yeah. I mean, this is something I’ve noted for several years now that there is far more hate on the Left. And I don’t really, …

Mark Gullick: Oh, yes! Yeah.

Woes: I’m not sure if these terms are applicable really anymore, but we’ll use them for convenience.

Mark Gullick: They work as a shorthand, until we have something better to come along, yeah.

Woes: Yeah. And there is far more hate among like the champagne socialist, the antifa, they are riddled with hatred! Whereas I think on the far-Right, or in the national sphere, there really isn’t that much hate. I mean, there are people who are indelicate, there are people who are angry. There are people like that, but most of us aren’t like that. I think most of us just want a sane world.

Mark Gullick: Yes! I’m just going to say, the whole idea of “hate speech” as well, it’s so, I don’t know, if you’ve ever known anyone who you say something to them, or voice an opinion. And they don’t just say:

“Well, I’m not sure if I agree with you.”

They just go from naught to 60 in three seconds! It happened to an English journalist called Rod Liddle recently. Do you know, Liddle? Rod Liddle? He writes for The Spectator.

Woes: Yeah.

Mark Gullick: He’s an okay guy. He’s affable. And he’s Right-ish. Although he’s a social, he’s in the SNP, I think. But he was cancelled, or whatever they call it. Deplatformed from a local university, or from a British university. And he was saying the same type of thing as Professor Stock and Phoenix were. Which is:

“Men are men, and women are women.”

What we are! Grow up. And then they immediately said:

“This is hate speech!”

Woes: That’s just remarkable! If you went back to the 90s and said that to affirm the gender binary will be regarded as hate speech, no one would believe you! [chuckling] I don’t think.

Mark Gullick: Not just contentious, or worthy of debate, or even, you know, slightly to be sniffed at. But actual “hate speech”! It means you hate transgender people, or whatever. It’s just an extraordinary idea! But it is, of course, the way that these movements gain traction.

I remember 20 odd years ago, when I last worked in an office, you know, some of my views on things got me some odd looks in the office. And maybe the occasional cold shoulder at after-work drinks, or something. And that’s when I first remember noticing the phrase:

“For fear of being branded racist!”

Which became a very, almost a banner under which a lot of public sector bodies sailed for a long time, and still do. But now it’s far more serious than that! Now I probably would have lost my job for saying that some of the things I said about Islam, or whatever it might be.

It’s changed. The power has become frightening, really! Even for the uncancellable! I’m sure you’re aware of the whole furore around, who’s the Harry Potter woman? J Rowling.

Mark Gullick: Yeah, it’s the same as Germaine Greer, even. [laughing].

[35:30]

Mark Gullick: Yeah, but not only, … Yes! Yes! Yes! Of all people! She would never have predicted that happening, I don’t think. Poor old Germaine Greer!

But not only did JK Rowling sort of get socially. I mean, you can’t cancel her, she’s the third richest woman in the world, or something ridiculous. Some of these people are uncancelled in terms of you can’t cost them their career. You can just shun them!

But they didn’t stop at that. They had photographs of protesters outside her house, with the address clearly visible. The veiled implication being:

“Come and smash some windows, everybody!”

Woes: Yeah. I mean, in her case she can easily afford the necessary security. I’m sure she can afford multiple teams of security squad, security guys, to keep her safe.

Mark Gullick: But who wants to have to live like that?

Woes: Well, exactly! And for other people such luxuries are completely impossible.

Mark Gullick: Yes. Yes.

Woes: And this is the threat of the mob in this day and age. I had a similar thing where antifa came to my house. It was a long time ago. It was nearly five years ago. And they didn’t do a protest, or anything. They just came to the house. And if that’s frightening enough. If that’s never happened to you, it’s a scary, very unsettling thing!

Mark Gullick: Yeah. I’m sure it is.

Woes: And that is something that it amazes me that antifa never, … I don’t know, it shouldn’t, it doesn’t really amaze me. Because I know I understand why they get away with it. But still! It’s galling! And it also amazes me is that they don’t realize themselves. That they don’t think:

“Hold on! I’m doing a really shitty thing here!”

But this is the luxury of being on the winning side. You don’t have to question yourself.

Mark Gullick: Yeah, that’s the luxury being on the winning side. And it’s also the fabulous feeling that you get of being in lockstep! You know:

“I think the right things, those people think the wrong things. Therefore it’s their house we’re gonna turn up and give a hard time to!”

And not only that, it’s not even. You don’t have to stand up and say:

“Okay I’ve got a problem with transgenderism, or I’ve got a problem with this, or I’ve got a problem with that.”

I’m sure you’ve heard about this as well. I’ve never heard of this band “Mumford and Sons”. I’ve heard of them, but I’ve never heard them. No idea what they’re like. But they’re banjo player, I think they’re sort of folky band. Their banjo player, or something like that, tweeted, or put on Facebook, that he was reading a book by Andy Go, or Ngo, however you pronounce it.

Woes: Oh yes! Yes.

Mark Gullick:The very brave American journalists who got hospitalized with brain bleeding by antifa, in Portland, I think.

But this guy just said:

“Oh, I’ve just been reading this great book about antifa.”

And wow! That was it! Out the band! Off social media! It just immediately pounced! Like guard dogs.

Woes: It’s remarkable! I mean, it’s like the kind of thing you hear about, that you would associate that, with Soviet level control of public opinion.

Mark Gullick: Well yeah. And that’s a real worry if it goes down that road then. Yeah.

Woes: Well. I mean, it almost doesn’t need to, because we’ve already got that level. I mean, that level of control is pretty damn high! You can see what’s going on there.

And actually something that I wanted to put to you specifically was that in Britain and the West in general, we used to have the expression, “it’s a free country”, whereas no one says that anymore. It used to be a sort of casual thing that people would say jokingly, but everyone knew that it was true. And it was a banality. Yeah, it was funny to say it, because it was so obvious and just:

“Yeah, of course, yeah. And we live in a free country. Yes.”

Mark Gullick:I remember in the 1970s. Yeah, I remember my parents, friends, in the 1970s saying it. You heard it on situation comedies all the time. And it was a rhetorical question, the answer being yes, of course, it’s a free country! The answer now is:

“No. It absolutely isn’t!”

[40:09]

Woes: Yeah. And I think that people have entitled which, …

Mark Gullick: I’m just going to say, and that leads on to one more thing. Which once you look [cutting out] sees. You look to politicians in the media to, … Oh sorry! Yes, I was just going to say that once you feel free speech is under threat [cutting out]

Woes: Oh dear! Let’s see what happens. I’m sure he will be back. I know that he’s outdoors just now, so that’s probably the cause of all this. But oh come on let’s see.

Oh dear. Mark can you hear me? He’s disappeared okay. Oh no that’s a shame there are what I’ll probably do is keep this one fairly short once it comes back so that we’ll just get it wrapped up.

I’ll ask the questions that have been posted on Entropy and there are two of those. And I don’t think now there aren’t any on Odysee. It’s a shame, because he’s such an interesting guy, and clearly has a lot to say. But I’ll try to persuade him to get a better setup together for these kinds of things. Because I think he should be doing more of this. I think he’s a really worthwhile speaker. But I don’t think he realizes that! [chuckling] Some people are like that they don’t realize that they’d be good at this stuff until they do it.

Let’s see what’s happening. See if he sent me an email. Ah no. He’s not showing up. That’s a real shame. Oh someone says, thank you Galileo’s Tongue. He says:

“He seems like a nice bloke. Where can I hear more from him? How did you find him Woes?”

Well, he writes for Counter-Currents. And Greg did a stream earlier this year I think it was the 10th anniversary of Counter-Currents and he did a celebratory stream. And he had a lot of his writers appeared on that. Just voice only. And for most of them I think it was the first time they’d ever done anything like that. And so and one of them was Mark Gullick. And that was how I first heard of him.

Now I think I might have read some of his essays before then. But thereafter I was aware of him as a person there was a sort of voice to go with the name. And so I made a point of, because I liked what he was saying on that stream.

I find him quite a likable guy, affable and interesting. So I looked out for his essays thereafter. And I think I’ve read about five of his essays since then. And he really is a bloody good writer. He did one about 1984. He did one about the university. He’s done several recently that I’ve read.

Ah, here he is.

Mark Gullick: I’m back.

Woes: Hello? Hello? Hello?

Mark Gullick: Hi, sorry about that. I think that’s this end. This again. It’s Third World internet and it does just drop in and out.

Woes: Okay. Well, let’s we’ve been going for 45 minutes, which is just usually about the average for the Millennial streams. So I’ll ask you a few questions that have been posted.

[45:00]

Mark Gullick: Tell me.

Woes: Okay. These are quite different from what we were talking about earlier:

“Mark where are you educated in the analytic tradition that began with G E Muer [sp]?”

Mark Gullick: The only thing I know about Muer, … Well, no is the answer. No absolutely not! I steered very clear of logic and anything along those lines. Anything mathematical.

The only thing I know not Muer, … I’m not thinking of Bradley who was the one that was the influence on TS Eliot. One of those two I probably put my foot in it. That might have been Bradley not Muer. No. I wasn’t basically. I really came up through the classics. And then did a fast forward to Existentialism, when I was doing my first degree. And that sort of set the mould for the rest of my studies.

Woes: Right okay. So the rest of it was:

“Who are some of your favourite analytic philosophers?”

But I’m guessing you don’t have many [chuckling]!

Mark Gullick: Not really, no. No. Not my area of expertise, if anything is. I mean, I don’t know. Analytically? It depends if that’s a specific school then I’d probably put my foot in it, if I said that I was very interested in Wittgenstein, who I find analytical. But I don’t know if that’s what the questioner means by an analytical school.

Woes: He said analytic, which I’m suggesting, it’s a specific field.

Mark Gullick: I think you might be right, yes. Yes.

Woes: And then the other question was:

“Mark. You said that you knew a member of Killing Joke, back when you worked as a bartender. Who was he? And did you ever see Killing Jokes live gigs?”

Mark Gullick: Not quite true that I knew him. I did live with a member of the Clash for a while. But I didn’t know a member of the Killing Joke.

But the chap I was referring to was Geordie Walker, tremendous guitarist. And I walked into a bar in Brighton one night where I was at university. That’s where Sussex is. And there was Geordie Walker. He’s six foot three. And he’s very, very, very stand out. And he just got me completely drunk all night! Wouldn’t let me pay for a drink. And he told me that we would, … I said:

“Look you’ve got to let me buy you a drink.”

He said:

“No. We’re drinking the royalties for Love Like Blood.”

Which is probably their most famous single.

Woes: Ah I see.

Mark Gullick: That’s my Geordie Walker story.

Woes: Okay. And you also met Ian Curtis, of course, because, …

Mark Gullick: I did meet Ian Curtis. Yes. Yes.

Woes: Yeah you did a wonderful essay about Joy Division.

Mark Gullick: Well that was, and I think the story is included in that. I just had a half an hour, 45 minute, chat with him. And the nicest thing about that, well bittersweet really, because, of course, it has such a tragic end. The nicest thing about that was I went to see them again in London a couple of weeks later. And he recognized me and called out to me and said:

“Hey! Hey Mark! How you doing?”

Which now I look back on it some people think:

“My god! That’s legendary! You met Ian Curtis!”

But a charming man. And very tragic. But yes, I did write a piece about that. Which would have been in May, I suppose, because that was the anniversary of his death.

Woes: Yeah, it’s a shame. I do wonder what they would have gone on to do.

Mark Gullick: I absolutely, I really do. I wonder whether the band would have gone down the New Order route into electronica. And so on. I wonder whether, because when you listen to Blue Monday, it’s his vocal style. It’s just not over bass guitar and drums. It’s over kind of pulsing, electronic, upbeat. So I mean, I wonder.

Woes: Yeah I remember hearing an interview with I think it was Bernard Sumner who said that after his suicide they made a decision to go upbeat. In which case, had he lived, then they probably wouldn’t have gone upbeat in more New Order territory.

Mark Gullick: Yeah.

Woes: And I do think that Closer is just a fantastic album.

Mark Gullick: Oh it’s brilliant. And you can tell from the I think the first New Order album was called Movement. And you can tell that those songs were, in fact, I’ve recognized some other songs from, … I saw them live about six times.

Oh! I forgot to tell your questioner. I saw Killing Joke three times, was the answer to that question. And they were a staggering band to see live. And the first time I saw them was at my university. And they came through the audience with these the flaming torches. It was London, kind of primitive dancers, bouncing around and stuff. They were they were quite something else!

But no, the first New Order album Movement was obviously Joy Division work in progress, which Sumner took over.

[50:12]

Woes: Yeah. And I have listened to it. But I haven’t studied it. But I’ve heard people say it. It does feel quite like a Joy Division album. Or at least a midway point between the two. Okay there’s a question for you that’s just come in:

“Have you ever come across J M E McTaggart, The Unreality of Time?”

Mark Gullick: No. Not at all! Don’t recognize the name, nor do I recognize the book.

Woes: Okay. And there’s another one:

“Or Timothy Spriggs, The Vindication of Absolute Idealism?”

Mark Gullick: No I haven’t! I would love it if the questioner could email those to you. And you could bounce them on to me though, because I’ll always take a recommendation.

Woes: Okay. I’ll send those on to you. All right then. Well, let’s wrap it up there.

Mark Gullick: Sure. Listen Colin, my apologies for the standard of the broadcast. I hope it hasn’t been too wrong.

Woes: No.

Mark Gullick: If we do this again, … I mean, I’m in the process of, it is very, very difficult here! I live in a place where there’s about five apartments. But I’m the only one living here. So I can’t, … To get the internet set up just for my apartment is impossible, because I’m not a resident. You have to be a resident. And my landlady doesn’t do it. So I kind of piggyback on them on the cafe next door [wispering], … In case they’re in. [Woes laughing] But yeah, which is something okay.

So I hope it wasn’t too rough for you. And thanks ever so much for talking me through all this stuff. I wouldn’t be able to do it otherwise.

Woes: That’s fine and thank you for taking the effort. I do appreciate it. And this has been, …

Mark Gullick: You are more than welcome. I’m a great admirer of yours as well. I’ve watched a few of your debates, and speeches, and lectures. And so on. And you have a very measured approach to the way that you take on ideas. What’s your academic background, by the way?

Woes: Oh, I don’t have one really! [chuckling] I went to Art College!

Mark Gullick: Aha! Aha! But you did form a band.

Woes: Well, yeah. But it just wasn’t really academic, you know, I don’t, I can’t really tell you anything that I learnt there. So yeah. It’s kind of like three wasted, well four wasted years. [Mark laughs] But that’s also in London.

Mark Gullick: Right. Just one point I wanted to finish with, because it’s such an important point., you know, Jonathan Bowden, or Boowden, I’m never quite sure how you pronounce it. He said that he thought Counter-Currents was an online university.

Woes: Yes.

Mark Gullick: And I’ve said to a few people recently. If you are, … Well not that I know any 18 year olds. If, you know any 18 year olds, or if you’ve got a kid who’s 18. And they want to go to university to do a Humanities degree, try everything you can, short of physically locking them up, to stop them doing that!

If they just took 100 pounds and went to half a dozen charity shops, picked books at random which interested them. In three years time, they’ll probably be much, much more employable than somebody who’s done Gender studies, or Whiteness studies, or whatever the faddish thing is there. [Woes laughs] You’re just better off!

Woes: And then in the meantime they should read Counter-Currents. Yeah, I agree.

Mark Gullick: Absolutely! Yeah! Counter-Currents put me onto a load of stuff I had never heard of, another rank. And then, as I say I’ve just heard of the titles of two books and authors that I’ve never heard of before. So that’s worked for me.

Woes: All right well I’ll send those on to you okay. Well, we’ll end this one here. So thank you Mark Gullick for appearing on Millennials 2021.

Mark Gullick: Thank you very much. Have a lovely Christmas. Thank you for inviting me. All right.

Woes: Thank you very much.

Mark Gullick: Goodbye!

Woes: Bye-bye.

[54:14]

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[55:10]