Hello the Internet, and welcome to Season three, twenty four, Episode two of Dally's Dice Yeah Seductive production of iHeartRadio. This is the podcast will we taking deep dive into America's share consciousness America. It's Tuesday, February sixth, twenty twenty four. Oh boy, this is this is one of the furthest we've recorded in advance.
Well, guess what you know what it is? Shout out to all my chopsticks users because it's National Chopsticks Day. It's Safer Internet Day in the US. I'm not sure what that means. It's National fro Yo Day and uh yeah, that's it.
Look at you still out here.
Royo ever had fro yo with chopsticks?
That's what waited all I do on this day to celebrate.
It's an act and speed eating because once that ship melts, it's you can't do anything with the chopsticks.
Yeah, maybe you could, like you know how cat's tongue can like kind of scoop it, like right, basically defy gravity. Maybe with the right kind of speed and movement of the chop sticks, you could like made it kind of flowing.
Yeah yeah, yeah, or do like the way dogs drink, you know, by crowing their tongue backwards to scoop the water in their mouth. Have you seen that video?
Yes, and I think that's what I was thinking of it. I just have trouble of telling Captain dogs apart.
Well, just what you have to cut that lingual frenulum, you know what I mean, because you can really black that water up like a canine.
Well, my name is Jack O'Brien aka peas my Jackie Pie pacey white ass about ten miles wide. Looks so good with those grown man thighs, sweet Jackie Pie.
Yeah.
Courtesy of Macaroni on the Discord Man, ask a guy out before you sing, write a song about his sweet sweet dump truck ass like that, Lacaroni, Damn are we dating?
No?
Thank you for that as always, and I'm thrilled to be joined as all. Buy my co host mister Miles.
Gray and me Tiny Drag Djay on it on the Highway.
Wow. When I laid down sheets on dream and I had to I guess the again with Shane.
Okay, shout out Christy Yamaguchi, Maine, reflecting my dreams seemless, they still happen. They still happen.
I no longer know the lyrics to Tiny Dancer. Entertain that those are the lyrics to Tiny Dancer. Now, well, get Christy.
We missed you. We miss you, Yamagucci mane let us like, come on, man let me ks. I know you're busy.
I miss Yamagucci.
May Yeah, I missed the.
All right, well, Miles. We're thrilled to be joined in our third seat by a digital research analyst at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, where she researches online hate, extremism, disinformation in the US. It's being world.
Hey, thanks for welcome. Oh, thank you for stopping by, Thank you for being here on our silly show. Yeah, to talk about serious things because it's a big year ahead in twenty twenty four. From what I hear what I'm hearing, it sounds like people.
Keep saying that, and I'm like, what, like, why, what's so big?
What's going on? Is it because of the super Bowl? Because a Super Bowl every year?
I was I was already involved in politics in twenty twenty and that was probably one of the most strustful years of my life.
Hands down, it was non stop.
I think I had like four or five just straight like seven day weeks in the office till one two in the morning, ordering food, getting rashes from the stress.
It was just awful. I can't going to be it was.
It was mostly just all the prep work, all of the like because I'm researched extremism vaguely then, and it was like getting all of the seed lists to get all to get in all the groups, to get all the discord chats to kind of make the way so when things kind of popped off, yeah, but things popped off then, like I.
Was in it, yeah, yeah, right.
I'm always amazed at, like, you know, people like you and your colleague Jared Holt, who we've had on the show many times and he was like you got to talk to Sab and he got under Like of course then if you say, Joe, like, we love the work you do. But I'm always amazed at like how people get into monitoring extremism, Like what how what was your
journey there? Like what were you doing Like I know you said twenty twenties when you start to getting into it, what were you doing in like twenty eighteen, Like was things very different or what was your sort of path into this kind.
Of work really funny. I actually started doing this as a joke. I was in college in twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen. I was in anthropology major. I recently switched and in Cells were like the big laughing stock punching back to
the Internet at the time. I think Contra Points had her video on in Cells and I was like obsessed with it, and so from my thesis, I was like, Oh, how about what if I did like a funny ethnography on like the inner lives of in cells, like as a goof for my the It doesn't matter, I'm already
gonna graduate. I did it, and then I That was December twenty nineteen, and then I looked for just in twenty twenty January and I got picked up by GQR, which is like a polling consortium, and they were looking for researchers who already knew about that kind of under CD underbelly of the Internet stuff. And I got picked up immediately after that and then worked for the whole election season and I ended up becoming my career path fully on accident.
Yeah, and are you embracing that? I know you say like it's on accident, but I mean, like it. I fell in love with.
The field and the people are really great, and it just ended up being a really good mix for me.
Right, something tells me you're a pretty good student when you do a thesis as a goof and get away with it. I'm like, damn, this is really fucking good and killed that thesis. Maybe you want to do this for a living him? Yeah, yeah, that's amazing. Well, we're gonna talk to you in a in a moment about the upcoming election. That's why people Okay, yeah.
It makes sense.
There's an election coming up. That's I get it right, right, ye ye, we'll talk about that how election denihalism is still a thing, whether or not another January sixth is imminent. But before we get into it, we do like to get to know our guests a little bit better by asking them what is something from your search history SA being that is revealing about who you are or what you're up to.
Hmm, that's a great question. I actually I went on a major deep dive. There was a recent video that came out, I think from Jacob Galler about the Pinocchio stories and history of Pinocchio. So I've been watching a bunch of movies about Pinocchio specifically, and like interpretations through different directors and artists. And so I have been like weirdly upset with with all the kind of like mannikinny I guess existential savements about life and death and everything.
And I've been like going through video essay like rabbit holes about that for at least three or four days.
Now, Oh, tell me tell me more, Like, so, what is an overall thesis that like first captured you on on the subject of Pinocchio, Like, what there's more to it than meets the eye?
Yeah, I think it's the fact that like it. I think I think there's a quote that he says where it's like we cannot fathom a world without the sense of the Pinocchio story, Like we can't imagine it anymore because it the wooden Boy, because he ends up being like a kind of vessel of all human sins or like human misbehavior, and the whole morality tale is like how to be not only a good person, but a person you have to like fully understand him to fully understand how to be human being.
It's really really interesting.
Wow, So what about Jim and Eye Cricket? Though?
I think he's just cute and fun.
Okay, I was like, is there a deeper thing? I just love Jimminy Cricket. No, Jimmy Crickett Satan, you didn't know. I mean, he's like, come on, he's there tempted.
No.
Yeah, in the new camera Germo del Toro Pinocchio. Yeah, even motherfucker dies and like goes to Hell or like spoilers, I guess why. Like an existentially dense text, it's pretty it's pretty wild, Like, I mean, there are multiple children deaths within the first half of the film, and.
Are they all going to at double hockey Sticks? I don't know.
I guess he doesn't go to and you know what. To be honest, I watched it on a plane that landed right when he got to Hell. So I haven't completed the film. Okay, Okay, that's right, So I don't know where exactly it goes. But the whole thing it's funny because I've been obsessed with death a little bit lately, and just how much of everything is just has the preoccupation with our own mortality and impermanence at its heart
is kind of wild. Like the second you start thinking about something, you're like, oh yeah, that's about death, and that's about death, and oh yeah, that's also about death. But Pinocchio. Pinocchio is a big one. You know. It's one of the questions. Like, that's a movie that my kids kind of we tried to start watching it. They're five and seven. They were like, yeah, kind of over it.
But I think if they had stuck with it, they would have been compelled because they have a lot of questions about death at that at that age, you know, five and seven, Like, yeah, Disney was onto something like that when you're like, wait a second.
Do they did? They ask a question? Will I die?
Will you? Milen?
No, No, like they asked, well, well, oh my Miles he gonna die.
Miles won't die. Will I don't know, maybe I remember that.
I remember like when I had that realization. I asked my mom. I was like will I Like will I? I was like, yeah, you're gonna die. I'm gonna die, Yeah, Grandma's gonna die. And I was like, fucked me up so bad. But that was just sort of that like brute brutal honesty that only an Asian mom can give you at that time, just straight to the face.
Yeah, yeah, that's a that's a tough one. I remember, yeah, being awake in my bed when I was like seven and just being like I can't I can't like conceptualize because I grew up Catholic and I was just like eternity, like doesn't really make sense because everything else is like finite. And I was like up crying, and my mom was like, in retrospect, I feel so bad for her, just like I don't fucking know.
Man, Like, yeah, we gotta stop going to mask was gonna go to you?
I can't go for wherever?
Sabine, did you have a moment of clarity like that where you got in touch with your own mortality as a child.
I know when I was really little, kind of towards when I was like until ten eleven, I was terrified of almost everything, like pathologically afraid of most things. And I think for Halloween one year, my mom got me a book about bones and how bones work, and there's an image in the middle of it where it's like a human flesh sack, like completely lived with no bones in it, and it was like this how.
You would be if you didn't have any bones in you? Did you know?
And that freaked me out so much that I essentially decided to become a skeleton for Halloween. But it ended up kind of turning, I think because it was like a I got to be learned something new, and also like I could see that the inherent horror of being
alive isn't is sometimes worse than just being dead. And so now I have a really strong love of horror and love of like gothic like themes and like works because I now like knowing how your body can be when you're still alive, but it sucks majorly, is like that does not bore. Having no bones just seem so bad, right.
It's also just like yeah, I mean, like I think in Western culture there's just like that sort of the sort of baseline is being like Mandeth. It is like so fucked up, like oh my god, I don't want to, don't want to, don't want it, whereas like culturally in many other places it's like, yeah, that's bring it on, like it happens and that's just part of what it is. That's kind of the deal, and use that to sort of motivate you to really enjoy or do as much
good as you can. Well, the party's still rocking.
I mean the whole capitalist system I think, at least partially is fueled by an inherent inability to deal with our own mortality and like, so it's like fueled by people trying to outrun death basically, which is impossible to outrun. So it's like one of the great fuel sources that you can come up with, like create a system of beliefs and that like thoroughly like doesn't tangle with death.
And then people are going to just be going as hard as they possibly can towards like trying to consume and acquire their way out of like thinking about it.
I mean when I look at Congress, I don't see that at all at all.
Now they're killing it. No, not at all, quite literally killing it. Sabin, What is something that you think is overrated?
I feel like so I originally went to school for zoology and I end up having to switch later. I think people whose favorite animals is a mammal is any mammal. I'm like, mammals are super overrated as a favorite animal. The lions, the giraffe, the hippos. I am an insect. Girly love love worms. I love polycute worms. They are in the bottom of the ocean. I feel like a lot of animals most animals aren't mammals, so I feel
like they don't ever get enough lover appreciation. Mammals are always the face of every conservation campaign, every save the environment campaign.
I am her slily tired of it.
Mm wow men. And now I'm like, now I'm like actually challenging myself to be like, what would my favorite like non mammal life form be? And the first thing I thought of was like a trilla byte.
Yeah, I don't know.
Why that was like in my mind, I'm like, yeah, I think with a trilla good answer. Good answer.
We just had the family feud.
Yeah, trilla byte. They're like, no, nobody's trilobite is not on the board.
Wait, now I have to look up trilla bite. I think I know what it is.
It's a fossil.
It's it's now extinct, almost like an isopod.
Yeapods are Yeah, I've always been into them.
When you bring the ones that exist now, the like giant sea bottom roly Polley's uh, which I think is the scientific name. Yeah, I know you went for that. That is the technical term. The ones look like really polyis but like when you take them up and they're like not in the pressure at the pressure of the bottom of the ocean, they just like blow up and they're so scary. That's a great answer. That's one of the wildest animals that I've ever seen.
Jack, what's your favorite non mammal animal?
I mean, probably the great white shark.
Yeah.
I should have known, Yeah, shock, no.
One, but I've just been you know, ever since shows. Yeah, but I like whales a lot because of how like they're technically mammals but so different from humans that like they give us a weird look at like how how different things could have gone.
Yeah, they used to be wolves. Straight up, they were wolves and they evolved back into being aquatic. It's crazy, what Yeah they used to be. They're like the like if you look it up, it's like an.
Evolution arre where it's like, yeah, the you know, animal leaves the water, goes to land, becomes like mammal and that's this weird wolf like kind of striped creature and that kind of ends up being like a primarily a quad hunter and would go back and hunt so often and just living there permanently, which is why it has all the same like it has like like whales have wrists and like fingers inside their fins because they used to be war.
Right, because they had right right right. That's oh shit. I never even thought about that because whenever you see like a whale skeleton, you're like, why I got them little digits under the right, what you're doing too much, whale? But now I'm realizing it's this is wild to look at, jack, just this whole evolution of cetace.
Yeah, the top that the carnival they used to be.
Yeah, wow, Yeah they started out like muskrats and then they just went into the ocean and wow, that's pretty wild.
So being you're fucking killing it right now, fucking me up, fucking up my Christmas right now.
And I love it there when you look at like a batswing and you see that it's just a hand like spread out super far, and like the whole thing is like the little skin in between your fingers, but just like stretched out super far. That always fucks me up.
A No, that's a hand right there. Man's just a big hand. Man.
Yeah, that would be some sicket hoops? What is uh? What's something you think is underrated?
I know if you guys are on like book talk or whatever, like people will go on TikTok and recommend different books. I feel like there are so many classic novels that, even though their classics are underrated, Like I recently read Rebecca for the very first time. It's like the nineteen thirties. It's about a woman who like remarries a guy whose ex wife is dead and she has to like live in her shadow. It's a crazy good book.
I've never heard anyone in my life ever talk about it, and I'm honor role of like reading classics that aren't like the ones you have to read for school. They're kind of just like out in the ether and they're genuinely mine, like like changing and fantastic, But because they're old, they aren't like recommended unless you got very specific like esthetic old timey vintage book talk circles like then they are, but I feel like they don't get enough love even
though they are technically classics, like I don't. Like I'm currently reading Left Heard of Darkness Let's Hand of Darkness by Ursula Kyle Gwynn. Never heard anybody else who has read it or talked about it before. It's like so far an amazing book and like no one's I'm like, I want them to talk about this one because it feels awful to read amazing pieces of work. And there's like two video essays on the entirety of YouTube about it.
It's like no endeavor investigated.
Right, I'm I've never read the book Rebecca. I didn't even know there was a book Rebecca, but I am familiar with the text because I'm an Army Hammer completist. And he starred in the twenty twenty film Oh okay, there's a Hitchcock film based on it, I believe.
Yeah, they'd a Hitchcock film.
And then there's a TV movie which I prefer, I think the BBC TV movie.
It has what the dad Lanister from Game of Thrones, Max the Winter, the main the husband.
In the story we call we just call him Tie taiwind Lanister. I guess people know him as Charles Dance see or Dance or whatever his name is, Charlie Dance what I call that man can dance.
You know, I'm not huge on book talk. It's one of the few, you know, TikTok sub cultures that I'm not fully plugged into. I think I know that like Moby Dick is really big on book talk, Is that right?
I think so it's for me to I know that one of the biggest things is a Crown of Roses and Thorns.
Akatar is like the big book top book.
It's like a really new I think fairy fay romance story. There's a lot of romance books are popular on book talk, right. There generally is good recommendations on there. We have to figure out where, figure out where your niches content was, have lists of books through exactly what.
You're looking for.
Yeah, it's interesting too because, like I know people in the film industry who like use book talk to try and like find new ip that they think is like they're like, oh shit, nobody's fucking got the rights to this book or whatever. And it's interesting to see because people are like bibliophiles and be like, we can't just talk about the same eighty books all the time. How like how book talk has like actually like to your point, like people are now like, oh right, there's there's just
so much work out there to actually comb through. But yeah, having that ability to recommend stuff is I'm sure very helpful. And I thought like, is that that like book chain thing that I've seen go around? Does that? Did that start on book talk where it's like you recommend a book and then like you send a person a book that you like or some shit? Do you know what I'm talking about?
I maybe?
I honestly, I my I've been trying to cut back on social media usage this year, so I'm like, I.
Honestly don't know.
But how do you do your job?
It's literally just for my job, and I try to log off and do literally anything else, all.
Right, I go on nazi telegram channels and then read a book. Let's not doing book?
That's exactly it.
Yeah, And so do you go on book talk?
And then you don't have to read the books? Right? You can just like get them to tell you about the books.
It's likely if the book is not that good.
I do kind of like I'm just on here.
I kind of get the big plot references from the talk, and then log off and I don't thought reading the book at all.
There you go, cool, so amazing, amazing, overrated, underrated, and search history A plus Sabine. We are going to take a quick break and then we're going to come back and talk about what things are looking like on the right these days, we'll be right back and we're back.
We're back.
By the way, I missed an opportunity to say one of my favorite phrases in the English language when you were talking about your favorite non mammal animal, so being the worms that they go to town whenever there is a whale fall, right, aren't they the ones that.
Those are? Hagfish?
Hagfish? Okay? Jack Wow, I went out on a limb. I got, I got warmed up. I was stretching out during the break.
Get ready flatliale fall drop ship, go with the hagfish fumble jack on, Mike, Oh boy, I'm.
A no, don't edit it out. Justin it's a whale fall.
Wait, that's when the whale whale dies and then like it creates an entire like ecosystem of food.
For it's just like massive event and like animals come from all over.
They're like what a whale?
But yeah, watching watching hag fish devour and skeletonize a well on the bottom of the ocean. As a Top ten things you don't soon forget Top ten reminders that we're all like more bro just bone bags waiting to get We're all just bone bags waiting to be skeletonized by time. Well, on that note, uh, let's talk about
election denihalism. Still here, folks, Still here. It's definitely hanging around more than I would have thought, like as January sixth was happening, and then like you know, the day went on and people like everyone in the Republican Party was like all right, man, like come on, obviously you lost, Like this is this is embarrassing, and.
Yet still here. Yeah, I mean I think there it's clearly like the beating heart that is keeping the Maga revenge tour alive right now, is like that ill that like the election being stolen. And at first this sort of like something that was just like more rhetorical. We're like, yeah, let's just say like we could say that to kind of pump ourselves up, to like motivate ourselves and just like something to cry about keep people's heads in the game.
But this sentiment is just still alive and strong, and I'm curious to being in like your research, and I've always wondered this, like are there there are there like distinct buckets of people within the larger election denialism like culture subculture, Like there's like gonna be the people that are grifting. They actually don't fucking believe that anything was stolen, but they know they could take advantage of people who do.
Then like true believers and then like casuals like lack of a better term, like how would you categorize, like what this sort of like election overall election denialism movement kind of looks.
Like absolutely their buckets.
I know.
One of the two biggest buckets are people who think the election nihilism is real, that like, definitely what's stolen and that therefore it's pointless to vote, and people who are like election was stolen, but you should still definitely show up with the poles please remember, and the two
fight regularly constantly. Election niners have a lot of infighting, particularly about which politicians they deem as legitimate like will enact MAGA like policies or who also reinforced election was stolen, and people who are like as long as they have like pro life stuff, it's fine. Like people tend to like kind of where they're giving and what they think is okay to like compromise varies wildly.
Even though they all they all basically believe that the election.
Was stolen right, because like I'm always curious how much in their bones, like they believe these lies, because like every court case just got the smack put on it, and it's just like, well, there's no you really have no evidence aside from the feeling that you just are aggrieved and like you know, But then there are people that are in like literal tears. They're like this country's just going to dog shit and others that are using their argument just like I think, just to sort of
justify their hatred of a democratic administration. So like I'm curious, Like it's always interesting to see how that motivates people, and like, to your point, we saw that sort of denialism backfired a bit in Georgia when Warnock was elected at the end of twenty twenty and a lot of people were like, I don't know if you could if we simultaneous like the election was stolen, but also go vote in Georgia to make sure Warnock doesn't get elected to the Senate. Like so to your point of the
people being like, oh, it's it's real. And also but they're like, but don't create like a sense of apathy and don't like totally black build these people. How are like how are these people, Like how are Republicans? Are people in the right wing able to like walk that line to try not to completely demotivate the base, like like how can you not if everything is fucking rigged?
Yeah, I know.
One of the main things I've seen is particularly extremist groups like crowdboys, like parents rights people that are on the extremist end three per centers. Those people tend to they're put up their own or like actively endorsed candidates that are very very far right and kind of use that as kind of like a carrot where it's like, if you do go vote, this person isn't just like kind Republican or like even solidly read.
They're like very extreme to the point where you're extreme. And I think I've.
Seen I've been seeing people essentially feel like for local elections and for state elections, like I mean, you're already there, so vote for like a president. You're already there, so vote for a send that person, But like you're really there to vote for these people, for these school board seats, for these board supervisor seats that are incredibly far right.
I feel like local elections definitely ended up being a major driver of people within these spaces where it's like you get more people who are kind of off the deep end and who are very much like I want to. I think there is a movement to like ban ranked choice voting as an option for voting in the future for within states, or like going back and increasing voter ID requirements make it so it just state ide isn't
valid any more. Like there are just a lot of people who want to run locally on these kind of platforms, and they get into a mass supporting traction. So it ends up being like you should support this person. And then you're already at the polls, you know.
Right, do you feel like, first of all, do you ever get in there and say, good point, it is pointless to vote, y'all should definitely not vote good good call guys.
Yeah.
And then but also, like you know, we've seen Trump himself over index when compared to his polling. But then more recently we've seen the Republican Party perform much worse than polling was indicating, leading in or at least on the like worst side of the continuum, on the more
disappointing for them side of the continuum. That like the the explanation for that that I've usually heard is just you know that people are actually pissed about their bodily autonomy going away, and that is a much better motivating thing than whatever kind of grievance shit that they have going on. But do you think that the people thinking that it's pointless to vote actually has an impact on that has impacted their electoral kind of underwhelming performances.
Well, I mean this past election to the twenty twenty two midterm election, right, people were trying to really get out the vote. Obviously, Arizona was a big focus, and then Wisconsin was also really big focused and I was in Arizona spaces in Pennsylvania spaces. After the election happened, and the people who they're putting up largely did not win, people are like, hey, what happened? If you didn't go vote,
why did you go vote? A lot of people were said, oh, I kind of wanted to vote, but like, my kid had a soccer game, I was traveling, I was busy, And they're like they because it wasn't convenient, they.
Didn't care enough about it because.
They were like, the odd up being ringed are so high slash, Like, I'm sure it was written in the past, and so if it isn't then easy plus with their whole I guess devaluing of mail and voting or early but people think that also it's like unsafe invaluable, so you have to be there in person on election day. A lot of people can't be there in personal election day or just it would be hard for them to
like stand in line for three hours after work. And so it's like they because they think of it as being kind of like a lost cause in the back of their minds. Anyway, doing a bunch of extra effort to go vote feels like a waste of time, I think implicitly it subconsciously, so they're like, oh, yeah, I don't My kid had to go to the doctor and so I was tired after and they didn't go vote, and that feels like a valid enough reason for them.
That is so wild that it's like, honestly, like I don't know right now, Like I mean, I know we need to take over the nation, but I had to go. Like I had to pick up a package at FedEx before they closed because I missed it when they delivered it the first time. So I just had to sit this one out, Like do you do you see, because twenty twenty four feels like it feels like they're they're resolute,
you know, in taking the White House. But how how does that square with this simmering like sort of denihalism, Like what's the fucking point energy that exists in the right? Like how is that? Like? What? What? What do you hear from people? Like are they still saying like it's important to vote or they're just more like man, we're gonna have to fucking take over the capital again or
some shit, Like what how are they motivating themselves? Because obviously the results are going to be born out in the voting, But if they aren't doing that, then how do they achieve that goal?
Yeah?
I mean for it's different this year, mostly because Trump is now probably going to be on the ballot and a lot of these people, if they don't like a billion the Republicans a billion of things, they do love Trump and so it's like him being their changes the
gave immediately. And then on top of that, I am seeing good enough people, which can very well could be all talk also being like willis we have to take a step more than voting, either like like convoying or doing mass protests or doing another I know that during the mid term people doing watching dropboxes with like with guns, right, they also kind of starting to get a little bit
of seam. I think we're there. Probably I can very easily see more public protests and like active obstruction of election processing local officials because they're like Trump is on the ballot, so now you need to vote because they can vote Trump back in office.
People.
I think that basically everyone in these circles desperately wants to have happened. But then to kind of mitigate fraud or to mitigate theft to vote, be watch surveillance cameras, put your drones in there and stare into the voting booth for like all hours of the day to make sure that nobody is cheating and no one's like and it ends up being like almost like a hyper surveillance game where it's like the more eyes we can have on every crumb of the voting process, the more secure
it will be. So like harass people at their jobs when they're counting ballots and like that tends to be almost like a even if you aren't super red pilled about, it ends up kind of being what you what you're going to do or what you're I guess encouraged to do within these spaces.
Yeah, because I'm like, it's wild. I think like for people that's where like to me, it's like it's just like a little it's just kind of shreeks of bullshit too, because like when you say, when I saw people like in Iowa during the caucuses, a lot of people were sharing like those clips of people just like putting scripts of paper in a fucking shopping bag to how they were voting, and they're like, I'm sorry, I thought y'all were all about the selection security, but they're like, well,
when it's us, we know it's when those other people get involved that you can't trust the process at all. But yeah, that's really sort of kind of interesting to think about because yeah, obviously, like with Trump on the ballot, that's a huge draw, but then it's also like, yeah, how will it how will it even out? Like how many people are gonna still maintain like yep, this is
the way to do it. And then other people who are like, ah, I guess, but also watch every like you say, every kernel, every little minute step in the process to hopefully, I don't know, catch something even though they they tried last time, it did not really work out that way.
Yeah, yeah, we talked about last time. Should we talk about January sixth, because it does feel a little bit like have you ever been in a town this happened? Like last time I lived in New York, there was a massive blizzard, and then the next time there was like any snow in the forecast, there was the great like it was called like snowpocalyps and you know, like all these It's also like what happened after nine to eleven, when the mainstream media made it feel like another equivalent
terror attack was absolutely imminent. You know, our imagination is basically formed by the things that we've recently seen, I guess especially in like the mainstream media. So I'm just it feels like people are like that that is the version of you know, right wing action that people are able to imagine. But it seems like some of your research has said, like that's probably not exactly it's gonna look like now. So I'm just curious to hear your thoughts on what we're kind of missing there.
Yeah, I mean January sixth definitely was a keystone moment.
I think that one thing that it did show, Like what one thing that it did show though, I think is that just because the previous for you to trumph mental Oby myself's empowered and like they're able to kind of get away with a lot of stuff.
To me that you can get away with literally everything.
And not of people who were put on the fly lists that were then like tried and convicted of crimes, especially because in these spaces people either frame danuous sex as like a terrible moment when our patriots were like tricked and deceive and now are put in its political prisoners, or it's completely a false flag by antif for or the FBI, And like I think during the January six I don't really see it in the forecast because it's like now people know that if you go too hard
into this thing and get kind of too caught up, there are are real tangible consequences, and like you can be arrested for doing crimes, and that's not something that you don't get kind of like free reign to do just because you look.
At Candon a lot, right, And I don't think.
That was a thing that had been proven on a wide scale in these spaces until January six, and now even people who do I do the dropouts motterting with guns, you know, they are also only two people, not a whrde And it's like people who are fully fully convenidentities and like make it, schedule it and talk to the police, make sure that like the police are okay with them
being there. It's a lot more of a it's weird to say, above door and effort and less like a mass you know, going towards do something because it just feels right in the moment. And I think people now know that that isn't necessarily going to work out. Well if you're caught up in the moment.
Right, do you think, like you know, just thought experiment, do you think that the energy is still sort of swirling around like that it could like like if all the right pieces are place, like could it repeat Like if like let's say Biden wins narrowly and it's like only down to like two states that were like you know, purple but on the red side or something, and somehow he's you know, wins whatever state you know, just for this hypothetical, and it like hinges on these two things,
and Trump begins agitating again and saying, like doing sort of like running the sort of same script again, will they do you think it would? It would there would be another attempt, except like more organized or again like to your point, too many people are just put off because they're like they're like, yo, this is a fucking op, like,
don't even try it. But also but it feels like they're also very motivated to show up in physical space and some capacity to sort of like let their displeasure be known.
No, I would much more predict which is like, ow, I'm dreading it, much more predict there being two, three, four, five people who show up and perage try to do something a lhile the Gretchen Whitmer attempted kidnapping, like it's like three or four guys as opposed to being people who were at January six at this point, Yeah, it being an op, it being a setup to be politically imprisoned is now a big enough narrative that I would
personally think that it's going to be. I would see more smaller either one person or three or four or five people attempts at like trying to go and take votes from election offices or like or finding out people who were elections people regularly put the names and faces of phone numbers of people who are election officials and say bother them, call their number, maybe docks them.
I'm thinking more things that.
I mean, even swatting people feels like it's probably be more more likely of an event to happen than another.
JASEX right, So it's more that. Yeah, at that point, it's like, oh shit, like you can't be that visible with a whole group like that. So either we go lone wolf for like these tiny groups or just stick to digital harassment because that seems like I mean, it's happening that like Nikki Haley and judges involved in Trump's trials and things and election officials. So yeah, maybe where we go one week, go like a few of us is kind of more a more accurate revial go on.
We go in manageable groups. That doesn't cause we get we.
Clear it ahead of time and we're like, hey guys.
Just an opsec is I think, Now opsec is, I think totally we gotta be we gotta that's the buzzword. Now it's all about operational security.
Yeah, all right, let's take you a quick break. We'll come back. We'll talk about you know what what what are some of the potential futures if Biden doesn't win narrowly, if Biden doesn't win by a landslide, if Biden doesn't win at all, We'll be right back and we're back, and there's a whole Atlantic magazine those like if Trump wins. But like I didn't see like any of those stories
like really breaking through were capturing people's imagination. It just feels like people are kind of exhausted by him at this point, which is something that we talked about, like in the very early days of this podcast, like of the Trump administration. The idea that you know, the Nazis first came to power, they were front page or just like when they first existed, rather you know, they were front page news, it was in a national scandal and
international scandal. By the time that they came to power, they were people were just like exhausted by it and tired of like reading about them and like just people you know, it's the Bannon strategy of flooding the zone with shit and you just become kind of inert to it. So I'm just curious, like to hear your thoughts generally on like what you think a world looks like with these groups preparing the way they are and like kind
of changing their changing how open they are. Like if Trump wins, I feel like they become a lot less scared of prosecution and like things go in a different direction, right.
Yeah, I mean in my mind that Trump would would probably also accompany a bunch of smaller the same election wins for Republicans, and I think that that would end up. I could see it being almost like you know how Twitter was and how Twitter slash x is now, where it's like you go online and like I saw beheading online in my feed yesterday and it was just like that's just around now and that was just part of
your everyday normal. I could see it being like you walk around your city and you see like a white price sticker on the stop sign, and that's just like part of the landscape of where you live, and it being essentially laws are paths that are that are you know, regressive and bigoted, and I could see it being like, you know, I think I'm thinking more in the sense that it would feel just generally unsafe, but then also would have the coffee other being like and you would
feel like, yeah, tired, it's tired and like it's normal, and like it sucks, you don't like it, but like it's a bunch of title instances that go about your day, not one big guy yelling at you or fighting with you.
What are you gonna do about it?
And I could see that being like, you know, every school board meeting is now some weird right right rings screen about how trans kids are ruining everything, and that's every school board meeting now, and there's not a lot of ways to counteract that or like to make that stop, right.
I'm like, you know, cause just we're in an election year and it feels like every time shit just gets worse and worse, Like the technology gets better for bad faith actors, the potential for violence increases. And I think a lot of people will probably hear like, okay, so there's not gonna be no j six two point zero and probably be like, okay, great, nothing to worry about, Like they realize they've been fully dissuaded from trying that
shit again. No need to be vigilant about anything. But you know, like I said, we've had Jared on the show too, and we were talking about like white nationalism two point zero and the rise of like active clubs and things like that. Aside from like sort of those groups and how they've sort of just like shifted or what however they're going to participate in this upcoming year
or next few years. What can what do you think people can expect to see from these right wing groups in terms of what sort of activities they feel like they're invested in, in terms of like the build up to the election.
Yeah, I mean I prepare for a lot of ads, a lot of very gross discussing ads in your YouTube and your Spotify is and your everything. I would also say that at least from my perspective, viral content and like and like just changes of language. I mean, like people use red pill in Selly style language as on the regular even if you are in the community. Now it's just now part of the language of being online.
And I think that expecting feeling a weird like right wing ideology shift, I mean, like this whole I mean, I'm seeing at a lot of trad wife content, a lot of a lot of white supremacists, like word usage or meme templates. I mean that's only going to get
more and more frequent. Feeling like everyone in your feetus constantly has some weird, disgusting worldview where everyone's out for themselves and the outsiders and the freaks are trying to ruin your life, and like that's what's going to feel like. It's a constant messaging wherever you go, and people are very much invested in making it feel like you should be scared all the time. The fact that you were upset and the things are going well for you is
somebody else's well that you should specifically blame. And solutions that aren't that or more nuanced in depth conversations are probably going to feel less like a part of your daily conversations.
So like, right, that's a lot of it is now just sort of shifting to what can we create energetically as an environment for people to operate in and then hopefully that will nudge people in the right direction or
just this way them from doing anything at all. That's some yeah, yeah, so grim, especially now when you look at just like the rise of like AI shit and the like all this deep fake stuff that's happening that can already like i mean, we're already seeing it and here little flashes here and there.
Are you, Yeah, as somebody who's like paying attention to misinformation online. You know, we've done a couple episodes about AI and you know we're somewhere between. This shit is scary too. Also, like the way companies are using it is kind of like hamfested and not not that impressive at this point, but just generally, like, I know, my job has gotten harder when it comes to being able
to like find reputable information on the Internet. I can only imagine what it's like in the trenches, Like as you are trying to track trends and things like that, are you how much of that is the new technologies that are answering how much of that is that the companies have completely given up on raining it in at all? And just yeah, I'm curious to hear your overall thoughts on the state of the union when it comes to disinformation online.
Yeah.
I mean when I was when I was doing work in twenty twenty, I marveled to my coworkers about like, like, wow, people on the right spend so much time doing illustrations and making like interesting meme and art to like just flood these systems And I would like reverse image search constantly because there's always new things being made with AI. I feel like that's only getting more frequent and worse
with disinformation. I mean, when I'm doing what I'm doing reports on the daily for my job, I have to generally go back and fact jack and see how people are saying this what's actually happening and find that information. Now, especially if it's a smaller local story that doesn't have a bunch of news art news outlets on, it is so difficult to like see what they're saying true or not. I don't want to just like write them all completely as being like everyththday is a lie, and like I
want to actually do my research. But if there's not a local news article about it or someone or like a reparatable source like trying to figure out something is true that they're saying, I'm like, they're saying it, I honestly believe them, but there's nowhere else to look to find different information. And I think that's one of the
bigger issues. I mean, I mean, obviously Twitter has the community know this thing, which is you know, biased at best, but like having reliable that check, especially for things that are more local or on a smaller scale, is like you're only getting the right way narrative of any event and to find the truth or like the non biased thing is just so difficult, and I don't I don't know how that's changing how people perceive current events or
or local events or just like regular takes on everyday life. If they're only seeing one side and like even if they don't like that person like that opinion, there's no other opinion or other side to look at to balance it out and define the truth in the middle.
Yeah, why do you think these big social media companies gave up so completely? Like it seems like this would be a time when you would be able to make a name for yourself by being the one place that actually tries to fact check. On the other hand, it was already an extremely difficult task to fact check all
the misinformation, and now it's getting more difficult. Is it just kind of that combination because we've also talked about how most corporate entities have like gone away from doing good from that idea being like, you know, it was never their main driving impulse, but it was like fashionable for a little bit to like have these ESG programs and stuff. And now it's like a bad word to say that you're investing in those things. Like where do you think that kind of giving up came from?
I think there are like a few things. One of the first things I'm thinking is that, like I remember when they started to do kind of disinformation countering and started to do this efforts, they got a lot of pushback from actual Republicans in Congress because they'd be like, my statement is getting fact checked and flagged the day isn't true. And it's like when you start to objectively go about what is true information or not, Hey, a real person has to trasically go through every single thing.
If someone doesn't get a joke, it doesn't understand that there's the satire.
That actisms get caught in the middle of it.
But then also people who are making inflammatory rhetoric then who are elected officials also get caught in that. And then it starts looking to Republicans mostly that this platform
is being biased because it's censoring you Republicans. Now they're really bing narrative for a long time with that, social media companies are censoring the right because you put something up that's like the COVID nineteen vaccine causes autism, and then you get flagged and it's like, well, then of course you're going to get flagged, But then if that happens in a weird biased scaategory, then like you think that that's a negative or like it's a targeted harassment campaign
from the social media company. Also the fact that rage clicks make money. People engage with things when it makes you mad, and so there's not really a financial benefit of having that not be there. And also like, yeah, real people have to go through and moderate spaces. I spend a lot of time submitting posts for moderation or flogging posts for a boarding posts because it's like this
person missed this, and it's like a lot. I mean, especially Twitter slash x they cut down their moderation team basically zero, and Facebook already doesn't really have a super big one that's always on the clock. So it's like you're asking a team of fifteen people to monitor the entirety of Facebook.
That's a really big ass.
They're going to miss stuff, and so it's like they have the company has to invest in hiring your people and setting stronger, more specific guidelines and then also adhering to those guidelines, even at the person that they're adhering to brings no a lot of traffic and money to the platform. It's like there's not a ton of upfront incentive.
So it's the stuff that's always been true. It's just again like the public they just got tired of like resisting the main impulse of capitalism to be like, yeah, no, you can do that. It's not profitable and you'll get fired for doing it, but yeah, no, go ahead, it's great. That looks great on you. After a while, the forces just kind of wear you down.
Yeah, exactly. Well, then also just how much we've seen how much conservatives have just worn even the media down to be like, how dare you well fact check the words I say? You're trying to silence me, and like there's no they're like, fuck man, I don't. We don't have the will to push back, or we're not getting the directive from the people high up to push back.
So it's just kind of like, Okay, I guess we'll just please appease them, and then you event you end up in this sort of place where it's like too much of a hassle to follow through on those kinds of things, and it's kind of like it's a little unsettling Sabine, right, because with everything you're saying, it's like, you know, they're they're not the fucking platforms aren't going to do anything. They're fucking just doing their own thing,
putting out their own news. That is going to be the first point of contact for a lot of people if they're looking at like one of these stories or
manufactured sort of scandals or whatever it. What is the role that normal people can play in sort of countering this, Like not to say that like now you need to get on your moderation shit and start like hopping in these spaces, but like what what is like like what are the sort of steps because I feel like all the time you hear about like a Project twenty twenty five or like these other things are like what what
the fuck? Like what I mean not that this is specifically to that, but you're like, what do what is
the left doing anything about Project twenty twenty five? Not that I can see, But for regular people who are witnessing this kind of evolution, I'm sure many people already live in areas where they are seeing like white Pride stickers or they're getting fucking KKK Nazi shit thrown in their driveway and is it block bag filled with rocks and stuff like that is what is the response or what is the what kind of networks of people or can be created or things can be done to sort of counter that?
Yeah, I mean so online, particularly because most of my expertise, there are always some forms of practice that I think I would endorse. I know people are like, hey, well you're dunking on someone's screenshot and then do the dumps. They don't get the engagement if your tweet goes viral.
There's also just I guess not encouraging behavior. Maybe if we're not dunking at all, if you can help it, If you see a tweet or you see a headline, take the extra time to see if it's actually true before before you share it, before you then again make
outrage bait. A lot of a lot of particularly right accounts make their money and get their influence from being inflammatory and like and triggering that like the instant thing you to get mess and that you know isn't right or that you know isn't true, and like taking the time to like step back, think about is it worth
it to engage? Is it worth it if it really is a narrative you want a counter, screenshot it and talk about it on your own things so they don't get the engagement, or and they make sure you can like double check fact check whatever you're sharing, like and
not just doing an immediate emotional share offline. I would say that, at least for me, there are tons of people in my community have heard stuff or said stuff, or like kids will come home and say anything that they've heard at school, and like it all feels in the moment like a one off instance of someone being shitty, and like it honestly, it can be more than that, and it can foster a bi it like that's okay, and so like not letting those things slide or let
lie or have just brushing them off. I know, like in my hometown, my parents will walking by your school, someoney changed it to say a bunch of slurs and like pro Nazi stuff. When everyone was on vacation, we took a picture of it, put it in the county Facebook group and stea, hey, this isn't cool when you
talk about this. When we had a conversation about talking to your kids, if you have teenagers or anything in the area, make sure you're talking about what is there is not appropriate to do, and what is this not true about minority groups? Des me that you can do to kind of like not just let it be a shitty thing that you saw and then now have to I guess ignore a rush up.
I know.
Also, my company I See has a program called Strong City's Network where they do deradicalization programming, trainings and classes for city officials, for local officials, for community members about what you can do to foster an environment where extremism doesn't feel welcome or safe in your area. There are I think already existing anti hate groups that are either
national or that could be in your state. I know that Virginia where I live, certainly has some, and seeking out those groups and participating is also great to feel like you're doing something, you're getting involved.
Right, Yeah, I think it's It's also I mean, it's kind of a really interesting point where it's like so much of the engagement that these inflammatory accounts get is purely because of the reaction from people on the other end of the spectrum, and it's like sort of like it's that easy for them. It's like, dude, all you gotta do is just say this and then it blows up and its.
People dunk on you and then their content becomes your content.
Right exactly, and then it's like sort of like yeah, I mean one of the biggest ways to sort of like pull the rug out from under them is to also, like to your point is like if you're going to talk about it, maybe don't share the handle or just take the screenshot so that actual individual post isn't getting the sort of engagement that they need to feed the algorithms.
It kind of blows the eyes. It's like, just remember a lot of this shit while it is upsetting, it's the intent is for you to interact with it, so the message goes further and wider. And that's like just such a super subtle thing that Yeah, to think about how it's like, yeah, it's kind of like a Rube Goldberg machine that it's just kind of like, yeah, man, I'll get it this one thing and it can do next thing. You know, it's setting off all kinds of alarm bells.
Yeah, Well, Sabine Lawrence, such a pleasure having you on the show. Yeah, where can people find you? Follow you all that kod stuff.
I'm on Twitter, slash x my at is on Galliant for hire. With the number four as a for hire. I can put it in the chat so you can put on the screen or anything. And that's the only place besides like I I have papers sometimes I dispatch it sometimes that are posted to Twitter, to LinkedIn and also just on the ISIC website.
Amazing. And is there a work of media that you've been enjoying.
Yes, I currently have been enjoying a lot of Jack Staubert. He's like he was on Adult Swim a lot, and he does these really cool clamation and like techno pop works and it's my favorite artists.
Cool, no nice. And we will link off to Sabine's Twitter handle in the notes notes Miles, where can people find you? Is there a workimedia you've been enjoying?
Yes, my name does not have a Tolkien reference in the handle, but you can find me at the at based platforms Miles of Gray, and also find Jack and I on our basketball podcast Miles and Jack Got Mad Boosties. And if you like a bit of a ninety day Fiance, I also talk about that a mile off time that's on four to twenty day Fiance. Check that podcast out a tweet. It's actually a TikTok because your boy's been
scrolling and there's this one account at Casey Winnie. This woman she's been doing just like these very subtle things, like you know, imagine the first person, like the first pirate to say are And I think she first started going viral because she was doing her own version of Jennifer Coolidge going like er like she's like really good at that sound. But she's been like doing these just
these videos, very simple, that's like hypothetical. And this one is called imagine the person who first replied after a wild crocodile. Even though it is in a wild crocodile. A lot of people were in the chat or the comments been like it's in a while crocodile.
Let me just said after a while crocodile.
Oh I've always had in a while crocodile. I mean where you are you in a while or after a while in a while? Okay, okay, Well look the country, Uh, there's so many more divisions that we even know about, you know, so it's good to get these things all out there. But this is the clip of it because I just love it's just like this reaction of the person who's just eating. But please listen to the background chatter, because that's what honestly makes the video so hilarious.
Later, alligator after a while, crocodile waiting, Oh wow, how did you come up with that?
A crocodile and an alligator?
She's like, what's the square root of sixty four?
Eight?
Y'all, that's what the square root of sixty four is because it's eight. So anyway, her tiktoks are pretty hilarious. So yeah, shout out to that one.
That's amazing. After a while.
In a while, wow, you're guys, that's like me thinking about my trilobite love, going to that part of my brain.
You can find me on Twitter at Jack Underscore Obrian. I liked a tweet there from Goose that is in the genre of lose yourself lyrics. Always like a fake lose yourself lyric. So his balls are sweaty, knees weak, balls are sweaty. They're sweaty on his sweater or already balls are sweaty. Just made me laugh.
Art art art.
You can find us on Twitter at daily Zeitgeist. We're at the Daily Zeitgeist on Instagram. We have Facebook fan page and a website, Daily zeitgeist dot com. Where we post our episodes and our footnotes. We'll link off to the information that we talked about in today's episode, as well as a song that we think you might enjoy. Miles, is there a song that you think people might enjoy? Yeah?
Yeah, yeah there is out So a few days ago. Last week, I was talking about an Indonesian funk band called Aka. But when I was searching for them, I found another group called Aka. But if I think it's like an African funk band, like a psychedelic African band from the seventies, I couldn't find anything else. But this is what showed up. This track is called Shake Me by AKA, and it's it's just got like it's this that afro psychedelic vibe shit from the seventies and it's
like really good funky horns, stuff like that. And you know, leve a live band, So check this one out. This is shake Me by AKA.
We will link up to that in the footnotes. The Daily Zeiche is a production of my Heart Radio. For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app Apple podcast. Wherever you listen to your favorite shows, that is gonna do it for us. This morning, we are back this afternoon to tell you what is trending and we will talk to you all then.
Bye bye yeah