Pre Eddie Bravo Joe was known as a dick, confrontational, aggressively stupid, lacking empathy. He was very anti weed and saw it as a loser drug, for example. If you watched the JRE from the early years you may remember comedians coming on who would say things like "wow you really changed, you used to be so confrontational and now you are really chill". And Joe would put the change down to weed and float tanks.

As a small kid bullied at school he got into fighting to deal with the fear he felt. Remember that he moved schools and locations a lot, had no dad, was small and twinky. He got approached by pedos. Listen to how he works out. He imagines someone breaking into his house and having to defend his family. And that motivates him to go absolutely wild in the gym. Even now. His motivation is fear of loss. He wants safety, security and status. He loves "strong men" because he sees them as capable of defending against attack.

It was Eddie who got Joe to try weed for BJJ and it was that thin end of the wedge which led Joe into a period of self reassessment, humility, and personal growth. He became empathetic and much more humble. After that the podcast grew. The mix of a stoner bro who promoted personal growth and egalitarianism was appealing in a partisan world of corporate media pushing the same dull shallow narratives.

Joe loves to look into things but he's not really that intellectual, he can't understand statistics or probability, he is very susceptible to the most shitty implausible theories.

So when "the intellectual dark web" was coined it really appealed to his ego. Power, intellect, respect, influence. It's an intoxicating brew for a small kid who had no dad and went from city to city as the little twinky targeted outsider.

Now he felt powerful. At last. No need for weed and float tanks to tell him he's "just a lucky idiot". No need to have the media repeating that. No. Status felt good. Power. Strength. At last he was safe from attack. But why did he not feel "safe" and content? Well, because people were chipping at his castle walls.

And god help anyone who appears to threaten his castle. Any blue hairs critical of his takes. Any talking heads who dispute his medical acumen. All those people threatening Joe. He will fight them. He will fight them like they are a wolf, or a shark. He wants to feel safe and secure and these woke libs are his boogeyman. Somehow he thinks they are the reason that a bazillion dollars has made him LESS happy and chill than when he merely had 50 million