Dan Peña has never been subtle, and this clip is Peña at full volume. In this excerpt from his July 2018 London Real interview, Brian Rose asks him about a word he hadn’t been using two years earlier: “snowflake”. What follows is part social theory, part personal history, and part provocation.
It’s a clip that divides viewers, so here is what he actually says, and what he says he isn’t saying.
▶ Watch the full episode: Dan Peña – Generation Snowflake
What is a snowflake?
To Peña, a snowflake is a young person, “mostly guys,” who melts under pressure. He tells a story about a mentee who pushed back that every snowflake is unique, so each one deserves to be there. Peña’s reply: that’s not the point. What matters is how they hold up under pressure.
The numbers he cites
Peña backs his view with statistics. He says the average 30-year-old man’s grip strength fell from around 118 pounds in 1986 to about 96 pounds in 2016. He also cites studies showing that testosterone levels and sperm counts have fallen to 60 to 70% of what they were 50 years ago. “We’re dying out,” he says. These are the figures as he quotes them in the interview; we haven’t checked them against the original studies.
Where it came from
Brian asks if the liberal media is to blame. Peña says no. His theory goes back to the Second World War. He is a product of what’s called the greatest generation, and he argues that the countries most marked by that war, Germany and Japan in particular, now live with a deep fear of what might happen. He calls it “German guilt” and links it to Angela Merkel’s support for the EU.
The wider result, as he sees it, is a society that wants to be liked and avoids conflict, partly because Neville Chamberlain failed to stop Hitler. The rubber band, he says, has snapped too far the other way.
The snowflake test
Peña describes a test he gives the people he mentors, around 22 or 23 questions. He claims about 95% of those who take it fail. The first question, paraphrased: what would you do if someone spat in your wife’s face?
Some answer that they’d try to understand what kind of day the man was having. Peña’s own answer is extreme, and he says so. When Brian asks if that’s what the world needs, he says he isn’t advocating it. He grew up in the barrio of East Los Angeles, he explains, with a father and male role models who were all hard men, and he tells the story of a cousin who went to jail over a stabbing. That’s where he comes from. But the point, he says, isn’t violence. It’s that men should stand up for themselves: “act like they had a pair.”
What to take from it
Take the theatre out, and Peña’s message is about resilience. He says many of his mentees come to him because they never had a strong role model, and want to change. You don’t have to share his politics, or his answers, to recognise the question underneath: when real pressure arrives, do you hold your ground?
Who is Dan Peña?
Dan Peña is an American businessman and mentor, born in East Los Angeles, who built the oil and gas company Great Western Resources in the 1980s. He created the Quantum Leap Advantage (QLA) coaching method and for years ran seminars from Guthrie Castle in Scotland. Brian Rose’s documentary The 50 Billion Dollar Man tells the story of their relationship.
In this full 2018 episode, Peña and Brian talk about snowflakes, standing up for yourself, and making money in what Peña calls the Trump-era gold rush. You can also watch his most popular clip: Dan Peña – Is Global Warming The Biggest Fraud In History?.
See everything Dan Peña has done with London Real on his guest page: Dan Peña on London Real.
More on London Real
Transcript
Transcript: Dan Peña – Why We Have A Snowflake Generation
0:00 Brian Rose: That’s what you’re teaching these kids, correct? It’s not just business. How to stand up, how to have a pair. Which gets us into the snowflake. You hadn’t used that word two years ago.
0:09 Dan Peña: No, I didn’t.
0:10 Brian Rose: What’s a snowflake?
0:11 Dan Peña: A snowflake is a kid, a guy or gal, mostly guys, who melts under pressure. As opposed to what they tell me: “Mr P, every snowflake is different. There’s not one snowflake the same as another.” And I said, yes, that’s correct. And he says, “So we deserve to be here.” Not, that’s not correct. In my opinion, snowflakes melt under pressure.
0:38 Dan Peña: I gave you a couple of stats; they’re worth repeating. In 1986 the average man’s handshake pressure, a 30-year-old man, was 118 pounds. In 2016, 96 pounds. A woman in 1986 was 105 pounds; today [unclear]. Testosterone levels and sperm counts tested 50 years ago and today: they’re producing 60 and 70% of the testosterone levels and sperm counts they did. We’re dying out.
1:27 Brian Rose: Why? The liberal media?
1:30 Dan Peña: No, it’s not the liberal media. I think World War Two had a lot of effects on us. I’m a product of that generation, the greatest generation, they call it. It’s like talking to the Japanese now: they’re deathly afraid of everything because of the war, what they did. The Germans, Merkel, God love her, is supporting the EU because of what I call German guilt. Everybody’s scared to f*cking death of what might happen.
1:58 Dan Peña: So they want to come across as your friend. They don’t want people to say bad things about them, because Neville Chamberlain could have stopped Hitler 80 years ago, and so now we’re overreacting. The rubber band has gone way back the other way. My dad, I’m glad he’s not alive to see this, because the more snowflakes we have, the less possibility of the Earth making it.
2:39 Dan Peña: And there’s my snowflake test. By the way, 95.4% of everybody, the many thousands, tens of thousands, who’ve taken the test are p*ssies. And I don’t mean vaginas, I mean cowards. The first question on the test, paraphrasing it: what would you do if somebody spat in your wife’s face? And the answers range from, “Well, I’d try to ascertain what kind of day he was having, and if he’d had a bad day I’d try to be understanding.” Are you f*cking kidding me? I’d be in prison for murder. I would beat the guy to death.
3:24 Brian Rose: Is that what we need today?
3:25 Dan Peña: No, no. I’m not saying that. That’s me. Where I come from, the barrio, you spit in a guy’s mother’s face, you are dead.
3:40 Brian Rose: And you’d like to see more of that?
3:42 Dan Peña: Right now we’re way over at this end. You don’t have to come all the way to my end. But that’s awful. And then there are 22, 23 questions. It’s foreign to me that people would answer, “I would try to ascertain what kind of day he was having.” What does that have to do with somebody spitting in your wife’s face, or your mother’s face?
4:08 Dan Peña: And they know they’re snowflakes, and that’s why they come to me, because they think I’m the alpha male dad they never had. They say it during private time: “I’m a p*ssy. I don’t want to be a p*ssy. How can I change? My dad was a p*ssy.”
4:28 Dan Peña: I had no male role models when I was growing up, but my dad’s five or six best buddies were all tough guys, so I didn’t see anything different. I’ll tell you a story. My cousin, God love him, went to jail for being involved in stabbing a guy 17 times because somebody said, “Your girlfriend’s got a fat a**, looks like two pigs in a gunny sack.” He stabbed him 17 f*cking times. By the grace of God he couldn’t stab right, and the guy didn’t die. That’s where I come from.
5:21 Brian Rose: And you’re not advocating going back to that extreme.
5:23 Dan Peña: Not at all. But I am advocating that guys act like they had a pair.
