‘Wokeism Is the Death Star of Our Time’: Dave Rubin’s Plea to America

Like most Americans, Dave Rubin woke up on March 15th 2020 wondering if he should wash his eggs before cracking them. 

“It was the beginning of a national lockdown,” he writes in his new book Don’t Burn This Country. Two weeks to “flatten the curve” had been announced and a surreal pandemic reality had become the norm. “Restaurants, bars, small mom-and-pop shops were being shuttered. Aisles in big box stores lay barren—no cleaning supplies, no toilet paper, no bread, no water.” Before long, looting and rioting ensued, firearm sales soared, and simmering anger filled the air. “Finally people went nuts.”

Two years on, reflecting on the pandemic madness, Rubin criticises authorities’ conduct. But perhaps more importantly, he questions the public’s blind submission and compliance. 

“Our countries’ leaders used Covid-19 as an opportunity to test our limits.” They asked themselves just how much oppression people would tolerate. Will they spy on their neighbours? Can they be guilted into looting and rioting for a cause they don’t understand? “The unfortunate truth,” writes Rubin, is that most Americans “were happy to submit while our country burned.” They were willing to put every aspect of their life on hold at the authority’s command.

It is peoples’ inability to recognise the state’s infringement on their basic freedoms that Rubin finds most troubling. “The bottom line,” he tells Lotus Eaters, “is that the individuals hold the power. You do not have to shut your shop, restaurant, or school just because the state sees it fit. People should not fear their governments—governments should fear their people.”

Utopia Is Fiction

Don’t Burn This Country’s message is clear: we have reached a point where we can either resist the “oppressive woke machine and corrupt Washington oligarchy,” or watch helplessly as America is dismantled from within. “It's now or never,” warns Rubin. “The moment we are in right now is genuinely the last chance to defend America from tyranny. Wokeism fuelled by media manipulation is the Death Star of our time, but there’s always a way to blow out a death star.”

Praising individualism and self-reliance, Rubin encourages readers to strive to limit their dependence on government and beware of the many guises that state intervention can assume. Covid is a great example; the state posited itself as the ‘saviour’, the one to “rescue” vulnerable citizens from a menacing disease. But it is not just Covid—infringements on citizens’ space, freedom of expression, and individual sovereignty are everywhere. 

Carl Benjamin and That Patreon Saga

Rubin takes time to reflect on his famous departure from Patreon, a move prompted by the platform’s mistreatment of Carl Benjamin. 

“In December of 2018, Carl Benjamin, known better as Sargon of Akkad on YouTube, woke up to find that his Patreon account had been deleted without explanation and notice. This hit a little closer to home for me personally, as Carl was one of the first people to help me wake up from my progressive slumber. Sure, he is a bit of a self-proclaimed troll, revelling in poking fun at social justice warriors and making inflammatory digs. But because he publicly promoted Brexit and consistently criticizes modern-day feminism, radical Islam, and identity politics, he’s automatically and unfairly put in the far-right bucket.”

Rubin continues to recount the events that transpired; the platform had set a dangerous precedent where “at any moment, a Patreon member could wake up to find his or her account closed because of words said or actions done outside of the platform’s own ecosystem.” The ban wasn’t concerning any particular violation: “Patreon staff just didn't like what this guy had to say in general.”

Rubin called Jordan Peterson and the two famously announced their protest exodus. “It was philosophical and ethical to stand up for the very principles that we were talking about on the [12 Rules For Life] tour. If we weren’t going to do something about it, who would?”

The Art of Self Reliance

Throughout the sequel to Don’t Burn This Book, Rubin urges people to better themselves, to protect their brains, to “shake hands with their neighbours” and to stop digital media from taking over their lives. Don’t Burn This Country holds digital media not only as a force negatively affecting our well-being, but a new ‘collective’ of the kind detailed in Tocqueville’s vision of “a society not comprised of independent people, but instead reliant on large, centralised systems that they wouldn’t be able to survive without.” 

Take for example the daily quandaries of “who do I follow on Instagram, what do I buy on Amazon, or what do I watch on Netflix?” A centralised society “risks devaluing individual freedoms … Eventually, this kind of democracy morphs into a creepy little monster. The monster has a name, a horrible name. The collective.”

Something Is Different Now. It’s Personal 

Rubin writes openly and candidly about his personal life. From day to day struggles with lockdown, to getting a dog and the game-changing decision to start a family, the impact of wokeism and state overreach on his life outlook is already clear to see. He discusses the implications of various government policies and narratives well into the distant future, considering their likely effect on generations to come: 

“Knowing that I'll one day have a child to raise changes everything. Although I’ve always cared about the future of this country, something is different now. It’s personal.”

Dave Rubin writes as he speaks, but don’t let his free-flowing, casual style mislead you. This is a well thought out, intelligent, and insightful book, inspired by some of the brightest minds to grace our planet—namely Rubin Report’s memorable guests, including Thomas Sowell, Jordan Peterson, Yeonmi Park, and Douglas Murray. Years of stand up comedy helped this eternal optimist to keep an engaging upbeat tone throughout, even when discussing gravely serious matters.