115: Tearing Down Disney with Robert Evans

jump in real quick. With an email from Meg, she writes, Hello, Nightcall. Wasn't sure if you've seen the online petition going around demanding that Splash Mountain be re themed to Princess and the Frog. I work in the theme park industry here in Orlando, and usually when updating a classic ride comes up, there are many decries from theme park enthusiasts and Disney purists that this is a racing history and the ride

should be used as a teaching moment. Same argument came up with the retheming of the Bride Auction scene and Pirates of the Caribbean. While I agree with what Karina Longworth recently tweeted about films like Song of the South and Gone with the Wind, where de circulating these films can turn them into fetish objects. I'm not sure this

applies to theme park rides. While it's nice to think that parents would use problematic aspects of rides as a teaching moment for their children, I believe it's not the case. The majority of the time, theme park rides feature simple story narratives that can be easily consumed in less than ten minutes. And while I appreciate the museum s aspects of some Disney attractions, mostly at Epcot or the Everest Que and the Animal Kingdom, the reality is people don't

linger and ponder these galleries and theme parks. They rush past them as it is another box to be checked on the to do list of things to cram in on their vacation. I feel that theme park rides are more like Confederate statues in that it subconsciously communicates the kind of ideas, stories, morals of history we uphold as worthy of celebration. Would love to hear your thoughts. Thank you for keeping me company every week. Just watched Eyes Without a Phase last week and loved it. Thank you, Meg.

What do you guys think thanks Meg, Yeah, this is great. I mean I my first thought in reading this email was just like okay, like like yes, a ride that was created in nineteen to celebrate Song of the South, which is like not even available to like watch legally, is insane and it's insane that that was made in if you go to Great Moments with Mr Lincoln, that's like kind of the shadow most offensive thing in Disneyland,

and it's like that's one of those things. It's truly like embraced by the Disneyland heads where they're like, you can't mess with that. That's classic Disneyland. But it's so fucked up it's crazy. I feel like there are well that's the thing too, It's like there are other even

more funked up rides still in Disneyland. Um, the Jungle Cruise is more openly racist than Splash Mountain because Splash Mountain is like so divorced from the source material that unless you knew it was a Song of the South ride, you would never know that. Yeah. I mean we we talked about this when we had Karina on before she did her Song of the South series on You must be Remember this, which is great, highly recommended if you haven't listened to that yet. But uh, because it is

like for me, a nineties kid or whatever. I went on Splash Mountain, you know, during our vacation to California when I was like five, and there was songs from Song of the South on Disney sing along tapes, and there's like, weirdly the thing lives on in a way. I can't. I think that they're just different kinds of insidious. That's more just like we're not going to let this go, even though we're gonna like make the source material mysteriously unavailable,

but we're going to like honor it in quotes somehow. Well, there's a lot of like Antebellum South fetishization and Disney also because that's like Waltz whole bit, you know, So I think it's very baked into all theme parks, uh, that kind of imperialism. Yeah, I mean there's like kind of that Antebellum architecture in a lot of Like there's a theme park I grew up going to a lot

in Kansas City called Worlds of Fun. I'm sure that people who listened from Kansas City will have thoughts about World of Fun if they've been there, but I feel like there's a lot of that was like an international themed one, but I swear that there was like a bunch of like the genteel Little South type stuff in there too, just because it's like Kansas. But yeah, I would say, like I'm all for I don't think that

UM theme parks should necessarily be treated as museums. And like Disneyland wanted to make a museum where they like put their shuttered stuff, I think that would actually be really valuable. But they will never do anything that's that self reflexive or like self critical, right. For sure, they don't want us to talk about it, but definitely some of like there are just other little weird racist easter eggs all over Disneyland because they like never get rid

of anything too. So there was like a Native American village that took up most of Frontier Land when it opened. Um. But they're like animatronics from that on the Mark Twain Cruise. Like I had never actually gone around the river until I did once, and I was like, oh, there's all these like repurposed Native American animatronics that I did not know.

We're still in Disneyland, um, but it's that Disney. It's that, like Karina talks about on her podcast, is that sort of paternalists, Like, here's history from the point of view of a funked up, old racist white guy telling you what history was. Like. I agree with what you guys are saying, but I do have one question about Meg's email, which is why why would the Princess and the Frog be the reinvent perfect. It's not interesting to me, it's not compelling. I really liked the the Moanna idea, and

I was into the Utopia idea. Zutopia should be an entire land. Anyway, Here's why it has to be The Princess and the Frog Because it's next to New Orleans Square. That whole area is already New Orleans themed. The Haunted Mansion, the little fake Bourbon Street area, and the Pirates, the Blue balou ball Um, all that stuff is kind of New Orleans themed. And then you go over to like Critter Country, it's more just like ambiguously Southern themed, but

Princess and the Frog is New Orleans. Critter Country is like Appalachia and and New Orleans is more of the South. It's like you got a brief tour eastern United States between Main Street, USA and there. But is there enough like water in The Princess and the Frog. Yeah, it takes places I don't remember anything about. Also, the good thing about Princess and the Frog, like and I can't remember from the last time I went to Disneyland how much of a presence it has in in New Orleans

and the New Orleans part of the park piece. If it doesn't, that's also fucked up because it felt like it was Taylor made to be slotted into that part of the Disney Parks experience because it's like very like like voodoo and like I don't know, like there's tons of music and it's it's it's all like very the villain from that movie who was a great villain. Um he appears in the Halloween Parade that they just announced they are not doing this year because of COVID oh um.

But I did just also get an ad for Orlando for um Universal Orlando reopening, like one second before we started recording, and it was an ad that showed them like wiping down escalators and for the whole family. I roll my eyes so hard when we talk about that stuff on this podcast. I feel like it's audible. I've been getting a lot of ads for casinos and in the same vein of like, it's been too long, it's

been too long. It has it has to be Princess and the Frog because it's black, the first black princess in Disney history. Yeah, it's only right. I had no idea the Princess. I saw The Princess and the Frog and I was like, I don't have like any it

was here. It was like, it's got like it's very musically driven, music driven, as I recall, I think I saw it like whenever it came out, which makes it good for um Splash Mountain because Splash Mountain ends with like a big kind of musical performance, so it's like very easy to drop in all the animatronics. Mountain already has a river boat, Like there's just a lot of

things you could easily adapt New Orleans. The people. The thing that people really didn't like about The Princess and the Frog is that it gives you this black princess Tiana and then it turns her into a frog for the whole movie. Oh shit, this is the t I'm sorry I shouldn't say ship and then talk about the children's movie. It's like I'm conditioned to correct myself there. But I I know I have a Tiana fan in my house, but we have never watched. But now that

I guess we have Disney plus we can. I was thinking it was like an old tiny thing I love. At this point, you could just be a fan of Tiana and never have having seen the Princess and the Frog, because that's just like Disney. Princesses is its whole separate like machine. It's it's weird, the like weird sieve of information. It's the same with L O L Surprise dolls, like I I don't know what they are, but I can

recognize them. There was an L L Surprise controversy. The L L Surprise guy just got canceled because he ripped off L Surprise sounds like something that was like destined to get canceled canceled. It's like a big ball full of toys. I's that's the surprise. It's like a plastic ball and you open it is full of toys, but

the dolls inside. There was a controversy too, But it's maybe I'm mixing it up, but I think that in a parenting group that I'm in there was a controversy where the L O L Surprise dolls were like dressed very like as if they had just come out of like a sex dungeon or something, and it was like, l O Surprise, you don't get to choose which dolls you get, and then it didn't really go well, but

I'll fact check this, okay. So L Surprise introduced a doll called the Rainbow Raver that is an exact like replica of this girl who's an influencer whose name is Amina Mucciolo who uh Brat's and Mattel I think also she's been ripped off before. She but basically they made

a doll of her. She's like her. Her whole thing is like Rainbow Raver and she has like blue hair with like if you look at the doll and you look at her, you're like, yes, this is a huge This is definitely like a rip off of this specific person.

So she called them out on it online and then the guy who is the CEO of L O L Surprise like tweeted a bunch of racist ship back at her, and everybody was like, hey, you know this is public and we can all see you, right, So geez Louise, so um, he was like denied all culpability and said some racist stuff to her. So a little surprise canceled? Can cancel? Yeah? You canceled? What Disneyland rides? Would you guys?

Re theme? And how? Oh man, I'm trying to think of ones I don't well, I've this is just a personal preference. I really don't like the Teacups ride at this point. I've noticed at some point I becoming dizzy was like the worst experience for me and I I got on the Teacups last time and I almost had to like emergency get off and spew because I just couldn't deal with the dizzy. So I'm like, is there a wit and and the Dumbo rides? It's like the

like ones that I loved as a child. Maybe I just want other children to not experience the joy I had, And probably Teacups are one of the few things that I feel like our iron clad like they're never like they're so timeless, and they're like I get so happy whenever I see the Teacups because the design is so perfect and they keep them so fun can clean that it's like they have to because people throw up on

the time. I'm sure, like I'm sure they get wiped down even pre COVID like every hour, but like, um, and there's like nothing, there's there's no like creatures in it. Besides like the cheshire Cat. It's just like those cute little lanterns and stuff, and it's just like it's great.

It's like peak Disney aesthetic. I feel like, right well, that's the thing, right is Disney is all about like wiping away the sharp corners of history to make it just like what was really going on at that tea party, just the antiseptic you know world, Yeah, I mean I would. I would. The one that bums me out the most right now, and it is a recently made over one is the um how they read it, leagues under the stay to be finding Nemo. Oh totally. I changed my

answer to that. It's it's awful. It's so depressing too, because you can't help but remember when you like descend the stairs into the submarine how it used to be, and it's so like it's like who wants to watch a TV under water? That's what's funny. It's like we all care so much more about that than about a

potential Splash Mountain retheeming like Splash Mountain. I'm like, even though we are all of the Splash Mountain generation, like make it the Princess and the Frog, I don't care, Like that would be better for the kids, but it still has to have the drop. It's the same ride. It's the same ride. Okay, okay, that was my my other. I was like, we have to think of something where there's like a wet drop the ride tech. It's like you can build in any narrative excuse for a wet drop,

Like that's like the Jurassic Park ride thing. It's like, why when is there a wet drop in Jurassic Park and yet they managed to make one of the best wet drops of all time. I love saying wet drop? Did we just coin it? Have you guys seen all the Jurassic Park tweets that have been going around where everybody's like, remember when we thought it was unrealistic that they would reopen the park immediately after people died not

but again they're like that was the plot hole. Everybody was like, why would they like just open it for people to come dine? Who would go to a park like that? It's like because of freedom, and everybody should be free to get eaten by a dinosaur if that's what they want, that's your own personal liberty. Should we take a break and come back with a nightcall, Let's do it, hig, nightcall. M. I'm not sure if this is going to work in terms of the math and

the calendar of what podcasts reproduced versus now. But UM, in the most recent episode where we you guys talked about California Slitch, you mentioned centan On, which is a fascinating organization. UM. And they owned this luxury hotel in sam Bonica for a long time, but then in the late seventies they kind of collapsed after UM then there was a lot of criminal activity that they were involved in, including putting a rattlesnake in the mailbox of an attorney

who had brought food against them. But anyway, there's all all kinds of weird CULTI stuff that they did that has had a lot of influence in UM behavior modification still to this day. UM. So, anyway, it might be something you guys would be interested into diving in deeper. Thanks by such a good night call. I am fascinated by sinn Anon. Yeah, UM, I didn't really like I

didn't really. I think I had read about them before, and then I didn't put it together when you know they're credited at the end of California Split I because it's like one of those names like Lyn that just kind of sounds like nothing. Yeah, but yeah, super super interesting though. Yeah. I think I heard about Sinnanon from a friend of my mom's. Actually, he was like, have you ever looked into cinnnon? It's fascinating because I didn't know.

I sort of knew I had heard the name before, but I think I got it confused with narcinon, which is the scientology narcotics anonymous. But well there's like there's Alanon, which is like friends of a There's just a lot of anons to Alanan's legit. Yeah, some of these are

legit and some are not. Um Cinnanon was a It was a drug rehab program that was founded by this guy named Chuck detorck Um in nine eight in Santa Monica, And it started as rehab and then it kind of became more of like a probing, like who am I thing? And then it became a cult. Basically it always had. It was the whole thing was that it was the

first drug rehab with no doctors involved. It was the first like self help drug rehab and Chuck Dettoric came up with it apparently after taking acid he was like, we should look inside. And it was founded like a few years before Lyn. But some of the group games and stuff are very similar to ESLYN. It's just like getting past your hang ups to like what's really underneath inside, and we're gonna get a lot of uncensored talking, like we're going to get right after it. We're going to

talk about it again, just like very similar to acting exercises. Yeah, like the whole master thing. You a little walking back and forth between the walls and slapping them types of you know, oh for sure with your friends. So they played a game that was called The Game. That sounds very scary, where you like get people all up in their insecurities. Oh um, I used to play this in high school. Actually I did, like Total side by. There was a thing called the Game. Did you ever know

about this around that time? That's just like the game. You're always playing the game until you think of the game, and then you've lost the game, and then you have to say I lost the game. It's one of those

like kind of stonery high school things. But anyway, I've also done probably the other game as well, more familiar with the one where you like make a hand sign and try to get your friend to look at it, and then you're like you lost the game when they see when they do, oh, I don't know, you go like this but like down down by your knee and then you can see what I'm doing on a podcast in your mind. Okay, Well back to cynan On. It also became a church Molly you mentioned, and well they

became they basically filed for church status. Um, they like incorporated into a company. It was like this guy had a storefront in Santa Monica and then he they moved into some old army barracks on the beach, and then they ended up make enough money to buy a hotel called the club Casa del Mar, which I think became Shutters maybe really yeah, And but they turned it into dorms and it was sort of like a commune as well.

It was like anyone could join. You didn't have to be in recovery, um, but you had to go totally cold turkey off drugs and you had to cut off contact with everybody from the outside world for three months, which is very culty and after a few years. It was originally supposed to be a two year in patient program and then you get out, but at some point Chuck decided that there was no like, once you're an addict, you never really recover, so you can never really leave

cinn and On. It's the Hotel California. So then it just kind of morphed into a cult. And they all shave their heads. Yeah, they shave their heads. They married, couples, had to break up, um, they gave men vass actomes and and coerced people into having abortion. It's just so crazy.

So I know, like it you mentioned, uh that uh th h X eleven thirty eight George Lucas first feature used extras from it, but like that just makes it sound like it was based like th X eleven thirty eight was based on cineon, because that's what th h X eleven thirty Like, nobody can have sex and in it, and it's just like everybody sort of the androgynous drone. Well, I think people were experimenting with a lot of alternative

living situations at the time. That's the thing is like Sinnnon was one of so many things that were happening in uh the sixties in the alternative line living space. I don't think people like batted it an eye at Cinnon, yeah, as much as we might right now. Well, there was so the anecdote about the snake in the mailbox, um

is very interesting to me. There's an l a megum article about this by Hill L. Aaron, But it's basically there was like a journalist turned lawyer named Paul Morant's Yeah, I looked at his website a bunch because he yeah, he has a website too. Um. But he had sued sinning On On behalf of this woman who claimed that she had been kidnapped and tortured and brainwashed and a bunch of horrible stuff, and Morants won the lawsuits, so

they got three thousand dollars. And then once he realized how horrible this group was, he started pressuring the Department of Public Health to shut them down. And then he started getting like scary retaliatory phone calls and threats from Sinnonon members. So he got really paranoid because I mean, much like people who speak out about scientology, it just sounded like it. It was very oppressive to him. Um, and one day he was like, I'm gonna stop thinking

about this. I feel like I've just been so paranoid. And he was chilling out watching sports on TV and then he saw a weirdly shaped package slipped through the mail slot in his door, and when he went to grab it, it was a four and a half foot long rattlesnake that bit him on the hand, and the rattler on the tail had been moved so that it wouldn't make noise and alert him, which is the fucking scariest thing I've ever heard. Um, it's it's so bizarre.

I mean, it's and it's weird. I would have thought that this would have been on our radar from day one, but I really hadn't heard of it until California split, and then I was like, what's this. Well, that's what's so funny about it was it was like right on the beach for so many years. It was like everybody knew about it because it was on the strand and you would see the synanon people like wandering around. It's just so weird to think about a time when Santa

Monica had like anything that weird in it. I heard the worst story yesterday about Manhattan Beach from Kate Raft was posting about it, worse than the eyelash House. Yes, a rich white mom uh filed to hold a BLM March, but it was actually just a graduation march for her daughter and her friends. Yeah, and they didn't they have hula hoops. I heard about this. It was like, and then they could they could pretend like it was an

exercise class if they got caught. Wait, so way did she She had to file because they wanted to have like a gathering of more than however many people. Yes, so she said they were having a BLM March, But then it was actually just like a rich white kid graduation party. Like we're we're in lays while we walked around in our graduation outfits. Manhattan Beach is so bizarre. Yeah, well, I think I feel like sent it on. You know, there's that the weird Rehab and Inherent Vice too is

totally it feels like sent it on to me. Um. Thomas Pinchin lived in Manhattan Beach before it got so

gentrified that nobody cool could live there. Um. Yeah, imagine living at the beach and it being weird and scuzzy again the dream, Yeah, I mean the the idea, like the proximity of of rehab to um two cults at that time, it just feels like this like perfect timing because it's like the first time that people have actually started to think about drug rehabilitation and like getting people like like aside from like a sanitarium or something super

old school, like, people were actually trying to think about holistic ways of treating drug addiction. Right. In a way, these people invented like promises, right, they invented the beachside rehab, which is now like Malibu is completely overrun with these rich person rehabs. They take up like half the real estate. Um. It's interesting to think of that coming out as something as scuzzy and actually counterculture. As sent anon. I watched Spaceship Earth, which I recommend so much um because it's

about the biosphere. But I had no idea. It was about how the biosphere came out of a commune and no, out of like a weird um into puntional community that is headed by a guy whose name is Dolphin Johnny nice um but you know, friends with Buckminster Fuller. Like it's all legit, but it's sort of the good version of this where everybody's like, yeah, nothing bad happened. We just sailed around the world on a ship we built ourselves. That's the dream. And they're like they're like also an

experimental theater company of course really eventually. I mean that's why I'm like, like, I feel like the odds of of a rehab commune or something turning into an experimental theater company are just so high as becoming a cult. It's just we only hear about the cults um. One thing I did learn about cinnan On that I didn't know is that allegedly they morphed into the wilderness retreat rehab thing that super rich kids in l A do. Is that the one where you get snatched out of

your bed in the middle of the night. Uh huh. It's a whole mini industry that's like for kids who do too many drugs, their parents pay to have them sent away to do like a yeah, like do like a experience type thing, like pretty much an escape room, like a turbo escape room, turbo escape room in the woods. It's like they leave you in the woods with materials and you have to like find your way back. Um. People have died on them. They have been kids who

have died from heating. Expose a few years ago about these that was so hard to read. It's so cruel. I think I was totally like, who runs these and finding out it's like that's what sinnan on turned into creepy but also makes sense. Terrible boo cancel sinning on too. Well, guys, should we take a break before we have our guest Robert Evans join us. Yeah, let's let's do it. Welcome back Tonight Call. We are thrilled to be joined today

by our guest, Robert Evans, the only Robert Evans. Uh. Robert is the host of Behind the Bastards, also on I Heart Radio, and Behind the Police, the new spinoff. He's also the author of a Brief History of Vice and is an investigative journalist at Bellancat. Welcome Robert tonight Call. Thank you for having me. We've all been on Behind the Bastards at certain points. So now you're you're in our archer. You're on the other side of the church

ship just got reciprocal. We wanted to talk to you a little bit today about sort of the citizen journalism aspect of the recent protests and uprising, and then take some listener questions. Yeah, that are specifically for our guest, Robert. We got a ton of good ones too, so you better have all the answers. Oh boy, okay, well I'll do my how to defeat fascism, etcetera. Um, we're going

to figure that out. Robert. You've been reporting live from the Pacific Northwest during the past month, uh and before that, and you are very much on the front lines of the stuff, both online and and offline. So we just wanted to talk to you a little bit about your experiences doing that. Yeah, you know, I got bored during the lockdown of you know, exercising in my front yard and going on jugs, so like dodging police munitions was a nice change in calistinics for a couple of weeks.

So yeah, it was mostly just like keeping my heart rate up sort of thing, you know, just making sure you're still in shape. Yeah, yeah, still ready for the next track. Meat. Think of a riot line armed with grenade launchers as a kind of gym. Yeah, yeah, I mean you were the person I saw reporting about some of the stuff that has now been reported in the mainstream,

specifically the boogaloo stuff. You were the first person I saw tweeting about that and saying Jason Wilson and I have the Guardian put together big article and the yeah yeah, and that was you know, I just noticed a lot um and I've noticed this with all the you know, uprisings up the past few years, that there is just such a huge divide between the way it's reported online and the way it's reported on television and in newspapers

that it feels like generationally we're getting a completely different sets of news yeah yeah, and completely different sets of realities and um on the right, a lesser extent on the left, but on the right a really organized ecosystem dedicated to making sure that there are two fundamentally separate realities.

And that is why one chunk of the country believes Antifa, who has never been tied to a single murder, um is a terrorist organist station while the terror the domestic terrorist responsible for the domestic terror attacks over the last six months, UM, which are right wing domestic terrorists, aren't a problem. Um Like, it's because the world they live in is fundamentally different. Because there was a concerted media effort to make sure that that was the case. How

culpable is Mark Zuckerberg for all of this? Uh, pretty culpable. Not for the I mean, obviously, the actual problem with like siloing off the right wing to a separate reality started way before Mark Zuckerberg, and I don't think he

was an intentional part of that. I think the thing that Mark Zuckerberg deserves blame blame for his Facebook developed a system whereby they would recommend Facebook groups to people which were closed and siloed off from the rest of the world and acted as like radicalization chambers for people.

And most of the time when people joined even like particularly the groups for Facebook's internal numbers suggested that six of the time when people joined the Facebook group for an extremist organization like the kkkor the prad Boys, sixty or percent of the time it was because Facebook's algorithm had recommended that group to them. Um, and Zuckerberg was one of a number of people at Facebook who were like, this isn't a problem. Let's keep doing it. It It makes

this money, and like that's you know. We can also talk about the ethnic cleansing. Facebook is partly culpable in, but there's a long list of reasons they suck. It's really ironic, I think because like I feel like Facebook's uh in general, I mean everybody's still on Facebook, like it's the most mainstream thing in the world, but like it did have a dip in public trust, I feel like in the last couple of years, or at least

since Cambridge Analytica. But then they like poured all this money into advertising in the last year or so, and it's all been based on groups. Like all of their advertising campaigns have been like Facebook groups is the reason to be on Facebook, And it's just like but that's actually one of the most problematic parts of it right now. Um, they just make it seem like it's all like cat

enthusiasts and stuff. Yes, well now it's like just clueless suburban people is their audience, right, That's like a lot of these websites they are just it's like what local news used to do, where it just like exists to stoke fear. Yeah, you're Onto is a very nice person and thinks Black Lives Matter is planning to break into her house and and do violence to her because she's white.

Like it's because like like that's the target audience for Facebook. Yeah, and like still refers to what's been going on now for three weeks as the riots. Like, Yes, I mean I saw some metric that was, like the top ten posts on Facebook over the past few weeks, and it is all like Ben Shapiro and trauma. And that's consistent too. I mean, that isn't that kind of usually the top ten trending topics on Facebook. There's a big right wing contingent, But it's also weird. Do you guys notice that pretty

recently on Instagram? I don't think it was always there at the bottom it says like brought to you by Facebook. Oh, Zuckerberg insisted on that person. But I mean that's kind like it's you know, it's hard to like avoid all of those. Do we have to divest from all these

social media companies? It is? It is not dissimilar from like, you know, I'm I'm I'm one of those people who has has been suggesting, you know, as as cautiously as I can, folks who have the have the mental space and feel safe, you know, mentally owning a firearm should maybe consider it, because it's not great that those are all concentrated in the hands of one group of very

hostile people right now. UM, And there are some problematic aspects of purchasing firearms because not all firearms companies, but an awful lot of them are part of this horrible culture war we're in because of the kind of ads that they support in the organizations that they donate money to. UM. But at the same time, when someone is trying to kill you with a gun, there's no nothing replaces having

a gun. And in the same way, when you are trying to impact the culture and change it and shift it in more positive directions, there's really no nothing that replaces Twitter and Facebook an instagram. Right, we're admitting Twitter as a gun, right, absolutely? I buy into this. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Twitter and Facebook are both guns. Facebook is a gun that regularly explodes in your hand, and being a blue check as bad as having a license. Yeah, it's it's I don't know, I don't know how how how deep

I want to get into the comparison. I mean, I think Twitter and Facebook both have the potential to kill a lot more people than are fifteens do. That's about three people a year in the United States. And um, I think there's actually very likely that Facebook kills more people a year already than at I just have to be the voice on the podcast that says I don't think people should get guns. I respect what you're saying completely, but I also, I mean, so many people are killed

by their own guns that I don't know. I'm not there yet, but it's a long conversation that has and I don't feel the need to like to to argue the point as um. But yeah, we all agree who shouldn't have guns, and then those are the people who tend to have the most guns. That's true, yes, and that includes the police, right, That is one of the problems. So we wanted to talk about like citizen journalism in general, which is taking place on all these platforms like taking

place on Facebook Live and Instagram and Twitter, um. And I mean I've mostly just been aware of it because I haven't been super plugged into it until like recent years. Like it really feels like it's a completely different animal now that you have these live streaming capabilities that are on all these sites. Like I mean I remember like the first periscope I ever watched and it being like, oh, is this the future of how we're going to get information?

And um, has that been, Like, are there are there pluses and minuses to that aside from being on the on these platforms that are inherently problematic. Yeah, you know, one of the one of the minuses to kind of

live streaming citizen journalism. I think that is always on my mind when I'm I'm working these events, is that, um, it's not impossible that your footage will catch someone committing something that is against the law um, but not necessarily a moral um, and that they will get in legal trouble and maybe even go to jail as a result of your recording. Now, So that's something that's always in my mind. It's part of why I try not to to to film, and have increasingly throughout my time in

the streets tried to avoid filming protesters. Um, sometimes it's necessary, like when protesters clash with police and police use violence on them, you have to record protesters and police. And I do think that the kind of risks for the protesters are outweighed by the massive public interest value of knowing what the police are doing when they're physically violent with protesters. I think that even the the overall safety benefit to the protesters is higher. Although it's not without

a risk. That is something you have to consider when you're doing this sort of work. Um, And so you have to act consciously to minimize the damage that your your reporting could do and maximize the security that it will add to the public, because at the end of the day, journalism is fundamentally about, um, comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable, and you don't want to afflict

the already afflicted. Yeah. Now, I feel like there's been so much more awareness, especially in this most recent wave of protests and activism, of of really being aware of Nazi like not showing protesters space with people who are

doing dandalism or anything like that. I feel like people have really really gotten that message, especially since so many people who were involved in the Ferguson protests and other protests and after, you know, since since then have been you know, suddenly murdered mysteriously or wound up dead, like there's a real threat there. Um. And it's not always

just getting arrested, you know, it's lots of other stuff. Yeah, I definitely noticed this time also just because the coverage, especially in l A, was so out of tune with what was actually happened ing that it was such a different world on Twitter than it was in the l A Times, for example, which is the only newspaper left in l A. Really so um just there was a lot of viral videos of police brutality and of police assaulting protesters that we're all taken by amateurs, you know,

or citizen journalists, um And it took a few days for those to reach sort of your average newspaper reader, you know. I sent my parents a few clips of things to be like, here's what's going around with people that I know that you know, shows the police are

tear gassing people even if they say they aren't. There was a clip um of in Van nuys when Van nuys Um was being looted there was some shop owners who called the cops and when the cops arrived, they tried to arrest the shop owners because they were black. That was on like the local news. That was like on the Fox of Philly. It that wasn't even on like Unicorn riot. That was somebody because the reporter was flagging down the cops right like once it started happening.

They were just sending people to kind of like capture it on the scene and then you would see just there were some people who were just completely still trying to be in denial even though it was happening, like literally right in front of them, you know, who were like I just got tear gased. But like I'm sure the protesters through a water bottle or something. Yes, well, you know, a salt water bottles are really danger to police officers. You know. One thing I do think about

a lot is the continuum of force. And the continuum of force is sort of when you're thinking about what is legally allowed in self defense, um, what you can do in response to someone else's aggression. Because I carry a gun pretty much every day in my life. I was actually in a situation in the streets recently where a young like right wing counter protester like pulled a machette and was like threatening marchers with it, and there was like and it was the situation where I was like, Okay,

she's five six ft away, she's not stabbing anybody. What is the point at which I'll have to shoot her? Um? Because there was a point if she had if she had attempted distab people to death, that would have been my moral obligation. Um. And it's because lethal force does justify the use of lethal force. And so when I think about the continuum of force, I think about what are the police doing in response to what? And usually it is someone chucks water bottles and the police fire

grenades wildly into a crowd. And were I to respond in a similar way to like say, somebody were to throw a water bottle at me and I were to shoot them or stab them or even punch them, I would go to jail. And I should go to jail for that, because that would be a wild escalation of force. Right. Well,

there's there's also like there's no consequences in place. So you've you know, we've seen this happening in every city that people are like, Oh, it turns out that all of the district attorneys are like in the pockets of these police unions, and that's why they're not prosecuting any of these killer cops. And that's why the killer cops

have no fear of always escalating in every situation. But it was sort of amazing to see, like the cops are accused of not de escalating enough, and everybody, just like every police force in the country immediately just like escalated to military vehicles and yeah, just demonstrating the point, right. And even you know, people talk about militarized police, if they were militarized in the way that our own military is,

we might be seeing less violence from them. Because while our military has done some really fucked up ship in Iraq and Afghanistan, I know a lot of guys who were over there and who would have who would deal with stuff like kids, you know, slingshotting rocks at them, and they weren't allowed to shoot those kids because that would be a violation of their rules of engagement. I think I think all of these people think they're exercising restraint by like just shooting people in the face with

rubber bullets instead of like shooting them, you know. And then you even saw like when Joe Biden was like, oh, just shoot them in the legs. That's not it just don't don't shoot them. And I mean, you know, people

have arteries in their legs, Joe. But it has it does feel like the veil has been pulled off for a lot of people who maybe otherwise did trust in the police or didn't think about the way the police act around communities of color, and you know, in places of poverty, Uh, it feels like a lot of those people are like, oh, I cannot deny that. Well, this

is a question I have actually because I do. I think that to a certain degree and in another way, like you're talking about, you know, these levels of force. And one thing I noticed just from being out at protests like not not in violent situations. Although I was like kind of in on the Crazy Day and Fairfax in l A. Down here, Um, I was there kind of right before that really started to get um bad.

I kind of left the scene. But one thing I noticed, especially between that and then later there were a bunch of car protests in l A. And I was just thinking about both from watching on live streams. Like for me as a person who's often been a pedestrian and often you know, isn't armed. Um, seeing the amount of forest, the amount of armor that was being used against these people was really striking to me because I I identified

with the people who were unarmed and pedestrians. Um. But then like when I was in the car protest, which was like the least police involvement I had seen thus far, even though everybody was driving around and like a weapon essentially, like it could have gotten bad, like there was easily a way that a car protest could go very, very bad. But it was the level of hands offness with the cops with that, and that was still pretty early on, like they were still kind of cracking down on a

lot of people. They were not cracking down on that, And I was just thinking about, like, like, there's some kind of respect for a car that there isn't for an unarmed human being, and that was that's I think. It's also just harder for them to assault people when

they're in their cars, is the reality. And so some of the car protests I've been at, it's like they start just saying they're going to give out tickets for honking, you know, they just um find aspects of driving to criminalize so that they can say, Okay, if you're here and we hear you honk, you know, we're going to

pull you over and cuff you. And so I guess the thing that I was thinking about out of that though, it was just that there are some people for whom like being in a car, me being in a car as as opposed to being a human on a street

on a sidewalk makes me like more. I don't know, it gives me more agency or something or or as opposed to like, I don't know, it feels very I just started thinking about all this stuff because I'm like, people are seeing these videos of police brutality at protests on Facebook and stuff, and a lot of them it's still not clicking for them. They don't see the imbalance of power there um And I don't know, I don't

know what to do with that information. I mean, there there are a lot of people out there who just respect power so much that you know, whoever has the most force, they are going to respect that. You know. Yeah, they respect power because they expect that it will be used in their defense. Yes, that's it. And I think that one of the things we've seen that has been positive. And I don't mean there's a wrong way to take this,

and I hope people don't. It's good that so many traditional liberals have gotten tear gased and assaulted by the police over the last couple of weeks because now they understand the reality of the problem for sure. And I mean I've heard other people say that and and mentioned Kent State and say that Kent State was very radicalizing for like white people in America because it was like white kids in a college campus getting tear gas instead of just you know, civil rights protesters. That had a

different effect on them because they're racist. Yeah. I mean so many people I know and people's parents who the man in Buffalo, I'm blanking on his name, right, that is the anti operative, Yes, Michael Like he was like some seventy five year old guy in Buffalo, Like and he was like, you know, a leftist or whatever, but obviously an elderly man. And that actually was a thing that a lot of people's parents in that generation, I

know that kind of flipped them. It was also the denial of what we could see on camera I think was very jolting for people. So he just fell. We didn't push him. I mean, it was such a microposma we saw it. But I think that the like, you know, because being from l A, it's like when the Rodney King tape came out, there was this feeling of like,

if these things are videotaped, they cannot be denied. If you see the cops beating an unarmed black man for no reason, you will have to acknowledge that they do that. And that's you know, they're objective. It's not an accident, and there were still so many people who were just like, I'm going to choose to see what I want to see, or just like I'm gonna say whatever I want to

have happened in this video happened. Um. And that's definitely still some people on the right, I feel like at this point or they just like to see leftists get the ship kicked out of them. Yep. Yeah, I think that's a lot of it. I think it is. You know, we talked about this on behind the police, um, policing in America from the very beginning before they're even like at the very start of the first police departments in

this country. Um. The big part of the desire to have them among people who weren't rich was a desire to have what historians referred to as designated vigilantes. Um. Yeah. And that's why I think how a lot of people who are okay with the violence against left wing demonstrators, that's what they see. These people are bad because I don't like them, and I want someone with the power of the state to physically harm them. Um. Yeah, it's

cool and good. Well, we got a bunch of calls for you, Robert um Let everybody know on Twitter that you're gonna be on the show. So if you want to get into some of those yes, So this is a text message for you, Robert. The National Alliance neo Nazi group is dropping leaflets in my city. What should I do about it? Oh boy? UM, Well, there's a

couple of things. One of them would be trying to identify the individuals actually putting out the leaflets, which is, you know, a mix of sort of surveillance and detective work. But ultimately that will be the most useful thing to do, is identify these individuals. So they do have to be connected and so many for example, businesses connected to them have to be connected with the actions being taken undertaken UM.

Another thing would be counter messaging, so potentially putting out other leaflets UM warning people about what the National Alliances, It's history, the terrorism that it's inspired. UM. I do think kind of a two part response is justified. UM. Another thing might be UM getting UM informing UM the FBI of what's going on UM, because they do care more about this sort of thing than UM. Other law enforcement agencies tend to. UM. I would put that lowest

on the list of priorities. First is figuring out who the who the hell is responsible and publicizing that as widely as you can um. Second is counter messaging, and third would be maybe given a heads up to federal law enforcement. What's happening? Can I ask a follow up on this? If if you're afraid of someone retaliating against you for you know, outing them as having done this or whatever, what kind of ways can you do? Can

you disseminate that information without making yourself a target? I'm going to tell you right now, UM, let me look up exactly what his handle is. There's a number of us you know you can reach out to on on Twitter. But the the there are anti fascist researchers who spend a lot of their their lives doing this sort of work, and you should uh reach out to some of them, um, because they'll they have large followings already and will help

you get this information out. One person to consider is anti fash Gordon, like Flash Gordon, but anti fash Um Gordon is a very experienced activist with the sort of thing. He does a lot of open source intel, so he could not only disseminate the information, he can double check it to make sure You've gotten the right guy. Uh, And I know Gordon would be very happy to do um this that sort of to help with something like that.

Another person to maybe reach out to would be Daniel Harper. Um. Daniel is a podcast called I Don't Speak German, which is a history which is like histories of individuals who are uh like really significant within the modern fascist movement. Um. So those would be like two people. Uh and he's at Daniel E. Harper on Twitter. Those are two individuals I was just reaching out to for maybe help with that.

I feel like if I was on a college campus right now, if this was kind of stuff was going around, for example, I would like invest in a roll of stickers and like bright neon pink that just say fascist and a lot of money everything. I don't know. I have a friend who lives in a small community and they had a similar question like this, and I had

no idea how to answer it. It's really helpful to know that there are people who can help out with that because I know that, especially like in in smaller areas where it's so easy to know, you know, if I post like, oh so and so is doing this very opposed to picture or whatever then you obviously these people are violent and scary, so that's really thank you

so much. That's a great service. Yeah, And in general, if there's like a local kind of ANTIPA collective around you, you know there's there are individual like city and state organizations, you might consider reaching out to them as well, um, because they might, they might. They generally have experience doing that kind of research work and disseminating that information. So yeah, is this where we publicly announced our affiliation with antiphon

night call? I don't think anyone had any doubt about that membership in a terrorist organization. Yes, yes, come find us. Let's do another question. This is about emergency rations. Hi, my name is Dominic. I'm calling with the question for Robert Evans. I appriciently started to uh prepare for food and emergency supply, but I live in a small department and I wanted to get his opinion on what is the best way to store large amounts of water in

a small area a lot of storage. Yeah, you know, there's no perfect answer to that, my because obviously, like water takes up a set amount of space, right, there's no way to make water take up less space because it is water UM. You know you UM. What I would recommend and what I myself do is I keep what is about a two week assuming about a gallon a day gallon and a half a day of water UM. I keep about a two week supply of water on hand.

Actually minds more like four because I have a little bit more space in my yard, but about a two week supply of water. And then what you should focus on is having a mix of water purification tablets UM, something like AH I forget the name here, but one of those like ultra violet wands that they use that you can use in the field to sterilize water UM and pump activated hand like hand pump activated water filters UM. You know you can get all three, and you could

keep a significant amount. You can keep all three in a significant including a significant amount of water purification tablets in a shoe box, and have what would be necessary to to filter thousands of gallons of water UM on hand. So you know you can only store so much. Two weeks is generally a good amount. Pretty much everyone has enough space for a two weeks storage supply of water. Get a couple of fifteen gallon UM jugs UM, and then focus on being able to purify and treat water.

That's a good call. That that's what I would recommend. Yeah. And just for our listeners who might not know why you might want to do such a thing, Uh, just still listen. Yeah. Think about back when the pandemic hit and suddenly stuff like toilet paper that you've never had a problem getting before and never had to think about it was hard to get. Um. Thankfully, that was just toilet paper, and there's alternatives to toilet paper. Um. And it's not a thing that you need to survive, um, thankfully.

While we did have shortages of different food stuffs and we're still going through those, nothing that was needed for basic survival was unavailable. Um. But also things that we never thought we wouldn't be able to get were unavailable. And that should make you realize things that you do need to survive could be made unavailable very suddenly. Yeah.

I mean I bought a grip of water the last time there was a little earthquake because I was like, oh, I should have so much water in case there's a big earthquake, and then I have drank it all during the pandemic. Yeah. And I'm not advocating stockpiling years worth of supplies and a bunker, because I don't think that

actually gets you much security. You should have enough two to four week supply of food and water is a good idea for everyone in this country, and it's something that you can build up over a period of time without spending a huge amount of money. I would say, actually for people who live in natural disaster prone areas, uh, such as Los Angeles or uh did you guys make me want to dan X? Right? Well, you know the

XANAX preparation is the xanax. Just staring at staring at that stuff, though, I think would decrease my quality of I'm gonna do it. You You've clearly scared the ship out of me. I'm gonna do it. But can I tell you something really funny? Actually, during the uprising, Sharon Stone posted this crazy like how to build a safe room thing because, like a lot of rich white people in l A, she was afraid people were going to

come directly to her house to loot it. I'm gonna be honest here, yeah, we all, we all were gonna loot. Sharon at a Santa's checklist, and she was number one. At first, I thought she was offering a safe house, and then I was like, oh no, she's saying here's how to like build a panic room. But one of the things she said was make sure you have a supply of water, and Zanna, yeah, yeah, in a panic room is not going to increase your safety in any

meaningful way. I'm not. I don't need to get into detail of what people who really wanted to harm you could do to a panic room. There's two things that will increase your safety. One is having enough of a supply of basic necessities that you don't need to panic, right, that's the goal. The goal is not to panic and

buy supplies. The goal is that if something bad happens, you don't have to go out and contribute to the panic cause you're like, well, no, I'm good, I have food, I have water, I have toilet paper, Like I made sure that I was prepared a while ago. I can

just sort of set this out. The other aspect of takeing of of true security UM is building ties with a community of people around you that you can rely on if things get really bad and you need to, Because the only real security that exists for any of us is communal securities. Community security. That's the only real self defense totally. And I think we've been seeing how as people realize that maybe the networks that are supposed to protect them are actually just harmful, that you do

have to build counter networks of mutual aid. Luckily, we all got a weird three month crash course in how everybody is interconnected and needs to help each other before uh, we really had to team up and help each other. But look out, guys, because Facebook is going to steal all of this to further advertise for groups they're like. Even the anti FA podcasters say that community is important. See, yeah, you use signal signal. This is gonna be my my

free spawn for signal right now. Mutual aid collaborative slash citizens self defense moist Robert when Trump, When Trump posted a Facebook ad that had an upside down red triangle, didn't you post eighty eight of them? Wait? What I didn't catch that part of it was the upside down red triangle supposed to represent Antifa or anti Antifa. Well,

it was the upside down red triangle. The reason people flipped out rightly about that is that in Nazi Germany, when you were put in a concentration camp, your your little uniform, the little jumpsuit or whatever they gave you would have a triangle patch on it that was color coded to why you were in the concentration camp. So, for example, homosexuals had a pink triangle, and communists, social democrats,

and anarchists got a red triangle. UM. And so when he posted a red triangle with no sort of commentary on his ad calling for violence against Antifa, a lot of people, including myself were like someone in I don't think Trump knew it it meant, but I think somebody within the administration who was you know, maybe it might have been as low as an intern, who knows, but somebody who was working on the social media team knew what they were signaling UM, and knew both that it

would serve as a way for them to intimidate and frighten left wing people, but also would serve as a way to kind of uh draw up like a panic among the left, and when the ads got pulled, that panic would provide full or like free advertising to the campaign. Like, I think there's probably both both lines of thinking occurred

in it. UM. I do think it's as likely a statement of kind of desperation, right now as it is a power though, just because things have not been going great for the right wing in the last couple of weeks,

I think they are on the back foot at the moment. Yeah. Um. I had a hoodie from the indie rock label Kill Rock Stars that had a yellow star on the breast, and I wore it once in front of my grandfather escaped from the Holocaust, and he was like, Hey, I don't like that because it reminds me of this other thing.

And then I didn't wear it anymore because that made me be like, maybe you can't actually appropriate these things yet they're always but it does seem like all sort of the greatest hits of like hateful iconography are coming back. You think that is a last gasp attempt to retain control. Oh, we don't know. It's kind of our responsibility to ensure that it is, like, that's our job is to make it be a last gasp. But that's not a guarantee.

That's the thing you have to fight to ensure. It does feel more like gesturing, and that kind of thing feels more like gesturing in it at power than actual power. But who knows. You know, this is a long way before the election, if we even get one. So yeah, yeah, yeah, it's early days yet, anything could happen. Um. Yeah, I'm going to hit you with another question from a listener. Sure, Hey,

I have a question for Robert Ovans. Um. I listened to your podcast It could happen here, and it was particularly alarmed at the episode where you talked about how UM in certain states, like rural Americans could potentially choke

the water into the supply. And I was just wondering, in your worst case civil worth scenario, UM, is there a particular state or even a particular city you think would be a terrible, particularly terrible place to be in because a lot of friends just like looking to move out of the city in New York, and UH would would love to tell them where you're clear of just in case it was a chipper chipper question, very dark, like, yeah,

there's no great place to be if things go really badly. Um, there's aspects of living out in the country that are safer, but you're also very vulnerable to you know, uh, roving groups of of gangs or death squads already want to call them. There's been cases in like South America where economies have collapsed and like people who had the resources retreated to compounds in rural areas that they thought were safe, and then large groups of people would just kill them

and take their stuff. And obviously there's dangerous of being in a city, including the fact that a lot of cities don't have access to um as much water as people think. If there's some damage to the infrastructure and food and like, but there's also a form of safety that comes from being around a lot of people who generally in cities, folks are less uh prime to the kind to like violent bigotry that is more common out

in the middle of nowhere. So there's the answer is that there's no perfect place to be and that the best thing to do is work actively to stop the

ship from going down. Yeah, yeah, I was gonna say some of that's already happening in places like Flint, Michigan, where the governor Rick Snyder, who like is a total fascist, choked the water supply, like specifically to poor black parts of Michigan um And I interviewed an activist from there a couple of years ago, and just hearing her talk about that and about water scarcity and like clean air

scarcity becoming the big issue. Um. It has felt to me since then like she was just sort of like speaking. You know, they're already in the future there, and with things like Standing Rock too, right, what can people do to like, what can people do to stop them from drilling everything and destroying everything? Are we going to have to, like, uh, you know, put ourselves in front of bulldozers in the

Appalachian Forest? Yeah? Sometimes, Um, you know, obviously the that kind of work well valuable, Um, isn't the long term solution. The long term solution is fundamentally changing aspects of how not just energy extraction works, not just how energy generation works, but how capital works and capital's relationship to to politics in our society. Um. But in the short term, yeah, sometimes people are gonna have to get in front of some fucking bulldozers. Um. You know. Uh, it is worth

noting that. I think that there's a decent chance. Obviously, the violence and Standing Rock happened under Obama. There was some evidence that they were pulling back from forcing the pipeline forward when Trump got elected, and he definitely forced it through. It's impossible to say it would have happened or not under President Clinton. I think we would have had a better chance of actually stopping the pipeline. Um. I don't think she was particularly gave a ship about

whether or not the pipeline happened. But in general, Democrats, when you yell at them, um, and you're on the left or the right, are a little bit you know there was is uh so like you can get them to do ship, you can shame them into action if nothing else. Yeah, I mean all we all we do is like shame or local politicians, and they seem to have like no reserves of shame whatsoever. They're just all

you know, so in the drink. That's the thing is that, like I think as far as election and elections go, like it, it would be great if we had a candidate for any office. It's like, yeah, we love this person. But it's much more like useful and probably possible to have somebody that you can just like brate into No. And I have felt like very heartened by the amounts of people that have been turning out for all kinds of things, um, to protect the more vulnerable people. You know.

I have seen people stand in front of some bulldozers to keep homeless encampments from being raised. And it feels like everybody is paying attention to you know, that to the way that the cops have always treated on how people in l A is how they are treating everybody. Now people are seeing how they are when you are. When you are confronting fascism. The only remedy to force

is force. Now that doesn't mean you have to violently attack them, but putting your body in front of a bulldozer is a type of force that is exhibiting, That is exerting force in the real world. Just like confronting a riot line, even if your plan is not to physically harm those officers, it's a stand arm in arm and make them beat you. You are exerting force in the world. Um And force is the only language. Fascism understands. Um and one way or the other, that's the only

thing that gets us out of this. You know. Maybe it is the force of keeping enough people out in the streets long enough for months that we scare them back into their little holes, and we win a democratic election and we start to dismantle some of the structures that allowed things to get this bad in the first place. Maybe that's the solution, but it starts where it already is. Right now with this uprising, which is people exerting their force as a mass in the street because there are

more of us than there are of them. Yeah, like please say, we're scared. Yeah, I think. I mean, you know, I haven't. This is the most optimistic I've been about our chances to win in a long time. Actually, um, because it does seem like a lot of people are finally getting it in a way that they haven't. That like, oh, ship's completely fucked, and like I have to go kind of risk my life a bit to unfunck it. Right. Uh, there's a great you know quote from my favorite problematic

white man Hunter Thompson. Um, in democracy, you have to be a player, and that that that if we want a democracy, we have to play. And that playing isn't voting. Playing is using force. Um, the kind of force, you know, non violent force, I advocate, but force, and that that is what we have to be doing for sure. And I think the force of a big group of people

showing up places is very powerful. And again, you know, when when the people I was with stopped the bulldozer, they all like sat in front of it peacefully, And I think people were just as confused as anything else you know, um, yeah, because doing something like that, even if it's not being outwardly, you're not exerting force on somebody else, You are forcing them to think about their actions in a way that they weren't thinking about them

for sure. And it feels like there's like a you know, more people every time at things like that, and people are now just you know, openly looking for like how can I be of help? How can I make myself useful? Well, also everybody has now been forced to become more familiar with being uncomfortable, and I think after three months of really being psychologically uncomfortable in isolation, but also you know, I mean really having to consider things like okay, well

what if my water supply work out off? Like all of these things that were very figurative are now very

pressing because we live in like techno feudalism. It's like we have the appearance of all this luxury and then when you strip it away and you see what's really there and people can't go to the doctor if they need to, it's like, oh, maybe everybody have having to like sit and think about like how your Starbucks gets made for three months is like very useful yeah, well, Robert, before we let you go, do you have any parting words for how people can find you on social media

where you know what what they can listen to that you make. I know we introduced you at the beginning, but your your social handles. I get a six part mini series within Behind the Bastards coming out right now called Behind the Police. You can find it and Behind the Bastards or you can find it by looking up Behind the Police on whatever podcast app you use. It's a history of the American police. Um and kind of my argument as to why reform is actually impossible and

we need to replace it with something else. Um. But it's it's history. It's a lot of history that I think, particularly a lot of white people. You'd be surprised how many of your your black friends know all of this history. But but I didn't know a lot of it until I started researching, and I don't think most white people do. And it's important, and yeah, check that out please for sure. I mean we talked on the first part of the show.

We were talking about replacing parts of Disneyland that are racist and whether they are like Confederate monuments and need to be like left Okay, we're finally talking about the teacup right, Yes, yes, those teacups literally, Oh I'm mad. Now it's gonna sunk up some police. And now I don't know. I feel like looking into the history of these things and of American institutions in general, is like the most helpful thing anyone can do is read read

the history of this country and see how we got here. Robert. I also wanted to out you as a fall fanatic. I just found out a huge fall stand an autumn man. I fall more than on them, but I love them both real excited for pumpkin spice to come back, hoping we all survive for that. Oh yeah, I thought you were a PSL stand. And look, if you live in a small place, how can people stockpile their pumpkin spice if they live in a small apartment survive. I'll actually

tell you, because I thought a lot about this. You don't want to be buying pumpkin spiced products. You want to buy actual pumpkin spice, the spice because that will allow you. Um no, No, it's just like a powder. There's there's there's yeah, there's like there's recipes for making it too, But you want to stockpile the raw pumpkin spice ingredients and then you can pumpkin spice whatever it is. It's it's all just nutmeg. It has layers. D Thank you so much Robert for joining us today, and everyone

please check out Behind the Police. Thank you very much for having me. Yeah, thanks Robert. We will see you next week. Thank you so much for listening to the pod this week. If you're enjoying it, we would love a review on iTunes. Um. You can follow us on social media. We are Nightcall Podcast on Facebook and Instagram, Nightcall Pod on Twitter, and you should give us a nightcall if you have any questions about our dystopian reality.

Our numbers one to four oh four six night or you can give us a night email at Nightcall Podcast gmail dot com. And you can also join us on our Patreon. We are at patreon dot com slash Nightcall, where you can join at a number of different membership levels to get bonus episodes, our newsletter, mix tapes, all sorts of fun stuff. So find us there Patreon dot com slash Nightcall and we will see you all next week. Him