Speaker 1: Welcome to Brief Recess. I'm Michael Foote, I'm Melissa Albrand.
Speaker 1: Today we're going to be talking about stolen antiquities, all
Speaker 1: the weird things Melissa found out in estate sale, the
Speaker 1: crazy conversations I had with a bouncer and JK. Rowling.
Speaker 2: Oh, I hit four estate sales this weekend.
Speaker 1: As actually an illness. You need to be stocked.
Speaker 2: I do not need to be back. I love the
Speaker 2: state sales. There is nothing better. Yeah, we'll tell you
Speaker 2: something and we.
Speaker 1: Could talk about Yeah, actually I want to talk about
Speaker 1: this with you.
Speaker 3: Dead old lady clothes, dead old lady furniture, dead old lady.
Speaker 1: Julis because they really don't because of late stage capitalism,
Speaker 1: they really don't make it like they used to anymore.
Speaker 1: So like if you can get your hands on like
Speaker 1: a sofa, sofa or a have re upholstered. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I've had a sofa for like three years and it's
Speaker 1: already and I spent a lot of sofas are expensive.
Speaker 1: I think this sofa might have been like four or
Speaker 1: five thousand dollars and now it's a piece of shit,
Speaker 1: and it really is like and that was that was
Speaker 1: a lot. We've really drained the savings to buy this
Speaker 1: fucking sofa and it's sagging and the fabric is weird
Speaker 1: and it's not like nice enough one where you would
Speaker 1: get it reupholstered. Right, Yeah, did you get anything good
Speaker 1: at the estate shale? Yeah? What did you get? Melissa
Speaker 1: goes to Okay, So Melissa goes to a lot of
Speaker 1: estate sales.
Speaker 2: And I do it's a problem.
Speaker 1: But ethically she gets furs, and ethically we feel like
Speaker 1: it's in this gray area where it's okay because the
Speaker 1: animal is already dead and.
Speaker 3: It is vintage. It is vintage. I would never buy
Speaker 3: a new fur coat. I really wouldn't Swift.
Speaker 1: He's already hate me on the internet, so peta people
Speaker 1: are going to come for me. I'm always posting Taylor
Speaker 1: Swift hate. She's a billionaire who's a crimate terrorist. So
Speaker 1: I don't know, you know, and there are a lot
Speaker 1: of them, like, it's just not the only one. I'm
Speaker 1: critical of all of them. But I'm not going to
Speaker 1: like be like, oh she does a step touch in
Speaker 1: her concert and has some like nice visuals. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: I'm gonna lay off this billionaire. No anyway, Sorry.
Speaker 2: So that's weird.
Speaker 1: But the but the peed of people will probably come
Speaker 1: for us for saying that. But I think vintage for
Speaker 1: feels okay.
Speaker 3: It does feel okay to me, and I mean, and listen,
Speaker 3: I am more than willing to accept that maybe there's
Speaker 3: something that I might not know about this, and if
Speaker 3: somebody wants to nicely come at me.
Speaker 1: We're open to suggestions.
Speaker 2: We are, I really really am.
Speaker 1: I'm one of the few men who actually takes notes
Speaker 1: and like says I'm sorry and incorporates it into his
Speaker 1: like work and life. So do you well, I don't know.
Speaker 1: If you ask my husband, you'd say something else.
Speaker 2: And let the record reflect that Michael.
Speaker 3: Charles Foot has never apologized to me.
Speaker 1: Ever, I apologize to you all the time when I
Speaker 1: don't know. I just felt like I should say that.
Speaker 2: Because he's lying. He's a liar.
Speaker 1: The phone, he got her on the phone. No, but
Speaker 1: you got good stuff at the Estates I did.
Speaker 3: I actually bought a shaved Lamb's woolf jacket.
Speaker 4: I love that.
Speaker 1: Instantly You're like, oh, I got all this great stuff,
Speaker 1: Like you know, there was like sofas and like ot
Speaker 1: stuff right for the Yeah.
Speaker 3: Besides, and I also got a couple of like Cashmere sweater.
Speaker 2: Okay, that's great, I no, no, I love it.
Speaker 1: I read an interesting article about Kashmir, how like we
Speaker 1: have overbred sheep in such a way that Kashmir is
Speaker 1: no longer what it once was. So if you can
Speaker 1: get your hands on a vintage Kashmere sweater, it will
Speaker 1: feel different.
Speaker 3: So now, well, I definitely think that the yes, I
Speaker 3: agree on that with the Kashmir. So now Kashmir is
Speaker 3: like one or two ply and it's basically see through,
Speaker 3: which is why it's so it's like relatively expenses relative,
Speaker 3: it's relatively less expensive than it used to be because
Speaker 3: the quality is because.
Speaker 1: Now you can go to blooming Del's and get a
Speaker 1: fifty nine to ninety nine or there's sweater, but it'll
Speaker 1: be very thin.
Speaker 2: It'll be very thin. It's like linen. Also, equality is
Speaker 2: not as what it used to be, which is I
Speaker 2: like to.
Speaker 1: Say, to life and late stage capitalism. So those are
Speaker 1: states will sound really fun.
Speaker 2: I went with my mother was out on this wreak.
Speaker 1: Tell the people in America what happens when Magali passed
Speaker 1: a car accident.
Speaker 3: So when we pass a car accident, I do my
Speaker 3: best not to look at all, right, because A I
Speaker 3: don't want to see any carnage.
Speaker 2: Number one that you can't you can't unsee that.
Speaker 3: But also I am aware that when you're driving past anything,
Speaker 3: you kind of slow down. You can't help it, right,
Speaker 3: you just kind of slow down. So I will almost
Speaker 3: speed up to go past. And my mother inevitably Melissa,
Speaker 3: why why I wanted to see?
Speaker 2: And I'm like, I don't want to see it, and
Speaker 2: you just like I want to see. It's really let me.
Speaker 2: Did I ever tell you what? I did?
Speaker 3: Tell you?
Speaker 2: This story about my mother This really long time ago.
Speaker 2: We were in Haiti.
Speaker 1: And we were.
Speaker 2: Headed home and there was a woman, two women and.
Speaker 3: A child walking up the hill and then the kid
Speaker 3: and the kid started to run out into the street
Speaker 3: and the mom grabbed him by the scruff.
Speaker 2: Of the shirt.
Speaker 1: And in the meantime, I don't remember the story, remember this,
Speaker 1: I don't remember this.
Speaker 3: My mother rolls the window down as this woman is
Speaker 3: walloping her kid and she's encouraging the lady to hit
Speaker 3: her kids.
Speaker 1: She's doing she's like.
Speaker 2: Doing it, and I was like, Mom, what is wrong
Speaker 2: with you? And then her mother hit him, and then.
Speaker 3: My mother says to me, can you imagine what a
Speaker 3: bad day I would have had if we hit this kid?
Speaker 1: May we all.
Speaker 3: And she said it we all have the confidence on
Speaker 3: My mom says this to my fun.
Speaker 1: How awful my day would have been?
Speaker 3: If we we get home and we tell my dad
Speaker 3: this story, and he's just like, yeah, it's like the noted.
Speaker 2: It would have been a really bad day for your mother.
Speaker 1: My lung just collapse. If we don't get canceled for
Speaker 1: the fur, it's going to be the driving Listen, I
Speaker 1: was sounds like a punchline. It's kill or be killed.
Speaker 1: It's rough. Really, yeah, I mean I can I've never
Speaker 1: been to Haiti, but I can imagine.
Speaker 2: I mean I think.
Speaker 3: I mean anytime I've seen like videos of what it's
Speaker 3: like to drive in like India, or what it's like
Speaker 3: to drive in Sri Lanka or Pakistan, there is a
Speaker 3: certain level of chaos, and I will say, if you
Speaker 3: can drive in those places, you can absolutely drive anywhere.
Speaker 1: I've been in a car with Melissa mel Branch a
Speaker 1: couple of times. You to me, Yeah, we went to
Speaker 1: the beach that one time.
Speaker 2: Oh that's right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she does drive like a girl who grew up
Speaker 1: in Queens like. She is very much like that stop
Speaker 1: signs a foot away and we're going to just start
Speaker 1: pressing on.
Speaker 2: The top of a break, are you okay?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm fine. I mean I made it out alive
Speaker 1: and we got there pretty snappy. Yes we did.
Speaker 2: I've got places to go. I have shiit to do.
Speaker 1: In then out. Yeah, she's got four fucking estate sales
Speaker 1: to go to.
Speaker 2: Listen. I will not be judged by the likes.
Speaker 1: Okay, I just want to tell you this one thing
Speaker 1: that a bouncer said to me this weekend. We don't
Speaker 1: have to get into the whole story about me going out.
Speaker 1: It's okay, we all support my lifestyle, especially Melissa, but
Speaker 1: I do just have to tell you that this bouncer,
Speaker 1: first of all, Lady bouncer rare elusive, that creature. We
Speaker 1: love to love it. And I was like, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: and so I'm like going in on our autpha and
Speaker 1: I'm like, this is great. We're having a great time.
Speaker 2: The bouncer had a special outfit on.
Speaker 1: She was just looking great. She was beautiful, and so
Speaker 1: were we were chatting. I feel like it's the line
Speaker 1: behind me.
Speaker 2: Okay, sorry, I just I think I feel like a
Speaker 2: bouncer would be wearing something a key key no no, no, no,
Speaker 2: would be wearing something in case.
Speaker 1: It was very I mean it was very like Buffy
Speaker 1: the Vampire Slayer. There was a lot of like leather
Speaker 1: like dark colors. It wasn't like like a Diamon person
Speaker 1: berg wrap dress. Like. It was like.
Speaker 3: I didn't think that, but like I didn't think it'd
Speaker 3: be an outfit that required comments.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but it was. It was like it look great
Speaker 1: and uh she looked at me. So the night sort
Speaker 1: of erodes on in a debauchroous way, and she and
Speaker 1: I ended up chatting at the bar for a while
Speaker 1: and she goes, can I just ask you something? Are
Speaker 1: you white or white passing? It's like that is a
Speaker 1: crazy question.
Speaker 3: Actually speaking passing or white presenting, white past Okay, those
Speaker 3: are different things.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know.
Speaker 3: I was like, this is I think white presenting. You
Speaker 3: can't help it, right, that's of course.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: White passing is when you were like skulking, right.
Speaker 1: She was like, are you in here with all the
Speaker 1: white boys pretending to be and not like pretending to
Speaker 1: be white when you're not. It was very It was
Speaker 1: like so interesting we got into a whole identity politics
Speaker 1: conversation after that, but I thought it was and it
Speaker 1: reminded me of your cousin who reached out to you
Speaker 1: asking to talk to a transracial couple, asking Melissa to
Speaker 1: chat about their.
Speaker 2: Relationship.
Speaker 3: So she did reach back out to me, by the way,
Speaker 3: I forgot to touch base with you about it, and
Speaker 3: then she was just.
Speaker 1: Like me for waiting for the viewers at home.
Speaker 2: Everybody was type.
Speaker 1: One in the comment section if you need to be
Speaker 1: constantly kept up to date on this, because I do.
Speaker 3: So she got back to me and she was just like,
Speaker 3: I'm sorry, I meant cross cultural, not okay, Yeah, which
Speaker 3: is which is great, which is because I was very worried.
Speaker 3: I was worried that, like, not that it would be
Speaker 3: an issue if I was married to a white man,
Speaker 3: but that they would think that my.
Speaker 2: Not white husband was white.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And what is the conversation that's been happening behind
Speaker 3: my back?
Speaker 1: RuPaul always says, it's none of my business what other
Speaker 1: people say about me.
Speaker 2: I don't believe I had my back.
Speaker 1: I try to live by that because people really do
Speaker 1: talk shit about me.
Speaker 2: No, I want to know everybody who's to.
Speaker 1: Know people on the Internet. I'm really limiting the comment
Speaker 1: like what comments I read, because sometimes it's.
Speaker 3: Like, no, the Internet, I think the Internet is different.
Speaker 3: But I'm interested in what my family think.
Speaker 1: Actually, that's the last people. I want to know what
Speaker 1: they think about where I'm scared.
Speaker 2: No, I want to know, and I will take them on.
Speaker 1: Let's take a brief recess, all right. So this is
Speaker 1: sidebar where I share all the weird things that happened
Speaker 1: to me in court this week. This is shout out
Speaker 1: to the batties, to the girlies, to the nurses of
Speaker 1: New York City, because nurses are fierce divas who not
Speaker 1: only kept everyone alive during the pandemic and then like
Speaker 1: I was talking about this with my friend this week
Speaker 1: and actually that and then we just literally stopped thanking
Speaker 1: them one day. We were like, oh.
Speaker 2: Done, Well we stopped banging on and then it.
Speaker 1: Was like, okay, back back to treating them like shit
Speaker 1: and underpaying them and like not honoring their union contracts, right,
Speaker 1: so not valuing them, yeah, of course, yeah yeah, referring
Speaker 1: to Yeah, So I met So I had this client
Speaker 1: who she was experiencing like extreme illness. I can't really
Speaker 1: say too much but she was very sick, and so
Speaker 1: I had to go get her stuff from the detention
Speaker 1: center because they transferred her to the hospital with the
Speaker 1: treating without any of her shit. And so I was like,
Speaker 1: all right, I got to go get her stuff from
Speaker 1: a detention center. Let's just say it's so far in Brooklyn,
Speaker 1: so deep in Brooklyn.
Speaker 2: We know what I say, what behind God's back?
Speaker 3: But when something is fucking far away, where is that
Speaker 3: behind Gods?
Speaker 1: Yes, that's literally yeah, behind God's huge back. We passed.
Speaker 1: We have sorry shout out to God type two in
Speaker 1: the common section if you love God. So we're so
Speaker 1: far behind Gods back that like the Macha shops of
Speaker 1: Brooklyn are like in f a speck on the horizon.
Speaker 1: So I get over stuff, I book it back to
Speaker 1: the hospital. She's not conscious, and I was hired by
Speaker 1: the family, Like I was not working with this individual.
Speaker 1: But I'm chatting with one of the nurses because nurses
Speaker 1: they are like, oh, you're an immigration law are a
Speaker 1: lot of nurses are immigrants, so like, yeah, kind of
Speaker 1: you know, come over and want a kiki and they
Speaker 1: want to like she asked me a quick question, No,
Speaker 1: why is that actually? So I know you have a
Speaker 1: lot of nurses in your family.
Speaker 3: I do so because what happens is that the United
Speaker 3: States has a shortage of nurses, right, so a lot
Speaker 3: of people from other countries are coming to the United
Speaker 3: States to be nurses, which is then resulting in a
Speaker 3: shortage of nurses in other countries.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: So, like there is a shortage, shortage of nurses in
Speaker 3: the Philippines because so many Philippina nurses from here, there's
Speaker 3: a shortage of nurses in And I know Africa is
Speaker 3: a big place in the content.
Speaker 2: I cannot remember the country, however, there.
Speaker 1: Is you got a haul on this one. Yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: they have.
Speaker 2: All gone over to Ireland.
Speaker 1: Oh, because there's a nursing shortage.
Speaker 2: There so and a lot of Irish they make.
Speaker 1: More than yes, Oh my god, where are the Irish nurses.
Speaker 2: Going the UK?
Speaker 1: Stop? Oh my yeah? Three card shuffle.
Speaker 2: Yes, and that's what's happened. This is that's what's happening. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Wow. Anyway, if only we could like come together and
Speaker 1: just be like, hey, guys, for so many Yeah, I guess, yeah,
Speaker 1: let's let's like fair pay. Anyway. So I'm chatting with
Speaker 1: this nurse and she's like oh, like this is and
Speaker 1: we sort of get into the case a little bit
Speaker 1: and the ICE wouldn't unhandcuff my unconscious client. So I
Speaker 1: asked the nurse. I was like, hey, like would you
Speaker 1: kind of be willing to testify? And she's like jumped
Speaker 1: on it. She was like yeah, sure, and I'm going
Speaker 1: to like help her out with other stuff. But I
Speaker 1: got to go to court the next day and the
Speaker 1: judge like leaned into me and was like, where's your client,
Speaker 1: like came at me hot, and I was like, my
Speaker 1: client's unconscious in the hospital. Ice won't release the person
Speaker 1: from custody. She's a non violent criminal record. We need
Speaker 1: to get her on a handcuff because medical professionals are
Speaker 1: advising that they can't treat her properly because she's still
Speaker 1: unconscious and handcuffed to a journey. So I got I
Speaker 1: facetimed the nurse. She gave me your number with the judge.
Speaker 1: I made her testify and did it work? It worked?
Speaker 1: It worked, They released her. It was great. She was awesome,
Speaker 1: And nurses like, I mean, they really fucking hate ice,
Speaker 1: like she was. They a lot of them are from
Speaker 1: immigrant communities. So she was like this, these are the receipts,
Speaker 1: These are the ways in which it was.
Speaker 2: Nurses also have empathy, yes, right, there's.
Speaker 1: That caregivers right, yeah, they care about it was. It
Speaker 1: was just like, what a feel good moment, and you know,
Speaker 1: an onslaught of fucking bullshit that you have to deal
Speaker 1: with as an immigration lawyer. So it's just like one
Speaker 1: of these moments where I was like, we're going to
Speaker 1: band together, we're going to hold hands, get this one
Speaker 1: person on a handcuffed, and so I can't much else
Speaker 1: about like what's coming going on with her, But.
Speaker 3: Now she's being properly treated. Good, good, good, I'm glad.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: So this segment is called, uh what the.
Speaker 2: Fox called under Earth?
Speaker 1: It's my show. Oh no, this segment's called under Oath.
Speaker 1: We're going to be talking about art law. I'm really
Speaker 1: excited to talk about this actually because I have a
Speaker 1: little bit of lare here because I actually I feel
Speaker 1: like I'm coming out. But I was an art lawyer.
Speaker 1: That was like sort of part of my villain origin story.
Speaker 1: I was an art lawyer. Right out of law school.
Speaker 1: I got a job working for a huge gallery. I
Speaker 1: can't say which one, you can probably guess it. But
Speaker 1: it was here in New York and it dealt with
Speaker 1: art from all areas of the world, modern art, antiquities, everything.
Speaker 1: So this case from two thousand and five, this curator
Speaker 1: was indicted in Los Angeles at the Getty for sort
Speaker 1: of taking antiquities, accused of taking antiquities from Italy and
Speaker 1: displaying them at the Getty. And it was sort of
Speaker 1: this like the sort of one of the first cases
Speaker 1: to really kind of deal with this issue because like,
Speaker 1: antiquities do belong to someone, like right, and this is.
Speaker 2: Like where they were taken from.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and this is like a huge I think a
Speaker 1: lot of institutions are sort of grappling with this like
Speaker 1: moment where it's like, Okay, we have this thing, we
Speaker 1: know it belongs to this other person. Like people's perception
Speaker 1: and how they think we should be behaving and treating
Speaker 1: these objects and treating other cultures, you know. I think
Speaker 1: the sort of logic and air quotes for those of
Speaker 1: you listening and not watching, is the logic was, Oh,
Speaker 1: it's safer with us than it is with this, and
Speaker 1: it's this very colonialist, fucked up perspective.
Speaker 3: I was going to say, because the colonizer will insist
Speaker 3: on colonizing, right, yes, at every turn.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And it was very much like steeped in this
Speaker 1: sort of notion of like, oh well, you know, these
Speaker 1: people could never possibly they don't understand what right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is like gross sort of like white imperialistic, frankly
Speaker 1: British perspective. I mean, the British Museum is like a
Speaker 1: very very infamous example of antiquity looting. So I wanted
Speaker 1: to talk about this case because I thought it was
Speaker 1: just sort of like an interesting entree into art law. Right,
Speaker 1: Like art law is sort of like cobbled together of
Speaker 1: all these weird different laws. Like there is no like
Speaker 1: art law section of a law school textbook. There's no
Speaker 1: like art law book of statutes. It's actually like it's
Speaker 1: contract law, it's criminal law. It is not. It's sort
Speaker 1: of like pulled together and the subject matter just happens
Speaker 1: to be art. So Marry and True she was the
Speaker 1: curator of the Getty, and she was accused of sort
Speaker 1: of like laundering these artifacts through private collections to sort
Speaker 1: of disguise the fact that they were acquired by the
Speaker 1: Getty in an improper way. So the outcome of this
Speaker 1: case was kind of cool because basically what happened was
Speaker 1: they sort of struck a deal in this like weird
Speaker 1: like Italian court where they return a lot of the
Speaker 1: antiquities and the charges were dropped, which is like an
Speaker 1: interesting thing. You don't normally see that happen. I mean,
Speaker 1: these were criminal charges, so you don't normally see that
Speaker 1: happen in criminal court where it's like, oh, if you
Speaker 1: return the TV you stole, I'm going to drop the charges,
Speaker 1: and it's like there's really no back seas in criminal court.
Speaker 1: That was like a really new thing. But I think
Speaker 1: because it was the getty, because it got so many
Speaker 1: headlines and this was five years later, Like it took
Speaker 1: five years of negotiating with the Italian government to sort
Speaker 1: of drop these charges. What happened to the woman, So
Speaker 1: Marian didn't have any finding of guilt, like she was exonerated.
Speaker 1: She does claim that, I mean, and I think she's
Speaker 1: probably right, like her reputation was badly damaged and this
Speaker 1: situation and I think contextually, like the criminal defense lawyer
Speaker 1: in me is like, yes, and everyone was doing this
Speaker 1: and this was the first time not to like say
Speaker 1: what she did was right and it.
Speaker 2: Was clearly right that was a precedent.
Speaker 1: This was the first time we've got a female curator.
Speaker 1: It's two thousand and five. I don't know there is
Speaker 1: something here there more. I'm like a little bit stuck
Speaker 1: on it where I'm like, yes, what she was doing
Speaker 1: was wrong. Everyone was doing it, and we chose this
Speaker 1: person to make an example of. Like that felt a
Speaker 1: little like, ooh, we've got there's something here. So since
Speaker 1: this case has happened, this was sort of like this
Speaker 1: beacon of how we're going to change the way we
Speaker 1: handle antiquities. Right, So we now have to have established
Speaker 1: provenance with every sort of artifact that says like you
Speaker 1: came from this place and sort of like a certificate
Speaker 1: showing that, like it's okay to do that. So if
Speaker 1: you're at the met, you're at a museum and you
Speaker 1: see something like that, they probably have some sort of
Speaker 1: documentation that says that it's okay for them to have that.
Speaker 3: Are they borrowing it from the country and not in
Speaker 3: the before times?
Speaker 2: More now I think.
Speaker 1: We're borrowing it. That's a great question because now I
Speaker 1: think there's like this sort of interesting trend that's happening
Speaker 1: with these institutions where they're like Ooh, this is like
Speaker 1: a bad pr moment and it's like totally not worth
Speaker 1: having this, Like mummy in our literally mummy in our museum.
Speaker 1: It doesn't look great for us, and people are kind
Speaker 1: of picking up on that, Yes they are, the wolk
Speaker 1: is coming for them, and so the woke left without
Speaker 1: saying goodbye.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So but they started started doing a lot of repatriation
Speaker 1: where they're returning objects to my eyes around New British Museum.
Speaker 1: Because I don't know how much of this they've actually
Speaker 1: done well.
Speaker 3: I mean, I think just the it's not just the
Speaker 3: British Museum, it's the entire British system where they would
Speaker 3: go into countries and steal the jewelry.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So there was sort of this like slate of
Speaker 1: international laws that came out that sort of governed this.
Speaker 1: But there have been like follow up lawsuits like Peru
Speaker 1: sued Yale University because they had objects for Machu Pichu
Speaker 1: that one of like the Yale professors sort of stole
Speaker 1: from Peru in the early twenty century.
Speaker 2: Can like I guess obviously they can.
Speaker 3: Peru sued Yale for this professor that I had taken
Speaker 3: these objects in the early part of the twenties, so
Speaker 3: it's not necessarily something that that may have happened in
Speaker 3: the past five or ten years.
Speaker 1: Oh no, you can go exactly old. Yeah, So a
Speaker 1: Yale professor discovered Machu Pichu. Peruvians knew where it was, right,
Speaker 1: but white people did and so he discovered it in
Speaker 1: his mind. And so he said, oh, I discovered this place,
Speaker 1: this abandoned city filled with antiquities, and brought back some
Speaker 1: of those objects and they were sort of being housed
Speaker 1: and held at Yale. So I mean, we'd love to
Speaker 1: see accountability. They did return the antiquities. Peru did kind
Speaker 1: of have to like sue them to get that to happen, right, Like,
Speaker 1: I don't love that part.
Speaker 3: No, So it's not like they were doing the right thing.
Speaker 3: They got sued right and had to give it back.
Speaker 1: And this was actually right after the Getty, So this
Speaker 1: was in two thousand and six, so there was sort
Speaker 1: of this like wave of oh, like this wave of
Speaker 1: being like, oh shit, we might have kind of fucked
Speaker 1: this up. And there's like kind of press coming out
Speaker 1: around this. So there was also an interesting statute that
Speaker 1: the US enacted an act the Native American Graves Protection
Speaker 1: and Repatriation Act because there were literal Native American remains
Speaker 1: being displayed in museums. So that Act has been pretty
Speaker 1: strictly enforced where people are returning, you know, burial objects,
Speaker 1: literal bodies sometimes. So the craziest things do happen in
Speaker 1: the art world, Like I think it is the most
Speaker 1: unregulated asset class. And so something I sort of learned
Speaker 1: quickly was that we're basically working for a finance company.
Speaker 1: It's an asset, and the contracts are just about art
Speaker 1: as an art lawyer. So I was an art lawyer
Speaker 1: for about two years and I worked at this gallery
Speaker 1: and like, the craziest things kind of happen.
Speaker 2: Would you like it?
Speaker 1: The silence is, I don't know if I still don't
Speaker 1: know if I liked it because it was crazy. It's
Speaker 1: like it's like hanging out with like your manic friend,
Speaker 1: Like it's going to be weird and crazy but also
Speaker 1: like really fun, but also you're quickly going to get
Speaker 1: kind of tired. Okay, you know that manic, depressive friend
Speaker 1: of yours, So you know who you are, Becky.
Speaker 3: Imagine there are a lot of also sort of really
Speaker 3: intense personalities.
Speaker 1: Right, A lot of intense personalities, a lot of Nepo babies.
Speaker 1: There was a lot of like interesting, yeah, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: the art world is governed by Nepo babies. It is
Speaker 1: all like the wealthiest people, their kids want to work
Speaker 1: in art, they are interested in contemporary art. Galleries are
Speaker 1: kind of run. It's like it really is this insular world,
Speaker 1: big personalities, a lot of entitlement. So that got old
Speaker 1: really fast too, Okay, I can imagine. So a lot
Speaker 1: of my job was like unfucking things up. So I
Speaker 1: don't know how else to say it. Yeah, but we
Speaker 1: were looking for this like bust of like Julius Caesar's head,
Speaker 1: and no one could find it.
Speaker 2: Oh I remember you telling me this for the actually,
Speaker 2: so we.
Speaker 1: Couldn't find it, and it was like months and it
Speaker 1: was my first day. Like the person well, first of all,
Speaker 1: when I interviewed, they were like, oh yes, great, Like
Speaker 1: I interviewed with like who my boss was going to be.
Speaker 1: And then I got a call from HR offering me
Speaker 1: the job, and they were like, just so you know,
Speaker 1: that person who interviewed with quit she is no longer here.
Speaker 1: She she quit her could she just no shoes on?
Speaker 1: Walked out the door half a cup of coffee on
Speaker 1: the table.
Speaker 2: Know how I feel. That's my theory about it.
Speaker 1: She was walking off into the sunset, never to be
Speaker 1: heard from again.
Speaker 3: Crazy something puts them over the edge. Yeah, she's find
Speaker 3: them their shoes behind because they said fuck it, yeah.
Speaker 1: Fuck this and just walked away. So she left this like, hey,
Speaker 1: we can find this bust of Julius Caesar's head. And
Speaker 1: this woman she was like, you know, well, I don't know.
Speaker 1: She was like, she was like, what are you doing?
Speaker 1: Four tense van uppaty. She was like this like older woman.
Speaker 1: It was clear she was. She was just like very
Speaker 1: much like a blue blood Emily Gilmour type, right, okay
Speaker 1: to like interview her. It was like a full interrogation
Speaker 1: in her office.
Speaker 2: Had to interview Emily Gilmore.
Speaker 1: Yes, and I had to sort of figure out where
Speaker 1: this was. We couldn't find it. It was really where
Speaker 1: it was very valuable. She was the one she was like,
Speaker 1: we don't know where this is, and so interview her. Anyway,
Speaker 1: she ends up retiring. Sure, as we're cleaning out her office,
Speaker 1: she was using it as a footrest. We found it
Speaker 1: on the floor under her desk.
Speaker 3: How do you not know that you're using a bust
Speaker 3: of Julius Caesar rest like or or or or or
Speaker 3: or how.
Speaker 1: Many how many busts of Juliuses are you using that
Speaker 1: you just mix them all up?
Speaker 3: Or was it in a box? Because that I can
Speaker 3: see right, was it in a box? And she was
Speaker 3: using the box as a foot rest not recognizing.
Speaker 1: No, it was like stuffed under her desk and she
Speaker 1: could I mean in her defense again, the defense lawyer
Speaker 1: and me really wants to defend more intense upity.
Speaker 2: What is the defense?
Speaker 1: The defense is like, you know, when was the last
Speaker 1: time she got on the floor and was kind of
Speaker 1: crawling around her office. I think it probably fell off
Speaker 1: her desk like backwards and then was on the floor
Speaker 1: and then she was like, my feet are sore, spin
Speaker 1: class this weekend, and was resting her feet on it
Speaker 1: for the next No, the past year.
Speaker 3: I reject this, I really really I rejected it. It's ridiculous.
Speaker 3: So you need to tell me. Let's just say that's true.
Speaker 3: You knew you had a bust, a valuable bust.
Speaker 2: On your desk. Oh sure, yeah, it fell off the desk.
Speaker 1: I mean yeah, I think it went yeah and then
Speaker 1: what it rolled? Yeah? It could have been. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think it probably rolled.
Speaker 2: This is this idea.
Speaker 3: No, I don't know, and this is not a you problem.
Speaker 3: And this is HORTENSEI van Uppitty's problem, right.
Speaker 1: Technically, I mean Julius Caesar's problem too.
Speaker 2: Well, he's it's not really his head.
Speaker 1: Well, we're going to do a rapid fire of all
Speaker 1: the crazy things that happened to me at that job.
Speaker 1: At one point, there was this Warhol that we couldn't identify,
Speaker 1: Like we had like an extra Warhol, which is like never.
Speaker 1: It's like when you're putting together Ikia furniture and you
Speaker 1: have an extra screw. It's like something's wrong. So why
Speaker 1: do we have an extra Warhol? And so we had
Speaker 1: to call in like a specialist from London. We like
Speaker 1: flew people into like we didn't know what this was,
Speaker 1: and it turned out that it was an empty frame.
Speaker 1: We spent like a hundred grand trying to figure out
Speaker 1: what it was, and it was just it was an
Speaker 1: empty frame that someone put the wrong sticker on.
Speaker 3: That would piss me off, we were that would really
Speaker 3: make me so angry, especially because I can see myself
Speaker 3: looking at something that looks like bullshit to me and
Speaker 3: I'm like, and now you've got me running around in
Speaker 3: a jackass parade.
Speaker 1: I mean, this is part of why I left. I mean,
Speaker 1: we've got I spent a lot of time in this.
Speaker 1: I was like, I could really be doing some good
Speaker 1: work with this law degree.
Speaker 3: Instead of working maybe not even good work, but better work.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. At one point we had we were moving
Speaker 1: everything around in this like shopping cart. Like there was
Speaker 1: a literal shopping cart, like from the stop and yeah,
Speaker 1: like from the stop and shop that we were moving
Speaker 1: art around the gallery with. Someone came and was like,
Speaker 1: I got to pick up my artwork and we're like,
Speaker 1: where is it? We're like trying to find it. We're
Speaker 1: moving stuff around in the shopping cart. The shopping cart
Speaker 1: was a work of art, and no one told us,
Speaker 1: and we were using it to transport. It had been
Speaker 1: like painted and glazed in like a specific way. We
Speaker 1: had to pay a lot of money to have it
Speaker 1: like restored.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, you've been.
Speaker 1: We've been pushing and that's the problem with modern art.
Speaker 3: I was going to say that that's the problem with
Speaker 3: modern art, right, and I can't stand that shit.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, I mean, because.
Speaker 1: I really am not pro shopping cart art. It has
Speaker 1: to stop somewhere like like, no, it's actually gotten out
Speaker 1: of hand. This is your expression is actually I do
Speaker 1: want to like shut down the art expressions.
Speaker 2: I just don't.
Speaker 1: I'm kind of anti artist at a certain point. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean I just become my father. I'm like, it's
Speaker 1: not a painting of a horse?
Speaker 2: Or is it like a bowl of fruit?
Speaker 3: Yea?
Speaker 1: Is it a still?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 1: What is it?
Speaker 2: You know? A nice water cool?
Speaker 1: It was my dad. Actually, wait, while we're on the
Speaker 1: subject of my dad. My dad touched a painting at
Speaker 1: MoMA and got escorted out of the building. When I
Speaker 1: was a kid. He walked. He was like, well, it
Speaker 1: looked like an interesting fabric, and he went and he
Speaker 1: touched it in an alarm went off.
Speaker 3: I was going to say, it's it's their fault if
Speaker 3: you don't want people to touch things, put it behind looseight.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean this is yeah, you don't want me
Speaker 1: to touch it. It's when I really became interested in
Speaker 1: the law, criminal law. My dad getting escorted out of MoMA,
Speaker 1: walked past the gift shop. I wonder who the artist was.
Speaker 1: I bet it's probably someone like really famous. They probably
Speaker 1: maybe they follow me on TikTok if you made that shopping.
Speaker 2: Cart, Michael.
Speaker 1: Sorry, I'm sorry. We did damage it a lot, but
Speaker 1: we fixed it.
Speaker 3: There was this person had a reality show and they
Speaker 3: were a i'll say they were like a rap mogul,
Speaker 3: and they had a piece of art that was basically
Speaker 3: like chalk on a chalkboard and the house cleaning person
Speaker 3: cleaned it.
Speaker 1: And that was bad. I have to be a good
Speaker 1: lawyer at this point, just for like a second. So technically,
Speaker 1: under like intellectual property law, if you are an artist
Speaker 1: and you are making these like temporal works like chalk
Speaker 1: or something like that, do some sort of like guide
Speaker 1: or manual that goes along with it. These sort of
Speaker 1: like artworks that can be like broken down and put
Speaker 1: back together, like swapped out, or they're an object that
Speaker 1: is like a cup ber thing, do like a menu
Speaker 1: script around it. That can be the thing that your
Speaker 1: intellectual property attaches to, rather than the drawing of the chalk,
Speaker 1: which can easily be a race. It'll raise the value
Speaker 1: of your property.
Speaker 3: And I think that that's probably really valuable advice. I
Speaker 3: just think that probably somebody who is an artist is
Speaker 3: like Erica Badu said, you know, is an artist and
Speaker 3: they're sensitive about their shit and they don't want to
Speaker 3: take the time.
Speaker 1: Yes to do so sure, yeah, of course, do you
Speaker 1: know what I mean?
Speaker 2: But your point is, well, hire.
Speaker 1: Someone to do or like chat gpt that shit, Like
Speaker 1: I don't, but you know what I mean, like if
Speaker 1: you've got like a little something. But I get it.
Speaker 1: And I've also been like that. My my agent was like,
Speaker 1: we really need you to write a book, and I
Speaker 1: was like, I don't have time or the energy to
Speaker 1: like you do, don't tell me what to do? Wait,
Speaker 1: I have that tattooed. What don't tell me what to do?
Speaker 1: You do? Yeah? Oh it's a bulldog and it says,
Speaker 1: don't tell me what to do.
Speaker 2: That's right. I don't think i've ever read your body before.
Speaker 1: We'll get a close up. Well, we'll throw a photo
Speaker 1: of my tattoo upon the screen. We could do a
Speaker 1: full tattoo tour one day.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: Other things that happened at the gallery. We had this
Speaker 1: one woman. She was always I would always catch her
Speaker 1: carrying a painting down the street like the like the
Speaker 1: Sometimes we had to send things out to be authenticated,
Speaker 1: and we would we would charge back a department for
Speaker 1: the transpo, and she wanted to save money on the
Speaker 1: transpot because we were on a shoe string budget, and
Speaker 1: so she would take the painting off the wall and
Speaker 1: like I would catch here like sidestepping down the street
Speaker 1: with the painting, and I have to be like, you're
Speaker 1: going to damage this, like and then I'm going to
Speaker 1: have to file the insurance claim. So she was always
Speaker 1: just rippach it off the wall.
Speaker 3: I don't know how I feel about the idea, because
Speaker 3: it sounds like this was like a major gallery, right,
Speaker 3: a major art institution that they were doing anything on
Speaker 3: a shoe string.
Speaker 1: Like, No, it was it was all about that bottom line.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, everything, but.
Speaker 2: The whole thing is the art. So if you damage
Speaker 2: the art, I.
Speaker 1: Know, well that was my poem. No Diva was going rogue.
Speaker 3: I don't know anything about this, and I'm telling you
Speaker 3: that that sounds stupid, right, So it bothers me that
Speaker 3: there are people who this was their jump.
Speaker 2: And they're just like, nope, I'm was gonna like take
Speaker 2: it off the wall.
Speaker 1: She's like, I read Sarah Palin going rogue, and I
Speaker 1: really took that to heart. I gotta just going straight wild.
Speaker 2: I was going to put this bust under my Death.
Speaker 1: Julius Caesar's head. I hate everything, say that every episode more. Okay,
Speaker 1: well you're about to hate me because at one point
Speaker 1: my I got locked out of my computer and I
Speaker 1: was getting sworn into the bar like this was back
Speaker 1: in twenty fourteen, and I was the only person who
Speaker 1: had access to this specific system. So my boss called
Speaker 1: me on myself and like at the swearing in ceremony,
Speaker 1: but in the art world, they don't give a shit
Speaker 1: what you're doing. And I had to read my password
Speaker 1: to my laptop.
Speaker 2: What was the ooh, my boss tell me what it was?
Speaker 1: Rainbow Dolphin sixty nine. Oh, that's not that bad, but
Speaker 1: with a capital R. Yeah, it was technically in compliance
Speaker 1: with like what he wanted. So I didn't get fired
Speaker 1: for that, but I was like, I had to explain
Speaker 1: it to him. He was like, that's actually not bad. No,
Speaker 1: it could have been really.
Speaker 2: Because I've had some bad passwork.
Speaker 1: I don't want to get hacked again.
Speaker 2: But no, no, I wouldn't say it.
Speaker 3: But I'm just saying, like I've had some nasty, nasty shit, yes.
Speaker 1: Or like real or like dark or.
Speaker 2: Like if I've hated a boss.
Speaker 1: Stop Melissa you're gathering your boss and your password every
Speaker 1: time you punch it in.
Speaker 3: Fuck this motherfucker hashtag number seven. Michael used to be
Speaker 3: my boss.
Speaker 1: We're not going to talk about that on the show
Speaker 1: or not. No, let's take a brief recess. Melissa has
Speaker 1: some cases actually this week that we wanted to talk about,
Speaker 1: so jump into it.
Speaker 2: I was looking at the docket for this year's Supreme Court.
Speaker 1: Where you just do you just like wake up in peruse.
Speaker 2: No, I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't but up a coffee on a Sunday morning.
Speaker 3: You know what. I was thinking about it because of
Speaker 3: the government shutdown, and I was just like, I wonder.
Speaker 2: What, I wonder what there?
Speaker 3: Yeah, their up to anything, and you know a little
Speaker 3: rabbit hole. One thing led to another and I was like, oh,
Speaker 3: I didn't and I don't think I had realized that.
Speaker 2: You can look at the docket for the year.
Speaker 1: Yeah right, yeah. A lot of people like track it.
Speaker 1: I stepped on sun New soda my horse foot once.
Speaker 2: Did you say sorry? You should have? It was a
Speaker 2: dick move.
Speaker 1: We were okay. So I was twenty four.
Speaker 2: Old enough to notice the excuse me?
Speaker 1: And I was waiting tables huh and she came in,
Speaker 1: huh with a big group, and she was I mean,
Speaker 1: she was great. I knew who she was, and like
Speaker 1: there was a whole like debate among the waiters of
Speaker 1: like what we call her. And I wasn't a lawyer yet,
Speaker 1: and so I don't really know. I think it's Madam
Speaker 1: Justice is what you're supposed to call her.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: Anyway, I stepped on her foot and she was like
Speaker 1: really cool about it. We both just kind of like
Speaker 1: looked at each other, like are we going to do
Speaker 1: a whole thing here, and she just like went and
Speaker 1: like just kind of ignored me. It's kind of great.
Speaker 1: She was super friendly.
Speaker 2: Though, Well that's welcoming to hear. Did I know?
Speaker 3: I did tell you this the time that I accidentally
Speaker 3: stepped on some guy's foot in the subway and he
Speaker 3: kicked me. What I said, excuse me, and he kicked you.
Speaker 3: Don't we go fuck myself and he kicked me.
Speaker 1: But the best was he mentally ill.
Speaker 3: He seemed fine to me. I kicked him back for
Speaker 3: me on all kidding aside, that was the part. That
Speaker 3: was the part when I tell you, let me tell.
Speaker 2: You about Perry. Menopause will make you do some shit
Speaker 2: and but let me tell you so, I unlike you.
Speaker 3: I am not a prolific TikToker, but I took it
Speaker 3: to TikTok.
Speaker 1: What did what did the clock apps say? Yeah? What
Speaker 1: were they saying? Well?
Speaker 3: There were I mean there were definitely two camps people
Speaker 3: who were like, you had a coming, bitch, what would it?
Speaker 2: Kicks you two?
Speaker 1: Because you stepped on his foot, you know, when you're walking.
Speaker 3: And I sat on the back of his foot and sorry,
Speaker 3: but I said, oh, excuse me, and then he turned around,
Speaker 3: fuck you, you bitch, and he kicked me.
Speaker 2: And I couldn't believe it.
Speaker 3: I kicked him back, and this man behind us, this
Speaker 3: random man sort of came up behind me and like
Speaker 3: very sort of kindly ushered me out of the way
Speaker 3: and was like, don't fight with him.
Speaker 2: He's crazy.
Speaker 3: And I was like, he kicked me, and I'm telling you,
Speaker 3: before perimenopause, I would have let it go.
Speaker 2: But if I, if I had a I might have
Speaker 2: cut him.
Speaker 1: Melissa auditioning for The Bend. It like Beckham sequels.
Speaker 2: Out of people even tell you and the thing is
Speaker 2: just like I think both of our kicks were like weak, like.
Speaker 3: It wasn't like not even, it wasn't like and it
Speaker 3: wasn't just like yeah, I kicked the world. It was
Speaker 3: like this week, but I was absolutely on fire in
Speaker 3: my soul, in my mind now.
Speaker 1: In my mind, you did something accidental that did not
Speaker 1: warrant physical intentional violence. The Men's Raya was present for
Speaker 1: that man.
Speaker 3: Well, I think I just I genuinely believe, and I
Speaker 3: was saying, this is somebody the other day. I just
Speaker 3: think that post pandemic, we are not okay, Like just
Speaker 3: generally the world is not okay.
Speaker 2: We're not okay.
Speaker 1: When I mean someone post pandemic who hasn't gone to therapy,
Speaker 1: like I went to so much therapy after the because
Speaker 1: I just couldn't. I literally didn't know how to talk
Speaker 1: to people. I like forgot, I forgot how to like
Speaker 1: relate to people, which I do you look in? Do
Speaker 1: you look both? Like? It was like how do I
Speaker 1: do this again? Like it really took me a minute.
Speaker 1: It was clunky, especially with like client based work, like
Speaker 1: how do you actually relate to someone with empathy? After
Speaker 1: like when all of your insides are screaming that you
Speaker 1: know what we're doing is unsafe just being near each
Speaker 1: other like that was so spooky. Yeah, so I went.
Speaker 1: I mean I did. And a lot of people I
Speaker 1: know went to therapy or were in therapy during the pandemic.
Speaker 2: I actually, I actually wasn't. I stopped right before. I
Speaker 2: stopped right before.
Speaker 1: And you're still wondering why you kicked someone?
Speaker 2: Could he kicked me first? It's not like I kicked him.
Speaker 2: He kicked me. I kicked him back. Fuck him, fun, sir,
Speaker 2: get out of here.
Speaker 1: Okay, you have it. Melissa brought a case this week
Speaker 1: that she wants to talk about the Supreme Court.
Speaker 3: So I was looking at the Supreme Court docket and
Speaker 3: they are bringing this case and the case is called
Speaker 3: Chiles versus Salazar. Oh yeah, and it is about Colorado
Speaker 3: law that is banning conversion therapy. So if you don't
Speaker 3: know what conversion therapy is, it is actually illegal in
Speaker 3: twenty five states, which means that it's not illegal in
Speaker 3: the other twenty five states.
Speaker 1: I had a friend who went to a conversion therapy really.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, he's still fucked.
Speaker 2: Up, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: People who go through it it.
Speaker 1: Really because, especially like at this time in your life
Speaker 1: when you're trying to figure your shit out and then
Speaker 1: someone is like forcing you to like not do that.
Speaker 1: It really does. Oh, I can imagine mess with these psychologically.
Speaker 2: Jumping down who you are, right, Yeah, And.
Speaker 1: Like it's a lot of some of it's like negative enforcement.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's really scary shit.
Speaker 2: And I also think.
Speaker 3: The idea that usually if you are a young person
Speaker 3: who's going into conversion therapy, your parents have sent you
Speaker 3: to that, right, Yeah, definitely to imagine what that must
Speaker 3: feel like as somebody who's sort of trying to come
Speaker 3: into themselves and the people who should be the most loving,
Speaker 3: the most supportive are telling you that there's something wrong
Speaker 3: with you, right, and.
Speaker 2: That you need to fix it.
Speaker 3: And in the fixing, it's almost like a breakdown.
Speaker 1: Yes. Also it's also like the messaging that you're getting
Speaker 1: from a parent is that I don't love you the
Speaker 1: way you are, right, You've got a change in order
Speaker 1: to be acceptable to me. That is like the most
Speaker 1: fucked up thing I think. I mean, my parents were
Speaker 1: contextually very cool with me coming out when I came out,
Speaker 1: and they were supportive, like in their own way, I
Speaker 1: don't think like they definitely didn't do anything like that,
Speaker 1: but at the time, like they were so progressive about it,
Speaker 1: and I like, I'm always so grateful for that because
Speaker 1: looking back, I mean, at the time, it didn't feel
Speaker 1: like a huge, big, crazy deal to me, but like
Speaker 1: looking back, knowing everything I know now about the world
Speaker 1: and how most gay people sort of enter it, I
Speaker 1: don't know, I just feel like very grateful for the
Speaker 1: fact that they made it like a non event, non issue,
Speaker 1: especially then going to law school in the South when
Speaker 1: I was twenty three and I had been out for
Speaker 1: eight years at that point, to meet all these gay
Speaker 1: men who were still so hung up on it, deeply closet,
Speaker 1: I really struggled with it, and I was like, it
Speaker 1: was it was a culture shock for me because I
Speaker 1: was very much like a Northerner going to school in
Speaker 1: the South, and I was like, I don't relate to this,
Speaker 1: Like I actually, this is like such a strange cultural difference.
Speaker 1: It was really it was different. It was hard to
Speaker 1: kind of connect with that community when I was there,
Speaker 1: because I was like, it's hard to really date when
Speaker 1: people are like very closeted or still hung up on it.
Speaker 1: And it was never something I was hung up on.
Speaker 3: You are permitted when you really needed it to be
Speaker 3: yourself exactly right. And now you're going your gone through
Speaker 3: college and now you're in law school.
Speaker 2: You are really yourself.
Speaker 3: And you are trying to connect with people hopefully who
Speaker 3: are also their authentic self.
Speaker 1: And you're also able to sort of like find parts
Speaker 1: about yourself that aren't sexuality based, like if you like,
Speaker 1: for me, it was like got through it, figured it out.
Speaker 1: Now I can explore like the other things I'm interested in,
Speaker 1: like what motivates me as a person, Like why hobbies
Speaker 1: am I interested in? Like how do I sort of
Speaker 1: want to enter this world? And I was able to
Speaker 1: sort of do that. I think a lot of queer
Speaker 1: people who don't have that experience then are still figuring
Speaker 1: it out now right.
Speaker 3: Right now, these are sort of adults in their thirties
Speaker 3: trying to figure themselves out.
Speaker 2: Still.
Speaker 1: Yes, but this band, they're banning it in Colorado and
Speaker 1: it's made its way up to the Supreme Court. In
Speaker 1: the stream Court is going to decide if they're going
Speaker 1: to hear it.
Speaker 2: They are going to be there.
Speaker 1: They have decided, yeah, they are.
Speaker 3: Going to hear it. And so the therapist who's bringing
Speaker 3: the case, her name is Kaylie Chilis. I think that's
Speaker 3: how you say it. She's arguing that the Colorado Band
Speaker 3: infringes on her First Amendment right to free speech because
Speaker 3: it is limiting what she can say to her clients.
Speaker 3: So this is a therapist whose therapy practice is faith
Speaker 3: based on Jesus.
Speaker 1: That makes me so nervous.
Speaker 3: Well yeah, and she, according to what I read, she's
Speaker 3: sort of really bristling at the idea that this is
Speaker 3: conversion therapy. She's saying that, you know, she wants to
Speaker 3: be able to speak to her clients about who they
Speaker 3: are and what God wants them to be.
Speaker 1: No, get fucked, God wants her kid to be gay
Speaker 1: as hell. I'm sorry, go fuck yourself. Like that's a
Speaker 1: that's like, that's a guy to the headline for me,
Speaker 1: dog like I don't know, man Like, oh, like God
Speaker 1: is telling me what to how about like the governing
Speaker 1: ethics for psychology and psychiatry.
Speaker 2: But again, what.
Speaker 3: She's saying is that so and she's also saying that
Speaker 3: these are people who were coming to her on their own, okay,
Speaker 3: not necessarily being brought forcibly to them by their parents.
Speaker 3: But it still makes me really anxious, you know. After
Speaker 3: the election. Actually I recorded it but didn't post it
Speaker 3: because I started crying in the middle of it.
Speaker 2: But one of the things that.
Speaker 3: I was really really worried about is I was worried
Speaker 3: about trans people while was going to happen to them.
Speaker 3: You know, I think being your authentic self is such
Speaker 3: an important part of who I am. I'm just you know,
Speaker 3: and it takes everybody some time to figure that out.
Speaker 2: But I can't imagine what it would feel like if
Speaker 2: you felt like the world around you resented you for
Speaker 2: simply being who you were, right, And it made me
Speaker 2: worried about both people sort of moving along in their
Speaker 2: lives and being healthy and choosing to stay with us, right,
Speaker 2: because that is something else that I'm really worried about.
Speaker 1: So the suicide rates in the trans community are significantly higher.
Speaker 3: They are higher, and we can sort of almost understand
Speaker 3: why that is, right, sure, feel like the entire world
Speaker 3: is against you, then what is there to live for?
Speaker 3: And I feel like, you know, I hate to sort
Speaker 3: of be this person, but like, please.
Speaker 2: Don't do that.
Speaker 3: You are loved, you are wanted, you are respected, you
Speaker 3: are valued, you know, And I hope that it trans
Speaker 3: folks are getting that message in spite of what is happening.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we've talked about this, just like the way in
Speaker 1: which like the queer community is taking care of itself,
Speaker 1: Like the way that like we're kind of like clinging
Speaker 1: closer to each other, and like, I don't know, if
Speaker 1: you are not trans and supportive, like and you know
Speaker 1: someone who is, like, you don't have to be like hey,
Speaker 1: holding space for you trans person. I know a lot's
Speaker 1: going on. You could just like be like, hey, how's
Speaker 1: it going, Like you get like there are ways to
Speaker 1: support each other that isn't like you know, the after
Speaker 1: school special, Like we can just be like we could
Speaker 1: just like be there for each other. You see someone
Speaker 1: at the bar, you see someone at a coffee shop
Speaker 1: who's sitting alone. Maybe they looks like you know, I
Speaker 1: just I think about that a lot.
Speaker 3: Yes, so do I And I actually feel it when
Speaker 3: I don't, you do like guilty.
Speaker 1: I'm like I really should have talked to that person,
Speaker 1: and then they get.
Speaker 3: Like a little I think the other that somebody could do.
Speaker 3: I know that I do this if there are people
Speaker 3: around me who are making like commentary that I find
Speaker 3: offensive and they think that it, well, I think you
Speaker 3: can do that if you choose be careful.
Speaker 2: I don't. Don't, don't do that actually, but listen.
Speaker 3: But I also think what I love to do is
Speaker 3: make people feel uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: Oh god, Melissa is a villain. It is so satisfying
Speaker 1: to watch you do this. It actually is like a
Speaker 1: litigation strategy. And I don't know who taught at you,
Speaker 1: where you found it from, discovered it yourself to you before?
Speaker 2: Why? Okay, person, I have the blood of revolutionaries. Oh yeah,
Speaker 2: at all times.
Speaker 1: No, and that is actually in your bio and it's
Speaker 1: on your business card.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: But I do think that sometimes by making people who
Speaker 3: are offensive feel uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: Right, that's the way. Let's do an example, So.
Speaker 3: Say say something that you think that we know is offensive.
Speaker 1: I think you got that. I think is funny. Oh
Speaker 1: I don't know if I can do that, but like
Speaker 1: I know the one that you've talked, right.
Speaker 3: The what I always do is if somebody says something
Speaker 3: I can they think is funny. Yeah right, yeah, I
Speaker 3: will inevitably say.
Speaker 1: I don't get it.
Speaker 3: Oh, I don't understand, and then they'll say it again
Speaker 3: and I'm just like, wait, am I missing something?
Speaker 2: What part of that? Oh?
Speaker 3: I'm sorry, explain it to me. And then Eventually they're
Speaker 3: just like, oh.
Speaker 2: She's taking me to task without actually being.
Speaker 1: Verify right, there's nothing worse than telling a joke and
Speaker 1: having to explain the joke, and then any joke, even
Speaker 1: if it's not a right, to have to have someone
Speaker 1: a not understand. So now there's crickets right then to
Speaker 1: have to be like, oh, let me answer a quick
Speaker 1: Q and A about that joke I told you no
Speaker 1: one laughed at. And now I'm realizing that I said
Speaker 1: something offensive, offensive.
Speaker 2: Not funny, yeah, but not clever.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And it's not something that I do to just random people.
Speaker 3: But when people say things in front of me that
Speaker 3: I find offensive that I know are could be potentially
Speaker 3: hurtful for somebody else.
Speaker 2: I make them explain it to me.
Speaker 3: Explain it to me slow, and then and it explain
Speaker 3: it to me slow because and then you know, and
Speaker 3: they usually sort of either like say, forget it or
Speaker 3: they fact pedal, Wait, why is that funny?
Speaker 2: See?
Speaker 1: So it's true.
Speaker 3: No, it's great and you and you and you have
Speaker 3: to look at them right in the eye and be
Speaker 3: really uncomfortable about it, like right, get in their face,
Speaker 3: and you don't. And again, not everybody is comfortable telling
Speaker 3: somebody to go fuck themselves, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah for sure. So on mind like those of
Speaker 1: us who are like, let's do it, you do it.
Speaker 3: And I think you do what you feel comfortable with.
Speaker 3: I am comfortable and making people feel uncomfortable. I'm very comfortable.
Speaker 1: I can live in the awkward silence where you know
Speaker 1: someone's getting called out on something, or if someone asks
Speaker 1: me something and I really need them to hear their
Speaker 1: own question, like getting comfortable with that like awkward minute
Speaker 1: of like let.
Speaker 3: Me ask you a question, okay, in an uncomfortable situation,
Speaker 3: like let's say you are in a group meeting with
Speaker 3: a lot of people, okay, and then there's somebody this
Speaker 3: is completely not what we're talking about, but I'm just
Speaker 3: now that you mentioned that, and there is that uncomfortable moment.
Speaker 3: Do you just live in the moment or do you, like,
Speaker 3: do you let the moment play out or do you
Speaker 3: sort of do something like some people will like move
Speaker 3: things around, some people will like cough, yeah.
Speaker 2: Do you want to know what I do?
Speaker 1: And do you know I find stillness like I'm just
Speaker 1: like you just wait. I think there's power and stillness.
Speaker 1: I think we're all moving around all, oh.
Speaker 3: I don't know why I do this, but I fake sneeze.
Speaker 2: And I don't know.
Speaker 3: And I think because I think because if I if
Speaker 3: I allergic, if I sneeze someone at someone's going to
Speaker 3: say bless you, and.
Speaker 2: I do, and now I've given away my thing.
Speaker 3: But that's what because sometimes if the uncomfortable thing has
Speaker 3: nothing to do with me, but I'm here, I.
Speaker 2: Get very no.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, but.
Speaker 2: If I it's different atrophy, I do, and I don't know.
Speaker 3: When I started doing it.
Speaker 1: My stop, I have a high bless you can't know that.
Speaker 2: That's a really good series.
Speaker 1: This is method actor Jared Letto the studio.
Speaker 2: That's what I do. I have a friend who just
Speaker 2: sort of she kind of does. But yeah, that's what
Speaker 2: I do. I fake me because I'm so uncomfortable and
Speaker 2: I've got to go.
Speaker 3: Someone's going to say God, bless you, and it's going
Speaker 3: to like resett out of here.
Speaker 1: My response is fighter flight. I'm like getting out out
Speaker 1: of the studio.
Speaker 3: So yeah, so anyway, back to this game, back to
Speaker 3: this case, back to Trance writes on the line, anyway,
Speaker 3: I'm super interested to see.
Speaker 1: Yes, I'm too.
Speaker 2: I'm super worried about trans folks, and.
Speaker 1: As a lawyer, I have to jump in and just
Speaker 1: sort of like compare like this to the gay Cake
Speaker 1: Baker lawsuit at the Supreme Court. So so there there will
Speaker 1: be like an interesting like call and response between those
Speaker 1: two decisions, right between this decision and that decision. Right,
Speaker 1: But speaking of like ally ship and like how you
Speaker 1: kind of relate, like we talked about like how to
Speaker 1: like relate and you know sort of like handle a phobe, right,
Speaker 1: a transphobe, a racist person at home? But whatever it
Speaker 1: Maybe JK. Rowling recently was talking to Emma or no,
Speaker 1: Emma Watson was talking to you.
Speaker 2: No no, no, no, no, no no, no, Emma Watson.
Speaker 1: I'm getting I'm getting corrected. Any any Harry Potter reference there? Okay,
Speaker 1: there are like ten people I send memes to. The
Speaker 1: only Harry Potter memes I send to people are to Melissa.
Speaker 1: She's the only person I said Potter race too, and
Speaker 1: she loves I mean, and you like every one of them.
Speaker 1: I love them too because I get it. If I'm hungover,
Speaker 1: it's Chinese food and Harry Potter movies on the sofa
Speaker 1: all day. That is my Sunday.
Speaker 3: As much as I have enjoyed the movies.
Speaker 2: My my real thing is the books.
Speaker 3: And just really quickly about my foray into Harry Potter.
Speaker 2: I came to it late.
Speaker 3: I was a grown ass adult when it first came out,
Speaker 3: and I thought it was stupid. I was like the
Speaker 3: idea that me, as a grown woman, I'm going to
Speaker 3: read a book about a boy wizard to get the
Speaker 3: fuck out of here. But I bought the scholastic like
Speaker 3: set of like the first four books from my cousins.
Speaker 2: I have a lot of cousins for my cousins, and
Speaker 2: the Thirst.
Speaker 1: Books look very much like for a kid like. The
Speaker 1: book covers are very.
Speaker 2: Much, yes, very much, very much.
Speaker 3: And I bought it for him and I don't remember why,
Speaker 3: but I ended up not giving it to him for
Speaker 3: his births and I threw it in the backseat of
Speaker 3: my car where it rolled around for months.
Speaker 1: Sure, she's flying down the road. I've been in the
Speaker 1: car with her on the brain. The Brakouse books are
Speaker 1: banged up.
Speaker 3: And I had taken my mother someplace and I ended
Speaker 3: up having to wait for her longer than we had thought.
Speaker 1: And this is before she was rubbernecking out an accident.
Speaker 3: Probably, and I pulled out the first book and instantly
Speaker 3: was like I was like, oh my god, this is great.
Speaker 1: You're like, oh shit, who's that g Why are the
Speaker 1: letters exploding out of that? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yes, love it anyway.
Speaker 3: So and then I even turned into the person who
Speaker 3: would go to the midnight Oh.
Speaker 1: I did that. My friends and I left the club.
Speaker 1: I was nineteen. We left the club and we went
Speaker 1: to the midnight showing Turn No.
Speaker 2: No, no, no, no, not the midnight showing.
Speaker 1: Oh of the book.
Speaker 4: Oh.
Speaker 1: We went to the movies and we were like, you know,
Speaker 1: hooting and hollering in the back. You went to the
Speaker 1: midnight like Barnes and Noble release party. I would did
Speaker 1: like Fergie perform. I don't know, And I just felt
Speaker 1: so like.
Speaker 3: It would just be me, all these like parents and
Speaker 3: like me just like standing there. I really do have
Speaker 3: a tremendous amount of affection for these books for some
Speaker 3: reason too, And it has been I can't even begin
Speaker 3: to tell you how deeply and profoundly disappointing it has
Speaker 3: been for me to realize that in spite of her talents,
Speaker 3: because she is talented, right like JK. Rowling has created
Speaker 3: this amazing world of books. She's also read other books
Speaker 3: that are also good. Yes, yeah, but to realize.
Speaker 2: That she's a really Jesus bitch, like she's this horrible person.
Speaker 2: It's it is really really disappointing.
Speaker 1: Kind of just say. My favorite meme is on Twitter,
Speaker 1: she was saying something insanely transphobic. Yeah, and someone said
Speaker 1: put her back her like thumbnail photo was it was
Speaker 1: clearly there was like black mold growing up the wall.
Speaker 1: And someone wrote, like the black mold is like destroying
Speaker 1: her brain. And then the next photo was she changed
Speaker 1: her profile photos she saw the tweet and changed her
Speaker 1: photo to to something else without black mold in this
Speaker 1: in the background.
Speaker 3: Yes, I don't understand the loathing that she has or
Speaker 3: that anybody has. Frankly, for the trans community, the transc
Speaker 3: community is minuscule. It's tiny.
Speaker 1: And also, like I got to say, like some of
Speaker 1: the coolest people I know, like there are a plenty
Speaker 1: of like jokes of like you know, punching down about
Speaker 1: like them not having a sense of humor or like
Speaker 1: but like literally I had the most fun. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of this like oh woe can't take a joke
Speaker 1: kind of like energy on the on the alt right
Speaker 1: or whatever, right, yes, yeah, right, I will say, like
Speaker 1: in my experience, like it's usually the people have the
Speaker 1: most fun with or trands because like to be trans.
Speaker 1: I think for the most part, a lot of people
Speaker 1: have like a lot of self awareness if you're trans.
Speaker 1: Like there's this interesting MPR sort of series a couple
Speaker 1: of years ago about trans kids and how they are
Speaker 1: oftentimes like the people who understand themselves as a person
Speaker 1: more than non trans children. They were able to identify
Speaker 1: that there's something different about themselves articulated to an adult
Speaker 1: and like seek assistance. So it's like kind of interesting,
Speaker 1: like I don't know to have that level of self
Speaker 1: awareness like a lot of the times, at least for
Speaker 1: in my case, of a lot of like humor about it,
Speaker 1: right anyway, to be like very disappointed. I think what
Speaker 1: we're kind of like coming up against her is like
Speaker 1: the artist versus the art. Yeah, and like how do
Speaker 1: we like separate that? And it's coming up more and
Speaker 1: more I think in society likes people just sort of
Speaker 1: like are getting more and more canceled.
Speaker 3: So, speaking of being canceled, so Emma Watson went on
Speaker 3: some podcasts and she was talking about, you know, her
Speaker 3: life after Harry Potter and how she sort of stopped
Speaker 3: acting for a while and she's thinking about coming back,
Speaker 3: and then of course the JK Rowling thing came up,
Speaker 3: and then she said that she's deciding that she's going
Speaker 3: to love JK Rowling in spite of her stance on
Speaker 3: trans folks, because she's choosing to remember the JK Rolling
Speaker 3: that she knew herself. Right, She's choosing to value the
Speaker 3: woman who wrote this amazing character, Hermione.
Speaker 1: Which I probably had like amazing experiences with her when
Speaker 1: she was a kid, right.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, And you know, saying that you know somebody, she's like,
Speaker 3: I am choosing to believe that there is something that
Speaker 3: she just does not understand. I don't want to believe
Speaker 3: that she's a bad person. I don't want to believe
Speaker 3: that this person that I loved is really sort of
Speaker 3: inherently evil.
Speaker 1: This feels like how people kind of like relate to
Speaker 1: a dead relative or parent or something like that. Like
Speaker 1: it's very much like I'm going to choose to remember
Speaker 1: like the positive things, and it's also like kind of
Speaker 1: like a very healthy way to sort of deal with Yeah, absolutely, yes, Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like how do I just like take this wonderful experience
Speaker 1: I have with this person who's now doing something that
Speaker 1: I completely disagree with, and like honor and cherish what
Speaker 1: I remember of that and not have it be colored
Speaker 1: by what's happening now. Like that is like a very
Speaker 1: evolve I thought so.
Speaker 3: I thought so, and it came across and I know
Speaker 3: she's an actress, but it came across to me as
Speaker 3: very sincere.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And she was.
Speaker 3: Just like, yes, I think that she's wrong. I think
Speaker 3: that maybe there's something that she doesn't understand. I think
Speaker 3: that she could be taught. Right basically what she was saying.
Speaker 1: This person has the capacity right, And she.
Speaker 3: Was just like, I am not going to cancel her.
Speaker 3: I am going to hold space for her, and I'm
Speaker 3: going to be here if she were to choose to
Speaker 3: be educated.
Speaker 2: I'm happy to do.
Speaker 1: What happened. I actually didn't.
Speaker 3: Follow this tweets ex'es or whatever it is rips Emma
Speaker 3: Watson a moment asshole like when I and just full vitriol.
Speaker 2: It was disgusting. Wow, And basically was like what she thinks,
Speaker 2: what JK Rolling thinks is happening is that now it.
Speaker 3: Is no longer sort of attractive to be the person
Speaker 3: who hates JK rolling right, so that now Emma is
Speaker 3: changing her stance to sort of gentle her stance on
Speaker 3: what she had said about her before, because apparently Emma Watson,
Speaker 3: dan Ol Radcliffe and Rupert had all come out and
Speaker 3: been like sort of against what she had said about
Speaker 3: trans people. And she's saying that she thinks that Emma
Speaker 3: now wants to sort of start back into acting again,
Speaker 3: and that she's now changing her sort of hardcore stance
Speaker 3: about JK Rowling to be gentler so that she herself
Speaker 3: becomes more palatable and that and just going in about
Speaker 3: how this woman is ignorant and doesn't know anything.
Speaker 2: It was so fucking.
Speaker 3: Gross, absolutely just so reprehensible, Like would it not be
Speaker 3: better to be like, you know what, Emma, I disagree
Speaker 3: with you.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna keep my stance.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm gonna keep I'm gonna I'm gonna keep being.
Speaker 2: This turf right. I'm gonna keep on doing this. But
Speaker 2: I appreciate the love that you have for me.
Speaker 3: I love you too, even if to say let's agree
Speaker 3: to do had as well.
Speaker 1: Yes, gonna go back to the right.
Speaker 3: I'm gonna go back to being basically unbreathed, the more together,
Speaker 3: right I was. Again, I'm just constantly disappointed by her, really,
Speaker 3: and it kind of bothers.
Speaker 1: Me to have like the level of imagination where you
Speaker 1: can write seven books about, you know, something that really
Speaker 1: was like very fascinating and interesting and she really built
Speaker 1: a world, but not be able to imagine the gender spectrum.
Speaker 1: It is like crazy to me to not be able
Speaker 1: to be like, oh, you know what, maybe someone is
Speaker 1: not necessarily a binary like what it was just crazy?
Speaker 1: That is whack.
Speaker 2: Yeah, No, it really really is. Anyway, I just thought
Speaker 2: those two things kind of went together.
Speaker 3: I really I hate I hate feeling so disappointed in people.
Speaker 1: It's like when I found out a client's guilty, I'm like,
Speaker 1: you fucking lie, or if I got uprising. No, I
Speaker 1: mean it's a lot of the times, like I represent
Speaker 1: guilty people like and it's just like a matter of
Speaker 1: we're figuring out a technicality or making sure the police
Speaker 1: did their job right right. But a lot of the
Speaker 1: times it's like I got to figure out, like they
Speaker 1: lie to me. It's not necessarily that they're guilty, but
Speaker 1: they lie the criminal record and I find out, like
Speaker 1: the most annoying way it's always like right when I'm
Speaker 1: like about to really stick it to the prosecution that
Speaker 1: I find out about.
Speaker 3: But the other thing is, I know you don't love
Speaker 3: being lied to, but also even guilty people deserve representation.
Speaker 3: Oh right, So yeah, I feel like really strongly, like
Speaker 3: I know, don't want to ever give JK Rolling another dollar,
Speaker 3: you know.
Speaker 2: What I mean? Like I know, And the thing is
Speaker 2: is that what I hate it.
Speaker 1: It was fantastic Beast movies. Though if you take an
Speaker 1: edible they're really good. They're not I mean, if you
Speaker 1: take a couple, if you take a dumpy not ei no,
Speaker 1: a little gummy and a fantastic beast, that is a
Speaker 1: that is a good night?
Speaker 2: Is it a good night?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a good night, good time all right? This
Speaker 1: is Tales from the DMS. I'm going to be answering
Speaker 1: all your burning legal questions that you send me on
Speaker 1: the internet. You DM them to me, you call in,
Speaker 1: you leave us voicemails. If you go to my lank tree,
Speaker 1: you can leave us a voicemail. We will play it
Speaker 1: on the show and I'll answer your legal question. But
Speaker 1: keep the information private if you don't want us saying
Speaker 1: who you are and also like, don't record a voicemail
Speaker 1: if you don't want people to hear your voice. Someone
Speaker 1: wrote and was annoyed about that.
Speaker 3: And also everybody, I want you to remember that one
Speaker 3: Michael is a lawyer.
Speaker 2: He's not your lawyer.
Speaker 3: So this is just for informational purposes, entertainment purposes.
Speaker 2: Just remember that.
Speaker 1: All right, this question, let's let's play it.
Speaker 2: What happens if you're riding in a self driving car
Speaker 2: and it gets into a crash or if a police
Speaker 2: officer pulls over a self driving car. What's the legality
Speaker 2: of that?
Speaker 1: Okay, So the interesting thing about self driving cars is
Speaker 1: that there's actually a scale based off states about autonomy.
Speaker 1: So there's like it's like a scale of zero through
Speaker 1: five of how autonomous is the vehicle, which I think
Speaker 1: is like so crazy that like someone had to come
Speaker 1: up with this of like, okay, it's just the one
Speaker 1: that kind of keeps you in the lane, and someone
Speaker 1: else was like, all right, it's like a completely self
Speaker 1: driving car. There's no person in the driver's seat, Like
Speaker 1: I think they have these on the West coast.
Speaker 2: Now right in San Francisco.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, So basically what happen and there's if it's
Speaker 1: fully autonomous. There's no one in the front seat that
Speaker 1: you can actually sue the manufacturer if there was some
Speaker 1: sort of like iper product liability. Okay, so that's usually
Speaker 1: what happens if there is an accident like that. There
Speaker 1: have been some cases where that's happened. But if you
Speaker 1: are in the driver's seat and there is like an
Speaker 1: autonomous feature that you're using and you get in an accident,
Speaker 1: you can be held liable.
Speaker 2: Yes, I mean I feel like that.
Speaker 1: Sorry, I was. I was surprised that there was I
Speaker 1: was when I learned about it. I was surprised that
Speaker 1: there was like a literal scale of like autonomous okay features.
Speaker 1: I thought that was cool. I'm like such a loser.
Speaker 2: No, no, no, no, no, no.
Speaker 3: I mean, but I feel like if you are behind
Speaker 3: the wheel of the car, if you're using the adaptive
Speaker 3: cruise control or something, you're still behind the wheel of
Speaker 3: a car, you are responsible.
Speaker 1: I guess I do love this because it's like the
Speaker 1: one instance in society where we are like passing the
Speaker 1: liability off on companies not the individual. Like that is
Speaker 1: actually kind of fierce boots, Like, I do love to
Speaker 1: see a company be held accountable rather like, yeah, it
Speaker 1: was actually kind of iconic.
Speaker 2: Diva.
Speaker 3: I have so many questions, you guys are going to
Speaker 3: make him insufferable.
Speaker 4: I want to know how enforcible NDAs are. I have
Speaker 4: signed several in my life, especially with people who have
Speaker 4: been in a position of wealth and power.
Speaker 2: So you feel there's some war here because.
Speaker 4: You're getting a payout or compensation for whatever activity.
Speaker 2: Well work you're doing.
Speaker 1: Is that stormy? You know what?
Speaker 2: I hate? It took me a second to realize that,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: So I'll just have it in the world that like
Speaker 1: literally a porn star signing an NDA, just the president.
Speaker 3: I'm really interested to what's been going on in this
Speaker 3: person's life, Like, legitimately, I know something going.
Speaker 1: On, having multiple dass. Okay, so this this is like
Speaker 1: kind of a hard question to answer, but I'm going
Speaker 1: to do my best.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: It kind of depends on what the hell you signed.
Speaker 1: Like some NDAs, there are contracts, So if it's a
Speaker 1: royally weird, fucked up contract that has all sorts of
Speaker 1: issues in it, it's not enforceable. So you really need
Speaker 1: a lawyer to look at what you signed, because like
Speaker 1: if you signed it under duress or there's like a
Speaker 1: basic contract law has been violated in this document that
Speaker 1: you signed. It's not enforceable and you can't be held
Speaker 1: to the terms therein.
Speaker 3: Let me ask you a question, though, what can you
Speaker 3: do if you've already signed it.
Speaker 1: If you've already signed it, you can bring it to
Speaker 1: a lawyer and show it to them. They really need
Speaker 1: to read it.
Speaker 3: Okay, So but can they get you out of it
Speaker 3: if you've already signed it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, if there's if there's some sort of critical flaw
Speaker 1: to a contract, you can get out of it. So
Speaker 1: for example, like you were forced to sign it, there
Speaker 1: was no I'm a criminal lawyer, so contract was kind
Speaker 1: of foreign to me. But if you weren't given anything
Speaker 1: in consideration for your silence, so there was no payment
Speaker 1: or any sort of like term. That way, if the
Speaker 1: terms are like really vague where it's like you can't
Speaker 1: say anything, it's like okay about what It has to
Speaker 1: be specific, okay to like one thing okay, or like
Speaker 1: a few things, but they have to be like enumerated,
Speaker 1: So it has to be there have to be like
Speaker 1: contract law. We can't just like be making up laws
Speaker 1: and NDAs and they're still going to be honored by
Speaker 1: a judge.
Speaker 2: What happens if you break an.
Speaker 1: NDIA Generally the damages are enumerated in the contract, and
Speaker 1: that's something that would need to be enumerated for it
Speaker 1: to be enforceable or that would be a sticking point.
Speaker 1: The thing about NDAs, though, that I do want to
Speaker 1: call out Stormy if you're listening.
Speaker 2: Is that I think she's okay.
Speaker 1: She's okay. Yeah. NDAs are often it's like the threat
Speaker 1: of litigation is what keeps people silent. It's not like
Speaker 1: if you say something instantly, there's like a carrier pigeon
Speaker 1: who like swoops in with a lawsuit. Like someone does
Speaker 1: have to be like, oh, you violated that you broke
Speaker 1: that law, you broke that NDA, and here you are
Speaker 1: being served for damages because you violated that contract. So
Speaker 1: a lot of the times, I think like people who
Speaker 1: sign NDA's stay silent because they think that there is
Speaker 1: something that's just going to happen if they happen to
Speaker 1: violate it. But if it's been like a really long
Speaker 1: time or something like that, or the person really doesn't
Speaker 1: care anymore, Like you don't necessarily have to pay those
Speaker 1: damages because someone would have to get a lawyer and
Speaker 1: sue you to enforce it.
Speaker 3: If somebody signs an MDA and the person dies the
Speaker 3: one that you're signing it for. Let's say you make
Speaker 3: me sign an NDA and then you die it something
Speaker 3: about something and then I, I were.
Speaker 1: The drafting layer, I want to make sure that there
Speaker 1: was some sort of clause about what happens. Yeah, because
Speaker 1: I mean.
Speaker 2: That's interesting question.
Speaker 1: Yeah, transfer, Yeah, Okay, Well that's everything we have today.
Speaker 1: On Brief Recess. I'm Michael Foot, Melissa Melbrandt. I'll see
Speaker 1: you in court. This has been an exactly right production
Speaker 1: recorded at iHeart Studios, Posted by me, Michael Foot.
Speaker 2: Me Melissa Malbranch. Our producer is CJ. Ferroni.
Speaker 1: This episode was edited by Nicholas Galucci.
Speaker 3: Our associate producer is Christina Chamberlain, and our guest booker
Speaker 3: is Patrick Cootner.
Speaker 1: Our theme song was composed by Tom Brifogel with artwork
Speaker 1: from Charlotte Delarue and Manessa Lilac, with photography by Brad Obono.
Speaker 3: Brief Recess is executive produced by Karen Kilgareff, Georgia hart
Speaker 3: Stark and Danielle Kramer.
Speaker 1: You can find me on Instagram at Department of Redundancy
Speaker 1: Department or on TikTok at Michael Foot and.
Speaker 3: I'm on both Instagram and TikTok as Melissa Albranch.
Speaker 1: Got legal questions, reach out at brief Recess at exactlyrightmedia
Speaker 1: dot com. Listen to brief Recess on the iHeartRadio app,
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