10. Ryan Handlarski – Shownotes

How do you cope with crowd pushback against your position? After he critiqued @hadiyaroderique’s article, he survived the deluge of “racist” and “ignorant” critiques by doubling down. 

Say what you think and STICK TO IT. That’s that! Compromises with your conscience breaks your mental and physical health. 

Crown attorneys and Bay Street lawyers probably have to keep their mouths shut online. Criminal defence lawyers on the other hand, are free! People need competent defence and don’t care about your tweets. 

On tangling with SJWs and twitter mobs: just block the trolls. Block the ones who give you dirty looks in court. In contrast, criminal lawyers are great! They’ll make jabs but can still chat with you warmly (like @johnstruthers).

On Baldwin’s infamous quote: Yeah, you don’t want to befriend someone who sees your skin as inferior. But if you define racism as differences in outcome? Nope. If you define racism as disagreement over definitions? Nope. 

“Black” people or “white” people are not some homogenous group! For eg, Nigerians outperform white people economically. You need to drill down to understand economic outcomes. 

Ryan does think that there is systemic racism, like generational impediments to building a good life and buying a house. For eg., the war on drugs criminalized black and low-income Americans, which meant many could no longer build a good life and amass wealth. But inequality of outcomes? Not enough to prove systemic racism.

He wrote the blog below to address the presumption of innocence, not, as I thought, about whether consensual sex is even possible anymore. #metoo erodes the presumption of innocence – raising a reasonable doubt becomes impossible. If everything is a “rape myth”, how do you defend someone accused of sexual assault?  

It’s a good thing then that justices don’t let the movement taint their judgements. For example, Justice Malloy. 

Jokes and flirting and light heartedness have been taken away by the DIE (Diversity, Inclusion, Equity) clerics. The orthodoxy makes life more miserable and BORING. Free speech is interesting. 

Cool thing about criminal law: it’s a free market. You have to prove yourself; it’s a meritocracy. He appreciates small d diversity which comes from a free market.   

Mandela: all groups and their histories are honoured and protected. This was how he avoided bloodshed. If it was a story of just genocide and crime against black people, there would’ve been a civil war, and Afrikaners would probably be pushed out. 

DIE pushes us to a similar reality: race on your mind 24/7, in all of the policies, etc. 

Furthermore, the roots of his objection to group categorization by race: the experiences his mom had with Apartheid Africa. You can’t have a cohesive society when everyone thinks with their skin colour. If race is on everyone’s mind 24/7 you will NOT get solidarity. 

BE CAREFUL when a baby boomer offers you advice! Leaving Bay Street and starting his own firm was the BEST year of his life! And yet, baby boomers would still see a bay street job is better. Take advice from someone your own age. Even be careful with taking advice from Gen Xer. 

For the law students out there: You can either copy a path or try something new. Bay street = copy. Try something new. See what you’re good at. Create or find a niche that only you can serve. You need to inward – stop thinking of grades and interviews and stuff.

“I am the only contrarian anti diversity ideology criminal defence lawyer out there; you’re not going to compete with me.” Ryan’s an example of his advice. He’s made a niche for himself and has monopolized it. (psst. you could probably compete with him)

Recommendations:

We should consider ourselves as thought minorities. Politics are hopeless. We should just create our own communities where the only people in it have similar values: free speech, low taxes, small government. Your own schools, your own institutions. Just disengage from politics. Just like the Amish. They don’t care about politics! He’s a fan of UBI. No more administrative state. He’s a fan of Andrew Yang. 

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