You're listening to Comedy Central. Ever, notice how you hate everyone who disagrees with you. If you said yes, then you're not alone. And if you said no, then you But you're not the only one who feels this way. After two hundred and forty four years together as a nation, we seem to be growing apart. Americans are fiercely split, not only about policy but on the basic decency of
the other side. Growing shares in each party now describe those in the other party as more closed minded, dishonest, immoral, and unintelligent. According to an NBC poll, sixty of college Democrats say they would not dorm with a Republican. Of Americans now have few or no friends across the aisle. In a poll before the last election, percent of Republicans and twenty percent of Democrats agreed that the country would be better off if large numbers of the opposing party
US died. We'd be better off off the other side just died. What that's crazy? Please think about it. The entire country would be haunted by the ghosts of your enemies. Enemies who, by the way, cannon will watch you master be And why can't you share a dorm room with someone you disagree with politically, it's it's a difference of opinion, not airborne chlamydia. Also, it would be great to dorm with a Republican. Do you know how fun it would be to sexile someone who doesn't even believe in pre
marital sex. Sorry, don't come in, we're drying our wet spot with your all Lives Matter shirt. Sure. So the question is how did we as a country become this divided? Let's talk about it in our latest installment of Long Story Short m H. Outrage in America isn't new. It's one of our oldest pastimes, right behind baseball and racism. But what is new is just how much money entire industries are making off our outrage, Starting with social media.
Their entire business model depends on keeping your eyeballs on the screen until your tokes gets numb on the toilet seed, and nothing does that better than anger. I've actually been on the toilet with my phone so long that I p again in and internal Facebook report showed that their algorithm purposely feeds users divisive content and ordered it increased
time on their platform. We've all ex vurience this, I mean personally, I am way more likely to click on some dudes transphobic ramps than another picture of my cousins twins. I mean, don't get me wrong, both those kids are up in their own truly fascinating way, but they're not keeping me strolling till two am. And once the algorithm figures out what pisces you off, it runs with it right off a cliff. In the summer of two thousand
and nineteen, Facebook run an experiment. It created a fake account for a forty one year old mom living in North Carolina. They called her Carol Smith. Carol started off by liking a few popular conservative Facebook pages like Fox News, Donald Trump, and Melania Trump, but quickly Facebook began dragging her down a rabbit hole of misinformation after only two days. Two days, Facebook recommended Carol follow a q and on page, and a few days later it suggested she follow another.
By week three of the experiment, Carol's feed had become quote a constant flow of misleading and polarizing content, and so Facebook began sending push notifications. One notification was actually to a Facebook post claiming Barack Obama was born in Kenya. Wow. Facebook radicalized the person in just three weeks even Isis was like, why can't we get numbers like that? And that's just one example. Everything on the internet is so sweaty.
I bought one credenza from West selman Sen and ever since then they've been emailing me like five times a day, and by the fifth one they're so desperate. They're like, if you check out our new throw pillows, we'll suck your But as bad as the Internet is, studies show that it's nothing compared to how cable news increases polarization, because at least on the Internet, different viewpoints sneak their
way into your feeds. But nobody on Earth is lipping back and forth between MSNBC and Fox News except for me because I like to break out of my bubble and watch the reverse mortgage commercials from both sides. Now, all the major cable news networks rile you up, but no one is better at it than Fox News. They've become the top cable news network by making their viewers livid, and they're not subtle about it either. This story will have you fired up this morning, U s soldiers now
learning about the dangers of white privilege. We have a story that will make your blood boil infamous social justice warrior calling Kaepernick is now the brand new face of a Nike ad campaign. If you just paid your taxes, this next story will piss you off. This is going to enrage you. You're going to be outraged when we tell you what happened. Prepared to be outraged, Get ready to be angry. The story is gonna make you sick. This story will make you want to throw your newspaper,
make your bo boiled. This next news story is going to make you so mad you'll want to punch yourself in the butthole. You'll be so mad you'll puke on your nana. You'll be so outraged by this next story you'll rip out all your pubes in one poll. So thank you Cable News. Now at the top of the anger food chain are the politicians who benefit the most from our outrage. Because politicians know that rage equals donations. That's why they're constantly pushing stupid culture war issues on us,
whether they're real or completely made up. This morning, a new warning about the dangers of misinformation spreading online and making its way into political races, and this latest claim that some school districts are providing cat litter boxes for
students who identify as cats. The first sign of the rumor in the US appears to have been at this Michigan school board meeting last December, where it was discussed by a parent without cruely, just then shared on Facebook by a chairwoman of the Michigan Republican Party referring to furies. The false story sneaking its way across the country and now into Republican stump speeches. Have you heard about the
litter boxes stuff? If we don't push back on a cat, they put tales on and they demand that they have a litter box in the school, not because there's actual cats in the room, but because there's kids going around licking themselves as though they're cats. We've literally got kids who think they're cats and dogs using litter boxes in classrooms. No, you don't, You literally don't. Kids are not trying to ship in litter boxes in the school or at all.
I mean, most kids won't ship in toilets in school, Are you kidding me? Other kids won't know that you ship and that's a secret. This is how I know it's a lie because they don't have one example of it happening, not one, but that didn't stop them from spreading it because it benefits them. So long story short, if you're wondering why you're so angry all the time, it's not a coincidence. The system is designed to provoke you. And politicians like this system because they profit from it,
they survive from it. They can say anything as long as it's what their audience wants to believe. That's why when there was a bill that would have required fundraising emails to be fact checked, Marjorie Taylor Green blocked it. Now that was a lie I just made up. But you are like, get up? Didn't? They're so ready to donate to my campaign. And once you notice how much this system profits of your anger, it's not surprising that
people would like the other side to just die. It's not surprising that people are afraid to dorm with the monsters who believe different lies than us. It's not even surprising when a mob of people believing they are righteous storm the capital, an event where ironically, a bunch of
furries used Nancy Pelosi's office as a little boy. Explore more shows from the Daily Show podcast universe by searching the Daily Show wherever you get your podcast What's the Daily Show weeknights and eleven tenth Central on Comedy Central and stream full episodes anytime on Fairmount Plus. This has been a Comedy Central podcast