Beef And Dairy Network - Episode 81 - Hidden Beef: The Historic Cryptocurrency of the Future

Episode Date: March 20, 2022

Mike Shephard and Tom Crowley join in this week as we find about the origins of our financial system.Stock media provided by Setuniman/Pond5.com and Soundrangers/Pond5.com

Hello. I'm the actor Roger Wescott LeMé Grelé. I'm probably best known for an incident in which I was shot with a medieval weapon by the much-loved entertainer Les Cheese. We were both in a play that theatrically explored the two sides of Princess Diana's persona. I was playing the innocent, demure, and doe-eyed debutante, and Cheese was playing the glamorous and wily socialite. Anyway, on opening night, it turned out that there had been a mix-up, and Cheese had learned my lines instead of his.

He was absolutely livid and stormed off the stage. As an actor, I knew it was important to fill what could have been an awkward silence, and so I began singing and acting out my famous bawdy version of A Nightingale Sang in Barclay Square. As I reached the line, the moon that lingered over London town, and began unzipping my trousers, Cheese reappeared with the 14th century longbow that he keeps in his car and began to pump me full of arrows at great speed, the stupid old bollock. Now, the audience did nothing, believing this to be a stunning artistic metaphor for Diana's swift fall from innocence. In fact, he only stopped turning me into a bloody pincushion when our co-star,

the actor Nigel Havers, who was playing the playful side of Prince Charles, stuck a magnet in Cheese's ear, which buggered his pacemaker all to fuck, and instead of keeping his heart going, it started broadcasting BBC Radio 5 Live. Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is that I haven't been able to work since, and thank God I was able to rely on my beef pension. Without it, I wouldn't have had the beef I need now in my old age. Do you realise that your body needs more beef as it ages? I can't stop eating the stuff.

Breakfast, elevenses, lunch, an afternoon... Sorry, what? Well, what do you mean the advert's taking too long? Well, no one told me it was meant to be 30 seconds. You bloody imbecile. You shit. You bastard.

All right. Bloody hell, You bastard! Oh, right. Bloody hell, I'll just read it out. Many people of pension age face an uncertain future without beef. Don't be one of them. Invest in the Mitchell's Beef Pension Fund today. All meat is salted and preserved

with less than a third of our users experiencing full putrefaction of their investment. How's that? Right, are you taking me to Pizza Express or not? It's in my contract. Ring ahead with my dough balls order so they're hot and ready when we arrive. Hot and ready! Hot and ready! for those involved, or just interested, in the production of beef animals and dairy herds. The Beef and Dairy Network podcast is the podcast companion to the Beef and Dairy Network website and printed magazine, brought to you by the Mitchell's Beef Pension. I know that many of our listeners will have questions around beef pensions. I know that when I began investing in my beef pension, I was worried about something rather unsavoury to think about. But what would happen to my pension if I didn't make it to pension age?

Well, if this is something you're worried about, don't fret. I spoke to the people at Mitchell's Pensions this week, and they assured me that any beef invested in one of their pensions, on the event of death before pensionable age, all of that beef will be transferred directly to Prince Charles. So you can invest with peace of mind. Now, earlier this week I spoke to Professor James Harkam to hear about his new historical research. Professor Harkam is maybe best known for his work on the role of cattle in warfare, and how the true history of these magnificent, noble beasts has been unfairly eclipsed by the false narratives constructed around the use of horses

in warfare. His belief that horses were bred in Japan in the 1950s by splicing the DNA of cows and rabbits and dolphin semen continues to make him a controversial figure. Last time we spoke with James, he had been researching the ancient community justice ritual of the Beefhead Man, and indeed had organised the first fully authentic Beefhead Day parade in over 200 years, an event which led to the death of a woman accused of stealing an onion at the hands, or should I say beaks, of hundreds of small birds whizzed up on cream. Because of his radical views and incidents like these, he has struggled to find tenure at British universities in recent years. However, good news, he's recently signed a contract with Wyoming State Cattle College of the Internet.

So sit back, relax and enjoy this interview with Professor James Harkam. Hello James, thank you so much for talking with me today. It's a pleasure and a privilege of course. I've got your new publication here, it's a self-published history book. That's right, Hidden Beef, the historic cryptocurrency of the future. I've had a flick through, I've got to say it's pretty complex stuff. So maybe you can just, you know, in a nutshell, tell us what it is you've been doing and what you found out. Yes, now it might seem obvious for the man that's been declared bankrupt seven times to want to question the economic foundations of society.

But I think this new work is really a significant departure for me. It represents both a historiographical textbook and, in another more real sense, a kind of pyramid scheme. What I'm offering the reader is both an investigation into the origins of money, currency, currency exchange, and also the opportunity to get in at a very attractive point in a brand new investment scheme. Okay, so a lot going on there. I think the main thrust academically that we have to remember is that what I've uncovered is the great bovine truth at the heart of the world economy.

The fact that it is beef, not gold, not silver, but beef, that has always been at the heart of the world economy. how this kind of old system of money was a system whereby if I had a pound note in my hand, that would correspond to a pound's worth of gold that was kept in the Bank of England. And you say that this situation really is analogous to how money began, but not with gold, but with beef. Think about that word, pound. Yes. Now, some people would tell you that the emperor charlemagne in the year 800 decreed that one pound of silver should be divided into 240 pennies but think about that the pound is that a pound of silver or is it a pound of silver side, of course, if you look at the original text, there is no clue there. But if you look at my copy, you'll notice that in very small writing in pencil, I've written

beef. I see. Yes. So you've written side beef to make it say silverside beef. Absolutely fascinating stuff. So it's all there. I mean, sorry, just to butt in. fascinating stuff so it's all there i mean sorry just to butt in i'm not a historian so i i you know i don't know exactly how you should treat primary sources but sort of writing on them to change to change them that's isn't that problematic from a historian's point of view like if i drew a volvo on the bio tapestry i couldn't then claim that, you know, William the Conqueror was driving a Volvo at the Battle of Hastings. Oh, I suppose you think that all historical documents need to be treated with white gloves, do they? Like you see on Who Do You Think You Are? They're not the National Lottery balls, yeah? They're historical documents. They've survived for thousands of years,

these things. Sometimes you've got to make a stand. Because I'm frankly fed up of sometimes being the only person that sees these things this way. And do you know what? If you want to put a clause on the Magna Carta about the free distribution of beef to the peasant folk of Nottinghamshire, then maybe sometimes you've got to do that yourself so that subsequent generations will agree with you. And if that makes me some kind of charlatan, then frankly, I don't want to live in your politically correct namby-pamby nanny state.

Right, so just to be clear, you have actually written on the Magna Carta? There are several copies of Magna Carta out there, and most of them are in pristine condition. I will just say that if you go and have a look at the one in Salisbury Cathedral, there may be some additional interesting material that students might care to think about.

Okay, so you have a historical document written by the Emperor Charlemagne. Yes, absolutely so. In pencil, you've changed it from a pound of silver to a pound of silverside beef. A silverside of beef, yes. Absolutely fascinating. Right, and then your contention is that the historical basis of currency, then, is beef? Yes. Where would an honest medieval peasant get his hands on gold also we talk about an accountant cooking the books why because it was beef always beef think about

our system of taxation these are ancient medieval words think about the word tax tax remove the t change the a to an o what have you got ox it's all there in in plain sight it's there if you look for it and sometimes what i'm doing is i'm just helping to draw the eye a little just uh give people a chance to think for themselves and think beyond the the boundaries that again a very restrictive academic ivory tower dwelling minority have very much tried to uh kind of corral i would say uh people's beliefs over the years so you're you're you know let's put it bluntly your forging of historical documents you say is kind of for the greater good because actually even if those things were written in 2021 rather than 897 the sense that you're giving is a is a better version of the truth than they would get if they were just looking at the primary sources i would say it is a deeper and a deeper and perhaps more fundamental truth. Beef is at the heart of every transaction throughout human history.

We have to remember that Smithfield Market, the great cattle market, the great meat market of London, actually predates both the Bank of England and the Royal Exchange by between 400 and 500 years. Think about that. We talk about uh her majesty's revenue and customs but uh do you know what the c in hmrc really stands for that's her majesty's revenue and cow stomachs right beef offal again paid as taxation by everyday working people so i'm just i'm just sort of getting my head around this If we imagine the great wealth of, I don't know, Elizabeth I, who sat on great amounts of wealth.

Absolutely. She defeated the Spanish Armada. Well, yeah, we've often put it down to essentially piracy, basically stealing a huge amount of silver from the Spanish in South America and bringing it back to Britain. And some say that is the very basis on which Britain continues to be a world power, is that they had this huge injection of wealth during that time. Well, I mean, there are two great changes that happened

towards the end of the 16th century, the beginning of the 17th century. Now, 1588, you rightly mark out the Spanish Armada as a great change in britain's fortunes um people remember of course great men like uh francis drake uh now he did play a role in defeating the spanish but the spanish galleons much larger than the smaller nimbler english ships they were also weighed down by the much larger much much less nimble Spanish bulls that were inside those galleons. The English fighting cattle, of course, up on the decks on the forecastle of the English ships, a fighting cow in the English navy, could fire a bow and arrow up to three times a minute.

The Spanish bull is enraged at the sight of a red rag. They see the English flag go mad inside the galleons and they all sink. Now in 1603, it's in fact James VI of Scotland who comes down to England bringing with him the largest reserves of Aberdeen Angus steak the world has ever seen. And it's that same rapacious beef lust that infects his son, Charles I, who will be driven to civil war because Parliament simply wants to stop

his massive acquisition of beef. The man was beef mad. Well, let's talk about your personal financial situation because i you know from what i've read it seems as if these these two things are kind of interlinked um many many listeners may have seen you in the news actually recently um you did something of finally you know uh you could describe it as a publicity stunt where i believe you paid your income tax this year in beef or or sort of attempted to do that i would contend that um again having been largely accredited uh by a wyoming state uh academic institution most of my income is actually currently paid in beef um what little uh else i make on ebay and etsy is really not not worth factoring

in um if rumors are to be believed you made quite a lot of money in the last couple of years selling horse pelts on eBay. Yes, I mean, there's more than one way to skin a cat. But believe me, there is only one way to skin a horse. And it is very time consuming and has to be done in the dead of night but um that's i would hate to be i would hate to be remembered as uh the guy that sold horse skin lamps on the internet you know um that that's what i think the uh what some of my what some of my more unbearable students uh in years gone by would have described as a side hustle so if my understanding is correct you you got your tax bill uh as many of us do yes that's right which of course would be expressed in pounds pounds sterling the currency of this country uh you obviously have

to pay that by 30th of january you instead dumped a lot of beef on the steps of Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs, the centre there in Cumbernauld in Scotland, dumped it on the steps there. I guess people would be asking, well, can you pay your tax legally in beef? Is it legal tender? Well, it was certainly tender. This was not a stunt stunt as you put it this was a demonstration this was a uh an active protest by perhaps a less common man but perhaps certainly on behalf of the common man what did the people at hmrc make of the the sight of a middle-aged historian dragging what must have been quite a lot of beef onto their front steps. I assume they were confused. As soon as I presented them with the legal documents dating back over 800 years, I pointed out to them their legal position.

They honoured their own legal position and they accepted they accepted my beef consignment So you have documents which say that it is perfectly legal to pay your tax in beef, that's what you're saying to the listeners today Absolutely, I mean again if you look at the, if you go to the British Library or the Bodleian Library in Oxford, you

will see one version of history, but if you look at my copy of the magna carta you'd see a very different version which i think is quite quite fascinating i'm just thinking um logistically for a moment last year when i did my tax return it turned out i was owed tax i had a tax rebate because something had been worked out incorrectly. So they said, oh, actually, you've paid us too much. You've paid us £800 too much. We'll send you that.

And that happened in an instant. My £800 was returned to my bank account. In a situation where they owe you a tax rebate of beef, how does that work? Well, I mean, yes, I have this situation. Again, they have been very tolerant. They've been very understanding. I would hate to bad mouth, you know, Jackie or Linda up in Cumbernauld,

but they did actually make a little miscalculation. As I say, the online business should not really have been taken into account, as we can trace back to the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, where animal pelts are not subject to taxation, provided that they do not stay within the land borders of the Kingdom of England for longer than 28 days, which was the traditional length of time to hang a side of venison. Right, so you're using a clause in the Treaty of Utrecht

made in the 1700s to not pay tax on your Etsy shop? Yes, and that's the wonderful thing about the law is that you can use it to prove literally anything. And the best thing about the British legal system is it's existed for so long that almost anything you want to be true probably is. More from Professor Harkam in a moment, but first I would like to read out a statement from Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs. They write, we are aware of Professor Harkam's attempt to pay his income tax and national insurance using beef. In January this year, Professor Harkam was monitored by security staff at

HMRC Cumbernauld as he loitered near the building for a few days. It was concluded, from his bedraggled appearance and heavily laden wooden cart, that he was a simple travelling horse-pelt salesman, most likely living in local woodland. In fact, many staff members purchased pelts from Professor Harkam, and one member of our executive team spent the evening drinking plum wine with him in a woodland clearing. After three days hawking pelts on the street outside our office, Professor Harkam then dragged a bag containing almost 1,000 kilograms of beef onto our front steps and started shouting at a CCTV camera, here's your filthy tax, here's your pound of flesh. For health and safety purposes, that meat was then taken into the building by our employees Jackie and Linda and fed to Alan,

our security guard. The meat has not been accepted by HMRC as a legitimate payment of his tax liability and we reject claims that the documents he provided us with prove the right of the common man to pay his taxes in beef. In fact, we call into question whether he has provided us with original copies of Magna Carta, the 1707 Act of Union, the Corn Law of 1815 and the Representation of the People Act 1949 because they largely seem to be written on napkins from Starbucks. Not all of the documents provided were written on napkins, although we have other reasons to doubt the veracity of these documents. For example, his copy of the Treaty of Utrecht that he provided us with was clearly printed using a modern word processor and contains extensive

use of clip art. We would also like it noted that after the incident with Professor Harkam and his ton of beef, we then began to notice that all of the horses that usually lived in the field opposite our offices had disappeared. We can't link Professor Harkam with this disappearance, we would just like it noted. P.S. tax doesn't have to be taxing. If you want help with any of your tax affairs, do call our hotline. And remember, do your taxes wrong and you will go to jail. Hello, I'm the actor Roger Westcott-Lemay-Grillet, and I'm here to tell you about the multifarious benefits of the Mitchell's Beef Pension. Since the age of 14, I worked the stages of London's West End to fund my insatiable lust for beef

But I knew it wouldn't last forever, and I was right I was shot 38 times with a bow and arrow It's unlikely, but not impossible, that this will happen to you that this will happen to you. But even if you aren't pounded with shafts of strong poplar and sharpened iron while trying to pull your trousers up during the course of a bawdy showstopper, you can't work forever. Though McKellen seems to fucking well manage it well enough. That's why you need a Mitchell's Beef Pension.

Prime beef invested in stocks and gravies. Hot, hot gravies. Don't spend your later years chewing on an old pillow and pretending it's beef. Invest in the Mitchell's beef pension scheme today. Right, are we going to Pizza Express now? Look, just, could you be a dear, please, and call ahead, ask them if I can smoke a cigar in the toilets. Well, they let me do it in the Norwich branch. In the Norwich branch, on more than one occasion, they've let me have a cigar in the kitchen. Well, the ash didn't seem to bother them.

At the Norwich branch, they let me stub out my cigar in a Quattro Stagioni. Fine people, good people. More after this. According to research, 90% of employers plan to make enhancing the employee experience a top priority in 2022. After all, a happy workplace is key to attracting and keeping great employees. There's a number of ways that employers can make employees happier. For example, they can make them feel more valued. They can focus on the company culture.

They can offer more learning experiences, and twice a month they can book a guy to come in dressed as a fireman who just hoses everyone down with bubbly milk. Is it bubbly milk day? No, it was bubbly milk day yesterday. You've got to wait 13 days. Oh no. Anyway, you're banned from bubbly milk day, you know that. I'm sorry! And if you need to add more employees to your team, there is ZipRecruiter. ZipRecruiter's technology finds the right candidates for your job and proactively presents them to you. You can easily review these candidates and invite your top choices to apply. Try it for free at ziprecruiter.com slash beef. That's ziprecruiter.com slash b-e-e-f.

As we've heard, Professor Harkum is now refusing to pay his tax in anything but meat. But that's not the only part of his financial life that he has switched over to beef. I myself, as I do mention in the book, have been investing heavily in beef futures, which to many people may look like I've got a fridge full of rapidly putrefying bull semen but again every single one of those spermatozoon's could become a cow i've potentially got billions trillions in future beef potential and that's why i mean fbp is the currency of the future yes now the end of your book uh moves on to talking quite a lot about um fbp which if i understand it correctly is a kind of sort of cryptocurrency is that the right way to describe it yes uh future beef potential that it's the the notion that uh if we hold in reserve

large amounts of bull semen then that can be kind of predicated as a notion of the cattle that each of those uh sperms can become so we we can then and then rather than having to to trade the livestock themselves we can trade ownership of the uh of the fbp that's held centrally located um kept in a large chest freezer in my garage. So if people buy FPP, and it's currently available to buy and trade, I believe. I would say it is an opportunity to invest. Okay, yeah. If I was to invest in FPP, I wouldn't physically take receipt of the semen.

That would stay in your garage, but I would know that I own it would be no there'd be no envelopes of rapidly defrosting um reproductive issue uh turning up on your doorstep early pilot schemes were not successful i think my worry would be that i was sending you you know i'm buying fpp with Pound Sterling. I'm sending you that. And then all I'm getting in return really is a piece of paper saying, you own this semen, which is in a man's garage. Do you see why some people wouldn't feel confident to do that? My garage full of semen, as you put it,

is essentially no different from the Bank of England. What happens if there's a power cut in your garage there are backup generators um again i have a pair of treadmills worked by a very hard-working pair of bullocks who will keep going through the night to keep the power on there will be some dip in temperature um obviously there is a degree of collateral damage um of up to 20 percent but no investment is without risk at the moment yes i have strung an extension lead from the kitchen into the garage but as soon as my uncle gets out of prison uh he used to be an electrician we're going to do some stuff with insulating cable and gaffer tape that he promises will work very well. Okay, and I think maybe the other criticism people could levy at what you're doing is that future beef potential, were it ever to reach its potential,

You mentioned that you have the ability to create, potentially, trillions of cattle, which would overrun planet Earth. The environmental impact of that many cattle on our planet would be, some would say, unthinkable. I would counter that argument by saying it's incredibly thinkable. I've just thought of it now, and it seems fine. I mean, what are you going to do? Buy a Ferrari and drive it at 30 miles an hour? You know, we can be the best. We can be the best versions of ourselves.

And I haven't always had faith in myself. I'm a historian. I tend to look to the past. But since I got into FBP, I have thought of nothing but the future. They say every week an area of rainforest the size of Wales is destroyed. But imagine an area of Wales that was just a wall of beef. Just cattle. Every single square foot. Imagine if Wales was just beef. I can imagine that and i think it looks

stunning and i can achieve that with the contents of one shelf of my fridge the small fridge normally use it for christmas bits but there's been a lot of demand. And obviously, as someone who, you know, you own the FPP system, if this system were to replace our current fiat currencies of the world, you'd personally become very powerful. And I guess my question is, if FPP really is the future, why is it then that you're still having to self-publish history books, sell horse pelts on eBay and Etsy? It doesn't project success in the way that maybe somebody who wants that confidence to invest would want to see. uh yes i mean i would like to think that if you do not see success of the fbp model in my lifetime then future generations will remember me more fondly best case scenario of course yes i do

become a warlord ruling the earth with an unrelenting fist of steel but again in all the cost projections that i've submitted to uh the small business advice center at my local bank that doesn't seem likely and and for that reason i i will also have to keep selling the pelts. So if you do fancy a little bit of horse hair around the house, do pop to James E's Curios on Etsy or eBay. Where do you get the horse pelts from, James? Just a brief disclaimer. I would like to very strongly repeat that all horses are locally sourced. And if you think you recognise any of those pelts from the Grand National or Trooping of the Colour,

you are very, very much mistaken. And the spate of local horse disappearances in your area has nothing to do with... No, nothing at all. Horses... You know, horses like to cry wolf, don't they? A lot of young horses, foals, they're immature creatures, as I say, genetically engineered. They're not clever. They're not smart.

They won't bed in with a family like a cow. Lots of horses run away from home. They think they can get a better life in the city. And yeah, they end up doing things I don't think any of us really want to think about too much on a family podcast, but that's not my business. That's their business. I'm no judge of alternative lifestyles, but horses do what horses do. Okay.

Well, James Harkins, thank you so much for talking to me. And what's your final message for the listener? There's a lot for them to take in here. Obviously, they can buy your book and get all this in detail. But if there's one thing you want them to take away from this interview, what would it be? We live in a stakeholder economy. And he who holds the stake owns the economy. And for a hot slice of that future, there's some FPP waiting in my garage just for you. Great. Well, no doubt we'll talk to you again in the future. Thank you, Dr James Harcombe. Always a pleasure. A big thanks to Professor James Harkam for that interview.

His book, Hidden Beef, the Historic Cryptocurrency of the Future, is available now. His Etsy and eBay horsepelt shops are up there and ready to take your order. And if you'd like to invest in FBP, simply send beef in a padded envelope to Professor James Harkam, 35 Maple Drive, Aylesbury. Aylesbury! So that's all we've got time for this month. But if you're after more beef and dairy news, get over to the website now, where you can find all the usual stuff, as well as our off-topic section, where this month we get to grips with nutmeg.

What's going on there? So until next time, beef out. Thanks to Mike Shepard and Tom Crowley. Carrie is it? Oh yes hi I'm Carrie I am Psychic Ross and I will be reading you this evening Oh interesting well okay I co-host a podcast it's called Oh No Ross and Carrie Yes I'm sensing that the spirits are telling me it is a show about poodles Well it's about like fringe science and spirituality and claims of the paranormal Oh you knew that You do research online But more importantly like we do in-person investigations

In-person investigations. You in-person investigate as well. Oh my God, that's amazing. See? Me and my friend, this is so weird, my friend Ross, same name as you. Weird. He and I just go and try them all out. And actually, we've gone to a number of psychics.

And to be honest with you, it's a lot like this. It's called Ono, Ross, and Carrie. They can find it at MaximumFun.org. I could have told you that. Schmanners. Noun. Definition. Rules of etiquette designed not to judge others, but rather to guide ourselves through everyday social situations.

Hello, Internet. I'm your husband host, Travis McElroy. And I'm your wife host, Teresa McElroy. Every week on Schmanners, we take a look at a topic that has to do with society or manners. We talk about the history of it. We take a look at how it applies to everyday life. And we take some of your questions. And sometimes we do a biography about a really cool person that had an impact on how we view etiquette. So join us every Friday and listen to Schmanners on MaximumFun.org or wherever podcasts are found. Manners Schmanners. Get it?

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