Of friends and vampires
In his bestselling new book, HOW TO BE POOR, Milo Yiannopoulos explained how his strategy for selecting friends backfired on him:
And never mistake an employee for a friend. If you're paying someone to spend time with you, he is either an employee, a therapist, or a prostitute.
The sad fact is your friends helped you end up where you are today, just like they did for me.As a general rule, if you have anything that passes for an "entourage", there is a high probability you are destined for destitude. The entourage is a descendant of the pagan king and the uncivilized Big Man, where the alpha male's greatness is measured by his largesse, and it is simply not viable in these days of income and capital gains taxes.
Even before my rise to intergalactic fame, my life was overflowing with friends and prospective friends desperate to break into my social circle. This exploded as I entered the American stage in full force starting in 2014. My ego, which is larger than several of Jupiter’s moons, convinced me that these people wanted to be my friend because of my stunning looks, dazzling charm, and devotion to defending those without a voice in the mainstream media.
I learned the hard way that I was blinded by vanity. As my stock shot up, the friends I attracted came to me with largely selfish intentions. They wanted to attach themselves to my fame. They wanted to live off my credit cards. Many of them, above all else, simply wanted access and social cachet. They wanted my stamp of approval on their products and services and they wanted their websites shared with my audience. By 2017, as an established superstar in the political world, I attracted more old-fashioned grifters eager to suck money out however they could. Some of the friends I’d gained in recent years converted into this type of monster as well—even some long-term friends from Europe ended up this way. They were all vampires draining my blood bank.
If my life were a horror movie—which it feels like much of the time—the plot would center around me being a carrier of the vampire virus, yet immune to it. Anyone who touched my finances would turn into a heartless monster whose thirst could only be slaked by MILO’s money, and I wouldn’t figure out how to detect these vampires until it was too late. You must admit, me being a disease carrier really lends some credibility to the scenario—whether my haters are on the control-left or the alt-right, they are all convinced by my gravity-defying cheekbones that I am pozzed, which is gay slang for “too poor to buy rubbers and too lazy to go to the clinic.”
In Dangerous, I reflected on the support I received from friends during one of the many times my enemies thought they had killed me. What feels like a million years ago, I wrote: “These have been trying times and I have been tested. There were a few days when I almost gave up on my mission. But thousands of fans reached out, my friends and family had my back, and the people of this world I respect the most kept taking my calls. I couldn’t let you all down. My enemies thought I had been vanquished, that I would go into hiding in the hills of Dartmoor with my dick between my legs like some weak ass pussy faggot. They couldn’t be more wrong. All they’ve done is piss me off.”
That passage has remained true for some of my more recent problems, including my financial fall from grace. For my sincere fans and friends, I thank you for sticking with me, and for purchasing this book. One thing is for sure, going broke absolutely separates those out for a quick buck from one’s actual mates. To understand my relationship with friends, and how it got me into trouble, you have to grasp my system. The old saying goes, “Make new friends, but keep the old, one is silver and the other gold,” which I adapted slightly into my own credo: “Make new friends, then rank them according to their personal qualities and let them fight to earn your favor.”
The end result of following my spreadsheet was a devotion to the worst people in my life. The best-dressed people led me into an arms race of $20,000 handmade jackets and accessories. The troublemakers blew through my money in repair bills. The hard luck cases got cars and rent payments and everything under the sun. The gourmands joined my fabulous (and fabulously expensive) chef’s tables in the finest restaurants. The best looking got all this and more. And I got a top rank of friends, my elite praetorian guard, who disappeared when the money ran out. If only I had tracked “likelihood to turn against MILO at the drop of a hat.”
And never mistake an employee for a friend. If you're paying someone to spend time with you, he is either an employee, a therapist, or a prostitute.
Labels: books, Castalia House
34 Comments:
I've always associated the entourage with black culture. Anyone remotely familiar with the NFL knows what I'm talking about. The people destroy the lives and the livelihood of those they are seeking to live off of. They remind me very much of possums.
See... a possum loves eggs. It wants to eat all the chicken eggs it can. So when it breaks into a chicken coop... it kills all the chickens. It doesn't eat the chickens. it just rips their necks. It wants the eggs.
Possums are incredibly short sighted and stupid.
And those people that attach themselves to people like Milo... or Johnny Manziel, or Vince Young for example.. are very much just like the possums. They give these people terrible advice and feed them bullshit about how great they are and in a matter of a year or two the star washes out and the money dries up.
And there they are left... just like the possum in the coop wondering why there are no new eggs coming in.
Even Milo's mistakes are certifiably fabulous.
I wonder if there's a connection here. I don't know if Milo had a strong father figure while growing up. And thinking of famous basketball players who were broke soon after retiring, many of them also lacked a good father figure. Antoine Walker being the most famous example. 100 million dollars earned and nothing to show for it. The desire to be loved and accepted by others may be hard to overcome for the person who was neglected by his father.
>>Possums are incredibly short sighted and stupid.
Faulty instincts or something. Where I live they come out too early in the spring and get run over a lot.
And good old Milo. Even in defeat he is still display oriented.
The friends you have BEFORE are the only ones you will have AFTER.
@1
And lottery winners and "hook a brother up" and "I'm going to college"... I've heard more than a few of those stories as well. Utterly gross and disgusting people.
Doesn't or didn't Ice Tea, or another rapper get crap from them for not returning to the hood?
What a nightmare of a 'community'...
"when you get back on your feet again
everybody wants to be your long lost friend
I said it's strange without any doubt
how nobody knows you when you're down and out"
Eric Clapton
Of course, he wasn't exactly innocent of the same towards the lives he devastated.
This is a really good book and I highly recommend it. It's sad that he had to go through all of this, but having grown up in NYC I can understand the temptation. I've seen it happen more than once to famous people.
For the rich and famous, it's probably very hard not to fall into this trap. Milo has grown in so many ways during the last few years that I like to imagine he's being groomed by God for a very special mission, and these hardships are just part of the process: burn away the chaff, steel the warrior, bring out the image of Christ.
The desire to be loved and accepted by others may be hard to overcome for the person who was neglected by his father.
From interviews I remember he had a mostly absent father and a violent stepfather. Add an unloving mother. You're spot on.
Vox: I second this:I'd pay $15 USD for an audio book by Milo. Perhaps others might as well.
TheMaleRei wrote:Doesn't or didn't Ice Tea, or another rapper get crap from them for not returning to the hood?
Ice Cube gave other rappers who left the hood a bunch of shit. He kept saying stupid shit like you got to give back. I think it was after the 4th or 5th time his house got burglarized that he finally said screw these people.
This happens to all kinds of people like this, from rappers to boxers to NFL players. They all end up broke. Everyone in their lives, plus a bunch of new people turn into vultures and leaches. Mamma is the first one with the hand out. Papa likely turns up at some point with a sob story.
Must say that the thinking of Milo is so alien to me that I can't relate. It would be psychologically impossible for me to have a "entourage". I can be generous but only in the context of a one off gift. The passage for Milo reads as whiny manipulation to my ears. But, I concede that this is an unduly harsh and judgmental.
Lots here to pray about, lest the lot of'em prey upon.
It would be psychologically impossible for me to have a "entourage". [...] The passage for Milo reads as whiny manipulation to my ears.
The excerpt by itself sounds that way. But he repeatedly stresses that he realizes the mistakes were mainly his own. And in another chapter he describes the deep insecurity and shame that his 'larger than several of Jupiter’s moons' - ego was covering. With that context in mind, I read the excerpt not so much as a whine but as a 'this is how stupid and blind I was - can you believe it?'
I actually learned about the Big Man from a leftist. In an appendix to Leopold's Ghost the Berkeley professor author came out and admitted africa is poor because of african culture, in part the "Big Man" attitude where the only reason you get power in government is to fleece the people under your boot and reward all your friends. It's essentially chimpanzee politics, where coalitions form and your supporters get rewarded.
Sid wrote:The passage for Milo reads as whiny manipulation to my ears. But, I concede that this is an unduly harsh and judgmental.
I think it's brutal honesty on his part...and what makes him different is that he is set to learn from those mistakes.
It's great you've not lost your empathy. Milo's was one of the first in the front lines of the culture war. His mental toughness is inspiring. I know that at that age, if I had that level of fame and money, I would very easily spiral into decadence...but I doubt I would have his tenacity to yank myself out of my pity party if I lost it all like he did.
I'm reminded of something I read...possibly here. That one of the reasons Africans (in Africa) tend not to get ahead is that their entire extended family has their hands out for a subsidy.
Which kills off motivation and sucks up capital.
Crab boil mentality. blacks that have escaped talk about it. A crab can't climb out of the boiling water because all the other crabs are constantly pulling it back down into the pot. That's not exactly what's happening here with milo but it is what happens in the black community a lot. they resent success
oddly enough you see the same attitude in poor whites in east TN and East KY and in WV. A kid trying to get out will take all kinds of crap from his friends and family
"How to be Poor"
Someday it'll be referred to as "How to be Famous"
I knew a guy from Kenya in college and he described something similar to the "crab in a bucket" mentality Nate talks about. He specifically was talking about trying to save money. The minute ANYONE in the village had any money there would be a line at their door of people asking for money for x, y, and z. And these requests would often be trivial or at least not of great importance. They weren't asking for money for food because they were starving. They would want money because they wanted to buy some alcohol, or some other triviality. He spoke of his uncle who was a farmer and he was trying to save money for a pump to irrigate his crops. He had previously had a pump and knew how much more money he could make with one but his last pump broke down and then thieves tore it apart to try to get something worth selling.
His uncle managed to save up about half of the money he needed in complete secrecy. But one day someone just happened to see him tucking the savings away at an inopportune moment and then the word was out. And it wasn't just a case of telling people "no". If the uncle refused to give anyone money - they would literally ostracize him. Even though the uncle could get far more money in the future just by having more crops by virtue of having a pump to irrigate with - it didn't matter - they couldn't think that far ahead and the ones that could didn't care. So his uncle had to choose - save up and get a pump but get ostracized or give out the money and still have a village that didn't hate him. He gave out the money because he knew if he didn't even if he bought the pump it would be ruined by thieves immediately after (who no doubt would believe they were in the right to rob him because he didn't give them money).
This is why the smartest people in this cultures become the Big Man. Because actually thinking ahead and helping in these areas is almost impossible.
Nate wrote:oddly enough you see the same attitude in poor whites ...
It's not just a Black thing, it's a poor thing. If you have a group that's poor, there is a good chance this crab bucket attitude is a part of their pathology. Alaska natives have it bad.
Hammerli 280 wrote:I'm reminded of something I read...possibly here. That one of the reasons Africans (in Africa) tend not to get ahead is that their entire extended family has their hands out for a subsidy.
Which kills off motivation and sucks up capital.
Here's the story you likely read, linked for the amusement of others as well:
https://i.redd.it/3xkwno6wxoa21.jpg
"It's not just a Black thing, it's a poor thing. If you have a group that's poor, there is a good chance this crab bucket attitude is a part of their pathology. Alaska natives have it bad."
Same with many Amerind tribes, etc. Being poor isn't noble or good, nor should it be treated as a way of life. Forget every other factor - this is the one that prevents civilization, first and foremost.
I am still waiting for a copy of Despicable, autographed no less, as promised to early subscribers to Milo's podcast. I, for one, will withhold support for his new work. Once bitten, twice shy.
> It's not just a Black thing, it's a poor thing.
By and large true, and I say that as someone who comes from one of those poor white areas. Most poor people aren't poor because of bad luck or even lack of opportunity. They're poor because they make bad decisions, and those decisions are often reinforced by the community they live in.
Breaking out of that trap is hard. Which is why Dave Ramsey has an audience.
James Dixon wrote:Most poor people aren't poor because of bad luck or even lack of opportunity. They're poor because they make bad decisions, and those decisions are often reinforced by the community they live in.
True, and it is so much easier to destroy than to create. Even if everyone else is doing everything right, it only takes one bottomless black hole of need -- a drunkard, a tweaker, a gambler, a vandal -- to drag the entire neighborhood down. See, for example, the thief that stole light, history, and community (true story).
I'd pay $15 USD for an audio book by Milo. Perhaps others might as well.
Milo self-produced an audiobook version of Despicable that he gave out for free to his podcast subscribers last year. Don't know where or if he's selling it, but I'd happily buy a DRM-free version of it from Arkhaven if possible.
Milo burned way too hot and disintegrated before our eyes. Pity he doesn't quit the destructive gay life. Reminds me of Freddy Mercury. I pray that AIDS doesn't get him.
“Above all else, value loyalty.” —Raymond Reddington
A bundle might be just the ticket, John Bradley. I'm holding out for the How to be Poor audio book.
This post twice features terrific writing and sold one book.
Bought the Kindle version of Milo's book and I'm about half-way through. Enjoying it more than I thought. Kind of like watching a disaster movie where buildings fall around the hero, but you know he'll end up fine in the end. I'm not really worried about Milo's future. But it's kind of fun, in a weird way, to hear him very honestly (with much humor) describe his dramatic fall.
And yes, if there had been an audiobook, I would have bought it instead. Maybe both.
@18
More disgusting people... Rather should have said disgusting behavior that makes people disgusting in an earlier post.
As wiser people have pointed out, good reason why Africa is poor...
> True, and it is so much easier to destroy than to create.
It doesn't even take destruction. All it takes is lack of maintenance. Maintaining what we've built is hard work, if not as hard as building it in the first place. Just look at the crumbling roads and other infrastructure that surrounds us.
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