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Speaker 1: Hello the Internet, and welcome to Season two ninety eight,

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Speaker 1: episode two of daylyes I Guys Day production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 1: This is a podcast where we take a deep dive

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Speaker 1: into American share consciousness. It is Tuesday, one of our

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Speaker 1: special EPPS Deep Dive Epps. It's August first. Welcome to

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Speaker 1: August first. Welcome, Welcome to August first. Welcome to August

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty three. Yeah, eight one twenty three miles. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: It's International Majong Day. Okay, just so you know, International

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Speaker 1: Child Free Day. I don't know what that means. Hopefully

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Speaker 1: it just means, hey, do you World.

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Speaker 2: Cancer, World Lung Cancer Day, Respect for Parents' Day, National

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Speaker 2: Minority Donor Awareness Day.

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Speaker 1: We got it all.

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Speaker 2: We've got it all.

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Speaker 1: Talk Respect for Parents' Day feels like it was created

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Speaker 1: by a dad in shorts and lung sucks saying you

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Speaker 1: will respect me.

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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, exactly.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, weird, I gave you love.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. I say weird.

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Speaker 1: Because I just said that five minutes ago. My kids,

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Speaker 1: my name's Jackobrah. Aka. Let's talk about space, baby, Let's

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Speaker 1: talk about you a piece. Let's talk about all the

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Speaker 1: tech things, non human things and n FT's courtesy of

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Speaker 1: Blinky hagg on the discord are UAP bros. The new

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Speaker 1: NFT bros. Feels like there's a certain portion of people

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Speaker 1: who are like the UFO praise on Capitol Hill last week.

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Speaker 1: It's just the new u NFTs, the new thing that

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Speaker 1: captured the attention and entire hearts of the gullible. And

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Speaker 1: to that, I say to the moon that remained personally

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Speaker 1: fascinated by the story, even if they're lying, like it's

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Speaker 1: such a wild lie to tell on Capitol Hill. So anyways,

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Speaker 1: I'm thrilled to be joined as a by my co host,

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Speaker 1: mister Miles.

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Speaker 2: Grab Miles break k.

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Speaker 1: I'm here under oath. I swear this is real.

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Speaker 2: I'm bold, and I have named prying States on UFOs

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Speaker 2: delusionistic claim. Just watch the film real there's no deep

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Speaker 2: bake to forty p that Dick take is their born. Okay,

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Speaker 2: shout out to Razac again, Natalie and Brookly a torn Also,

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Speaker 2: I also caught that at the karaoke party with that

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Speaker 2: this weekend, but they were not doing UAP adjacent lyrics.

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Speaker 1: So thanks there at Razac on their problem. Man. Yeah, Miles,

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Speaker 1: we are thrilled to be joined in our third seat

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Speaker 1: by when we decided to do the Deep Dive episodes.

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Speaker 1: Probably the first name that came up the executive director

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Speaker 1: of Civil Rights Corps, which is a nonprofit dedicated to

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Speaker 1: fighting systemic injustice. He's been a civil rights lawyer, a

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Speaker 1: public defender. He was named twenty sixteen's Trial Lawyer of

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Speaker 1: the Year by Public Justice. He's the author of several books,

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Speaker 1: most recently the incredibly compelling Usual Cruelty. Most importantly a

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Speaker 1: great follow on social media, please welcome the brilliant, the

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Speaker 1: talented Alec carricotsons.

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Speaker 3: Hi, everyone thinks having me back.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, thanks course, thanks for being bave you.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. The first time, I forget exactly what we talked about,

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Speaker 1: but I'm sure there was some very stupid stories in

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Speaker 1: there and we were like yeah. We were like, man,

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Speaker 1: I'd like to just hear Alec talk about Alec things.

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Speaker 1: And then we created a new format of episodes. Let

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Speaker 1: Alec cook is what they've been saying on the discord.

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Speaker 1: These are the let Alec cook episodes. Yeah, yeah, so yeah,

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Speaker 1: thrilled to have you here, thrilled to talk to you

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Speaker 1: about Usual Cruelty. Let's get to know you a little

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Speaker 1: bit better. What is something sir from your search history.

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Speaker 1: That's revealing about who you are.

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Speaker 3: That's such a good question. So lately I've been making

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Speaker 3: a lot. I make a lot of paintings in general,

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Speaker 3: and lately I've been making a lot of mosaics. And

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Speaker 3: I was making a bunch of mosaics from flowers that

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Speaker 3: I grew and then I dried, and then I take

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Speaker 3: different colors and try to make little designs. And then

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Speaker 3: I tried to get a little bit more ambitious and

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Speaker 3: make mosaics out of like wine corps. And so I

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Speaker 3: asked a bunch of my friends family to collect wine

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Speaker 3: corks for me. But but I, you know, I guess

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Speaker 3: they don't drink enough, so I don't have enough wine quarks, right,

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Speaker 3: And so I started searching, you know, how do you

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Speaker 3: buy There's a whole market on.

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Speaker 1: The internet used wine like us wineqorks.

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Speaker 3: Different sizes, shapes, designs, colors a little overwhelming. So I've

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Speaker 3: been googling wine corks that I can make a very

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Speaker 3: large wine cork mosaic.

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Speaker 2: Wait, how what's what's like the market for Lucy's what

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Speaker 2: we call loose wine corks.

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Speaker 3: You know, it depends on you know, the exact size

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Speaker 3: and shape you know champagne corks. Do you want quarks

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Speaker 3: that are stained with red wine? Do you want right,

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Speaker 3: don't have a red wine stain? You want quarks that

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Speaker 3: have a design on the top, design on the side.

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Speaker 3: I mean, it's really kind of it's overwhelming, and you

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Speaker 3: can sort of go down some rabbit holes there. But

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Speaker 3: I just want, you know, some simple, straightforward wine corks

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Speaker 3: that I can paint different colors.

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Speaker 2: Right, right, right, yeah, Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I noticed a couple of times and usual cruelty when

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Speaker 1: you're talking about things that could be funded instead of

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Speaker 1: of you know, a police state and an unjust carceral system.

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Speaker 1: You talk about like the arts and funding the arts

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Speaker 1: and public education and for youth education. Is that something

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Speaker 1: that you like? How do you keep that as a

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Speaker 1: part of your life? Is that something that kind of

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Speaker 1: keeps you grounded as you're dealing with some pretty real

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Speaker 1: difficult subjects during the course of your work.

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Speaker 3: Absolutely, When you think about, for example, do you know

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Speaker 3: about hundreds of billions of dollars that this country spends

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Speaker 3: on things that destroy things like bombs and fighter jets

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Speaker 3: and weapons and police prisons, et cetera. Even a tiny

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Speaker 3: fraction of that money could be spent giving it to

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Speaker 3: people to make things, whether it's theater performances or murals, gardens, poetry, writing, film.

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Speaker 3: I mean, we could be filling our society with beauty

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Speaker 3: and providing hundreds of thousands of jobs in the process,

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Speaker 3: all for just a tiny fraction of the money that

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Speaker 3: we spend destroying things. And for me working with artists,

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Speaker 3: we do a lot of work in our organization with

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Speaker 3: artists who've been in prison, artists who are thinking about

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Speaker 3: how to create beautiful art in their communities that documents,

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Speaker 3: you know, some of the horrific things that are happening,

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Speaker 3: but also some of the hope and some of the

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Speaker 3: beautiful things that people are coming up with in the

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Speaker 3: spheit of fighting back against these systems. And so we

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Speaker 3: have an artist and a poet in residence every year

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Speaker 3: in our organization who are people who've been in prison

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Speaker 3: and who are now making a living as artists. And

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Speaker 3: we've had exhibits in major museums across the country, and

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Speaker 3: we're constantly trying to think about how do we tell

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Speaker 3: the story of what's happening in the criminal punishment bureaucracy,

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Speaker 3: which has a tendency to dehumanize and to become the

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Speaker 3: sort of assembly line system of punishment. How do we

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Speaker 3: tell stories in a really different way that reaches people,

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Speaker 3: maybe in a way that lawyers can't typically do it

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Speaker 3: with their legal arguments, but through art, and so art

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Speaker 3: has always been a really big Music has always been

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Speaker 3: a big, really big part of my life.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, have you did you grow up painting or is

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Speaker 1: that something that kind of came late?

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Speaker 3: No, I have absolutely no skill when I say I'm

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Speaker 3: a scene because I really I really shouldn't even be

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Speaker 3: saying that in public. They're not. I grew up back

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Speaker 3: playing the piano. Actually, I was trained as a classical

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Speaker 3: pianist and doing musical theater and was never permitted to

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Speaker 3: do any artwork because I was I had just absolutely

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Speaker 3: no skill. But I really like making art now, and

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Speaker 3: so that's kind of my hobby of choice when I

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Speaker 3: get a chance, although I'm not going to be winning

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Speaker 3: any art awards.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, late in life getting into painting feeling like the

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Speaker 1: other example that popped into my mind is is one

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Speaker 1: of my favorite artists, George W. No, Bob Dylan like

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Speaker 1: went through a stage in his career where he started

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Speaker 1: painting and like it kind of unlocked some of the

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Speaker 1: best albums of his career. And then you see his

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Speaker 1: paintings from that time, they're like not, you know, they're

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Speaker 1: not great. I'm sure they've sold at auction for like

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Speaker 1: a lot of money before, but you know, just the

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Speaker 1: act of painting seems seems to unlock things. Well, yeah,

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Speaker 1: because you're you're quite You're like, it's another language you're using.

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Speaker 1: If you're not make used to making, if you're not

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Speaker 1: a visual artist, and you start doing like getting into

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Speaker 1: the visual arts, you're gonna you're activating parts of your

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Speaker 1: brain that you were not previously. So I can totally

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Speaker 1: see how that would be super creatively stimulating. Yeah. I

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Speaker 1: think Blood on the Tracks was one that he talked

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Speaker 1: about like painting being a big thing, like he was

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Speaker 1: experimenting with new painting styles or something and that created

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Speaker 1: new kind of concepts of time. Anyways, And that's not

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Speaker 1: to say you are late in life, just later in

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Speaker 1: life than most people start painting. I don't want to

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Speaker 1: suggest you're an elderly man.

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Speaker 2: No, No, we're not doing that.

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Speaker 1: What is something you think is overrated?

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Speaker 3: I think prisons are overrated. You know, we we have

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Speaker 3: a society that's putting people in prison at rates unprecedented world.

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Speaker 3: We put black people in prison six times the rate

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Speaker 3: of South Africa at the height of apartheid. We put

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Speaker 3: all people in prison at six times our own national

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Speaker 3: average prior to nineteen eighty. And when you read the news,

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Speaker 3: when you listen to the radio, you know every single

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Speaker 3: social problem that our society has the solution of people

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Speaker 3: in powers while we need more prisons. You know, we've

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Speaker 3: got a drug use problem, We've got prisons, We've got

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Speaker 3: homelessness prisons. So I think the idea that prisons are

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Speaker 3: somehow connected with our safety is one of the most

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Speaker 3: extraordinary myths of our modern society. And in reality, what

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Speaker 3: we know from decades of empirical research is that prisons

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Speaker 3: actually don't reduce crime at all, and actually slightly increased crime.

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Speaker 3: And really importantly, and a lot of people don't know this,

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Speaker 3: but every year in prison takes two years off a

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Speaker 3: person's life expectancy. And so because the US imprisons so

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Speaker 3: many people, and this is one of the most incredible

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Speaker 3: statistics that no one knows, our overall life expectancy is

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Speaker 3: an entire country is almost two years lower than it

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Speaker 3: would be if we incartrate people the same as other

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Speaker 3: comparable countries like Europe, Canada, South America, et cetera. So

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Speaker 3: we're literally with prisons costing hundreds of millions of life

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Speaker 3: years in our society. It's really remarkable, and so I

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Speaker 3: think prisons are one of the most overrated things in

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Speaker 3: our society.

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Speaker 2: That's wild that that number that like, because America will

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Speaker 2: never get to like eighty years old. It's as like

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Speaker 2: seventy eight, seventy seven ish. That too, like we'd maybe

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Speaker 2: be more in line with the UK, which is around

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Speaker 2: eighty if we just weren't locking people up. And that

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Speaker 2: was I didn't realize how much that was affecting life expectance.

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Speaker 3: It really does for a variety of reasons. Right, people

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Speaker 3: are exposed to infectious disease, they don't get medical care,

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Speaker 3: they don't get nutritious food, stress, there's violence. People who

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Speaker 3: grew up with parents in prison are more likely to

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Speaker 3: enter the foster care system or more likely to enter

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Speaker 3: the criminalsism, which then creates these cycles. And so there's

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Speaker 3: a lot of mechanisms that cause it, including people can't

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Speaker 3: get jobs after they get out of prison. They can

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Speaker 3: so like the longer you're away, the lesser you're able

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Speaker 3: to enter their workforce, you're lesser able to find stable housing.

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Speaker 3: So it's really remarkable and it's not discussed very much,

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Speaker 3: but it has a huge impact on all of our

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Speaker 3: life expectancies.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I mean that like you just did it there,

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Speaker 1: but like something that your book and you know, following

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Speaker 1: you and reading you consistently, I feel like you you

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Speaker 1: do a good job of like making people see the

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Speaker 1: insanity of our current system with fresh eyes. So yeah,

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Speaker 1: and we'll we'll continue digging into that. What is What's

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Speaker 1: something you think is underrated?

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Speaker 3: You know, I've been thinking a lot recently about David Graber,

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Speaker 3: who died in during the pandemic and is one of

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Speaker 3: my favorite writers and thinkers, and I think he's really underrated.

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Speaker 3: A lot of people in mainstream US society don't know

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Speaker 3: about David Graber, who wasn't professor at Yale, and he

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Speaker 3: was sort of forced out of Yale for being too

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Speaker 3: progressive and ended up teaching in the UK in London

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Speaker 3: for the rest of his career. And you know, if

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Speaker 3: I had to recommend one thing, super fun, short, amazing

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Speaker 3: book called Utopia of Rules, which you can even read

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Speaker 3: for free online, It's an incredible introduction into so many

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Speaker 3: things about our society. Has everything in it, from a

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Speaker 3: critique of the Batman movies, superheroes generally, to a critique

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Speaker 3: of bureaucracy and capitalism and really great thoughts and ideas

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Speaker 3: about how we live our lives. It's just an incredible

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Speaker 3: and a brilliant book. He was one of the leading

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Speaker 3: anthropologists in the world, but he used those anthropology skills

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Speaker 3: to really turn his eye toward analyzing some of the

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Speaker 3: ways in which our society is actually incredibly violent. And

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Speaker 3: he was also really interested in the concept of play,

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Speaker 3: and he was a big proponent and that people should

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Speaker 3: be working less and playing a lot more. And so

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Speaker 3: he has other great essays, for example, on why it

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Speaker 3: is that the police hate puppets. He has really great

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Speaker 3: work on why it is that animals really love to

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Speaker 3: play and and why modern society is crushing the spirit

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Speaker 3: of play and people. And so I think it's a

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Speaker 3: really beautiful, funny, uplifting, but also very intelligent set of writing.

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Speaker 3: So David Graeber is something I recommend. Its underrated.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, he's one of my favorites. I talk about him

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Speaker 1: a lot on the show that the Dawn of Everything

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Speaker 1: is so great. Bullshit jobs we talked about a lot

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Speaker 1: on the show, but yeah, the way The Dawn of

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Speaker 1: Everything uses anthropology to like dig into like that there

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Speaker 1: was that myth that like, well, even though like there

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Speaker 1: are problems with modern society, you pink like pinker's a

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Speaker 1: whole narrative that like when when you look before colonialism,

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Speaker 1: things were a lot worse than like, everybody was way

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Speaker 1: more violent, and he just like demolishes that and it's like, actually,

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Speaker 1: like we're way, way worse than those And then like

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Speaker 1: takes you through some of the ways that civilizations that

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Speaker 1: you don't learn about in generally in American educational systems

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Speaker 1: organize themselves and like really interested in some like indigenous

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Speaker 1: communities and valued these things that have been completely written

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Speaker 1: out of our society. And again like really makes you

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Speaker 1: see the some of the assumptions that I think a

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Speaker 1: lot of us take for granted on a day to

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Speaker 1: day basis about the world we live in again with

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Speaker 1: fresh eyes, it makes them kind of stick out to

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Speaker 1: you as being as weird as they should seem to you.

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Speaker 1: Why do police hate puppets? I Actually I've never read,

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Speaker 1: so I'm going to immediately act on this underrated and

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Speaker 1: read Utopia of Rules. I've read, you know, Bullshit Jobs

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Speaker 1: and History of Debt and The Dawn of Everything, but

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Speaker 1: I never read Utopia of Rules.

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Speaker 3: Of those books, I think Utopia Rules is my favorite.

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Speaker 3: I think it's it's his best, most concise work. So

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Speaker 3: I think you're in for a treat. And Okay, the

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Speaker 3: other essay you can read for free online is called

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Speaker 3: on the Feminology of Giant Puppet Puppets, and it's a

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Speaker 3: sort of a It has a lot of pictures in it.

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Speaker 3: It's about sort of the protest culture of the early

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Speaker 3: two thousands and why police always target puppets when they

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Speaker 3: go to protests, and why they always try to destroy puppets,

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Speaker 3: and why police officers are so infuriated by my puppets.

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Speaker 3: And I don't want to give too much away, but

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Speaker 3: it's also a great essay.

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Speaker 1: Wow, all right, well we're going to take a break.

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Speaker 1: I'm going to go read that, and we'll come back

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Speaker 1: in like three hours too with our puppet continue talking

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Speaker 1: about puppets. Now, we're going to take a quick break,

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Speaker 1: and then we're gonna dig in to some of your work,

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Speaker 1: and specifically the book Usual cruelty. So we'll be right

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Speaker 1: back and we're back and Alec, you know, we can

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Speaker 1: talk about how you're an author and a civil rights activist,

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Speaker 1: but I'd be curious just to here kind of you

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Speaker 1: talk about like your day to day and the ethos

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Speaker 1: that drives you, Like what is your central kind of

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Speaker 1: ethos that propels you and what is the work that

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Speaker 1: you're kind of doing on a regular basis. He kind

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Speaker 1: of talked about it a little bit with working with

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Speaker 1: imprisoned people and art and some of that, but you

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Speaker 1: just kind of speak to how you use your life

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Speaker 1: to address some of the things that you talk about

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Speaker 1: in your book.

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Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely. So I started my career after I graduated

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Speaker 3: from law school as a public defender and I was

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Speaker 3: representing people who were accused of crimes. I was working

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Speaker 3: in Alabama at the time, and those clients of mine

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Speaker 3: were people who were accused of serious crimes but couldn't

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Speaker 3: afford a lawyer, so I was representing them. And that

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Speaker 3: was a really incredible way to start my career because

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Speaker 3: I saw up close just how senseless and ineffective and brutal,

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Speaker 3: the chronal punishment pure acer she was. You know, so

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Speaker 3: almost exclusively poor people who are prosecuted in our society,

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Speaker 3: right about ninety percent of he'll prosecute are poor. The

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Speaker 3: criminal punishment system has separated tens of millions of children

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Speaker 3: from their parents in the last couple of decades in

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Speaker 3: this country, with absolutely no evidence that it does any

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Speaker 3: good or makes anyone any better. And so I got

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Speaker 3: I eventually became a public defender martian in DC, and

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Speaker 3: then in twenty thirteen I got a grant from Harvard

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Speaker 3: Law School to start my own nonprofit organization that you know,

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Speaker 3: use a lot of the insights that I had learned

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Speaker 3: from that work as a public defender, and really was

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Speaker 3: a new project for me. I was trying to not

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Speaker 3: defend individual criminal cases, but to affirmatively use civil rights laws,

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Speaker 3: which are really powerful. You know, we have actually like

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Speaker 3: pretty decent civil rights laws on the books. We have

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Speaker 3: in theory, at least in writing. We have a fairly

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Speaker 3: decent constitutional protections. They are almost never obviously enforced in practice,

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Speaker 3: especially for poor people people of color. But the idea was,

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Speaker 3: what would it look like if we use civil rights

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Speaker 3: laws affirmatively to attack mass incarceration, to attack the really

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Speaker 3: profitable centers of like revenue generation in the criminal punishment system,

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Speaker 3: et cetera, and really try to stop the system from

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Speaker 3: metastasizing the way that it was. And so for the

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Speaker 3: last ten years I've been engaged in that project, and

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Speaker 3: obviously that work is really, really difficult. We've had enormous success.

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Speaker 3: You know, our cases have gotten hundreds of thousands of

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Speaker 3: people out of jail. You know, we've helped put the

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Speaker 3: issue of the money bail system on the map. You know,

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Speaker 3: in this country and the Philippines are the only two

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Speaker 3: countries in the world with a for profit, multi billion

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Speaker 3: dollar commercial money bail system where private corporations decide who's

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Speaker 3: in jail and who's not pending trial. And that's a nasue.

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Speaker 3: We've worked on a lot. We've had enormous success on

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Speaker 3: many many issues, is whether it's police brutality, prosecutor misconduct,

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Speaker 3: the fines and fees system, where hundreds of thousands of

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Speaker 3: people are jailed every year in this country just because

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Speaker 3: they can't afford to pay debts to the court from

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Speaker 3: things like traffic tickets, et cetera. But you know, after

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Speaker 3: all of that work, the system really hasn't changed in

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Speaker 3: any kind of fundamental way. Over the last few years,

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Speaker 3: we've made it, you know, a little bit less harsh.

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Speaker 3: When I say we, I mean, you know, largely the

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Speaker 3: people who are most impacted by the systems working in

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Speaker 3: their own communities all over the country, with the assistance

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Speaker 3: of sometimes you know, lawyers and organizers and others, but

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Speaker 3: all of us collectively have been working on this for

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Speaker 3: a long time. We've made some progress, but the fundamental

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Speaker 3: architecture of the system just continues to grow. And that's because,

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Speaker 3: like any big government bureaucracy, with lots of people profiting

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Speaker 3: it every single turn, it's really really hard to shrink it.

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Speaker 3: There's at every stage, from the moment you're arrested until

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Speaker 3: the moment you walk out of the prison door after

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Speaker 3: serving twenty years sentence, someone is making a profit off

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Speaker 3: of every single thing that happens to you. They even

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Speaker 3: got rid of in person visits at jails all over

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Speaker 3: the country on the theory that if you let kids

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Speaker 3: come in and hug their parents, they won't spend as

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Speaker 3: much money on phone calls. And so they signed all

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Speaker 3: these contracts in thousands of jails around the country to

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Speaker 3: eliminate the ability of children to hug their parents because

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Speaker 3: they wanted to charge higher rates and get more money

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Speaker 3: for prison and jail phone and video calls. That's what

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Speaker 3: we're dealing with here. Yeah, and people like, you know,

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Speaker 3: the person who owns the largest for profit telecom company

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Speaker 3: for jails and prisons is also the owner of the

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Speaker 3: Detroit Pistons, And it's very powerful. People in our society

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Speaker 3: are making hundreds of millions of dollars off of every

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Speaker 3: single aspect of the system. And so every day, you know,

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Speaker 3: my job looks like trying to identify new areas where

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Speaker 3: people are being harmed and suffering, and meeting with families

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Speaker 3: and organized and academics and researchers and other folks who

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Speaker 3: care about these systems, and trying to come up with

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Speaker 3: ways of solving these problems, whether it's policy solutions or

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Speaker 3: sometimes a lot of time we have to sue people.

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Speaker 3: We do a lot of suing people in court over

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Speaker 3: their violations of people's rights. And I think the one

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Speaker 3: overriding thing that keeps me going is looking at these

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Speaker 3: systems and how ineffective and wasteful and fraudulent they are. Like,

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Speaker 3: I'm very confident that if more people in the US

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Speaker 3: really knew what was happening in their name in these systems,

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Speaker 3: they would not support them. It's scandalous. You know, the

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Speaker 3: amount of money that's being wasted, amount of pain that's

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Speaker 3: being caused. We could very easily have a different world,

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Speaker 3: and that that hope and that thought is really what

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Speaker 3: keeps me going, right.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, brief brief footnote for people to listen to our

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Speaker 1: episode on private equity because that prism phone calls and

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Speaker 1: profiting off of people in prison and you know, basically

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Speaker 1: their misery and their separation from families is one of

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Speaker 1: the industries that private equity has come in and take over,

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Speaker 1: taken over and the past couple decades. But yeah, I

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Speaker 1: mean that was one of the things that jumped out

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Speaker 1: to me. Like if you sit people down and told

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Speaker 1: them that stat there five hundred thousand people who are

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Speaker 1: in prison tonight because they don't have enough money, like

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Speaker 1: that would fuck them up. Like if you just if

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Speaker 1: you told them that that was the case about like

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Speaker 1: Victorian England, like you know, Oliver twist Era, like that

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Speaker 1: the ninety percent of people who are arrest it can't

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Speaker 1: afford a lawyer like that, you know, they'd picture a

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Speaker 1: world of debtor prisons like from some other time and

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Speaker 1: like ours is worse than that shit, Right, there is

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Speaker 1: a broad feeling that we talk about sometimes on this

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Speaker 1: show that like, young people are more leftist than past generations.

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Speaker 1: Do you do you feel that, do you, like take

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Speaker 1: any any hope in like the a sort of more

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Speaker 1: leftward move of younger people as as they age, and

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Speaker 1: as if the current generation and power ever rolling quishes power,

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Speaker 1: like if they somehow don't figure out how to live forever,

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Speaker 1: like the wind will eventually be at the back of

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Speaker 1: people who are trying to make these changes.

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Speaker 3: I have some hope for that. Obviously, we have to

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Speaker 3: cling to whatever hope we can muster in a time

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Speaker 3: of rising authoritarianism and ecological colaps. You know, we have

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Speaker 3: to have some hope. And I do see amazing young people.

434
00:23:30,560 --> 00:23:32,320
Speaker 3: I meet them every day in our work, and I

435
00:23:32,320 --> 00:23:36,200
Speaker 3: see them all over the country, and they definitely are

436
00:23:36,840 --> 00:23:41,639
Speaker 3: more attuned to these injustices then I was at that

437
00:23:41,720 --> 00:23:44,600
Speaker 3: age than my friends were that. You know, if you

438
00:23:44,640 --> 00:23:46,680
Speaker 3: look at the kinds of things that are being caught

439
00:23:46,760 --> 00:23:49,520
Speaker 3: in school. I'm not talking about you know, public schools

440
00:23:49,520 --> 00:23:52,199
Speaker 3: in Florida now with the Santis' new curriculum, but I mean,

441
00:23:52,359 --> 00:23:55,280
Speaker 3: just in general, if you look at like the classes

442
00:23:55,320 --> 00:23:59,560
Speaker 3: that are being caught at universities, community colleges, grad programs,

443
00:23:59,560 --> 00:24:02,480
Speaker 3: even high schools all over the country, there's a totally

444
00:24:02,560 --> 00:24:07,280
Speaker 3: new awareness to these issues of racial justice, these issues

445
00:24:07,280 --> 00:24:10,000
Speaker 3: of economic justice. I see it all the time talking

446
00:24:10,000 --> 00:24:12,400
Speaker 3: to hundreds of teachers across the country about their curricula.

447
00:24:12,920 --> 00:24:15,439
Speaker 3: So I think, young people, if you look at some

448
00:24:15,520 --> 00:24:21,520
Speaker 3: of the you know, subgenres in TikTok, you see like

449
00:24:21,560 --> 00:24:25,480
Speaker 3: a lot more chatter about these issues than there was.

450
00:24:25,680 --> 00:24:29,160
Speaker 3: At least this is only my anecdotal experience, but then

451
00:24:29,320 --> 00:24:33,919
Speaker 3: I remember even fifteen years ago. However, like I worry

452
00:24:33,960 --> 00:24:37,040
Speaker 3: that some of this stuff is really superficial. The depth

453
00:24:37,119 --> 00:24:42,160
Speaker 3: of understanding these systemic injustices and the systems that cause them,

454
00:24:42,680 --> 00:24:48,760
Speaker 3: and the overlaying the layers of propaganda is really difficult,

455
00:24:48,880 --> 00:24:51,120
Speaker 3: deep work that requires a lot of reading, a lot

456
00:24:51,119 --> 00:24:53,440
Speaker 3: of experience, a lot of critical thinking, a lot of humility.

457
00:24:53,800 --> 00:24:56,600
Speaker 3: And so it's not just being able to say I

458
00:24:56,640 --> 00:25:01,040
Speaker 3: hate capitalism, it's really being able to understand how it's

459
00:25:01,119 --> 00:25:08,760
Speaker 3: functioning and also developing a deep personal commitment to making

460
00:25:08,800 --> 00:25:13,800
Speaker 3: life better for everyone in our society that won't go

461
00:25:13,920 --> 00:25:17,640
Speaker 3: away at the first sign of adversity that can be enduring,

462
00:25:17,720 --> 00:25:21,119
Speaker 3: because any meaningful fight against these systems is very hard.

463
00:25:22,160 --> 00:25:25,200
Speaker 3: People make it unpleasant for you, and so I think

464
00:25:25,200 --> 00:25:27,520
Speaker 3: it remains to be seen whether this generation has the

465
00:25:27,560 --> 00:25:31,200
Speaker 3: depth of understanding and also the fortitude to keep going.

466
00:25:31,600 --> 00:25:33,080
Speaker 3: And that's why I talk to a lot of young

467
00:25:33,080 --> 00:25:35,960
Speaker 3: people about the importance not only of watching videos and

468
00:25:36,000 --> 00:25:38,000
Speaker 3: doing reading on your own, but getting involved with other

469
00:25:38,040 --> 00:25:41,760
Speaker 3: people and building relationships and like building a set of

470
00:25:42,240 --> 00:25:44,879
Speaker 3: people that you're in solidarity with and community with you

471
00:25:44,920 --> 00:25:48,240
Speaker 3: can hold each other accountable, because doing this fight alone

472
00:25:48,280 --> 00:25:52,680
Speaker 3: will inevitably isolate people and will inevitably make you give up.

473
00:25:52,920 --> 00:25:54,960
Speaker 3: And so the only chance that I see us having

474
00:25:55,040 --> 00:25:59,600
Speaker 3: is taking some of this increased energy and building lasting relationships.

475
00:26:00,000 --> 00:26:01,480
Speaker 3: And that's what I try to talk to young people

476
00:26:01,480 --> 00:26:01,960
Speaker 3: about all the.

477
00:26:01,920 --> 00:26:04,200
Speaker 2: Time, right because I think, you know, another thing you

478
00:26:04,240 --> 00:26:06,760
Speaker 2: always point out is just sort of how societally we've

479
00:26:06,840 --> 00:26:10,520
Speaker 2: just become numb to what our you know, quote unquote

480
00:26:10,560 --> 00:26:14,000
Speaker 2: criminal justice system is or is not in that label,

481
00:26:14,119 --> 00:26:16,439
Speaker 2: and how you know, for the most part, we just

482
00:26:16,720 --> 00:26:18,800
Speaker 2: aren't like in our minds like oh yeah, people are

483
00:26:18,840 --> 00:26:21,600
Speaker 2: like locked up in cages Okay, what's what else is

484
00:26:21,640 --> 00:26:24,119
Speaker 2: going on? But really the fact that we're not able

485
00:26:24,160 --> 00:26:27,080
Speaker 2: to really sit with just the reality of that and

486
00:26:27,119 --> 00:26:29,720
Speaker 2: begin to see like the humanity of that. And I

487
00:26:29,760 --> 00:26:31,720
Speaker 2: know that's like a huge bridge for I think a

488
00:26:31,720 --> 00:26:33,919
Speaker 2: lot of people to cross. And to your point, like

489
00:26:34,240 --> 00:26:35,879
Speaker 2: it's not enough about saying like, well, I don't like

490
00:26:35,960 --> 00:26:38,480
Speaker 2: capitalism too, it's like, can you see all of these

491
00:26:38,560 --> 00:26:42,960
Speaker 2: relationships manifesting in front of you? Because especially like over

492
00:26:42,960 --> 00:26:46,159
Speaker 2: the last few years, with so much talk about public

493
00:26:46,240 --> 00:26:49,000
Speaker 2: safety or crime and things like that, I think we

494
00:26:49,080 --> 00:26:51,639
Speaker 2: have so many things we have to begin to redefine

495
00:26:51,680 --> 00:26:54,159
Speaker 2: as what they are, Like is crime the idea that

496
00:26:54,200 --> 00:26:56,600
Speaker 2: there are just evil people out there who want to

497
00:26:56,640 --> 00:26:59,240
Speaker 2: fuck shit up? Or is it the fact that these

498
00:26:59,240 --> 00:27:02,760
Speaker 2: are the society societal failures that are manifesting in certain

499
00:27:02,920 --> 00:27:05,440
Speaker 2: you know, certain behaviors or people having to do things

500
00:27:05,600 --> 00:27:09,040
Speaker 2: like survival crime or things like that, and understanding, well,

501
00:27:09,080 --> 00:27:11,920
Speaker 2: where what are the like what actually makes us safe?

502
00:27:11,920 --> 00:27:14,680
Speaker 2: Because I think right now the default is well, put

503
00:27:14,680 --> 00:27:18,119
Speaker 2: this put the scary poor people in fucking jail. Like

504
00:27:18,200 --> 00:27:20,600
Speaker 2: that's and it just sort of our thinking ends there

505
00:27:20,600 --> 00:27:24,520
Speaker 2: without really trying to grapple with like this idea of

506
00:27:24,840 --> 00:27:27,760
Speaker 2: what is the system built for because it ain't justice,

507
00:27:28,359 --> 00:27:31,240
Speaker 2: and then then diving into that reality, like what do

508
00:27:31,240 --> 00:27:33,399
Speaker 2: you think, what are the what are the like I

509
00:27:33,400 --> 00:27:35,639
Speaker 2: think important steps I guess for someone to begin to

510
00:27:35,760 --> 00:27:38,399
Speaker 2: embrace that redefinition because I think that's something that people

511
00:27:38,400 --> 00:27:41,119
Speaker 2: get scared of, because I think, well, then there's no jail,

512
00:27:41,280 --> 00:27:44,159
Speaker 2: then I'm not safe. And you know, like we have

513
00:27:44,240 --> 00:27:47,239
Speaker 2: all these just sort of cliches that immediately kill like

514
00:27:47,280 --> 00:27:50,200
Speaker 2: our ability to analyze it any deeper. Like, what what

515
00:27:50,320 --> 00:27:51,960
Speaker 2: I guess for you and your work, how have you

516
00:27:52,000 --> 00:27:54,879
Speaker 2: been able to really present these ideas for people to

517
00:27:55,119 --> 00:27:57,600
Speaker 2: like what is the process of being able to fully

518
00:27:57,600 --> 00:28:00,320
Speaker 2: embrace or becoming more sensitive to the humanity of it

519
00:28:00,359 --> 00:28:01,720
Speaker 2: all and knowing what to do next?

520
00:28:02,400 --> 00:28:04,879
Speaker 1: You're programming people who are part of the cult of

521
00:28:05,040 --> 00:28:07,280
Speaker 1: the New York Times's what's your message?

522
00:28:07,400 --> 00:28:09,320
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, first, don't read the New York Times. It's

523
00:28:09,320 --> 00:28:11,520
Speaker 3: the first step. I'll just say. I've been thinking about

524
00:28:11,520 --> 00:28:14,480
Speaker 3: this a lot because I just agreed to write another

525
00:28:14,520 --> 00:28:19,640
Speaker 3: book on copaganda and the way in which it changes

526
00:28:19,680 --> 00:28:22,600
Speaker 3: how all of us think about safety and about how

527
00:28:22,640 --> 00:28:27,840
Speaker 3: to create safety. I think a first step, Miles is

528
00:28:28,840 --> 00:28:32,560
Speaker 3: like learning a little bit about like how the system's

529
00:28:32,640 --> 00:28:37,119
Speaker 3: actually functioning right now. So you know, for example, only

530
00:28:37,240 --> 00:28:40,760
Speaker 3: four percent all police time is spent on what the

531
00:28:40,760 --> 00:28:44,320
Speaker 3: police call violent crime. So you know, over the last

532
00:28:44,320 --> 00:28:47,200
Speaker 3: few years in this country, the police have chosen to

533
00:28:47,320 --> 00:28:50,920
Speaker 3: arrest more people from marijuana possessions than all violent crime combined.

534
00:28:52,320 --> 00:28:57,560
Speaker 3: Police and prosecutors virtually ignore completely things like wage step

535
00:28:58,080 --> 00:29:02,160
Speaker 3: packs of Asian corporate fraud. Right, These cause orders of

536
00:29:02,200 --> 00:29:05,680
Speaker 3: magnitude more harm than all their property crime combined. These

537
00:29:05,680 --> 00:29:07,760
Speaker 3: are the kind of things that lead to hundreds of

538
00:29:07,760 --> 00:29:12,480
Speaker 3: thousands of people dying through poverty, through eviction, through lost jobs, etc.

539
00:29:12,680 --> 00:29:15,760
Speaker 3: Et cetera. Same thing with illegal dumping of chemicals in

540
00:29:15,800 --> 00:29:18,360
Speaker 3: the water in the air. I mean one hundred thousand

541
00:29:18,360 --> 00:29:20,520
Speaker 3: people die every year in this country because of air pollution.

542
00:29:21,000 --> 00:29:24,440
Speaker 3: That's five times the number of homicides combined. So we

543
00:29:24,480 --> 00:29:28,120
Speaker 3: need to think about questions like, well, what are police

544
00:29:28,240 --> 00:29:31,239
Speaker 3: spending their time on, right, Like, if you've got a

545
00:29:31,320 --> 00:29:35,800
Speaker 3: force that chooses to arrest people for drug possession instead

546
00:29:35,840 --> 00:29:40,320
Speaker 3: of testing rape kits right, that hardly ever investigates or

547
00:29:40,400 --> 00:29:43,680
Speaker 3: arrest people for sexual assault, doesn't do undercover operations to

548
00:29:43,840 --> 00:29:47,000
Speaker 3: uncover sexual assault, right, you know, cross and this is

549
00:29:47,000 --> 00:29:48,800
Speaker 3: the kind of thing I talk about usual cruelty. I

550
00:29:48,800 --> 00:29:51,600
Speaker 3: give hundreds of examples like this, along with data and

551
00:29:51,680 --> 00:29:55,080
Speaker 3: evidence to back them up. But the first step I

552
00:29:55,080 --> 00:29:58,120
Speaker 3: think is understanding that although in the second half of

553
00:29:58,120 --> 00:30:00,880
Speaker 3: the twentieth century we started to be told that the

554
00:30:00,920 --> 00:30:04,040
Speaker 3: system of policing and punishment was to keep us safe,

555
00:30:04,600 --> 00:30:08,800
Speaker 3: actually those systems were never developed to lead to holistic safety, right.

556
00:30:08,880 --> 00:30:12,400
Speaker 3: And if more policing and prisons and punishment made us safe,

557
00:30:12,440 --> 00:30:14,280
Speaker 3: the US would be the safest society in the world

558
00:30:14,280 --> 00:30:16,600
Speaker 3: because nobody else even comes close. But we're not the

559
00:30:16,600 --> 00:30:19,040
Speaker 3: safest society in the world. We have lots of violence, right.

560
00:30:19,120 --> 00:30:24,640
Speaker 3: And so one of the key things to understand is

561
00:30:25,000 --> 00:30:28,720
Speaker 3: this system is not designed for safety or for justice,

562
00:30:29,240 --> 00:30:32,640
Speaker 3: but it is extremely profitable and beneficial. So, for example,

563
00:30:33,200 --> 00:30:37,240
Speaker 3: if you're someone who benefits from inequality in our society,

564
00:30:38,120 --> 00:30:42,240
Speaker 3: you might like a system that arrests and jails people

565
00:30:42,240 --> 00:30:46,800
Speaker 3: who are homeless rather than builds new housing for them, right,

566
00:30:47,360 --> 00:30:50,960
Speaker 3: or ensures that our society is more equal distribution of land.

567
00:30:51,320 --> 00:30:55,120
Speaker 3: So I think these are like fundamental social problems that

568
00:30:55,880 --> 00:30:57,640
Speaker 3: when you when you stop to think about it, it's

569
00:30:57,680 --> 00:31:01,200
Speaker 3: common sense that like things like crime are much more

570
00:31:01,200 --> 00:31:04,920
Speaker 3: a function of poverty and inequality, lack of access to housing,

571
00:31:04,960 --> 00:31:07,760
Speaker 3: lack of access to medical care. We know that, for example,

572
00:31:07,800 --> 00:31:10,400
Speaker 3: one of the most important things in predicting future crime

573
00:31:10,520 --> 00:31:13,800
Speaker 3: is investment in early childhood education. All of these things

574
00:31:13,920 --> 00:31:18,600
Speaker 3: dwarf any impact that like a prosecutor or a police

575
00:31:18,600 --> 00:31:21,720
Speaker 3: officer have on crime. So the first step I would

576
00:31:21,720 --> 00:31:24,160
Speaker 3: say to answer your question is really like deepening our

577
00:31:24,280 --> 00:31:27,200
Speaker 3: understanding of what do these systems do and why do

578
00:31:27,240 --> 00:31:31,840
Speaker 3: we have them? And from there, I think you can

579
00:31:31,880 --> 00:31:33,960
Speaker 3: start to think about, well, what are some of the

580
00:31:33,960 --> 00:31:38,560
Speaker 3: ways in other countries, other societies, certain places even in

581
00:31:38,600 --> 00:31:41,880
Speaker 3: the US are actually adopting really different strategies to safety.

582
00:31:41,880 --> 00:31:45,840
Speaker 3: They're actually much more effective than these systems of punishment

583
00:31:45,840 --> 00:31:48,240
Speaker 3: and pain that so much of the US isn't obsessed with.

584
00:31:48,880 --> 00:31:51,280
Speaker 2: Right, It's like, objectively, you can, like, I think the

585
00:31:51,320 --> 00:31:53,520
Speaker 2: most compelling thing that I always tell people who are like,

586
00:31:53,680 --> 00:31:55,960
Speaker 2: you know, not really thinking about this kind of shit

587
00:31:56,160 --> 00:31:59,680
Speaker 2: is just positing to them for how much money is spent?

588
00:32:00,560 --> 00:32:03,520
Speaker 2: Do you think like that's like this experiment is working

589
00:32:03,680 --> 00:32:06,320
Speaker 2: for the what near trillions of dollars that have been

590
00:32:06,360 --> 00:32:08,640
Speaker 2: spent on this, you know, this our form of crime

591
00:32:08,680 --> 00:32:11,880
Speaker 2: and punishment. It's not born out in the results at all.

592
00:32:11,920 --> 00:32:14,720
Speaker 2: It's just created an entire industry where people are profiting.

593
00:32:14,760 --> 00:32:16,840
Speaker 2: So in that sense, like you're like, well, it's an

594
00:32:17,040 --> 00:32:20,000
Speaker 2: l because you're not showing me anything that shows that

595
00:32:20,040 --> 00:32:22,600
Speaker 2: the money spent is there. The return comes in the

596
00:32:22,640 --> 00:32:26,040
Speaker 2: form of safety or lower crime, and that's like, you know,

597
00:32:26,080 --> 00:32:27,840
Speaker 2: that's usually like the one thing that you're like, well then,

598
00:32:27,880 --> 00:32:29,840
Speaker 2: and what do you say to that? And most people

599
00:32:29,880 --> 00:32:31,880
Speaker 2: are like, well, I don't know, it's just like probably

600
00:32:31,920 --> 00:32:33,600
Speaker 2: tough for whatever. It's like, no, it's cause it's not.

601
00:32:33,720 --> 00:32:36,080
Speaker 2: It's not designed to do that. Like look how many people,

602
00:32:36,200 --> 00:32:38,640
Speaker 2: like people you know who are cops who brag about

603
00:32:38,640 --> 00:32:40,920
Speaker 2: the overtime they get and then what their pensions look like,

604
00:32:40,960 --> 00:32:43,120
Speaker 2: and they're like it's fucking sweet dude, Like I'm getting

605
00:32:43,120 --> 00:32:46,600
Speaker 2: paid like six figures forever, like and that's it. It's

606
00:32:46,600 --> 00:32:48,880
Speaker 2: not because I have I have any interest in doing,

607
00:32:49,240 --> 00:32:52,640
Speaker 2: you know, about public safety, but because it's an arena

608
00:32:52,720 --> 00:32:55,920
Speaker 2: that allows me to exercise absolute power and I get

609
00:32:55,920 --> 00:32:57,120
Speaker 2: paid really handsomely for it.

610
00:32:57,760 --> 00:33:01,840
Speaker 1: Yeah, and just broadly, they're there's some anecdotes about the

611
00:33:01,880 --> 00:33:06,280
Speaker 1: shocking lack of accountability and lack of an appetite for

612
00:33:07,440 --> 00:33:13,080
Speaker 1: statistical you know, evidence that like these methods that they've

613
00:33:13,120 --> 00:33:17,400
Speaker 1: been using for a long time actually work, and you

614
00:33:17,440 --> 00:33:24,600
Speaker 1: talk about like that there are forensic methods that were

615
00:33:25,080 --> 00:33:30,600
Speaker 1: determined to be like scientifically fraudulent that the police like

616
00:33:30,760 --> 00:33:36,480
Speaker 1: kept kept using for like forever, like they kept using

617
00:33:36,520 --> 00:33:40,680
Speaker 1: them just because nobody's paying attention to whether the current

618
00:33:40,800 --> 00:33:45,040
Speaker 1: system works and just talking about like, I don't know.

619
00:33:45,200 --> 00:33:50,000
Speaker 1: Another detail that you bring up usual cruelty that made

620
00:33:50,080 --> 00:33:54,040
Speaker 1: me see kind of this current system a little bit

621
00:33:54,040 --> 00:33:58,400
Speaker 1: more clearly is I've never seen the war on drugs.

622
00:33:58,520 --> 00:34:00,400
Speaker 1: You know, the rise of the quote unquot war on

623
00:34:00,480 --> 00:34:06,160
Speaker 1: drugs and this investment in just out of control aggressive

624
00:34:06,240 --> 00:34:11,279
Speaker 1: caging of black bodies, and you know that next to

625
00:34:12,080 --> 00:34:18,239
Speaker 1: the backing away from prosecuting white collar crime and like that,

626
00:34:18,320 --> 00:34:20,680
Speaker 1: there was this two part movement like starting kind of

627
00:34:20,719 --> 00:34:25,520
Speaker 1: in the eighties with Reagan where suddenly they stopped holding

628
00:34:25,880 --> 00:34:30,120
Speaker 1: corporations and you know, white collar people responsible. And we

629
00:34:30,160 --> 00:34:32,920
Speaker 1: saw the result of that, or the culmination of that,

630
00:34:33,040 --> 00:34:36,520
Speaker 1: I guess in the two thousand and eight economic crisis,

631
00:34:36,560 --> 00:34:38,760
Speaker 1: where it was just you know, fraud on a massive

632
00:34:38,800 --> 00:34:43,560
Speaker 1: scale that is costing everyone in America so much money

633
00:34:43,960 --> 00:34:48,840
Speaker 1: and nobody is held accountable, right, and that is happening

634
00:34:48,840 --> 00:34:53,200
Speaker 1: at the same time that they've decided to start caging

635
00:34:53,520 --> 00:34:58,239
Speaker 1: other people for drug crimes, like crimes that you know,

636
00:34:58,600 --> 00:35:02,520
Speaker 1: it's been shown against bally that this doesn't make anyone

637
00:35:02,520 --> 00:35:03,560
Speaker 1: safer from drugs.

638
00:35:04,719 --> 00:35:06,520
Speaker 3: It's not really happening at the same time, but it's

639
00:35:06,560 --> 00:35:11,600
Speaker 3: part of the same plan. Yeah, you know, the administrations

640
00:35:11,640 --> 00:35:16,120
Speaker 3: of Reagan, Bush, Clinton, they all made and then Bush too,

641
00:35:16,600 --> 00:35:21,759
Speaker 3: they all made explicit decisions to transfer like literally jobs

642
00:35:22,360 --> 00:35:26,480
Speaker 3: away from things like antitrust, white collar crime, et cetera,

643
00:35:27,040 --> 00:35:33,759
Speaker 3: to the DEA, to FBI terrorism and drug like. So, like,

644
00:35:34,880 --> 00:35:38,960
Speaker 3: one of the things people don't really appreciate is police

645
00:35:39,160 --> 00:35:45,520
Speaker 3: prosecutors only investigate and look for some crimes committed by

646
00:35:45,600 --> 00:35:48,960
Speaker 3: some people some of the time, and the things that

647
00:35:49,120 --> 00:35:53,360
Speaker 3: come into the criminal punishment bureaucracy are the things that

648
00:35:53,400 --> 00:35:56,320
Speaker 3: they decide to look for. So if you take away

649
00:35:57,200 --> 00:35:59,680
Speaker 3: we have several hundred fewer people in the Anti Trust

650
00:35:59,680 --> 00:36:02,799
Speaker 3: Division than we did in nineteen seventy nine. So if

651
00:36:02,840 --> 00:36:05,240
Speaker 3: you take away hundreds of people that look for anti

652
00:36:05,239 --> 00:36:08,120
Speaker 3: trust violations by companies, and you give those people a

653
00:36:08,160 --> 00:36:11,240
Speaker 3: new job saying we want you to look for drug

654
00:36:11,280 --> 00:36:14,120
Speaker 3: crimes committed by poor people and immigrants, and you're going

655
00:36:14,200 --> 00:36:16,200
Speaker 3: to start prosecuting a lot more people because those are

656
00:36:16,239 --> 00:36:18,239
Speaker 3: the cases that are brought into the system. It's the

657
00:36:18,280 --> 00:36:21,240
Speaker 3: same thing with local police. If you say to local police,

658
00:36:21,680 --> 00:36:23,960
Speaker 3: we're going to give you financial incentives to set up

659
00:36:24,000 --> 00:36:27,239
Speaker 3: a checkpoint in poor neighborhoods to pull over cars and

660
00:36:27,280 --> 00:36:30,920
Speaker 3: search for drugs, instead of we're going to give you

661
00:36:30,960 --> 00:36:36,160
Speaker 3: money to test rape kits from sexual assault survivors. You're

662
00:36:36,160 --> 00:36:38,440
Speaker 3: going to start prostituting a lot more drug offenses than

663
00:36:38,480 --> 00:36:41,279
Speaker 3: you are rape cases. And that's exactly what we've seen

664
00:36:41,719 --> 00:36:44,440
Speaker 3: across the white collar spectrum in the US over the

665
00:36:44,520 --> 00:36:47,239
Speaker 3: last thirty or forty years. Just you can be very

666
00:36:47,360 --> 00:36:51,719
Speaker 3: very safe if you're a white collar potential criminal, be

667
00:36:51,840 --> 00:36:54,279
Speaker 3: very safe in knowing that you're very very unlikely to

668
00:36:54,280 --> 00:37:00,239
Speaker 3: get caught because we just are not investing the sort

669
00:37:00,280 --> 00:37:03,680
Speaker 3: of resources into looking for those crimes. That's why we

670
00:37:03,800 --> 00:37:09,200
Speaker 3: have over one trillion dollars in IRS estimated tax evasion

671
00:37:09,520 --> 00:37:11,400
Speaker 3: by wealthy people every year in the US. I mean

672
00:37:11,440 --> 00:37:14,880
Speaker 3: that is to put that in perspective, that's about one

673
00:37:14,960 --> 00:37:18,759
Speaker 3: hundred times all other property crime combined. And when you

674
00:37:19,000 --> 00:37:21,319
Speaker 3: hear in the news every day about these waves of

675
00:37:21,800 --> 00:37:25,440
Speaker 3: shoplifting and organized retail theft, it's pales in comparison to

676
00:37:25,520 --> 00:37:28,440
Speaker 3: the kind of crimes that the wealthy people are engaged

677
00:37:28,480 --> 00:37:30,239
Speaker 3: in without anyone paying attention to it.

678
00:37:30,440 --> 00:37:32,440
Speaker 2: Well, I will hold on alec because I feel like,

679
00:37:32,440 --> 00:37:36,080
Speaker 2: if you did the math on thirty math books stolen

680
00:37:36,160 --> 00:37:38,640
Speaker 2: from an Apple store, it probably comes out to like

681
00:37:38,680 --> 00:37:41,080
Speaker 2: a trillion dollars. I would like to check the math.

682
00:37:41,160 --> 00:37:43,800
Speaker 2: But yeah, yeah, I mean, I mean think of poor

683
00:37:43,920 --> 00:37:46,279
Speaker 2: cvs too, obviously, And you know that's actually funny. That

684
00:37:46,320 --> 00:37:47,400
Speaker 2: was I think one of the last things we did

685
00:37:47,480 --> 00:37:49,600
Speaker 2: talk about when you came on the show, because the

686
00:37:49,680 --> 00:37:54,320
Speaker 2: fucking idea of again these like these sort of media

687
00:37:54,400 --> 00:37:58,800
Speaker 2: fed narratives that are purposefully kept to obscure our understanding

688
00:37:59,040 --> 00:38:02,200
Speaker 2: of the horror or and the inhumanity of you know,

689
00:38:02,320 --> 00:38:05,799
Speaker 2: this criminal punishment bureaucracy. Great phrase. I like that, like,

690
00:38:06,160 --> 00:38:08,680
Speaker 2: and I guess does that I'm imagining. That's why a

691
00:38:08,680 --> 00:38:09,880
Speaker 2: lot of you, you're a lot of you have a

692
00:38:09,920 --> 00:38:11,960
Speaker 2: lot of smoke for The New York Times too, because

693
00:38:11,960 --> 00:38:13,800
Speaker 2: every time like we're like I was like, oh, Alex

694
00:38:13,840 --> 00:38:16,640
Speaker 2: got another fire thread against the New York Times, Like

695
00:38:16,960 --> 00:38:17,840
Speaker 2: I got to open this.

696
00:38:18,400 --> 00:38:18,799
Speaker 3: I'm sure.

697
00:38:19,160 --> 00:38:21,120
Speaker 2: I'm sure because for you, you see that as part

698
00:38:21,120 --> 00:38:23,640
Speaker 2: of one of the barriers for our ability to become

699
00:38:23,800 --> 00:38:28,319
Speaker 2: more sensitive right to what the scenarios and situations are

700
00:38:28,360 --> 00:38:28,879
Speaker 2: around us.

701
00:38:29,920 --> 00:38:33,640
Speaker 3: Obviously, the New York Post and Fox News and a

702
00:38:33,640 --> 00:38:36,560
Speaker 3: lot of the sort of right wing radio they're horrible

703
00:38:37,200 --> 00:38:40,840
Speaker 3: on these issues as well, and they spew misinformation and lies,

704
00:38:40,960 --> 00:38:47,719
Speaker 3: and it's all Willie Horton's style, you know, misinformation, But

705
00:38:48,280 --> 00:38:51,960
Speaker 3: like that's less interesting to me, and and and and

706
00:38:52,239 --> 00:38:55,759
Speaker 3: it's much more overtly nefarious. And I think a lot

707
00:38:55,800 --> 00:38:58,640
Speaker 3: of like well intentioned people can easily see through at

708
00:38:58,640 --> 00:39:01,359
Speaker 3: this point some of the propaganda undo that Fox News

709
00:39:01,400 --> 00:39:04,400
Speaker 3: is spewing, right, and that's kind of widely understood. But

710
00:39:05,239 --> 00:39:09,080
Speaker 3: ideologically what's so fascinating and so damaging and so harmful

711
00:39:09,160 --> 00:39:13,239
Speaker 3: is that a lot of like, you know, self conscious

712
00:39:13,280 --> 00:39:16,560
Speaker 3: liberals or self described liberals, I should say, people who

713
00:39:16,560 --> 00:39:18,600
Speaker 3: think of themselves or who want to think of themselves

714
00:39:18,600 --> 00:39:22,560
Speaker 3: as progressive. You know, they're consuming these these news sources

715
00:39:22,600 --> 00:39:25,960
Speaker 3: like NPR, the New York Times, the Atlantic that in

716
00:39:26,040 --> 00:39:31,680
Speaker 3: many respects are spewing almost exactly the same authoritarian ideology,

717
00:39:32,200 --> 00:39:35,080
Speaker 3: many of the same underlying assumptions, but those news sources

718
00:39:35,120 --> 00:39:39,800
Speaker 3: have adopted like an air of sophistication, slightly different tone,

719
00:39:40,360 --> 00:39:44,000
Speaker 3: slightly different words that are catered at their more liberal audience.

720
00:39:44,040 --> 00:39:47,359
Speaker 3: And so I think it's more interesting and potentially more

721
00:39:47,520 --> 00:39:49,520
Speaker 3: you know, better use of my time rather than pointing

722
00:39:49,560 --> 00:39:53,960
Speaker 3: out how every Fox News article is racist and is

723
00:39:54,040 --> 00:39:57,359
Speaker 3: trying to you know, increase the profits of the bail

724
00:39:57,400 --> 00:40:01,480
Speaker 3: industry whatever it is, pointing out how these these outlets

725
00:40:01,520 --> 00:40:06,640
Speaker 3: that are seen as more prestigious, more liberal, more balanced,

726
00:40:06,800 --> 00:40:09,520
Speaker 3: more objective, are actually doing many of the same things

727
00:40:09,600 --> 00:40:11,880
Speaker 3: in a more sophisticated way that's harder to see for

728
00:40:11,920 --> 00:40:14,920
Speaker 3: a lot of well meeting people. And that's why I've

729
00:40:14,920 --> 00:40:18,359
Speaker 3: focused a lot on New York Times in particular. That's

730
00:40:18,360 --> 00:40:23,640
Speaker 3: why I find the Washington Post and pr MSNBC, CNN,

731
00:40:24,160 --> 00:40:27,080
Speaker 3: you know, all these outlets that are doing a lot

732
00:40:27,080 --> 00:40:30,560
Speaker 3: of the same right wing propaganda but under the guise

733
00:40:30,760 --> 00:40:35,120
Speaker 3: of like objective even progressive news as being more harmful.

734
00:40:35,120 --> 00:40:36,880
Speaker 3: And that's why I've focused on them a lot more.

735
00:40:37,320 --> 00:40:40,279
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's take a quick break. We'll come back and

736
00:40:40,320 --> 00:40:54,839
Speaker 1: continue talking about that. And we're back. And I thought

737
00:40:54,880 --> 00:40:58,280
Speaker 1: a couple of times during reading the book of the

738
00:40:58,320 --> 00:41:02,360
Speaker 1: Mitchell and Web sketch where like the one Nazi turns

739
00:41:02,400 --> 00:41:04,640
Speaker 1: to the other Nazi and like they're both wearing like

740
00:41:04,680 --> 00:41:07,120
Speaker 1: fucking skulls on all their uniforms and he's like, wait,

741
00:41:07,360 --> 00:41:10,040
Speaker 1: are we the baddies? Like are we? Are we the

742
00:41:10,080 --> 00:41:15,560
Speaker 1: bad guys? And just like no nobody can read this

743
00:41:15,600 --> 00:41:21,400
Speaker 1: book and not come to that same conclusion. But I

744
00:41:21,440 --> 00:41:25,759
Speaker 1: think what we're talking about with regards to the New

745
00:41:25,840 --> 00:41:28,759
Speaker 1: York Times and NPR, and you know that that is

746
00:41:28,800 --> 00:41:32,000
Speaker 1: sort of the edifice and like sort of the barrier

747
00:41:32,280 --> 00:41:38,040
Speaker 1: that is put in between people looking in the mirror,

748
00:41:38,080 --> 00:41:41,560
Speaker 1: looking at each other and being like, wait, are we

749
00:41:41,640 --> 00:41:44,400
Speaker 1: the bad guys? So I'd love to kind of continue

750
00:41:44,440 --> 00:41:48,160
Speaker 1: talking about like what what are some like watch words

751
00:41:48,440 --> 00:41:52,040
Speaker 1: or just things that you see, Like you talk about

752
00:41:52,080 --> 00:41:55,760
Speaker 1: how you your alarms go off when you see criminal

753
00:41:55,880 --> 00:41:59,640
Speaker 1: justice reform as as a concept, or just like that

754
00:41:59,719 --> 00:42:04,080
Speaker 1: phrase is like because it usually means that there's going

755
00:42:04,160 --> 00:42:10,080
Speaker 1: to be more investment in prison and in the systems

756
00:42:10,120 --> 00:42:13,680
Speaker 1: that jail people and police people but can you just

757
00:42:13,719 --> 00:42:15,560
Speaker 1: talk a little bit more about like what you are

758
00:42:15,600 --> 00:42:18,320
Speaker 1: looking for when you read the New York Times or

759
00:42:18,360 --> 00:42:22,240
Speaker 1: the Washington Post or you know, some of these liberal

760
00:42:22,480 --> 00:42:24,200
Speaker 1: quote unquote l let's.

761
00:42:24,840 --> 00:42:26,239
Speaker 3: Yeah. So, first of all, I love that Mitchell and

762
00:42:26,280 --> 00:42:29,600
Speaker 3: Web sketch. It's great. It's so funny, and it does

763
00:42:29,680 --> 00:42:31,800
Speaker 3: really capture a lot of how I feel when I

764
00:42:31,840 --> 00:42:34,880
Speaker 3: look at The New York Times. I think that, you know,

765
00:42:34,960 --> 00:42:39,800
Speaker 3: first of all, obviously these these mainstream news outlets curate

766
00:42:40,000 --> 00:42:43,279
Speaker 3: the kinds of issues they talk about. So you know,

767
00:42:43,360 --> 00:42:46,600
Speaker 3: you see a ton of articles about retail theft, for example,

768
00:42:46,640 --> 00:42:50,719
Speaker 3: but like rarely an article about wage theft or or

769
00:42:51,080 --> 00:42:55,759
Speaker 3: building safety code violations or illegal dumping of chemicals. So

770
00:42:55,800 --> 00:42:59,399
Speaker 3: that's obvious, right. So they also do something I think

771
00:42:59,400 --> 00:43:02,279
Speaker 3: really in the very which is they kind of make

772
00:43:02,480 --> 00:43:05,880
Speaker 3: us think through the way they like tell their stories,

773
00:43:05,920 --> 00:43:09,160
Speaker 3: through which stories they tell, through who they interview in

774
00:43:09,200 --> 00:43:12,600
Speaker 3: these stories and who they don't interview, what perspectives they include,

775
00:43:12,600 --> 00:43:15,840
Speaker 3: what perspectives they don't, what background context they choose to

776
00:43:15,880 --> 00:43:20,319
Speaker 3: provide versus choose to omit. They make us assume and

777
00:43:20,440 --> 00:43:24,720
Speaker 3: think that these that the punishment bureaucracy is like acting

778
00:43:24,760 --> 00:43:27,560
Speaker 3: in good faith, that it's like genuinely there to make

779
00:43:27,640 --> 00:43:29,440
Speaker 3: us safe, that it's that the people who run it

780
00:43:29,640 --> 00:43:31,719
Speaker 3: are trying their best to figure out these complex and

781
00:43:31,760 --> 00:43:32,800
Speaker 3: difficult questions.

782
00:43:33,040 --> 00:43:33,200
Speaker 1: You know.

783
00:43:33,200 --> 00:43:36,120
Speaker 3: It's like they'll have an article about homelessness, for example,

784
00:43:36,680 --> 00:43:41,200
Speaker 3: and the entire time they won't mention inequality or capitalism

785
00:43:41,560 --> 00:43:44,800
Speaker 3: or real estate developers or anything like that. It's all about,

786
00:43:44,840 --> 00:43:47,160
Speaker 3: you know, how do people feel about seeing a homeless

787
00:43:47,160 --> 00:43:49,840
Speaker 3: person on the subway or what is how many police

788
00:43:49,920 --> 00:43:51,680
Speaker 3: is Eric Adam's going to send into the subway in

789
00:43:51,680 --> 00:43:55,200
Speaker 3: New York to deal with homelessness. So the entire article

790
00:43:55,239 --> 00:43:57,520
Speaker 3: is sort of framed as like, well, the only options

791
00:43:57,520 --> 00:44:01,799
Speaker 3: our society has are these government bureaucrats who are going

792
00:44:01,880 --> 00:44:07,880
Speaker 3: to punish people into having housing, and so they an

793
00:44:08,000 --> 00:44:11,200
Speaker 3: article after article, issue after issue. They make it seem

794
00:44:11,360 --> 00:44:15,800
Speaker 3: like the only solution to these problems are more police,

795
00:44:15,840 --> 00:44:19,880
Speaker 3: prosecutors in prison. And then there's a whole other category

796
00:44:19,920 --> 00:44:22,120
Speaker 3: of article, which I think maybe more what you're getting

797
00:44:22,160 --> 00:44:27,440
Speaker 3: at with your question, which is like, sometimes the injustices

798
00:44:27,480 --> 00:44:30,920
Speaker 3: and the brutality and the violence of this system becomes

799
00:44:30,960 --> 00:44:33,440
Speaker 3: too much for them to ignore, so they usually ignore it.

800
00:44:33,440 --> 00:44:36,480
Speaker 3: Every day. But sometimes, like with the murder of George Floyd,

801
00:44:36,480 --> 00:44:38,879
Speaker 3: the murder Eric Garner, the murder of Breonna Taylor, right,

802
00:44:39,360 --> 00:44:42,480
Speaker 3: it's impossible for them to ignore because something really horrific

803
00:44:42,520 --> 00:44:46,400
Speaker 3: has been captured in a way that captures the public imagination.

804
00:44:47,080 --> 00:44:49,560
Speaker 3: And you know, the murder of Tyree Nichols and Memphis

805
00:44:49,640 --> 00:44:50,880
Speaker 3: is a really good example of this with the New

806
00:44:50,920 --> 00:44:54,080
Speaker 3: York Times coverage that I wrote about. But what you

807
00:44:54,120 --> 00:44:59,799
Speaker 3: see in those moments is a mobilization of copaganda that

808
00:45:00,280 --> 00:45:03,200
Speaker 3: tries to get the well meaning reader, the people who

809
00:45:03,200 --> 00:45:05,920
Speaker 3: don't want to live in a society of rampant police violence,

810
00:45:05,920 --> 00:45:09,080
Speaker 3: of rampant racial injustice, to think that, well, something is

811
00:45:09,120 --> 00:45:12,320
Speaker 3: being done about that, right, So they trot out all

812
00:45:12,360 --> 00:45:15,359
Speaker 3: of these experts and all of these things, these these

813
00:45:15,440 --> 00:45:21,120
Speaker 3: want these sort of these catchphrases like accountability and community policing. Right,

814
00:45:21,160 --> 00:45:23,799
Speaker 3: They never defined those terms. They never bring on any

815
00:45:23,800 --> 00:45:27,840
Speaker 3: experts who say, did you know that in every major

816
00:45:27,880 --> 00:45:31,759
Speaker 3: instance of police violence is nineteen thirty. Immediately afterward they

817
00:45:31,760 --> 00:45:34,840
Speaker 3: started talking about the need for better training, more accountability,

818
00:45:34,960 --> 00:45:37,960
Speaker 3: better technology for the police. And every single time over

819
00:45:37,960 --> 00:45:41,360
Speaker 3: the last one hundred years, after police violence, the police

820
00:45:41,360 --> 00:45:45,680
Speaker 3: have been given more resources, more training, more weapons, Right,

821
00:45:46,200 --> 00:45:48,600
Speaker 3: has it ever made police less violent? No? I mean,

822
00:45:48,840 --> 00:45:51,720
Speaker 3: after all the conversations about George Floyd in twenty twenty,

823
00:45:52,200 --> 00:45:54,440
Speaker 3: US police killed more people in twenty twenty one than

824
00:45:54,480 --> 00:45:56,480
Speaker 3: they did in twenty twenty and then they killed even

825
00:45:56,520 --> 00:45:58,200
Speaker 3: more people in twenty twenty two than they killed in

826
00:45:58,200 --> 00:46:01,480
Speaker 3: twenty twenty one. And so what I wrote about a

827
00:46:01,480 --> 00:46:04,160
Speaker 3: lot in a series on my Substack, which is going

828
00:46:04,239 --> 00:46:06,160
Speaker 3: to be in The Cop Again in the book, is

829
00:46:06,440 --> 00:46:10,359
Speaker 3: an analysis of how does the punishment bureaucracy use its

830
00:46:10,400 --> 00:46:15,440
Speaker 3: own failure under the guise of reform to actually increase

831
00:46:15,480 --> 00:46:18,279
Speaker 3: its own budgets. I think the best possible example of

832
00:46:18,320 --> 00:46:22,040
Speaker 3: this is body cameras. So body cameras are now trotted

833
00:46:22,040 --> 00:46:27,440
Speaker 3: out as like the reform that everyone loves for illegal policing.

834
00:46:27,920 --> 00:46:29,560
Speaker 3: But what a lot of people don't understand is that

835
00:46:30,120 --> 00:46:33,040
Speaker 3: for many years, the police and the multi billion dollar

836
00:46:33,120 --> 00:46:35,680
Speaker 3: companies that produce the body cameras and the facial recognition

837
00:46:35,760 --> 00:46:39,000
Speaker 3: software and the cloud computing databases that they rely on,

838
00:46:39,400 --> 00:46:41,840
Speaker 3: they actually wanted to get every cop in the country

839
00:46:41,880 --> 00:46:45,279
Speaker 3: a mobile surveillance camera that the cops themselves controlled. But

840
00:46:45,360 --> 00:46:48,640
Speaker 3: they couldn't figure out how to get liberals in control

841
00:46:48,680 --> 00:46:52,399
Speaker 3: of local governments to pay for them. There's billions of dollars, right,

842
00:46:52,800 --> 00:46:54,520
Speaker 3: so what do they do. They came up with a

843
00:46:54,560 --> 00:46:58,480
Speaker 3: marketing strategy. After Michael Brown's murder in Ferguson, they came

844
00:46:58,560 --> 00:47:03,800
Speaker 3: up with the marketing strateg to say, well, we need

845
00:47:03,800 --> 00:47:06,560
Speaker 3: body cameras as a method of a police accountability. It's

846
00:47:06,560 --> 00:47:10,800
Speaker 3: no longer about surveillance and increasing police control and et cetera.

847
00:47:11,200 --> 00:47:13,279
Speaker 3: And the real reason they wanted them, you know, the

848
00:47:13,320 --> 00:47:15,800
Speaker 3: biggest reason they wanted them was that since police control

849
00:47:15,840 --> 00:47:18,160
Speaker 3: of videos, they can use it. It's a much better

850
00:47:18,600 --> 00:47:20,919
Speaker 3: form of evidence for prosecutors and police to coerce people

851
00:47:20,960 --> 00:47:24,799
Speaker 3: to play guilty more quickly. So they turned this tool

852
00:47:24,800 --> 00:47:26,880
Speaker 3: of surveillance that they all wanted but couldn't pay for

853
00:47:26,960 --> 00:47:28,680
Speaker 3: into a tool of reform and then got all the

854
00:47:28,680 --> 00:47:31,840
Speaker 3: money they needed. And that, to me is one of

855
00:47:31,880 --> 00:47:35,560
Speaker 3: the most insidious roles of the media in the aftermath

856
00:47:35,719 --> 00:47:38,799
Speaker 3: of so you know, another great examples of The York

857
00:47:38,800 --> 00:47:40,960
Speaker 3: Times is when they did the summary of all the

858
00:47:41,000 --> 00:47:44,719
Speaker 3: George Floyd protests. They wrote these series of articles about

859
00:47:44,760 --> 00:47:47,319
Speaker 3: how every major review in every major city had found

860
00:47:47,320 --> 00:47:51,560
Speaker 3: that the police engaged in widespread brutality and illegal, illegal

861
00:47:52,120 --> 00:47:54,399
Speaker 3: suppression of the protests. They were beating people, they were

862
00:47:54,840 --> 00:47:56,920
Speaker 3: pepper spring people, they were using chemical weapons, they were

863
00:47:56,960 --> 00:47:59,920
Speaker 3: using tanks and batons, they're hitting journalists, they're running over

864
00:48:00,160 --> 00:48:03,120
Speaker 3: their cars, et cetera. And the Times concluded that this

865
00:48:03,320 --> 00:48:07,880
Speaker 3: was because they were unprepared and lacked training, and they

866
00:48:07,960 --> 00:48:11,640
Speaker 3: lacked proper technology, and they didn't have enough intelligence to

867
00:48:11,719 --> 00:48:14,440
Speaker 3: be tracking the protest leaders in the advance. So the

868
00:48:14,520 --> 00:48:19,080
Speaker 3: Times framed what was in actuality a highly coordinated, consistent,

869
00:48:19,760 --> 00:48:22,360
Speaker 3: very well trained police response. If the purpose of the

870
00:48:22,440 --> 00:48:26,440
Speaker 3: response was to squelch descent and repress so social movement,

871
00:48:26,680 --> 00:48:28,920
Speaker 3: they made it seem like police were just hapless and

872
00:48:29,160 --> 00:48:31,400
Speaker 3: with a little bit more money for better training and

873
00:48:31,760 --> 00:48:35,200
Speaker 3: more money for intelligence divisions so they could infiltrate social

874
00:48:35,200 --> 00:48:39,000
Speaker 3: movement groups, police would have been better. And so framing

875
00:48:39,040 --> 00:48:42,640
Speaker 3: the whole problem as one of actually police needing more

876
00:48:42,719 --> 00:48:45,560
Speaker 3: training and more resources is I think one of the

877
00:48:45,600 --> 00:48:49,120
Speaker 3: most insidious and nefarious roles that the mainstream corporate media

878
00:48:49,160 --> 00:48:53,200
Speaker 3: has played in our understanding of what the real problems are.

879
00:48:54,239 --> 00:48:57,920
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, you talked about a quote from you use

880
00:48:57,920 --> 00:49:02,760
Speaker 1: a quote from Fucau about just how reform has always

881
00:49:02,760 --> 00:49:06,560
Speaker 1: been a part of the prison system. That's just a

882
00:49:06,600 --> 00:49:09,960
Speaker 1: way that it feeds itself. Essentially, is having that two

883
00:49:10,000 --> 00:49:12,280
Speaker 1: way conversation where it's like, oh, we got to reform

884
00:49:12,320 --> 00:49:15,840
Speaker 1: and suck in more resources to just kind of continue

885
00:49:16,480 --> 00:49:17,920
Speaker 1: building out right.

886
00:49:18,800 --> 00:49:23,240
Speaker 3: I highly recommend the book Walls and Bars by Eugene Debs.

887
00:49:23,440 --> 00:49:26,319
Speaker 3: It's a really amazing It's a memoir that he wrote

888
00:49:26,360 --> 00:49:28,800
Speaker 3: in the nineteen twenties when he was in federal prison.

889
00:49:28,840 --> 00:49:31,320
Speaker 3: He actually ran for president, got over a million votes

890
00:49:31,719 --> 00:49:34,960
Speaker 3: from prison. He was imprisoned on you know, ludicrous charges

891
00:49:35,000 --> 00:49:37,480
Speaker 3: that obviously by lead the First Amendment for his anti

892
00:49:37,520 --> 00:49:41,360
Speaker 3: war advocacy and other sort of union organizing activities. But

893
00:49:41,840 --> 00:49:43,960
Speaker 3: the whole book he's making points just like the ones

894
00:49:44,000 --> 00:49:47,080
Speaker 3: I'm making right now. I mean, he's talking about this

895
00:49:47,280 --> 00:49:49,319
Speaker 3: over one hundred, you know, about one hundred years ago,

896
00:49:49,880 --> 00:49:53,080
Speaker 3: and it's remarkable to see how the system responded to

897
00:49:53,160 --> 00:49:55,879
Speaker 3: him and how the prison system grew after that, right,

898
00:49:55,960 --> 00:49:58,160
Speaker 3: and and how we're making the same points about the

899
00:49:58,800 --> 00:50:02,000
Speaker 3: It's I think very review. When you read something like that,

900
00:50:02,520 --> 00:50:04,640
Speaker 3: you can see we're not stuck in a prop way.

901
00:50:04,840 --> 00:50:06,680
Speaker 3: It's not like we don't know the solutions. It's not

902
00:50:06,719 --> 00:50:09,680
Speaker 3: like we're dealing with something new here. These systems have

903
00:50:09,719 --> 00:50:11,560
Speaker 3: been doing this for a long time.

904
00:50:11,800 --> 00:50:14,360
Speaker 2: Right, And you know, I think because a lot of

905
00:50:14,400 --> 00:50:15,960
Speaker 2: the times, you know, as we all look at this

906
00:50:16,040 --> 00:50:19,279
Speaker 2: and we're more and more people become interested in the

907
00:50:19,360 --> 00:50:23,279
Speaker 2: idea of you know, what what liberation looks like. I

908
00:50:23,320 --> 00:50:25,799
Speaker 2: really like the points that you make about how like,

909
00:50:26,040 --> 00:50:28,759
Speaker 2: while there's no like just sort of magic solved to it,

910
00:50:29,280 --> 00:50:32,359
Speaker 2: one part is about creating enough of a tipping point

911
00:50:32,400 --> 00:50:35,960
Speaker 2: in terms of like mass movement for our courts and

912
00:50:36,000 --> 00:50:40,240
Speaker 2: our politicians to respond to because without without a show

913
00:50:40,400 --> 00:50:43,520
Speaker 2: of power from people, especially the ones that are most affected,

914
00:50:44,160 --> 00:50:47,120
Speaker 2: it takes a long time. Obviously, it takes decades for

915
00:50:47,200 --> 00:50:49,960
Speaker 2: the Supreme Court to respond to anything, or you know,

916
00:50:50,040 --> 00:50:52,439
Speaker 2: politicians because they're more like, yeah, what's the status quo,

917
00:50:52,560 --> 00:50:56,120
Speaker 2: We'll reinforce that, great, what's the next case, versus seeing like, oh,

918
00:50:56,239 --> 00:51:01,160
Speaker 2: it's this many people who think everything is absolutely backwards.

919
00:51:01,200 --> 00:51:03,839
Speaker 2: Maybe we do need to consider that. What for you,

920
00:51:04,280 --> 00:51:06,480
Speaker 2: I know you've you've talked about the importance of connection,

921
00:51:06,640 --> 00:51:09,680
Speaker 2: but you know, for as we look towards something a

922
00:51:09,680 --> 00:51:13,120
Speaker 2: little more just something more equitable. What are those steps

923
00:51:13,320 --> 00:51:15,799
Speaker 2: that you feel are the most potent things that you

924
00:51:15,840 --> 00:51:17,319
Speaker 2: know we can kind of put to the front of

925
00:51:17,320 --> 00:51:19,239
Speaker 2: our mind to understand. Well, I don't want to be

926
00:51:19,520 --> 00:51:22,200
Speaker 2: obviously I'm not a lawyer or part of the you know,

927
00:51:22,560 --> 00:51:24,960
Speaker 2: quote unquote legal system in a formal way. But how

928
00:51:25,000 --> 00:51:29,719
Speaker 2: do I, as a conscious person contribute or put my

929
00:51:29,760 --> 00:51:31,600
Speaker 2: head in the right space to know, Okay, this is

930
00:51:31,640 --> 00:51:33,640
Speaker 2: how we move forward, and this is the way we

931
00:51:33,680 --> 00:51:34,640
Speaker 2: need to all be moving.

932
00:51:35,040 --> 00:51:38,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, in any communities are places you see a different approach,

933
00:51:38,239 --> 00:51:41,000
Speaker 1: like Miles describing kind of working that you wish got

934
00:51:41,000 --> 00:51:41,560
Speaker 1: more attention.

935
00:51:42,400 --> 00:51:44,640
Speaker 3: I think there's so many different ways people get involved,

936
00:51:44,640 --> 00:51:47,160
Speaker 3: and people with different skills can get involved in different ways.

937
00:51:47,160 --> 00:51:50,520
Speaker 3: If you're a coder, you know, if you're a lawyer,

938
00:51:51,080 --> 00:51:56,560
Speaker 3: if you're member of a church, if you're a writer,

939
00:51:57,080 --> 00:51:59,600
Speaker 3: if you're a web designer. I mean, there's so many

940
00:52:00,080 --> 00:52:04,000
Speaker 3: places that like basically anyone with any skills can plug in.

941
00:52:04,440 --> 00:52:06,799
Speaker 3: And so I encourage you to like figure out like

942
00:52:06,880 --> 00:52:10,799
Speaker 3: who in your local community is working on, you know,

943
00:52:11,320 --> 00:52:14,080
Speaker 3: reducing the size and power of the punishment bureaucracy, who's

944
00:52:14,080 --> 00:52:15,640
Speaker 3: trying to close a jail, Who's trying to prevent a

945
00:52:15,680 --> 00:52:18,840
Speaker 3: jail from getting built. Who's trying to reduce the police

946
00:52:18,880 --> 00:52:22,040
Speaker 3: budget and to get more money invested in alternative first

947
00:52:22,040 --> 00:52:26,120
Speaker 3: responders and mental health care and housing. Who's organizing tenants,

948
00:52:26,560 --> 00:52:29,640
Speaker 3: who's building work around co ops. We need to be

949
00:52:29,719 --> 00:52:33,800
Speaker 3: building the mechanisms through which all of us will connect

950
00:52:33,840 --> 00:52:37,400
Speaker 3: and form stronger relationships and bonds. So I'm really if

951
00:52:37,440 --> 00:52:39,480
Speaker 3: you're interested in the criminal system, I'm really interested in

952
00:52:39,520 --> 00:52:42,880
Speaker 3: the growing movement of court watching. There's lots of groups

953
00:52:42,880 --> 00:52:45,600
Speaker 3: in different cities across the country, whether it's the DC

954
00:52:45,719 --> 00:52:48,799
Speaker 3: area where I am, or Pittsburgh where I grew up,

955
00:52:48,920 --> 00:52:51,680
Speaker 3: or Los Angeles where we have our big case challenging

956
00:52:51,680 --> 00:52:54,360
Speaker 3: the money bail system. Because court watch programs are literally

957
00:52:54,400 --> 00:52:56,879
Speaker 3: anyone and my mom did this when she retired, can

958
00:52:56,960 --> 00:52:59,680
Speaker 3: sign up and to start watching court and documenting what

959
00:52:59,719 --> 00:53:02,520
Speaker 3: the wh and prosecutors are doing and then reporting those

960
00:53:02,600 --> 00:53:06,080
Speaker 3: in groups of people that you other sort of volunteers. Right,

961
00:53:06,480 --> 00:53:08,759
Speaker 3: There's all kinds of things that flow from that. There's

962
00:53:08,760 --> 00:53:11,880
Speaker 3: getting involved in a local bail fund. There's running for

963
00:53:12,320 --> 00:53:15,520
Speaker 3: local library board or the water board, or there's so

964
00:53:15,600 --> 00:53:19,080
Speaker 3: many different things that actually, like conservatives have mobilized for

965
00:53:19,760 --> 00:53:22,520
Speaker 3: and are therefore in charge of the utility commissions in

966
00:53:22,520 --> 00:53:24,440
Speaker 3: a lot of different places, et cetera. And like, this

967
00:53:24,560 --> 00:53:27,200
Speaker 3: is an enormous consequences for the climate movement. This is

968
00:53:27,400 --> 00:53:30,960
Speaker 3: enormous consequences of a lot of these. You know, Houston

969
00:53:31,120 --> 00:53:33,799
Speaker 3: just decided, for example, the school board to fire a

970
00:53:33,800 --> 00:53:38,440
Speaker 3: bunch of librarians and replace the school libraries with disciplinary

971
00:53:38,480 --> 00:53:41,359
Speaker 3: centers for punishing kids. Right, these are things that like

972
00:53:41,920 --> 00:53:44,800
Speaker 3: people in their local community need to be organizing against

973
00:53:44,840 --> 00:53:47,640
Speaker 3: and rising up and fighting. And so get together with

974
00:53:47,719 --> 00:53:50,000
Speaker 3: your neighbors, do a reading group, learn about some of

975
00:53:50,040 --> 00:53:52,520
Speaker 3: these issues, figure out who's already doing the work in

976
00:53:52,560 --> 00:53:54,799
Speaker 3: your area, ask them how you can get involved and

977
00:53:54,800 --> 00:53:56,920
Speaker 3: plug in. Like there's no one size fits all answer,

978
00:53:57,320 --> 00:53:58,920
Speaker 3: but that the one thing I will say is like

979
00:53:59,239 --> 00:54:01,640
Speaker 3: you have to be in, not involved, in organizing your

980
00:54:01,680 --> 00:54:04,680
Speaker 3: local community around something, then you should get involved, because

981
00:54:05,239 --> 00:54:07,520
Speaker 3: we're never going to win these things unless we actually

982
00:54:07,560 --> 00:54:10,040
Speaker 3: and you know, it's sometimes it's not the most glamorous work,

983
00:54:10,080 --> 00:54:13,960
Speaker 3: it's not the most thrilling stuff, right, but like, unless

984
00:54:14,000 --> 00:54:17,600
Speaker 3: we participate and fight, we're going to lose any semblance

985
00:54:17,640 --> 00:54:22,560
Speaker 3: of democratic life, and we're gonna have fully authoritarian society before.

986
00:54:22,280 --> 00:54:22,719
Speaker 2: We know it.

987
00:54:23,760 --> 00:54:28,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, Alec, such a pleasure having you. I mean,

988
00:54:28,080 --> 00:54:30,040
Speaker 1: this is kind of why we started doing these deep

989
00:54:30,080 --> 00:54:32,399
Speaker 1: dive episodes. And you know, having you on to talk

990
00:54:32,440 --> 00:54:37,120
Speaker 1: about this didn't disappoint. Where can people find you? Follow you,

991
00:54:37,280 --> 00:54:38,560
Speaker 1: read you all that good stuff.

992
00:54:39,360 --> 00:54:42,440
Speaker 3: Yeah, so you can follow me on Twitter at Equality Alec.

993
00:54:42,920 --> 00:54:46,319
Speaker 3: That's my name on very social media, although I've only

994
00:54:46,360 --> 00:54:48,280
Speaker 3: ever posted once on Instagram.

995
00:54:47,880 --> 00:54:48,040
Speaker 2: So.

996
00:54:51,560 --> 00:54:53,480
Speaker 1: Thousand pages, it's yeah.

997
00:54:53,760 --> 00:54:57,239
Speaker 3: I just start posting some of my mosaics. People can

998
00:54:57,320 --> 00:55:00,399
Speaker 3: laugh at me. I think that. You know, I wrote

999
00:55:00,440 --> 00:55:04,680
Speaker 3: a newsletter on Substack called Alex Copaganda Newsletter, which I'm

1000
00:55:04,680 --> 00:55:06,680
Speaker 3: going to be turning into the Copaganda Books. So keep

1001
00:55:06,680 --> 00:55:10,240
Speaker 3: your eyes out next year for the Copaganda Book. And

1002
00:55:10,239 --> 00:55:11,920
Speaker 3: in the meantime, you know, you can also follow the

1003
00:55:11,920 --> 00:55:15,080
Speaker 3: work of Civil Rights Core, which is at civ Rights

1004
00:55:15,120 --> 00:55:19,160
Speaker 3: Core on Twitter and Instagram and it's a really amazing organization.

1005
00:55:19,800 --> 00:55:22,359
Speaker 1: Amazing And is there a work of media that you've

1006
00:55:22,400 --> 00:55:23,040
Speaker 1: been enjoying?

1007
00:55:23,800 --> 00:55:26,920
Speaker 3: You know, this last week I've been looking at some

1008
00:55:26,960 --> 00:55:31,080
Speaker 3: of the old Tornado O'Connor performances and thinking a lot

1009
00:55:31,120 --> 00:55:34,760
Speaker 3: about I had never really been a fan of her, music.

1010
00:55:35,320 --> 00:55:37,360
Speaker 3: I just I just wasn't I don't know. It was

1011
00:55:37,400 --> 00:55:40,920
Speaker 3: something I kind of kind of missed, and the courage

1012
00:55:40,920 --> 00:55:44,520
Speaker 3: that she displayed. It's so rare to have someone that

1013
00:55:44,680 --> 00:55:47,920
Speaker 3: prominent make the kind of sacrifices that she made for

1014
00:55:48,000 --> 00:55:49,800
Speaker 3: the things that she believed in. You know that that

1015
00:55:49,920 --> 00:55:52,239
Speaker 3: Saturday Night, there's a tweet circulating with that video of

1016
00:55:53,000 --> 00:55:55,080
Speaker 3: Tim Robbins introducing her on Saturday Night Live and then

1017
00:55:55,120 --> 00:55:58,040
Speaker 3: her tearing up the photo of the Pope. You know,

1018
00:55:58,080 --> 00:56:00,000
Speaker 3: that was an act of courer. It's hard for people

1019
00:56:00,120 --> 00:56:02,280
Speaker 3: in this country to understand what that meant in Ireland

1020
00:56:03,200 --> 00:56:06,080
Speaker 3: at the time, in the early nineties, and I'm just

1021
00:56:06,280 --> 00:56:09,239
Speaker 3: I just I marvel at the lack of courage. You know,

1022
00:56:09,280 --> 00:56:12,239
Speaker 3: the NBA players, for example, can't even get their act

1023
00:56:12,320 --> 00:56:16,080
Speaker 3: together to condemn Tom Gores for making hundreds of millions

1024
00:56:16,080 --> 00:56:18,600
Speaker 3: of dollars off black children by ending the right to

1025
00:56:18,680 --> 00:56:21,520
Speaker 3: hug their parents in jails right right. The level of

1026
00:56:23,000 --> 00:56:27,640
Speaker 3: removal of many prominent people in this country from the

1027
00:56:28,040 --> 00:56:33,839
Speaker 3: extraordinary injustices of our time is really profoundly depressing. And

1028
00:56:34,080 --> 00:56:37,360
Speaker 3: I've been really encouraged by just watching her and thinking

1029
00:56:37,360 --> 00:56:40,080
Speaker 3: about how inspiring it was that she did that, and

1030
00:56:40,239 --> 00:56:43,600
Speaker 3: all the pain and sacrifices she made that accompanied it,

1031
00:56:43,600 --> 00:56:45,080
Speaker 3: So I think it's worth honoring that.

1032
00:56:46,120 --> 00:56:49,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, it cost her everything, you know, in a time

1033
00:56:49,120 --> 00:56:51,480
Speaker 2: when you're making a point that now is sort of

1034
00:56:51,480 --> 00:56:55,000
Speaker 2: a normal, valid criticism that we think now it's like yeah, yeah, yeah,

1035
00:56:55,000 --> 00:56:57,279
Speaker 2: of course, yeah, there are bad things going on with

1036
00:56:57,320 --> 00:57:00,200
Speaker 2: the Catholic Church, Whereas back then, I mean, like who

1037
00:57:00,239 --> 00:57:02,600
Speaker 2: was it Joe Peshi or someone or well, I forget

1038
00:57:02,600 --> 00:57:04,560
Speaker 2: one of these people can't like I can't believe she

1039
00:57:04,640 --> 00:57:07,520
Speaker 2: did that crap or whatever at the time, because yeah,

1040
00:57:07,520 --> 00:57:09,399
Speaker 2: we weren't willing to like look at some of these

1041
00:57:09,440 --> 00:57:12,400
Speaker 2: issues with these sort of objectivity it deserves.

1042
00:57:12,920 --> 00:57:15,440
Speaker 1: Yeah, Miles, how about you? Where can people find you

1043
00:57:15,480 --> 00:57:16,360
Speaker 1: as their working media?

1044
00:57:16,400 --> 00:57:19,600
Speaker 2: You've been enjoying Yeah, Twitter, Instagram, threads, wherever at Miles

1045
00:57:19,600 --> 00:57:22,720
Speaker 2: of Gray. Check out my new podcast, The Good Thief,

1046
00:57:22,760 --> 00:57:26,000
Speaker 2: talking about the Greek robin hood Vasilis Palio Costas. It's

1047
00:57:26,000 --> 00:57:28,120
Speaker 2: a really dope show. We're talking about somebody who is,

1048
00:57:28,240 --> 00:57:32,120
Speaker 2: you know, doing some good old fashioned wealth redistribution. And

1049
00:57:32,200 --> 00:57:34,720
Speaker 2: also with Jack and I got the basketball podcast Miles

1050
00:57:34,720 --> 00:57:37,640
Speaker 2: and Jack out Man boost Ees and for twenty Day fiance.

1051
00:57:37,760 --> 00:57:40,840
Speaker 2: If you like hearing about trash reality shows tweet I

1052
00:57:41,000 --> 00:57:44,840
Speaker 2: like it's from at Equality Alec. The tweet is for

1053
00:57:44,880 --> 00:57:47,880
Speaker 2: each dollar stolen in shoplifting, there's at least five dollars

1054
00:57:47,880 --> 00:57:50,800
Speaker 2: in wage theft and one hundred dollars in tax evasion.

1055
00:57:51,000 --> 00:57:53,240
Speaker 2: Have you ever heard about a wage theft or tax

1056
00:57:53,240 --> 00:57:56,240
Speaker 2: evasion quote crime wave? What do you think this tells

1057
00:57:56,320 --> 00:57:59,160
Speaker 2: you about how reporters determine what is quote news and

1058
00:57:59,200 --> 00:58:02,760
Speaker 2: what is ignored and who benefits? And I think it's

1059
00:58:02,760 --> 00:58:04,000
Speaker 2: just the kind of shit we need to keep it

1060
00:58:04,080 --> 00:58:05,960
Speaker 2: in the front of our mind when we say what

1061
00:58:06,160 --> 00:58:07,560
Speaker 2: is crime exactly?

1062
00:58:07,600 --> 00:58:09,520
Speaker 1: Who are the bad kish?

1063
00:58:09,960 --> 00:58:10,360
Speaker 2: All right?

1064
00:58:10,440 --> 00:58:13,200
Speaker 1: You can find me on Twitter at Jack Underscore O'Brien

1065
00:58:13,280 --> 00:58:18,240
Speaker 1: and on threads at Jack Underscore, Oh underscore Brian tweet

1066
00:58:18,240 --> 00:58:21,000
Speaker 1: I've been enjoying you know, Aleck, you almost had it,

1067
00:58:21,040 --> 00:58:24,520
Speaker 1: but I gotta go with at smooth Dunk, who tweeted

1068
00:58:25,000 --> 00:58:28,320
Speaker 1: I am become death. Oh really, Oppenheimer? Do you also

1069
00:58:28,520 --> 00:58:32,480
Speaker 1: has cheeseburger? You two thousand and seven mean sounding motherfucker?

1070
00:58:33,720 --> 00:58:38,000
Speaker 1: And I just enjoyed that so almost went with one.

1071
00:58:38,840 --> 00:58:41,720
Speaker 1: I had to go done with it. You can find

1072
00:58:41,840 --> 00:58:44,280
Speaker 1: us on Twitter at daily Zeikeeist. We're at d daily

1073
00:58:44,320 --> 00:58:46,880
Speaker 1: Zeitgeist on Instagram. We have Facebook fan page and a

1074
00:58:46,920 --> 00:58:50,440
Speaker 1: website Daily zeikeeist dot com where we post our episodes

1075
00:58:50,520 --> 00:58:53,240
Speaker 1: and our footnotes. We'll link off to the information that

1076
00:58:53,280 --> 00:58:55,760
Speaker 1: we talked about in today's episode, as well as a

1077
00:58:55,840 --> 00:58:59,000
Speaker 1: song that we think you might enjoy. Myles, what song

1078
00:58:59,080 --> 00:58:59,720
Speaker 1: do you think people know?

1079
00:59:00,080 --> 00:59:02,880
Speaker 2: It's a track called Nebulous Tango, which feels like an

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00:59:02,920 --> 00:59:06,160
Speaker 2: appropriate track name for today's topic. But it's by the

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00:59:06,280 --> 00:59:09,160
Speaker 2: artist Heather h E t h e R. And I

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00:59:09,200 --> 00:59:11,880
Speaker 2: believe they're like a producer, but the it's like a

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00:59:11,920 --> 00:59:15,640
Speaker 2: minute track but really really dope instrumental. You know how

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00:59:15,640 --> 00:59:17,480
Speaker 2: I get down this is. It's a it's a next

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00:59:17,480 --> 00:59:20,200
Speaker 2: Snapper but it's a one minute banger, So just check

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00:59:20,240 --> 00:59:22,640
Speaker 2: it out. Nebulous Tango by Heather H g E t

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Speaker 2: h e R.

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Speaker 1: All right, we will link off to that in the footnotes.

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Speaker 1: The Daily Guys is the production of iHeart Radio. For

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00:59:27,960 --> 00:59:30,360
Speaker 1: more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,

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00:59:30,360 --> 00:59:32,720
Speaker 1: Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

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00:59:32,760 --> 00:59:34,400
Speaker 1: That is going to do it for us this morning,

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00:59:34,720 --> 00:59:37,520
Speaker 1: back this afternoon to tell you what is trending and

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Speaker 1: we will talk to you all that fight.

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Speaker 2: Bye.