Debunking the Off-Grid Fantasy

This video’s brought to you by Mubi.  A curated streaming service dedicated to elevating great cinema from all  around the globe. Get a whole month free at mubi dot com slash m m fish.  And of course, by my lovely patrons. You know, ever since I was young, I always wanted  to live with a sense of adventure. So that’s why I’m getting into off-grid content. I just love  the idea of being self-reliant, self-sufficient. Thanks babe! So thirsty. Mmm, small batch Frappuccino. It was truly only a matte

r  of time before the YouTube algorithm sent me down the funnel  of off-grid homesteading content. Being from Pure Michigan, I love the outdoors. I love camping. I love looking at bugs.  I love Identifying birds with my Dad. I’ve also been obsessed with Tiny Houses  for a while now, in a morbid fascination type of way. There’s something about watching  a family of four cram into a mobile bunker, while the host giggles about the  unpredictable housing market. There are only so many episodes I  ca

n watch in a row before I feel like there becomes a moral obligation  for the host to mention that the real housing problem is that we don’t  treat it as a basic human right. “They need to sell their house now  so they won’t be paying a big house mortgage, a tiny house mortgage, and  student loans all at the same time. But by god I will watch all  four hours of you trying to fit your piano and baby crib into  one. I’ll do it! I’ve done it. Anyways, all to say, not even my love  for the outdoors

or yelling at Tiny House Nation could prepare me for the endless abyss of: Off-Grid Grifters The off grid grifter is just one variety of  off-grid person under the overarching off-grid umbrella. Here’s some other  categories close to my heart. You got your standard doomsday couple. You got your illegal camping videos,  which are very helpful and informative. There’s an entire genre of hot girl  almost undressed in thumbnail video. The hot girl category actually dovetails into two  separate off-g

rid genres: actual hot girl content. And video with hot girl thumbnail, but the  actual video has negative sexual vibes. I cannot emphasize enough how many undressed women are on these thumbnails. Maybe youtube  just knows me. But they know you too. There are men in the woods reinventing  the wheel over and over and over again “I wanted to make a steam-powered  car. I probably will do it, but it won’t be so much a public thing. Andof course, the classic, sapphics  renovating a camper to run away

videos. And I’m sure there are many, many  more, comment below with your favorite off-grid subgenre . You can file  this video under “deconstructing off-grid content” off-grid content. But what makes  an off-gridder an off-grid grifter…. Wit. Yes that makes sense. What makes  an off-gridder an off-grid grifter? Money! Money! Money! And I don’t even mean that off-grid grifters  make money, or even that they have money. What makes a grifter is a lack of transparency  ABOUT the money. Just compare

these folks, who are very up front about the  realities of living off-grid. People who have alot of money. People who  have a lot of acreage in beautiful places. They have brand new vehicles and you think  “what in the world is real? How do these people pay their bills? How can they have all  this stuff if what they are is really remote?” Well the chances are they aren’t really remote. “If you don’t have a decent amount of savings to  begin with, it can be very challenging. So even though I’m s

pending less on my lease than I was  on my rent, there are all these additional things. So to be honest I’m working a lot more now than I  used to. It was very very financially stressful. With this person, who’s very… vague. “A couple years ago I bought two rustic  cabins in the woods and have been living there ever since. I love them and I  still own them. I, about two months ago, purchased this place.” “But, that being  said, I did have my mom co-sign with me.” And just to say it out loud, my 

inner Legal Eagle is speaking, I’m not accusing anyone of fraud,  or any other criminal activity. Off-grid grifters can pop up in any  of the off-grid sub-categories. And they can be hard to spot, like those  cell towers disguised as trees which to me look exactly like the trees  from Lego Island. But anyways. How can you spot an off-grid grifter in  the wild? Well lucky for you I’ve been able to identify some common characteristics  found so you know what to look out for. Of course, the most o

bvious flag-of-red is how the off-grider responds to questions about  how they could afford to move off grid. It takes a chunk of capital to  construct a homestead. It can cost much less than buying a house  which is definitely the reason many people choose this lifestyle. But it  ain’t free. And it’s usually not cheap “We found six acres just 3 and a half miles  from downtown Boone, and we were able to create this beautiful place, not only for  us to live, but for students to live with.” Glossi

ng over what I hope is an obvious ethical  question about living with students, there is a large gap between finding six acres of land and  buying six acres of land. Hey, wait a minute, yeah, how did he– “And, from the beginning,  hired students to help us do all the work, here on the site. We hired a sawyer  to come in and crate lumber for us that we could use for decking and framing  on the various structures that we knew we were going to build. We built this tiny  house in my father’s drivewa

y. I hired a Appalachian State student to come with us for  the summer, and he and I built the tiny house.” The most egregious examples of  “yadda-yadda-yadda-ing” over money, is when one rich off-grid youtuber  will go around and document other rich person’s architecturally  interesting off-grid homes. “I owned 400 acres. You know as a  young person coming on the land, I could not believe that nobody wanted this.”  Yeah, I also don’t believe that nobody wanted it. “We came on the land and there

was no water, no  roads, no bridges, there was nothing. But there were trees. You gotta remember we came  on the land we had absolutely no money. This cost 85 hundred dollars to build.” Well it doesn’t sound like you had no money, it  sounds like you had at least 85 hundred dollars. Even if the houses are not  architecturally interesting, they’ll still go check it out if  they’re in the same tax bracket “I learned a lot of things, co-founding  AirBnb. It can’t be a UFO. Nobody wants a UFO in th

eir backyard. They want  something that feels like home.” It’s almost like there are all these people all belong to  a “class” who all happen to have a particular “resource” in abundance. I’m at a loss. If  only we had a name for that class, or resource. Besides being obscure about how  they have paid for their homestead, off-grid grifters are also obscure about  the labor that goes into their homestead. “We did almost all the work ourselves.  I think if we'd had it hired out we’d probably be sp

ending around $400,000. One  of my favorite pieces here at the A-frame is this painting. It was actually painted by my  father, he’s a professional impressoinist oil painter. He actually helped a lot with this  build, he was here with me probably I would say half the time I was building here he was  helping. We did almost all the work ourselves.” So just to recap: being an off-gridder is  all about being self-reliant. Which means doing everything by yourself. Except when you  need some students

to work for free or cheap. Or when you need specialized laborers like a  sawyer, a pipefitter, or a welder. So you do “almost all the work yourself,” implying  its just you and maybe your partner too, but then on youtube you show a photo  of what is clearly three men working, and in another part of the video you admit  you’re literally a contractor so you probably have some of your “guys” help out without even  thinking of it as “outside help,” because you own them. And also you couldn’t have do

ne this  without your dad. You know. Self-reliant. Another flavor in the palette of off-grid  grifters, is when an off-gridder is a little too… “philosophical” about how or why they chose  this life for themselves and/or their family. “This project has taught us so much about what  we value and what we enjoy doing. What I love about this journey is just feeling a new  connection to the animals and to nature. While there is absolutely nothing wrong with  being passionate about the way you live, s

ome off-gridders are clearly romanticizing and  idolizing a life of solitude and self-reliance not because it was actually good for  their mental well-being or growth, but because it feeds their ego and  presents an opportunity to prove their masculinity via seclusion. An attitude  as outdated as a 19 19 hit and miss engine. “I have an old 1919 hit and miss engine.” There are also off-grid grifters who I simply label as grifter because it’s clear they  don’t actually know what they are doing? Bu

t they present themselves as if…  they do? Like our buddy Shadow here. “I just got tired of the city.  Tired of where mankind’s going, and always had the idea that I could do it better.” Who I admire for trying to  live free from capitalism. “I try to live without money as much as possible” but maybe doesn’t know how water filtration works. “This is for natural filtration. As well  as for chickens.” “So when you’re done with dishes or you’re done brushing  your teeth you pour it onto here, and w

hen it goes back into the ecosystem, it  doesn’t wreck the ecosystem that you’re in.” When I first watched this, I was pretty  sure organic filtration wasn’t that simple. And any questions I had were confirmed  by this dad who lives on a houseboat, explaining his gray water filtration method. “There’s nothing dumped overboard on the float  home, my gray water system is self-contained, it goes through a series of filtrations  which is then pumped up to the flower boxes and evaporation takes  care

of it from that point.” Yeah… I think those chickens  are just eating gray water. “So this is the library and this is the biolab, this is where I do a lot of my own research  about what’s going on in the environment I’m in, and this is how I know what kinds of  poisons are toxifying our species.” Oh, well that’s a relief. “Drinking water is still an issue,  I still haven’t built any type of a, filtration systems yet. I have a few ideas.” Now there are various degrees of audacity,  and I’m not t

rying to say that everyone who used their inheritance to build a cabin  in the woods is a grifter or unethical. It’s just a pattern of behavior that paints  off-grid living in a way that at best is not obtainable, and at worst encourages someone  to cut themselves off from support systems and community in order to feel like they are 13 again  reading My Side of the Mountain for a book report. “I’ve completely failed. I’m really  embarrassed about this,. I guess I’m just gonna have to stop doing

it. This is  ridiculous, I just can’t keep doing this.” “It’s really disheartening to work at  this for seven and a half, eight years, and just to get the legs cut out from underneath  ya, and they won’t even tell you why.” But mostly, I just find these videos  fascinating to watch. The characters, the explanations, the compostable toilets. And  I’m already caught up on TINY HOUSE NATION. But what if I told you there  was one fully grown adult who encapsulates all of these qualities? An  off-gri

d grifter the likes of which I have not seen in my many years of being  around men who wear camo unironically? Did I mention I’m from Michigan. RURAL Michigan. WHY YES THAT FONT IS TOO SMALL, THANKS FOR ASKI– This, is Brent. “Hello there! My name is Brent.” If Brent were to tell you his story, he’d say  he used all of his life savings to buy this old mining town called Serro Gordo three hours outside  of LA. He’s passionate about history, and can’t wait to fix up Cerro Gordo for generations to 

come and learn about the people who lived here over 150 years ago. While he’s completely alone  in this old ghost town, we watch him uncover old articles about the town that subscribers have sent  him, or things that he found on online. He loves walking around and talking about all the little  details of the structures, and the mine itself “I go down there mainly to  discover history. That said, there still is some very cool minerals down  there.” Along with images of maps and charts. But if I w

ere to tell Brent’s story, I would put  it like this: This, is Brent, a former investment banker who became a partner in a marketing firm.  He bought an old mining town, for 1.4 million dollars in 2018, with an investment group whose  members include a Hulu Executive, and a former American Apparel Executive, and he can’t wait  to fix it up for people pregaming coachella. “We hope to have this online in a month or two,  and depending on how the Corona virus thing goes, this could be the first pla

ce you  come and stay if you visit us here.” The idea of “preserving” the town of Cerro Gordo  and celebrating its history seems really important to Brent. “I just think it’s so cool to see people  rallying around a piece of history.” I also like preserving cool towns! I think most people do! His  audience certainly also seems like they’re into it as well. He’s amassed a huge following on YouTube,  with a passionate fan base who watch his monthly videos thinking that he might have died between 

uploads while exploring the Cerro Gordo mine “There’s dynamite box, and in  the dynamite box there’s denim.” “Well let me get around the  corner so when it does explode.” In the first Ghost Town video I ever watched, Brent shows off the various  houses he plans to Airbnb. “Second house we hope to get  on Airbnb is the Belshaw house. It’s where I typically stay so  I try to keep it a little nice.” He gives a tour of the old “American Hotel” along with all of the historical  relics that remained a

t the site “We see the saloon and the American Hotel.” But just two videos later. The hotel burned to the ground! “About five hours ago, around 2, 2:30 in the  morning. A fire burned down our hotel here at Cerro Gordo. The American Hotel. Last night  I woke up to an explosion of the propane tank in the hotel. By the time I got outside  the building was already half way down.” The American Hotel was presumably fine for 100  years until he showed up and within weeks the propane tank blew up. A PRO

PANE TANK NEAR THE OLD  FLAMMABLE DESERT HOTEL??? That’s made out of wood! Now, yes. It is a tragedy that the hotel burnt  down. And I’m sure the people watching his channel were very emotionally affected by this.  I mean, Brent spent all of his life savings (and a bunch of investor’s money) to turn the hotel  into an AirBnb, and now, it is a pile of dust. But knowing that he’s backed  by super rich investors made the last part of the video that much more… well “I could use some help. A lot of y

ou  have been very supportive of the town and our progress. And if you could donate we could  use–any dollar that’s given is going directly into this. If you’re close and you have any time of  construction skills or cleaning skills or even a truck to help move some stuff, we  need the help, we need the manpower. We’re gonna rebuild, what other  option do we have but rebuild, so.” It finally happened. I finally saw  something that I would say is cringe. Brent. Brent. Brent. It’s just you and me 

here talking, no one is listening… Everyone else watching this video cover your ears for a  second. This is between me and my friend Brent. Did you not get fire insurance? I  mean, buddy, I’m coming to Cerro Gordo, staying at your 150 year old  building… that you don’t have insured? I know at least in California  it’s practically impossible to get a mortgage without fire insurance. “Upstairs is where the rooms used to be. No  visitors have been allowed upstairs in years, it’s not structurally so

und up there.” Wait, so if the building  wasn’t structurally sound, to the point where you’re not even supposed  to go to the second floor, makes it seem like Brent’s gonna have to tear down the whole building  anyway… Especially if he wanted people to stay in the American Hotel. It’s almost as if he had a  pretty big motivation to… I’m not gonna say it. The fact that we don’t know whether or not  he had fire insurance is a testament to how vague these videos can be. It’s either,  no, there wasn

’t fire insurance which is incredibly irresponsible. Or there was fire  insurance, which opens a whole other can of worms since he’s asking money from his audience  to save the dream of Westworld minus robots. Or some other secret third thing that  I’m not allowed to know because I don’t have a 401k. Do you not show proof of  insurance when you put your place up on Airbnb? Do businesses like theme parks  and tourist traps not need to be insured? “And Cerro Gordo’s gonna be here after I’m  gone.

And there's gonna be a hotel here, and that hotel is gonna have  a story of the fire of 2020.” No no no, no no, you don’t get to watch the hotel  burn down and then say actually that’s part of the history you are so intent on preserving. What  Brent witnessed was the textbook definition of the opposite of preservation. Arguably the  most historic building in the town is gone, burnt to a crisp, and even though his entire  channel is about him being ALONE in his GHOST TOWN, this is somehow not his

fault or his  responsibility. And actually it’s yours. Everyone likes to think they’re “off-grid” and  “self-reliant” until their propane tank explodes and then suddenly it’s like, why did it take  the fire truckies 3 hours to get to meeeeeeee. If I’m being harsh I am sorry! The only reason  I came upon Brent’s videos is because my friend Harrison, who lives off-grid in Alaska, thought  that this was hilarious.I don’t know Brent, I have nothing against him personally, it just gives me  the squi

cks to see someone co-opting the language of nonprofits for his for-profit westworld. We’re  slowly but surely approaching Evermore territory, and I have just as much confidence in Brent  as Jenny did in the guy who owns Evermore. From an audience perspective,  it gained him tons of sympathy, and raised over a hundred  thousand dollars on GoFundMe. And this was back when we were like…  clapping for nurses. Sh– was dire. As I mentioned earlier in this video,  one reason I was interested in talkin

g about off-gridders is because of  the strange way they talked around finances. And Brent is a prime example of  how a marketing executive uses inspiring, emotionally charged language to wave away  the financial realities of his situation. Brent uses his marketing skills to romanticize  the town, “Something historic is going on here!” its legacy, “Back in 1800s they pulled  $500 million worth of minerals out of this hole behind me,” and whatever mineral  deposits still remain underground for hi

s taking. “Cerro Gordo smithsonite goes  for thousands of dollars on eBay. I’m not the one selling it so if it’s you, where  did you get it and how did you get it?” Here’s Brent on the Half Hour Intern  podcast in 2016, talking about the media manipulation skills he learned from  another partner at his former marketing firm. “(Brent) Giving any bloggers what they would  want for the perfect story and kind of like running with that story whether there’s half-baked  truths in there or anything alo

ng those lines. Yeah, there’s certainly a world that I’d never  been exposed to, and made me question pretty much every single article I read online to this day. I  know there’s somebody behind it doing something to influence the content within it… (host) I mean  half of the articles are basically written by this companies themselves, it’s very obvious.  But even these news stories that are obviously written by the news organization, might’ve had a  big influence by you know any of the businesse

s mentioned in there. God it’s just so interesting.  AND TERRIBLE… (Brent) Somewhere along the lines, somebody assumes that it’s been fact checked…  So you know, your local blog might not have the fact checking standards that NBC news does.  And then the next size blog isn’t going to fact check because they assume somebody else  did it. And that’s how unreal news becomes reality. Is kind of, as you’re trading it along,  there’s a certain expectation that somebody is fact checking when in reality

probably  nobody is… ” (host) yeah, just so crazy. Unreal news. How adorable. Quaint  even. 2016, what a virgin of a time. After Brent’s baby exploded, the project  to rebuild the hotel has been difficult since the town is so remote. Getting a  bunch of cement out there is a logistical nightmare. Brent mentions that he  looked into hiring a helicopter. “I was looking into renting these  massive trucks. I even called a helicopter company that quoted me  160 thousand dollars for a day.” But… well

golly gee wilikers  you’ll never guess. A Fremen Tom Bombadill has arrived (recommended by his  subscribers) to save the day with friendship, and a mutual love of facial hair and tobacco. The  strongest foundation to build a new friendship. When Brent talks about this newly forged  friendship, suddenly any mention of the price tag disappears. “I need 81  yards of concrete delivered here, and he’d just seen the road. And I remember  he just looked around and said, I gotchu.” And so, the magic ma

n and his magic concrete,  magically pour into the new foundation of the new hotel after the old one magically burned  down. And look that that! The new building will magically now be up to code and able  to magically support a second story! Magic! Maybe I’m in the minority here, but  I think the finances of running a place like Cerro Gordo actually seems  interesting, but we don’t get that. So we’ll never know… until it opens, and  I come as a guest wearing a mustache. When Brent isn’t building

a luxury hotel from  the ground up with zero regard for historical building methods, he is doing the second most  exciting thing a teenager would do in Cerro Gordo: exploring the abandoned mines. “Dark vein there.” “That’s cool, yeah.” To Brent’s credit, he has absolutely  zero regard for his own safety. And you know what? Top tier content. “Now we’re  gonna go into the great unknown, you know? See what happens from here.” In this  video, Brent has hired some men to lower him down via the eleva

tor shaft and  just… just listen to these guys neg him. “Got your phone? Take a picture of him. Take the last known photo of  the billionaire from Cerro Gordo.” What do these guys know that we don’t know? “Used to be a millionaire  before you owned a mine!” Brent… so clearly wants them to shut the f up. “What’s the combination to the safe!  Where’d you hide all that money!” “Bye” “Where’s that money in that suitcase.” “Aw man” You know, you can edit that out, Brent.  Unless he kept it in to make

him seem more grounded or something. I think he’s trying  ot play like he’s in on this joke. He’s not. “You know if you wanna come back  up you’re gonna have to tell us.” “Yeah… I didn’t think about that.” “Goodbye cruel world!” Now suprisingsly, or unsurprisingly, i don’t know, there is one thing in the mines that will get  Brent really excited about money: Levi’s Blue Jeans. “And the reason that these jeans are so  interesting is, they’re a collector’s item!” My favorite moment is when he fin

ds a  stash, tries to pick it up for the camera, and it just immediately disintegrates  in his hands. WHO DISTURBS MY JEGGINGS Our dear Brent even edits screenshots  of auction listings into the videos, to let us know just how much  we should be willing to pay for the minerals he collects and the crusty old blue  jeans he peels off of the floor of the mine. “People that are really into that piece  of clothing will pay upwards of $100,000 sometimes for these jeans. And for  me it’s never about th

e $100,000” “They’re a collector’s item!” This might be a bit of a sidenote,  but there is also a video of Brent suffering through a snowstorm and the entire  comment section is people offering extremely helpful and common sense advice, stuff  that even I know from living in Michigan, and he posted a weirdly defensive  comment because… it sure seems like he still doesn’t know anything about living  ALONE IN HIS GHOST TOWN after three years. Cerro Gordo was established as a mining town, to extrac

t as much value as possible from  the mountain, and channel that revenue ainto the pockets of whatever mining baron owned  it. And now, in this age of social media, a marketing executive is able to buy  that abandoned mine, use the idea of a romanticized American West to extract value,  not even from the mine, but from his fans. Then when the hotel burns down, he gets fans  to donate more money–through a 501c3 charity so he doesn’t have to pay taxes on his GoFundMe. But Brent also mentions that

he has  “volunteers” helping him rebuild. “Whether you’re here moving blocks  or just watching this from home, this channel is what’s making this hotel  possible.” As in, his fans are doing free labor. I think it’s safe to say, Brent still has a lot  to learn about living off-grid. “Four hours into the hike, and I’m completely lost. The sun  goes down I’ll have no idea where to go but, I honestly don’t know what to do.”  But I do think there is one area where Brent has made big strides in over 

the past three years. His content. If you compare his recent videos to his  earliest, there are some noticeable changes in tone and production quality. Early on, he  was much more soft spoken–going for a kind of “intimate conversation” vibe. “That stained  glass is from a Stevie (sic) McQueen movie called Nevada Smith.” Fast forward to today,  and it’s “Hello there! My name is Brent!” Ahh! It’s pretty obvious Brent is trying to model  himself as a Johnny Harris or a Casey Neistadt. But those two

will chase stories and take you  on interesting journeys to learn something. Brent is taking us on a journey to his hotel,  “Right now I am sitting on the first floor of the future American Hotel,” where you  will pay him to stay when it’s complete. Brent and other off-grid grifters insist  that “it’s not about the money”... but a BIG part of it is the money. “This isn’t  a project, this isn’t a startup. I don’t think about it in month-over-month growth.” My  dude, it is literally a project and

a startup. You have an investment group and your goal  is to turn it into a tourist attraction. In the past, Brent has assured us  that everything he finds at Cerro Gordo will stay in Cerro Gordo to preserve its  history. But, in this latest video, he says: “You know my mentality from day one has  been that everything at Cerro Gordo needs to stay at Cerro Gordo. That said, we also  have a extremely expensive hotel just down the way to build. So all that to say I’m going to  start–I’m going to t

ry–a small online rock shop. I wouldn’t think Brent cared  so much about the money… if he wasn’t constantly bringing up the money. The reason Dave Sparks helped  out Brent, wasn’t out of the kindness of his heart–no matter what the  narration tries to imply. “He said alright, I gotchu.” He did it because he was  able to monetize it on his own channel, getting multiple videos out of it, with what  were most definitely massive sponsor deals. Ironically, a sponsorship for  a high-risk insurance com

pany. Dave wasn’t even able to get all the concrete  he needed for the building! After two trips, the cement company refused to come again  “The cement company decided you know what no, that road is too dangerous. It's too  much of a risk for our drivers. We have much easier jobs everywhere else,  we’re just not gonna do it.” So Brent turned to… “This time we’re taking a  bit of a different approach. This time, this community that cares so much about this town  has all rallied behind it, and we’

re gonna make it happen.” His fans and volunteers again,  getting them to come and mix cement by hand. I do have a lot of respect for people who  find alternative ways to live outside of the capitalist hellscape that most of us are  trapped in. Like our dear friend Shadow. And the off-gridders who are breaking down what  their lives are like, and can shed light on things we could change about our society to  make it a better place for everyone to live. For most of us, that’s why we watch this  c

ontent. We also fantasize about our cottage core homestead in the woods, as I clickity  clack on this keyboard next to my fake plants. But for an off-grid grifter, the goal isn’t  to explore alternatives to capitalism. It’s to escape capitalism, by using the  capital they already stored up the bank. Rich people have always been able  to “escape capitalism.” That’s what happens when you become rich! You no longer  have to work other people’s hours for other people’s happiness. And they aren’t  be

ing honest about “doing it on their own.” They regurgitate rugged individualism  while spending thousands on hired hands. There are also much more sinister  pockets of off-grid content, that if you’re not paying attention, seem  like just any other off-grid video. Yeah, remember all those naked women thumbnails?  Some of those channels do not give off the air that these women are creating this content  of their own accord, if you’re catching my drift. There are whole off-grid channels that are 

confirmed hoaxes, people just pretending to live off grid in the woods, or even  being coerced to beg for money on camera. It’s…extremely uncomfortable  wondering… who is holding that camera? Time for an obligatory Thoreau quote: “If  a man walk in the woods for love of them half of each day, he is in danger of being  regarded as a loafer; but if he spends his whole day as a speculator, shearing off those  woods and making earth bald before her time, he is esteemed an industrious and enterprisin

g  citizen. As if a town had no interest in its forests but to cut them down!” And even  Thoreau needed his mom to do his laundry. The reality is–as much as off-gridders love to  sell themselves as truly independent, or being out there “on their own”– if you’re saying “I’m  independent” on YouTube, you are not independent. When you use a tool like a hammer, over  time your brain actually starts thinking of that tool as part of your body. As far as your  mind is concerned, you are one with that t

ool. And I feel like these “self-reliant” youtubers  prove that this same thinking can also extend to other humans. If you hire someone  to do something, tell them what to do, and then they do it, it can FEEL like YOU did that  thing that you had someone else do. You can feel a certain sense of ownership over it. After all  that was your capital that paid for their labor. That’s how executives are able to tell themselves  that they’re doing all the hard work of “running a company,” while the act

ual laborers do everything  on the factory floor or behind the espresso bar. This is why the tool itself is such a  powerful symbol in workers’ movements. Focusing on the tool restores in our minds the  importance of the person holding that tool, and the actual labor that goes into production.  Society is based on the means of production, but bosses–and off-grid grifters –often try to obscure  the material conditions of that production. This whole subject is extra-relevant because I  live in LA,

where a lack of housing is a crisis. In 2020, as the pandemic raged and Brent  was just starting his youtube channel, a little community started to form in Echo  Park. If you listened to local politicians or the police, they’d tell you horror stories  about how terrible the encampment was. But if you went there, you’d see that  wasn’t the case at all. I know this, because I happened to go to Echo Park  with my family in November of 2020. What struck me most about walking through the  encampment

was how chill it was. There were community gardens. People were bartering  for supplies, or even giving away stuff for free. It was this little alternative  economy, functioning all on its own. But in March of 2021, Echo Park’s city council  member had the LAPD kick everyone out of the park. The city claimed that they’d move those  people into permanent housing within a year. But a year later, out of about 200 people that  were living in the park, less than 10 percent were in permanent housing,

and at least  seven had passed away since being evicted. Unhoused people are the ones living like they’re  in the wild west. Not Brent. For people without permanent housing, every day is a struggle to  find food and shelter. They’re hassled by police, rich locals, and vigilantes. They don’t  have stock accounts or rich family members they can fall back on. And they’re  not backed by millionaire investors. But living in a tent in a metropolitan  area with a population of 13 million people doesn’

t conjure images of the “wild west,” so the media will never portray them the  way they’ll portray someone like Brent. “Self-reliance” is a myth. All of us are  interconnected. I think a lot of us learned that lesson the hard way during lockdown. I  know I’m not alone when I speak into a mic, or talk into the camera. That’s  why I love doing what I do. At the end of Brent’s last video, he actually came to a similar conclusion  after spending three years in Cerro Gordo. “It has been three years…

But for the past  three years… Over the last three years… over the past three years… I see my own memories  over the past three years… It’s been a long three years. It’s been a challenging three  years… Three years that I’ve been living up here… It has been three years… The last three  years… Past three years… So that is THREE YEARS. Thirty-six months… Three years ago…  Three years, Three years, thirty-six years.” Brent tells us, “And after a lot of thinking, you know, I don’t think it’s the bes

t  to call this a ghost town anymore.” And you know what, Brent’s right. Which  is why every single person who gave up their time for should demand free stays  at the New Cerro Gordo American Hotel AirBnB combination spa and mine tour experience. My mustache and I will see you there.  In about 15 years when it opens. While on my off grid journey, I like to fill my  free time by watching Mubi, the sponsor of this video. Just as soon as I figure out how to  power my laptop using these potatoes. Mu

bi is a curated streaming service dedicated to  elevating great cinema from around the globe. I said that in the intro, and you can’t me  from saying it again. Mubi always has new movies to discover and I can’t wait to check out  Sally Potter’s gender-bending 1992 film Orlando, an adaptation of Virginia Woolfe’s unfilmable  book. We’ll see about that. Mubi is expertly curated with really helpful descriptions, so every  time I browse I find something exciting to watch that I’ve never even heard o

f before. Whether  you’re a noobie, or you live on a houseboat constructed from your favorite discarded DVD cases  and wallpapered with old issues of Cashiers Du Cinema, Mubi will ensure that you won’t run out  of cool films to watch before the apocalypse, or rapture! Or whatever event gets you the most  views on youtube. So try mubi free for 30 days at mubi dot com slash m m fish. The creature from  the Black Lagoon lives just down the river and I’m sure he’ll want to join me for a double featu

re  of Orlando, and Beyond the Black Rainbow. Say it with me. Mubi dot com slash m m fish! Mubi dot  com slash m m fish! Mubi dot com slash m m fish! Thank you so much for watching! An  extra special thank you to my patrons, and everyone watching on Nebula. Who I am deeply,  deeply dependent on. If you enjoyed this one, might I recommend my video on Motel  Makeover, about a reality show about two ladies renovating a motel, for profit!  If you liked the video be sure to like the video and subscri

be so you don’t miss  the next one. As always, renovate Martha.