Dave Rubin - Dont Burn This Country: Surviving and Thriving in Our Woke Dystopia

Sentinel

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Copyright 2022 by Emma Dog Productions, LLC

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Rubin, Dave, 1976 author.

Title: Dont burn this country: surviving and thriving in our woke dystopia / Dave Rubin.

Description: [New York] : Sentinel, [2022] | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2021047001 (print) | LCCN 2021047002 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593332146 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780593332153 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Liberty. | IndividualismUnited States. | LiberalismUnited States. | United StatesPolitics and government20172021. | United StatesSocial conditions2020

Classification: LCC JC599.U5 R75 2022 (print) | LCC JC599.U5 (ebook) |

DDC 323.44dc23/eng/20220206

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021047001

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021047002

Cover design: Faceout Studio, Jeff Miller

Author photograph: Michael Franke

pid_prh_6.0_139713515_c0_r0

To David

(Not me, the other one.)

Introduction: Welcome to Dystopia

Like most Americans, I woke up on March 15, 2020, wondering if I should wash an unopened box of Ziploc bags. It was the beginning of a national lockdown. Restaurants, bars, small mom-and-pop shops were being shuttered. Aisles in big box stores lay barrenno cleaning supplies, no toilet paper, no bread, no water. Last-minute impulse buys at the checkout counter like packs of gum or tabloid magazines had been replaced by ransacked cardboard cartons reserved for light-blue PPE face masks and little bottles of hand sanitizer.

The NBA season announced suspension, schools closed, ships dropped their anchors, travel bans were enforced, and curfews were put into place. There was something viscerally exciting about it alllike when a thunderstorm causes the electricity to go out or when a nasty blizzard makes for a snow day. Itll only be for two weeks, they say. Two weeks to flatten the curve.

Rushing to prepare for two weeks indoors, I planned to pop into CVS to pick up a few last-minute things and then head home. As I pulled into the parking lot, I remembered that just around the corner was a dog shelter. Only a month before, our beloved dog, Emma, passed away, but nowhere in the plan was getting another dog. It was supposed to be a busy yearmy first book tour was on the horizon and my company Locals had just launched. There was way too much travel on my agenda to justify getting a new dog. Whats more, my husband, David, made me promise we wouldnt even think about getting another dog before the fall.

I grabbed my items, checked out, got into my car, and made my way toward the local shelter, just to see who the new arrivals were, knowing we werent going to be making an adoption. I figured thered be no harm in saying hello to a few dogs and scratching a few bellies before locking myself in my house for two whole weeks.

Inside the shelter, it was totally empty besides the howling dogs and faceless, mask-wearing workers. Ominous to say the least. Theyd rescued five dogs that morning from a Los Angeles kill shelter, one of which was a white and honey-colored pit bull mix with a bald spot on his head. Something about him reminded me of Emma. He sat there quietly and nervouslyhis big round eyes piercing mine, his tail anxiously wagging. A worker showed me some paperwork from the previous shelter with a time stamp on it: 3:15 p.m., March 15, 2020his scheduled euthanasia.

My stomach churned and my phone buzzed. It was David. I left the shelter and answered my phone.

David and I had been having ongoing conversations about starting a family (as actual dads, not just dog dads). He had always wanted kids. I was always on the fence. No, wait, I take that back. I never wanted kidsI thought being gay was an easy out. Kids, I had always thought, wouldnt be compatible with my career and, well, doing whatever I wanted to do whenever I wanted to do it. So, while David and I would continue having conversations and meeting with fertility doctors, we kept punting the reality further down the road. But there I was: forty-three years old and the world was ending. Something shifted in meI felt like it was now or never. If the world was really ending, I decided that creating life was my only chance at saving it.

I rushed home and we called our fertility doctor.

Docs response? Were closing in two hours. You better get here, because Im not sure when well be opening again. If were able to get an egg and a surrogate but dont have the sperm, then were at an indefinite standstill.

We hopped into the car and drove at light speed for about twenty-five minutes. The tension on the roads was palpable. People honking and swerving. The 405 freeway was a parking lot (which, to be fair, was normal). On the overpass, we saw birds-eye views of grocery stores with lines out the door that seemed to stretch on for miles.

We arrived at the clinic and got out of the car. Oddly enough, this street in Brentwood was empty. It was an unusually windy and blustery day, which made everything seem even eerier.

Once we finished at the clinic, after finalizing one of the biggest decisions well ever make, we got back into the car and headed toward home. What I knew, but David did not, is that I had no intention of heading home from the sperm bank. No, I was heading back to the animal shelter to go and save that nameless mutt that had not left my mind (except maybe when I was in that little room at the sperm bank).

So, uh, I thought maybe wed just swing by that animal shelter to see whats going on?

Oh my god, Dave. What have you done?

Lets just foster him for a week! I suggested. After that, I figured, things would be nearly normal again. We walked out of the shelter that day with an unnamed pit bull-boxer mix. You now know him as Clyde.

You know what happened next: the curve never flattened, and nothing went back to normal.

My book tour, travel, everything was canceled. People went months without seeing their families, skipping out on Christmases and Thanksgivings even when it could have been their grandparents last. Those who did see their families were condemned as reckless and irresponsible. (Youre gonna kill Grandma!) The US presidential election came and went, fraught with skepticism, and Americas biggest (and sketchiest) pharmaceutical corporations raced to manufacture and distribute a vaccine before it was ever approved or even properly tested. Eventually, cities began to slowly open up and relax mandates againonly to later reinforce even more severe mandates than before.

These never-ending lockdowns had extreme ripple effects. Businesses were boarded up. Political protests erupted in the streets. Sales of firearms reached record highsfive million Americans bought them for the first time in 2020 (myself included).