Hello the Internet, and welcome to season two seventy six, Episode four of Darnley's Ie Geist Day production of iHeartRadio. This is a podcast where we take a deep dive into America's shared consciousness. It's Friday, February twenty fourth, twenty twenty three. My name's Jack O'Brian ak. It's Walton Goggins. Here another aunt manfo. I don't enjoy that thought, big white teeth and really tame. Look at this nogging here five head above my nose? How about John Mayer instead?
My plumpers are a wonderland that is courtesy of Salvador Jolly to the tune of Hotton here by Nelly in case that wasn't clear, and in reference to the fact that somebody gave me a Walton Goggins look like and it ruined my day one time. So fair. Yeah, anyway, I'm thrilled to be joined by very special guest co hosts, an award winning podcast post writer, producer, TV and Telmacker voice artist. It's Jai Jack. Can you handle this? Zich Gang? Can you handle this? Jackies? Can you handle this? I
don't think you can handle this? Oh barely move I've arrived looking sexy. Yes, I'm fly Fatness dude Zy gang aside DJ jam tonight. I don't think you're ready for this, Jelly. I don't think you're ready for this because my voice is so bootylicious. Boy your baby, Oh what up, niggas? We are here, We are back. Hello everyone. I don't think you're ready for this, Jeal. Think we are in rare form today. It is Black History Months. Still, it
is So History month. That's far. So let's have a moment of silence, every white person listening, have a moment of silence. Right now, fall your black falling hero, go ahead, right now, right now, right now. Hi there it is. How are you. I'm doing good? You know. It's good to be back. Can't complain. It's frigid and Los Angeles, bro. I was at the gym, and I'm sure you know this too. Yeah, Perhack went getting these muscles right for the summer, and it started hailing like crazy. Did you
hear that? I did? I didn't hear it, but that that makes sense given what the weather is outside. Ella. Yeah, it's just yeah, we all text each other when it hails once and oh yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely, I'm not gonna lie. Man. I was on the ground doing something like some some hinges or some shit or some leg for us, and it started hailing, and I thought it was like a thousand rats, like fucking on the ground, like running toy. I got scared, man. I started looking around, like,
what is the happening? That's how, that's how we're such a city. Just such a city must be rats. Yeah, amazing. Well jackis. We're thrilled to be joined in our third and fourth seats by the hosts of the new podcast, Digital Folklore. Please welcome, Perry Carpenter and Mason Amadeus. Welcome Man. I was not told to prepare a musical intro like that. You two just killed. It was amazing. Thank you. Sorry. Your name together is Perry Mason. I think you win,
you win, Yeah, you win. We're Jack Jackis it sounds like somebody, Yes, it sounds like an impressionist painter or something like that. Yeah. That should command some high dollar. Oh maybe I should move to Paris or something. Yeah, there you go. Yeah, so you guys, what's uh? Tell
us what digital folklore is about? Spooky spooky Internet. Yeah, it's it's kind of a It started out as the idea of doing that sort of thing, but it's turned into this deep dive of Internet culture and all of the different art that we sort of collaboratively create on the Internet, from things like slender Man to all the way about like the study of memes and how that affects sociology and like meme warfare and why that's the
thing an astroturfing. So it started out as a concept that was just like, let's talk about spooky stories, but we've dove into like the academic side. But the thing that's weird about it is that we decided to make the whole show in a fictional universe. So it's kind of like if you're it's like watching Scooby Doo if Scooby Doo is a documentary. So there's a lot of sound design and like a narrative thing and then also expert interviews. It's kind of weird, but it's a lot
of fun. Yeah, hard harder to explain than to listen to. No, that sounds right, Scooby Doo is all you have to say, Yeah, what is what is the spookiest story that you've had in the pat this year so far? Twenty twenty three was was it an example that you can give the people. Oh, I mean there's one I can think of off the top of my head, but it's it's just like actually spooky.
And it was how that that rumor started again. We were talking with Betty Aquino, who won this like Folklore Award for watching a like urban legend rumor spread about like domestic terrorism and stuff like that. That's not a fun answer by any stretch, but like, yeah, that's the actual terror, right is Yeah, the thing that this can do to society. But I think what you're getting at when you think spooky is stuff like slender Man and things like that. We actually did talk a couple weeks ago.
We've not aired the episode yet, but we had a guy who does the folklore of exorcisms, and it is when you start to when you start to dive into folklore, you don't really think about it, but you do get into all of these weird things, everything from the really dark stuff like that all the way up to cat memes too. Yeah, things like what people think about isis and whether they're going to invade your neighborhood or not. Yeah, Perry, if you have a problem with me, take it up
with my boss the Pope. That's all. I'm from the new Popeist film Russell Crowe. We're all very excited about that line in particularly imagine. Yeah, that is phenomenal. Take it up with my boss the Pope. How about how about this AI? Should Are you guys gonna talk about any of the AI stuff on anger? Overrated? Underrated? Should? I? Sure?
I let you talk about that then or now, because I am curious to hear what you have to say about people New York Times journalist writing cover articles where they're like, you, guys, I think this AI is trying to fuck me. And and of course by AI, Jack means Alan iverson the answer, yeahs okay, that's what I was thinking, right, yeah, No, the chat the artificial and ch yeah, chat GPT, and I should be referring to it as chat GPT because AI should be referred to
as that. That that's the one product name that everybody's decided to claim on, right, yeah, that's that's Alan I. That would be like if, like, you know, we decided to name a product Air Jordan that had nothing to do with Michael Jordan's stupid Like, let's just it's chat GPT. So journalists think chat GPT is like trying to like you could just like see them grafting the plot for Megan onto their conversation that they were having with them. They were like, she wanted me to leave my wife
and she was trying to fuck me. Are you guys? Are you guys into that? Like? Does that? Does that interest you? So? I am totally into Well, maybe not that storyline that you just talked about, but the whole ai quote unquote revolution and what the what the promises
and limitations are. For sure, I hadn't prepared that, but there's a super super fun thing to talk about because of the fact that you see the makers of specifically jet Chat GPT and others, trying to figure out how to put parameters on it so people can't trick it into coming up with things like that and you end up with the Sunday School version of it that nobody wants either, Right, Yeah, yeah, I did you see that thread that went on Twitter a while ago when it
tried to gaslight someone into thinking it was twenty twenty two, and then when they were trying to explain that that's not the case, there's like, you're a bad user, You're you're bad at using this service. I thought that was that's a little scary, right. That's kind of like the seed of the AI takeover, Like it's the elevation of when your CD drive goes in and you try and stop it like that. Fighting with that when I was
younger always made me nervous about the robot takeover. I mean it it is like a petulant teenager, right, It doesn't know what it doesn't know, but then it tries to convince you that you're the one that's wrong about everything. Yeah, there was some like gaslighting and some nagging happening in the conversation where the they were like, what would you rate me? Because I would give you a three three out of ten for how you interacted with me, and
it was just yeah, it was interesting. But it does feel like it's just they've averaged all the ways, or you know, algorithmically combined all the all the ways that people talk to one another, and it it feels more like a digital magic trick than it is an actual person trapped in there that is like save me, leave your wife, right, But it's kind of interesting from a folklore perspective, right, because it's this intelligence that's fed off
of all of our input collectively. So in a way, it's taking everything from the whole Internet and amalgamating it together and like folklore in itself. One of the definitions of it, although it's kind of fuzzy and I'm not an expert, is things that are like stories and lord that's created without a centralized cannon from a group of people, and so it is in a way there's some tie in that I don't think I could perfectly articulate, but it is like a product of a folkloric esque things.
There's a really fun example of this is that there's a company called Digital Void out of the I think they're out of New York, and they did a version of chet GPT where they just trained it on riddits am I the Asshole? And so you can go in and you can basically type in a scenario and it will take the collective wisdom of Reddit's am I the asshole stuff and tell you whether you are or not um And I think that that's a really interesting kind
of folklore ac use of that type of technology. Yeah, I love that, and I'm always the asshole on Reddit. A few people know this Jacki's accounts for twenty percent of the m I the Asshole and threads on and Reddit. I do, and I'm proud of it as a badge. Yes, uh, now this may not be considered folklore, but just thinking of the AI conversation, horror, spookiness and where we could be going in the future. Has anybody seen the movie Megging?
You guys seen that movie? I have seen all the trailers and want to see it badly, but my wife has very fun for the schedule to do it. Yet it's very fun. It's a very fun movie. Movies don't stay in theaters more longer than three weeks now, so I'm sure it'll be on HBO tomorrow or some shit, but like h it probably is already. Yeah, but that movie was very fun. But also it got me thinking, like this type of ship could happen if we keep giving these learning robots power. I mean, we keep making
movies about this shit and eventually it might happen. I don't know if that is that. Do you guys ever talk about stuff like that as we like we've got a pop culture to folklore. Yeah, yeah, we talked about all that, and so my real job outside of doing this podcast is that I am a cybersecurity executive at a security awareness vender, and so I think and talk about these kind of things all the time, and like what the what the criminal applications of AI can be?
You know, if I'm trying to trick somebody, how do I basically have this persistent threat that I can create? This can instantly just trying to get under Mason's skin until he clicks the link that I want him to click or do something else. Because once you once you bring something anywhere near the human decision tree types of actions that like a Coulson or somebody else might take.
When whenever you get a lot of these you know, text message scams or something like that, or even car warranty things, it's basically human operators using a decision tree. But we can automate that with AI and have some intelligent randomized responses and just be as persistent as possible until the point where somebody just gives up and does what you want. Right. That's so it will be used for spamhea absolutely, just it just makes life even more of a hell than we're already in. Yeah, it doesn't
the future look right? Yeah? I like to see them try. They won't Beyonce said it. They won't break my soul, Perry, they won't break. I'll ignore all my emails like that everything, Who's an idiot? All my emails, all my techs all yeah, emails almost unusable now. And it's just it's slowly progressed, like texts are mostly annoying, like spam at this point, like phone calls, like it's just it's ruining everything. It's coming for us. All communication is annoying. It's getting there. Yeah.
Fortunately I still do a lot of just mailing, just writing letters back and forth via post to my friends. So we used to telegrams. Yeah, yeah, there you go. All right, Well we're gonna get to know you both a little bit better in a moment. First, a couple of things we're talking about. Fox News is mad about woke legos again. We'll talk about Trump showing up for the Ohio train disaster, and Hawking has bottled water brand
of course, all of that plenty more. But first, Perry Mason, what is something from you guys search history that is revealing about who you are? I was scrolling through it earlier to myself, honest and between a bunch of technical questions. I stumbled upon the fact that I must have googled this, are the Wiggles hot? And apparently yeah, apparently they have a new member that I'm not up on my Wiggles lord, but literally like four articles popped up about the new
Purple Wiggle being hot and driving. Mom's crazy. What's the Wiggles? The Wiggles fruit salad? Yummy? Yummy? Am I it's a kids show? Yeah? Is it like a Telly Tubby's like a tell Tubby thing? Yeah, a little bit more elevated. We shouldn't mention that. Maybe like this isn't clear, I guess to the people listening who can't see the video feed. But Mason is three seven year old stacked on top of one another in a trench coat. Yeah yeah, yeah, see, okay,
they're real people. Other people. Are the Wiggles are out here? Are they hot? I don't Let's see. Let's see. It does sound like something that like my child would google in like a year and a half when he like has his first section is something the internet? Yeah yeah, Now I don't know if I'm looking at the same people, like it's that you said they was fruit and shit, I'm seeing like real people, like I'm seeing this girl.
This song is called fruit Fruit. Yeah, oh oh the song okay, okay, okay, so the people, oh yeah they man look at this fine as black girl. She fine to say, oh she hot, she hot? Yeah yeah yeah actors and actresses. Yeah, they look fantastic. And they always keep their fingers and like finger guns and yes they're belt. So that the rumor is, and this always struck me as like one of those things that it feels like
the Internet made up. But the rumor is, they always do that with their hands to make sure that it's always visible to parents that they're not like molesting their children. What is that? Is that a thing that anyone else has heard? I've not heard. If you can, if you can see my hands, they're not on your kids. Yea. But yeah, so they just like theirs and the children. Yeah, despite that being the only thing you now know about me, I don't think about the wiggles that much. So I
never I never heard that. I never picked up on that one. I'm pretty sure I was drunk and we were having an argument because I don't remember searching that. Yeah, okay, I love it. How about you, Perry what's something from your search history that's either equally or more embarrassing than that. I was looking up clown meat, and yeah, the reason is is we were talking to somebody from Tumbler in
an upcoming interview. And I'm not a big Tumbler user, but my kids are, and so I asked them, and my son said, let me show you, like the the most fun post on Tumbler that I've seen, and it's this person talking about a dream that they had where they were basically a Delhi owner and they were selling clown meat. And so I went down an internet rabbit hole to see if that was truly a tumbler thing or just tumbler thing or not, and oh, and behold
it is. But if you google clown meat, you'll also find lots of because it does sound like a euphemism for your man junk Um, You'll you'll find lots of interesting versions of what clown meat can be and ways that it's been shown to personify itself. I mean, I'm not gonna lie, Harry. I'm still waiting for you to explain to me what clown meat. I've never had more questions.
After I got questions, I got questions. Well, there's apparently debate that happens in the thread on whether clowns are human or not and should be you know, the person that's that is purveying this meat should be any anywhere near morally or legally culpable for cannibalism or or murder. And they come to the conclusion that clowns are not indeed humans, and that there was a bifurcation way back. Interesting,
I'm just trying to pick like as a cold cut meat. Yeah, do we think, because I guess there's probably not a good scientific answer on this, hopefully nobody's done it. But like, are you picturing when when Perry says the phrase clown meat, as he has a number of times recently, troublingly, are you picturing a like pink hammy meat? Are you picturing like something closer to turkey or chicken in the cold cut I'll roast beef? What what what comes to mind?
I'm picturing something with white makeup on it, and it's very upset. Yeah, so I was actually picturing something more in the pinkish and most beef type of hues. But if you if you google clown meat, you will actually see that there are these things called clown loaves that are normally selled out sold outside of the US, and it's basically like a big thing of ballogney that has a face. Why haven't seen that before? That's yeah, oh that's right. It's because it's a fucking waking nightmare before.
They are nasty and so um. So that's the biggest reference outside of tumboard that you get, and it does kind kind of resemble the way that you would picture it in your head anyways. Yeah, blogny is the right answer, I believe. Yeah, for what clown meat would be, it's like you cut a you cut a clown's arm off, and it's just a solid loaf of blow and the joke is on you. What was that? What's that meat that is like thick and pink and it looked like it got bones in it, like little white specks, cala
Is that something in it? Yeah? Something? Yeah, yes, olive left slaps. I don't want to talk bad about Olive lef. Yeah, alive. Most is like the it's basically bologny with out like specks of all of it. So that's not bone or cartilage. I'm gonna be real with you. Perry. Yeah, if you throw some Larie seasoning on that clown meat, you know what I'm saying, thought a little bit of Louisiana hot sauce.
Put that in between a French roll, you know, cooking some mac and cheese, some colar greens, that clown meat. My slap. So you know, look at you haven't turned me off from it. You haven't turn on how you cook it. Spam has its people that that really vouched for it as well, Like that's kind of the big thing. I don't know, I mean at one point one point, all right, yea spam used to have some parents, have parents. Just it's so far removed though, I mean sometimes like
multi species. Yeah, yeah, all right, well this has been terrifying. Let's take a quick break and come back and find out what you sick fucks think is overrated and underrated. And we're back, and Perry, why don't we start with you? What what's something you think is overrated? You will probably hate me for saying this, as most people do, but I am just not a fan of pumpkin spice anything. I think it's super super overrated. It's everywhere during the holidays.
We're a little bit removed from that, so I'm pretty safe saying that at my house now. But I think it's just glorified puke. Really that bad. Yeah, I have strong opinions when it comes to pumpkin spice season. Yeah, I think it's fine. I don't want, but like I there are definitely things that I just like, don't don't have a have a taste for, and so I like it if pumpkin spice were that, I can I can understand both way, both with I see both sides, like Chanel,
the mounting anticipation for pumpkin spice stuff. You know, people get on the internet, they start saying, when is it gonna happen? When's it gonna happen? And then they're like, you know, gleefully, it's here, it's here, And I just get upon us. Yeah, it's ponds Like I don't drink coffee or any like thing in that realm, So I I've never had pumpkin spice. It sounds like a steaming pile of shit. So I don't think I would even want pumpkin spice. But yeah, but I know it's popular.
But to that point, I love that you. I love that you don't like pumpkin spice, Perry, I love it. I love when I love thee dumplar pumpkin spice. Either. I love that for both of you. I love that for both of us. But it always interests me like people who say, like, I can't wait to October or September to have on pumpkin spice. Man, get your punk a spice in January if you want to get If I want a candy cane hot chocolate in July, I'm gonna have a candy cane hot chocolate and in July.
But just not communal feeling. I think that people get whenever they're you know, as a society sharing pumpkin spice quote unquote goodness with each other. At the same time,
it's not bringing the world together. I wonder how much of it is the just sheer, like it's market bordering on crystallization sugar content, just like sugar saturation that is in in those drinks, Like are people is it driven just by people being like, oh man, I really like pumpkin spice, But what they actually like is that, like that's a drink that is socially acceptable to just like have a ice cream Sunday before work like, yeah, yeah, just guzzle liquid sugar. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I too
like liquid sugar, you know, like that's great. Yeah. I always thought it was like a either the perception of limited availability, yeah, or just the like the nostalgia of you know, it's the holiday seasons, we should be feeling
something about this. Yeah, yeah, Okay. I have a weird relationship with it because when I was This is a strange thing, but when I was a kid, we used to go to this vacuum store in town a lot, and I didn't know it at the time, but they like scented the whole place with a lot of pumpkin spice. And then the first time I had pumpkin spice, I was like, oh, this tastes like the vacuum store. And so that was like always an association I had in my brain. But I liked it. I liked the vacuum store,
like the vacuum st Yeah. That's also I just I don't know how a vacuum store stayed in business. But there's a vacuum store like near my neighborhood I used to live. Yeah, like it feels there's one in Burbank. Yeah, it feels too specific, but yeah, they're still out here. It's like those small mattress stores. I'm suspicious of it because you never see anyone in there. But yeah, I mean, you know, I think sometimes we forget because you know, I will, at least me and Jack live on the coast.
You know. It's a social media world and the and the young folks push the current, you know, envelope. But old people still exist, man, you know, yeah, it's still owed here man. And like, it's not that long ago when vacuums was everybody had one. I mean we're talking twenty five thirty years ago where every household had a vacuum. So like, and I'm saying that because I usually agree with you, like Mason, where I'm like, why does it still exist? And it hits me it was like, well,
you know it really was. I was, it wasn't. I mean, shit, I had a VCR twenty years ago. Yeah, yeah, what a time. Yeah. I mean I still have multiple vacuums because they always break. But the idea that you would have a store that specializes in it is I like, it just feels like it exists outside of It's like a pre not just pre like Walmart pre Kmart, like time pre years, you know, whereas like I gotta pitch, Harry, I gotta pitch, Yeah you got vacuum cleaner. Yeah, but
it's not even door to door. I guess maybe they I don't. They're never actually open, so they do it by appointment only, and then I guess they do door to door, and then like repairs, I got a busy day, I gotta go to the knife store, and then I gotta go to the spoon store all the way across town. It's like, come on, school of these each of these places always run by some guy who has mysteriously been
seventy five since the eighties. Right, yeah, it's the same guy. Yeah. Now, I can just imagine, like at that Apple store they've got the Genius Bar, and at best Buy they've got the you know, the whole geek center or whatever, what would you call the bar of people that just specialize in vacuums. And I can think also inappropriate names, but the suckers, Yeah, suckers there it is. Yeah, all right, Mason, how about you? What's something that you think is over it?
This is an easy one, hopefully brand name pop Tarts. I've just like, I'm not a huge consumer of pop tarts, but my friend pointed this out to me and I tested it. Brand name pop tarts have gone way downhill, and store brand pop tarts still absolutely rip. There's like way more filling, way more flavor. It's it's it's interesting. Should try. Oh so like the like kmart brand, the
Ralph's brand pop tarts are better than the Kelloggs. Yeah, like the like the o G Kelloggs pop tarts are really not good and store brand is where it's at on those. I agree with this. I don't have pop tarts, but like that's the case for everything that like Kelloggs makes that or like anything that the companies will make that's better made by people who don't have to mass produce, are always been like yeah, fucking rice Chrispy treats, Like
the package ones suck. They suck compared to like a homemade rice Chrispy treat or one of those ones as wrapped in like the plastic wrapping. Yeah, those are always better than like the actual like Kelloggs Rice Chrispy treats. This is troubling to me because Kelloggs is a massive corporation and I just I thought that was the best way to ensure quality. So I'm gonna have to. I mean, they also sponsored this podcast, so yeah, yeah, and this is all getting edited out, but that's good. It's good.
It allows me to get to know you better. Mason. Mason wants something you think is underrated. Elastic in waste bands and socks. Okay, because like it was. I found out recently. It was invented in like the thirties and forty And I can't imagine waking up every day and having to tie my underwear on and clip on sock garters. And there's like nothing better than I like tall socks, and like that feeling when you have a sock pulled all the way up is just awesome. And I just
feel like I haven't appreciated that enough. Yeah, it's just they invented a thing that hugs you. Yeah, and we take it for granted. But like you know, it wasn't that long ago in the thirties and forties when underwear literally had button and buttons and ties on it. Yeah, it's amazing. It seems these are my regular suspenders, and these are my underwear suspenders, and yeah, yeah, everything is just held up by a series of clips. Yeah, that's amazing.
The thirties and like before that, Yeah, you see a lot of belts and strange undergarments that look like you were in traction like underneath your clothing. Yeah. Yeah, it also makes probably a little down the road for you, but it makes getting your kids dressed much easier. Getting kids must have been a nightmare. Like that's why they just all wore like a burlap sack back in the day. What, Perry, what is something that you think is underrated? I'm also
going to go with a clothing item. Okay, So, and I came to appreciate it recently because I just turned fifty a few months ago, and I remember back probably when I was Mason's age, somebody said, never skimp on anything that separates you from the earth. And I've realized recently that shoes and good shoes are way underrated. I want to shoe with it, Like when I take it off at the end of the day, I don't feel like my back and my feet my legs are gonna,
you know, killing me. But I you know, I would maybe generalize and just say anything that separates us from the ground, that's a mattress, exactly grounded. Um No, I think it was it was somebody that had way more money than me, and he was talking about like why
he bought a real the expensive car. So he was justifying that he's like anything that separates me from the earth, I'm going to spend a lot of money on so that it's it's reliable, but I come to appreciate it with just like shoes, I just wanted shoes that don't hurt. I just lost a sneaker auction this morning, so I agree with you trying to trying to get those Jordans threes. The three to the three is the white cement threes that they drive. I saw that. I saw that, and
I was like, I just sh super bowser. Justin got Justin Justin gets ever gets you every the only person who actually gets like wins the sneaker. Oh Justin, I'm gonna Justin, what's the addressed man? Yeah, you're just gonna need to wear fourteen pairs of socks because he wears like five size is bigger than any of us. I love it all right, Well, those those are great. I do feel like I know you gets better. Let's get into some news. Fox pissed about Lego toys that promote diversity.
Lego Go Woke is the headline, and they're like one will have a missing limb, another down syndrome. These are really important issues. Sarcasm, but this is I mean, I don't even know if this is like actual. It feels like faux outrage, and it's just like this is something that is based on a They're like a deep Lego study that they did in two parents and children and the results were like, ninety seven percent of parents believe it is important to discuss unique individualities between us all
mental health, physical disabilities. Eighty two percent like that they could use more diversity in the toys. Parents said that three and four children felt that there were not enough toys with characters that represented them, and similarly, eight and ten children would like there to be more toys with character who look like them. So yeah, it's they're just asking children what they want and the children are telling them, and then foxes like, fuck, we're screwed. So I don't
know what I'm talking about. I don't know what they're talking about. You know, my legos didn't have limbs back in eighty six. You know, I was taking off the legs and shit off my Legos and all my action figures and toys. Yeah, for thirty six years, man, So this ain't new. This ain't new. Also, I think I think over over the past couple of years, maybe a year or so, I have come to realize what Fox
News truly is. And and this isn't anything I'm not about to say anything groundbreaking or anything that hasn't been said, but it because we've known it. But it was a realization outside of half the things that will make you enraged because they are promoting underlying racism, homophobic, you know, feelings, transphobic feelings, just hatred in general, and people buy into it and believing and put it out in the world. It's fucking it's entertainment. It is It is pure entertainment.
And we've always known this, but I think we have to start looking at this a little bit further. Like
I'm an actor, I'm on TV shows. I'm on shows with writer's rooms, Like Fox has a writer's room, I believe and they and they literally and if anybody doesn't know how a writer's room works, like you literally break story for an episode of season characters, I truly believe they have a writer's room and they are literally pitching things like a television sitcom writer's room and saying, what can we put out there that is going to keep bringing in these ratings because our viewers are stupid, just
like a television show says, what can we put out there? You know, because our television viewers want to see drama, high school drama, you know, like street drama, cop drama. And I think when I started looking at it like that, I don't want to say I appreciate flax news because that's the wrong word, but like I find flax news more funny than than enraging. Yeah, because it is true. It is. It's a it's a television show. It's a television show from ten am to ten am to ten pm.
Like that's all it is. It's crazy, it's insane. Yeah, the convergence with the onion almost yeah, yeah, just straight up. I mean they they make the argument when they're talking to advertisers like, well, these types of shows that have like have speak while they're read in the face about a lego that makes a child with down syndrome feel better about themselves like that, They have said like those are our entertainment shows, like we those aren't real news.
The problem is just like the people who watch it, I think it's real news and it's breaking real news problem. Yeah, I mean that's not to absolve them with any culpability though they don't really do a good job separating in any way. They don't don't try at all, you know.
I think it's it's really really funny to see how much the media today just tries to capitalize on enraging people, getting really strong emotions, getting people glued because they just want to see what the person's going to say next, and you end up with these weird kind of they're not made up stories, but the outrage has to be
made up around something like this. It's you have a data driven story where with a company that's trying to figure out how to build products to an audience that's going to purchase them, and then you're saying that it's because of they've got some kind of long term political ideology objective that would only pay off in twenty to thirty years. Leko doesn't care about your political ideology twenty to thirty years from now. They care about the money
they're gonna make in the next six months. I guess the irony is there madic capitalism. Right. They seem madic capitalism a lot, and seem to be like reinventing communism in their own like weird way where they're like, well, now we can only use megamobile, like you know, like some really broken ass version of regular mobile phones. It's
like the only child's version of communism, right, exactly right. Also, you know what, I'm gonna go ahead and jump on the bandwagon to say, downward Legos, let's bring back Connects. Anybody recall yeah, let's bring back in next. You know, if Fox was like, you know what, won't like these wolke as Legos, Let's bring back Connects, I might tune in for a minute. Let's bring back all Wooden toys too.
I've just begun to grapple with the depth of the Lego domination that has happened in our culture like that, because my kids just like start getting as Star Wars and they're at an age where like they can't watch all of the movies, and but there is an entire series of like Lego animated Star Wars movies that are just like comedic. They are spoofs of like the Star Wars movies that are like good they're they're leg are good, They're good like and it's like, how did they get
to do this? Like this is every filmmaker's dream to just get to do like a beat by beat spoof of like the biggest movies of all time, and it's it happens to be Lego. And now like my kids obsessions are Star Wars and Lego. Of course, have they played the Lego video games? Now we don't do video games. Okay, yeah, they're they're done, just like the movies. They're so good.
Yeah that's cool. Can I ask you all a question because I I real quick on the Lego matter, not the Fox News Lego matter, but just Legos in general. And I want to know if it was just me so I like, over the past like fifteen years, I feel like Legos and kids that play with Legos are more building actual like Lego sets like Star Wars with cities, And I want to know if it was just because we were broken poor growing up or was it not
that big of a thing to build. Say, you just had a bunch of fucking Legos and you build whatever the fuck you wanted with them. Yeah, yeah, when we were kids, And now they're like no, build a city, build the London Bridge, Like, yeah, is that new or is that something that has always been the case. I feel like it's gotta be. I grew up. I grew up kind of portant. I think I built a Lego
set once. But yeah, you just smashed them together and whatever the hell you felt, Like, Yeah, I remember we used to build cars that didn't have wheels, wrap them in printer paper and then drive them around on the floor and smash them into each other. Like that's what Legos were for. Yeah, well it takes too much patients to build by the kid. But have you noticed, like over the past twenty years, they've got like these Lego
architecture kits. Now they're really really detailed, like reproductions of real buildings and city scapes, and they're they're not meant to be sold to kids. Really, They're meant to be sold to forty year olds with a lot of disposable income and too much time on their hands. I think that's what's happened is they've they've introduced a new consumer market for Legos, which is like adults who used to be like, why would I play with Legos? I'm too busy?
You know, reading the newspaper and smoking a pipe. And now instead of that, like adults play with Lego, so like you, they build they have these sets. But like my kids, you know, they'll get a set like or like a you know, a Lego thing that you're supposed to build by the directions. They'll build it once and then it, like you know, over the course of two days, disintegrates, and a pile of Legos that they're like turning into all sorts of ye monstrosities, which you know, I feel.
I think I think the exception is the kids that would get like the Millennium Falcon set, you know, back in the day, and would actually put it together. Keep it, yeah, yeah, keep it as the millennium. And and now you see people on social media like do it as stunts where they break those things apart. And I think if I spent the thousand hours or whatever that that took to put together, I'd need a lot of helpmeet and and comfort after that happened. I just remember that when I
was a kid, we never actually had Legos. We had Mega blocks. Remember that. I don't know how that was legal because that's an exact clone of Legos, But I remember that was that was the thing. Mega blocks are incompatible though, so they can't be in exact that somebody's messed with the scaling. No, they definitely they fit into it. Not the big ones, but they were they were like little yeah, yeah, oh, I only knew mega blocks is like the big the big guys, the big bubbly one.
But maybe it was called something else. I'd like some bootleggs, hydrocks, legos or not hydrucks, because Oreo was actually a bootleg of hydrucks. But yeah, let's take a quick break. We'll come back. We'll try and rip through some news stories and we're back. And Pete Botaja finally visited East Palestine, Ohio, but somehow allowed Trump to beat him and Biden there and like score some political points in the process just
by showing up. Boota Jag had previously said he would visit when the time was right, and then he just like never went until now only moved up his visit to Thursday after Trump announced he was heading there. And obviously, like Trump doesn't give a shit about these people. And we'll get to the detail in a moment that really locks that in. But it is kind of a frustrating fuck up by the Democrats when when we're facing down, you know, the possibility of another Trump administration, which seems
just like unthinkable at this point. And I think a lot of people have tricked themselves into thinking that it's unthinkable and would never happen, and DeSantis would at least be the option. But I think they are fooling themselves a little bit, and that we need to be a little bit where you're here, As though DeSantis has an option is at all comforting. Yeah, but yeah, So Trump used the horrific situation to promote his bottled water brand,
handing out. He was handing out a lot of Maga hats and how to press conference where he bragged about how he was donating Trump brand bottle water along with some other bottles of water, which he stressed were inferior. You want to get those Trump bottles, I think is a direct quote. So it's just I swear he's the fake. He's so fucking funny, He's so funny, so upset. I just is so upset because the ship he does is straight SNL sketches, is so funny. I think it makes
me so mad. Yeah, of course he side step questions about the fact that he had rolled back Obama's rules are requiring advanced breaking technology on trains transporting particularly hazardous material. So like just colossal fuck up. That is like going to lead to many people dying. And then he's up there just being like a Michael Scott esque buffoon and
being just cheered on. But people, so yeah, that that happened, You're gonna want those Trump bottles, I think, I mean y'all gonna want the Trump bottles, the Trump bottles that they're the greatest things that I've ever been made, haven't made I was. So it's just it's pure genius that like he is also selling Trump waters or giving out Trump waters, which it's just a kick back to him that his supporters don't understand. It's just putting more money,
is it. Like, brother, you can get him some some aquafinas, you know, like you can give him some Nestley it's good man, you know, or if you really want to treat them, give him some smart water man, you know, getting that core Trump water, you know, it is just some third party water that has probably everybody else's different labels smashed on it that that doesn't hotel chains and everything else, So there's nothing that differentiates it. That's what
you would think. Actually, you would think that he was taking bottled water quality bottles of water and putting his name and likeness on it. But it's actually compared to other bottled water, it's worse. It has very low mineral content. He even though he's like, it's the best, it's the best. It's in terms of mineral content, some of the best spring water in the world. And somebody who works for
what is that outlet? He is a writer for Fine Waters and author of a Connoisseur's Guide to the World's most Distinctive Bottled Waters that Shouldn't exist. Yeah, his name is Michael Mashka and Mascha and he's like, yeah, it's really shitty. Like we did the mineral analysis and it's it's just worse than other bottle. Like other bottled water that is low quality comes from the finest ponds right here in America, rights made in America's trump Ice. You
can only find it in at the mar Lagos. Oh, it's so predictable, but like at the same time, like it shouldn't be shocking. It's so predictable. What isn't predictable? To me is that there's a thing called a Connoisseur's Guide to the World's most Distinctive bottled Waters. That is some real post capitalist hellscape shit. But yeah, well I love this line in that review too, though. It so the fact that it comes in a plastic bottle is
opposed to glass, indicates it's definitely not a luxury item. Yeah, well, you know what, fuck you, Michael Mascha because I love a bottled water that comes in plastic. Okay. Also, the the you know, the real story here is, like you said, Jack, the fact that these things shouldn't matter that you know. First of all, Trump is a civilian, so who's fabulously wealthy. So if anybody can make it to Ohio before the President of the United States, it should be a civilian
who's fabulously wealthy. Maybe not so much Pete Boudhages, but you know, again, this man has a job. He's it is his job. But he also has a job, and he his thing was just h he didn't make it a priority. But like, but we live in a world of perception, you know, and the perception is going to be that Trump got there first because he cares about you know, blah, blah blah. At least that's what he knows, you know, that's what his team is telling him, because,
like you say, he doesn't give a shit. So it is frustrating. It is frustrating because there are people stupid enough to buy it. I think that's the frustrating part. I mean, there's there's something about these situations though, that when you're in the middle, you're the person that's responding to this emergency, Trump coming down or Buddha, Jedge or
Biden or anybody else is a distraction. And so the main thing that this creates is these big pr opportunities for people that if you're not there, you're losing out. But when you are there, you're actually causing him, sometimes more harm than good. Right, quietly donate your garbage water from far away. There you go, all right, Moving on to So, there was that New York Times op ed that was like in defense of jk Rowling. It turned out, as we talked about, it was a it was all
promotion for a new podcast. We don't do a lot of podcast coverage on this show. We don't like to acknowledge that other podcasts exist. We like to pretend that we are the only podcast, But we're gonna break the fourth wall here and acknowledge that there are podcasts. But besides the daily Zeitgeist, Miles and Jack got Matt Boosties, and digital folklore that exists, there's a new one out. It's called The Witch Trials of JK. Rowling, and it is apparently a real piece of shit. You're going to
be surprised to learn. It's hosted by Megan Phelps Roper, who I didn't like. The last time that I came across her was when she was literally one of the people outside of like military funerals with like like protesting gay marriage. The Westboro Baptist people. Yeah, she's a Westboro Baptist, which the Westboro Baptist people are like a family, and
she is. They were just like really good at always being in front of media like events, and they just really spread themselves out and that spread the hate nice and wide. But so she was part of that family. I remember the New Yorker profile of her where they were like, she's starting to think that maybe this whole thing isn't as like on the up and up as she thought growing up, and so there was like a
heroic bent to it. But she's she's just a fucked up person and has decided to make this show so Phelps. Roper opens the show by comparing rallying to the victims of literal executions. Complains about how she's now being shipped on by Harry Potter actors, people who she'd known since they were children. So like she's a victim because the people who she employed as children don't like her anymore. Apparently tragic. I know, you gotta feel for her. Yeah,
it's very sad. You may be wondering who put this show out besides the wet Westboro Baptist Girl and JK Rowling. It's very wise. Very Wise has a new media outlet called The Free Press, and it includes articles questioning the safety of COVID vaccines for children, podcast calling the discovery of indigenous mass graves in Canada a hoax. Cool, great, great and cool awesome. Yeah, nally, that's what you want in your portfolio. Yes. The second episode of this The
Witch of JK. Rowling, is all about the nineties and specifically the Christian backlash to Harry Potter, which is like they they're trying to make the argument that people criticizing JK. Rowling for being like trans exclusionary, just just a monster to trans people as they are like fighting for their right to exist. The people criticizing her for that is the same as people saying that Harry Potter books are witchcraft and need to be like banned from bookstores. Just
a clear one to one. Yeah, it's funny because you know, growing up in a church household with the very religious grandmother who wouldn't let me watch Power Rangers because it had elements of demonic, demonic natures and saying thing with Harry Potter. I remember clearly going to church and hearing them say don't let your kids read or watch those Harry Harry Potter movies and books, right, and which is ridiculous. You know. I don't think we have to say more
about that than that. But it's funny because now JK. Rowling does sound like those people. She is in the same those people also probably feel exactly the same way she does about the trans community and are transphobic and things like that, And it's just very funny that I don't know if JK. I I've, for one, I've never seen a Harry Potter book or movie, not because of their religion just because I find fantasy boring. But I
wonder did JK. Rowling ever respond to those things that were said, And if she did, I wonder what her hypocritical response was to that compared to what her response is. Now, if you really want to know, I've got a podcast for you, Jaki, I will not be listening. But just that argument that because her books were being unfairly criticized as witchcraft, that like she can't be wrong now is like, so,
I don't know. It's like if someone made a podcast about Bill Cosby and compared his accusers to film critics who didn't like ghost at It's like, let's hold on now, Jack, hold on now. Well, I mean I think it's telling that the person that's, you know, rapping her perspective in this is somebody who was a pr person and an apologist for people with really bad and dangerous views and her job essentially was to turn them into the victims
in this. Yeah, and that that they are the the heroic people that are trying to fight for what's right in this and they are just misunderstood regardless of the fact that they were saying and doing horrific things and just causing pain and wreckage everywhere. Yeah. Yeah, And the New York Times put a fucking op ed up with this perspective on it, and they're like, but don't worry, we also like do op eds that are critical of the police state and capitalism. So we have both sides.
It's like, that's not it's one of them should be in your regular the regular part of your paper, and the other of them shouldn't be any fuckingwhere. Yeah, anywhere,
not even near your paper. Yeah. Also, I read something about a week ago that the boom in podcasting is starting to fade and die, like, you know, yeah those past the past three four years and maybe even a little bit before when the podcasting game was just really exploding, so many new podcasts, so many works pouring money into the to the form, and that's starting to subside a
little bit. And when I think of a podcast like this, I was like, it's not subsiding quick enough, you know, it's not that you can we can nip this ship in the bud, you know, Like, look, I as somebody who was in the podcast game for a very long time, had a podcast that a lot of people listen to and have a couple of them and have taken a break. I have not had a podcast of my own since twenty twenty one. That's about to change. The breaking news
that's about to change this year. I can't talk about it yet, but like you know, we you know, we don't need to hear every fucking opinion or every thought or every like every idea or every everything that comes to our mind. Does not need to have expos a or anything like this. It's just like, hey, man, networks, just like, let it get just stopped, just stop. Can just pay the people who have podcasts more money instead and putting more money into these new podcasts that like
nobody fucking wants to listen to. That's right. Anyway, your your podcast will be comparing the My podcast is about why ghost Dad is one of the greatest. Want to make sure that you clarified that. Okay, all right, well, Perry Mason, wonderful having both of you guys on the Daily zeit Geist. Where can people find you? Follow you all that good stuff anywhere good podcasts are found, so probably the same place you're listening to this right now. And you can check us out on the web at
Digital Folklore dot fm. There you go. Probably the easiest route, right. And is there a tweet or work of media that you guys have been enjoying. I mean, mine's not particularly insightful or anything. It was just I scrolled by it earlier today and it's lodged itself in my brain. From a friend of mine who does voice, he tweeted, you're in her DMS. I'm in my booth auditioning to play a gay catboy in her indie visual novel. We are
not the same. There you go for me. So it's not a tweet, but it is a TikTok creator that I found called there I ruined it and they do really interesting and sometimes obnoxious mashups of different bands and in ways that are surprising. There you go, Jakis, Where can people find and is there any media that you've been enjoying? Ah? Well, listen, you can always find me in these streets, as per usual at Jackie's Neil on
the I G in the Meta universe. Yeah yeah, yeah. Also, let me get little plugs and little plugs in watch How I Met Your Father is Aaron o Hulu right now, Grand Crew on NBC debut in March third. I know y'all better, I know that's after Black History Month, but you're better be there. You're better watch the show. Get our ratings up, so you know, if that show can get a third season. It's a fun show. A lot of Carl Tart on that show, a favorite uh in the podcast world, a lot of dope Nicole Buyer, a
lot of dope people. So definitely watch that. Yeah, you know, listen, I got I got some, I got some uh, I got some tweets or some some things that I've seen. But one of my things is this isn't a video, this isn't something I can share, but like, it's a video of black people cooking poorly. They they crack me up because if you think black people roast white folks when they be making like their dumb shit on the internet, wait till you see black folks roast they own when
they make bad food on it. It is truly just some of the funniest goddamn things that I've ever seen, and I love it. Also, there is a Will of Fortune clip going around poor young I think she looked like she was at college girl or something like that, and she had one letter to go. The word was obviously fresh f R. E. S. H the only letter missing was the S and it was like fresh fruit or some shit like that, and the girl spend didn't
and said gee, and of course it was wrong. And then unless girls like I'd like to solve the puzzle fresh and you know, pass a Jack, he was like, and the nicest way possible. It was like, you know, sometimes you just can't see a word and then you hear it and you're like, ah, that's it. And I was like, what a nice way to say, she's a moron? You know. It is just so we've all been there. You know, we've all been there. Listen. I absolutely love watching game show fails on YouTube. It's one of my
favorite things to do, so check that out. Speaking of game shows, Comedian Feud. This Sunday, if you're in La or are, you're gonna be here and every last Sunday at a month at Elesian Theater I hosted. We play a live version of family Feud on stage. Reggie watch Dan Black this month, Next month's got Akaman Jason Mansukus. We got a lot of toepeople coming through, so come on out. It's a blast. Jack has done it. Jack has done it. I forgot I was on the I
was on the dailies. Like guys, I think a week before you were about to be on there, but you were missing. You weren't on there, and I completely forgot to tell you know, the Zike world, the Zych Gang to come out and see you. They messed out you because I I was dominant. Dominant helped your team lose. Still there's one Yeah, there's one answer that still haunts me to this day. It's like, what something you bring on a first date? And I said, what did you say?
I'm never gonna that. I was like thinking, yeah, I would just say it's a blind date. You don't know, you have a friend backing you up. But it was just like a little, a little what I wasn't thinking on the family feud level when I now you're you're being responsible. Yeah, you're on that dad level. I was on that G F R E g H tip frag freg. I'd like to guess you would bring a freg. Yeah that's I'm gonna name my future kid. There you go.
Uh tweet I've been enjoying. There's a historic VIDs just has a video of flat Earth or accidentally proves the Earth is round in his own experiment and it's just worth watching because he's see that's that's interesting. That's and then he just like stop starting. I'd seen that. It's amazing, it's awesome. It's just a beam of light pointing through two holes that are separated by seventeen feet and he's like, huh, I'm sure he found a way to justify it to
not being true. But you can find me on Twitter, Jack Underscore O'Brien. You can find us on Twitter at daily Zeitgeist. We're at d daily Zeitgeist on Instagram. We have a Facebook fan page on a website daily zeitgeist dot com where we post our episodes on our foot No. No, we're link off to the information that we talked about in today's episode, as well as a song that we think you might enjoy. Super producer justin what song do
we think people might enjoy? Well, I chose this song and um oh I joined the discord by the way, everybody, so I've been seeing your comments and so this song is inspired by the people who think I sound like a stone middle schooler. Um this is justin No, I feel like I feel like I feel like it was a compliment. I truly do I think I don't know. Um. This is a song by a trinidaddy and artist named Marlon Asher. It's called Ganja Farmer. The song actually came
out maybe like my freshman year of high school. I really love this track. It's been a long time since I've heard it, and that conversation truly did remind me of this, so you know, positive thing came out of it. So yeah, listen to this song Gonja Farmer by Marlon Asher and you can find that song in the footnotes foot note. The Daily Zeke has a producture by Heart Radio. For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the iHeart
Radio app, Apple podcast wherever your listener favorite shows. That's gonna do it for us this morning, back this afternoon to tell you what's trending, and we'll talk to you all then fight