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Speaker 1: Also media.

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Speaker 2: I watched a man vomiting a casino pit last night.

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Speaker 2: Was beautiful. Welcome back to Behind the Bastards, a podcast

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Speaker 2: that's this week hosted from sunny Las Vegas, Nevada. We've

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Speaker 2: got a real special one for you this week. We've

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Speaker 2: got an episode about somebody who embodies everything that is

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Speaker 2: meaningful about like where we are in America today, like

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Speaker 2: both our complete divorce as a culture from any sort

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Speaker 2: of shared truth, our acceptance of all sorts of like weird,

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Speaker 2: unhinged metaphysical realities. The guy who's probably going to be

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Speaker 2: running Medicaid in the near future. We all owe them

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Speaker 2: to our topic this week. Our subject this week someone

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Speaker 2: you all have heard of, Oprah Winfrey. And because Oprah

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Speaker 2: is such a big topic and honestly kind of a

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Speaker 2: scary person to go after, this might be the most

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Speaker 2: powerful bastard we've talked about. I brought in some very

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Speaker 2: special guests. First off, let's say a warm welcome to

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Speaker 2: the great Bridget Todd Bridget, Welcome to the show.

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Speaker 3: I want to say it like Oprah Dove, thank you

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Speaker 3: for having me. I actually has that thing.

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Speaker 1: I just knew, I just knew you were the right

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Speaker 1: person for this job.

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Speaker 3: I don't even know Bridget I do.

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Speaker 1: I was gonna say, Bridget is the host of There

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Speaker 1: Are No Girls on the Internet, and that's right, and

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Speaker 1: also just one of my favorite people in the entire world.

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Speaker 4: That's right. That's right.

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Speaker 5: She is here.

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Speaker 1: And we are so lucky. Who is our second guest today?

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Speaker 1: Because we couldn't have just one for.

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Speaker 2: Oh no, no, for Oprah. You got to bring out that.

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Speaker 2: You got to have a double barrel, you know, if

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Speaker 2: you're going if you're going for a grizzly bear. And

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Speaker 2: our second round of buckshot this week is.

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Speaker 3: Andrew t.

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Speaker 1: Thanks for being carry Andrew. Andrew is the host.

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Speaker 3: Of you is this racist?

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Speaker 4: That's right? How's it going?

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Speaker 2: We're gonna need to ask that a lot in these episodes.

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Speaker 3: The answer is always gonna.

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Speaker 4: Be, yeah, boy, it is.

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Speaker 2: There's a lot of stuff to discuss there, Robert.

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Speaker 1: Robert and I have been talking about doing the Oprah

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Speaker 1: episodes for what feels like a year and the subject

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Speaker 1: of like who do we have on for this? Like

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Speaker 1: how like guess who do we have on?

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Speaker 4: What do we do?

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Speaker 1: Because like no matter what, like I mean, I I

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Speaker 1: read Oprah's bio in like middle school and like she

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Speaker 1: yeah comes off with her like origin story as like heroic.

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Speaker 2: She's deeply sympathetic in many ways, and these first two

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Speaker 2: episodes are going you're gonna be sympathetic to her more

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Speaker 2: often than not because we are covering a lot of

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Speaker 2: her childhood in these The things that she does that

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Speaker 2: are awful, and the reason why she deserves to be

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Speaker 2: on the show is not because she's personally odious right

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Speaker 2: in like her personal interactions usually like I've run into

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Speaker 2: a bunch of like reddits where people who worked on

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Speaker 2: the show talking more often than not, people who worked

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Speaker 2: on the Oprah Winfrey shows say like, we were paid well,

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Speaker 2: it was a reasonably good gig. You know. You can

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Speaker 2: certainly find people being like a she was a dick

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Speaker 2: to me when I was like a barista or whatever.

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Speaker 2: There's stories like that, but I wouldn't hang an episode

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Speaker 2: on it. It's more her level of influence is so

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Speaker 2: titanic and the things that she has chosen, she's chosen

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Speaker 2: to push a number of people who are We have

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Speaker 2: done two part episodes on in the past, Doctor Oz

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Speaker 2: Doctor Phil both owed their careers and the intense amounts

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Speaker 2: of damage that they've done to society, to Oprah Winfrey.

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Speaker 2: Neither of those guys are in anyone's radar if it's

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Speaker 2: not for Oprah Winfrey. John of God, that Brazilian mystic

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Speaker 2: who raped and molested thousands of people, owes a huge

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Speaker 2: amount of her career in prominence to Oprah Winfrey. There's

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Speaker 2: a number of cases like that. She's tied in massively

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Speaker 2: with a satanic panic. She's tied in massively with a

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Speaker 2: number of different like myths like we're going to talk about,

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Speaker 2: like rainbow parties and the like. So we've got a

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Speaker 2: lot of fun stuff today. I do want to start

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Speaker 2: by asking Bridget Andrew, what are y'all's histories with Oprah.

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Speaker 1: Oh, that's a good question.

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Speaker 6: Oh.

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Speaker 3: I mean, I have to say, I'm really glad that

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Speaker 3: you framed the Oprah conversation the way that you did,

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Speaker 3: because I almost have like a love hate with Oprah. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: you can't. First of all, you can't be a black

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Speaker 3: woman and not have some deep admiration for Oprah. And

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Speaker 3: I would say it's only been recently that I have

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Speaker 3: really had to have my come to Jesus moment of

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Speaker 3: some of the bad actors. Charlatan's hucksters and just like

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Speaker 3: bastards that she has made famous and now we're sort

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Speaker 3: of stuck with. So it's sort of a love hate Oprah.

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Speaker 3: Like I did a report on her when I was

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Speaker 3: in fifth grade where I had to dress like her.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, you're, weirdly enough, not the only friend of mine

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Speaker 2: who did a report on Oprah for when they were

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Speaker 2: in school.

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Speaker 7: Yeah. Well yeah, I think there's like an element of

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Speaker 7: like it's a little bit like Obama.

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Speaker 4: You're like, it's good that there's a.

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Speaker 7: Different type of like like a like a black person

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Speaker 7: being able to achieve the highest ranks of whatever.

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Speaker 2: The wealthiest. She's the wealthiest person in media period, like

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Speaker 2: wealthiest purely media star, two billion, something like that.

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Speaker 7: But there's also like some version of like having to

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Speaker 7: so you're like kind of grading on a curve. It's

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Speaker 7: like for a billionaire, she's probably pretty good, you know,

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Speaker 7: relatively speaking, I mean, but she has you know, she

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Speaker 7: has all the trap. It's the same with Obama, where

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Speaker 7: you're like, every president has committed crimes against humanity.

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Speaker 4: That's just the job.

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Speaker 7: But like so for a while, you're like it's sort

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Speaker 7: of nice that he's like, you know, he is who

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Speaker 7: he is. But then you're like, just she weren't doing

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Speaker 7: all these terrible things.

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Speaker 2: As we'll talk about one of the complicated things about Oprah.

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Speaker 2: There's a bunch of stuff that really is very sinister

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Speaker 2: about her impact. And then when you whenever you're reading

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Speaker 2: the books and stuff, the critical bios of her, the

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Speaker 2: things they choose to go after her for are always like, well, actually,

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Speaker 2: I don't think she did anything wrong. There, Like, there's

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Speaker 2: a lot of very weird she's she has she has

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Speaker 2: also had to You can't talk about the things she's

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Speaker 2: done bad without also defending her because she has come

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Speaker 2: under fire for so many insanely unreasonable things as well.

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Speaker 5: I also did an Oprah book report, probably in the

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Speaker 5: fifth grade, And you know, she was on my television

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Speaker 5: for my mom watched a lot of Oprah.

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Speaker 1: There was a lot of Oprah in my household growing up.

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Speaker 1: And then like a few years ago, I was working

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Speaker 1: on a project with Jamie Loftus and we went back

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Speaker 1: and we were looking for like a specific Oprah episode

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Speaker 1: to reference in something, and just the show episode titles

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Speaker 1: were so triggering. Oh yeah, and then it's and then

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Speaker 1: Robert and Bridget you were both at you were both

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Speaker 1: of the DNC and Chicago, but I don't think you

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Speaker 1: guys were both there for Oprah speech?

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Speaker 7: Were you.

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Speaker 4: Speech?

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Speaker 3: I was in the audience. I remember it very well.

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Speaker 6: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I was there for that, and it was like the

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Speaker 1: most like like detached I felt from an audience in

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Speaker 1: my life. I was like, I was like, oh, no.

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Speaker 3: Sophy, do you remember. I feel like she got I

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Speaker 3: completely agree with you about the tenor and the vibe

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Speaker 3: of the speech. However, maybe it was just my section.

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Speaker 3: I feel like people were losing their fucking minds when

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Speaker 3: she came out and started talking like yeah, I was like,

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Speaker 3: are we hearing the same speech?

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Speaker 1: Like it truly I had what I'm saying. That's why.

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Speaker 1: That's why I was like I was. I was like,

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Speaker 1: I was like, really, we're still, We're still. And then

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Speaker 1: again with there were several people that I was like, Oh,

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Speaker 1: these are known horrible humans and people are going Pharaoh

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Speaker 1: for them as well. But yeah, Oprah Oprah.

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Speaker 2: Cheers were It's hard to get across because there's really

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Speaker 2: no one on earth like this, how cross at least

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Speaker 2: first certain kind of for a certain like category of person,

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Speaker 2: particularly like middle aged moms from the nineties through the

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Speaker 2: through the aughts. It's amazing the degree to which Oprah

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Speaker 2: completely cut across like political and cultural boundaries. You know,

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Speaker 2: Like my mom was a very conservative white lady in

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Speaker 2: Texas loved Oprah. Oprah was always on and like that

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Speaker 2: was the case with every mom that I knew as

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Speaker 2: a kid, Like Oprah was just like an institution, you know,

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Speaker 2: like it's it's it's really And I don't think she's

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Speaker 2: even quite like that today, just because like things have

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Speaker 2: gotten considerably more fragmented in the media ecosystem, and so

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Speaker 2: one of the things that's interesting about her is like

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Speaker 2: when we talk about her influence, there probably won't ever

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Speaker 2: be a single person that influential again in the same way.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, Bridget at the DNC, when she came out, were

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Speaker 1: you sitting or standing?

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Speaker 4: Ugh?

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Speaker 3: I wish I could say that I like turned my back,

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Speaker 3: you know, I gave her a standing ovation even from

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Speaker 3: my like big talk.

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Speaker 1: But you were you in the standing section.

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Speaker 3: Or this ex I was in the seated section. I was.

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Speaker 4: So here's my question.

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Speaker 1: When she came out, did you immediately look under your chair?

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Speaker 3: Like, yeah, like Oprah, did you leave me?

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Speaker 2: You get a car?

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Speaker 3: I wish Oprah.

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Speaker 1: Came out at an instinctly was like, is there a gift?

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Speaker 1: There was, There was not.

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Speaker 3: Honestly though, if anybody could arrange that, it would be

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Speaker 3: Oprah exactly.

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Speaker 2: I should let you know. I've bought you both cars.

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Speaker 2: They're not They're not they're geoprisms. They are not like

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Speaker 2: these are really like burdens for both of you.

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Speaker 4: Robert's books. It's really just like a.

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Speaker 2: Used to offload I'm underwater on a deal. In the

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Speaker 2: spring of twenty twenty four, Oprah Winfrey participated in a

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Speaker 2: three hour special sponsored by weight Watchers called Making the Shift,

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Speaker 2: alongside several other celebrity panelists. She talked about the failures

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Speaker 2: and shortcomings of America's toxic diet culture and took some

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Speaker 2: degree of ownership for her role in perpetuating it, calling

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Speaker 2: herself a major contributor and saying I've been a major

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Speaker 2: contributor to it. I cannot tell you how many weight

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Speaker 2: loss shows and makeovers I've done, and they have been

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Speaker 2: a staple since I've been working in television. And even

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Speaker 2: this statement, which is fairly unequivocal, underplays the reality of

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Speaker 2: the situation, because it's probably accurate to say that no

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Speaker 2: one human being alive has had more of an impact

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Speaker 2: on how Americans talk about dieting and weight loss than

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Speaker 2: Oprah Winfrey. For the entirety of the time that everyone

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Speaker 2: on this call has been alive, she has been the

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Speaker 2: most public face of diet culture, and tens of thousands

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Speaker 2: of Americans followed along as she gained and lost weight

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Speaker 2: in the public eye. One of the biggest regrets of

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Speaker 2: her career came in nineteen ninety eight as a result

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Speaker 2: of this, and I'm talking about the famous wagon of

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Speaker 2: Fat incident, which was precisely what it sounds like. Winfrey

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Speaker 2: launched a new season of her hit daytime talk show

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Speaker 2: by pulling out a red wagon filled with sixty seven

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Speaker 2: pounds a fat, which is how much she'd lost on

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Speaker 2: her most recent diet. And because this is kind of

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Speaker 2: what Oprah says is in her view, the lowest moment

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Speaker 2: of her career, I do want to start with playing

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Speaker 2: a clip from this because it represents the intersection of

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Speaker 2: a couple of very complicated things we're going to have

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Speaker 2: to dissect in these episodes.

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Speaker 3: Oh my god, Now let me tell you.

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Speaker 1: I lost.

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Speaker 6: I have lost as of this morning. As of this morning,

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Speaker 6: sixty seven pounds since July seventh, sixty seven pounds and

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Speaker 6: thirty inches from my bust, my waist Emma hoops seven

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Speaker 6: twelve eleven. I think it is. And this let me

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Speaker 6: tell you those of you who are starting dieting or

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Speaker 6: dining a little bit, this is what sixty seven pounds

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Speaker 6: of fat looks like. I can't I can't lift it.

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Speaker 6: Now when you talk about Jimmy, is this gross or what.

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Speaker 4: Okay to me?

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Speaker 3: That I can't lift it?

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Speaker 6: But I used to carry it around.

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Speaker 3: She's definitely lifting.

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Speaker 4: The radio flyer people. Do you think they were like

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Speaker 4: that in there?

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Speaker 3: Oh god, I remember that clip like it was yesterday

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Speaker 3: when you as soon as you set it up, I

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Speaker 3: closed my eyes and I can like I remember it

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Speaker 3: crystal clear, Like what a moment in culture.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and she does look great in that video. No

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Speaker 2: one can deny that. And it's interesting to me first

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Speaker 2: off that this is this is such like a especially

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Speaker 2: in like the critical reading on Oprah. This is such

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Speaker 2: like an apocal moment, right, like how how toxic this was?

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Speaker 2: What a bad you know moment this was in terms

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Speaker 2: of like cause like inculcating toxic attitudes and American you

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Speaker 2: know culture visa v weight loss and how like tame

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Speaker 2: It seems honestly in a lot of ways considering like

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Speaker 2: where we are now just in general with like the TV,

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Speaker 2: how much like worse ship there is every single day.

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Speaker 2: But it's also interesting because like this is an easy

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Speaker 2: moment to hang on as toxic. I actually don't I

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Speaker 2: have trouble blaming Oprah the for this, even though she's

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Speaker 2: definitely contributing to some really ugly aspects of diet culture.

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Speaker 2: As we'll talk about, the way she gets attacked and

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Speaker 2: like focused on in the media over her weight is

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Speaker 2: probably unique. Like I don't know that anyone else has

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Speaker 2: been kind of anyone else's personal weight has been obsessed

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Speaker 2: over to the same degree that Oprah's has. It certainly

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Speaker 2: was in the late nineties. So yeah, as we'll talk about,

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Speaker 2: I don't see this as like a low point for her,

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Speaker 2: but this is probably what she would name as like

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Speaker 2: the absolute worst thing in her career.

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Speaker 7: Wait, and maybe I'm missing something, so and she would

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Speaker 7: say that, or she has said that because it's just

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Speaker 7: like a crass stunt.

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Speaker 2: It's and she has started to talk about the degree

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Speaker 2: to which she thinks that diet culture and the are

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Speaker 2: obsession with that and weight loss is unhealthy, and that

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Speaker 2: she was a big part of that, right like she

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Speaker 2: started talking about it now, she started talking about that

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Speaker 2: in participation with weight watchers. So I don't know, I

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Speaker 2: don't know how much credit you want to give her,

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Speaker 2: right like clearly done in good faith. Yeah, maybe not

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Speaker 2: totally done in good maybe more of just a pivot.

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Speaker 7: But I will just say, as someone who is like

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Speaker 7: a little more outside of the Oprah sphere, I think,

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Speaker 7: compared to everyone else here, I feel like I didn't

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Speaker 7: particularly perceive, like I hear what you're saying about, like

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Speaker 7: she was like one of the faces of it, was

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Speaker 7: so pervasive everywhere. Not to like completely let her off

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Speaker 7: the hook, but it is a little just like that's

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Speaker 7: what you did when you were like especially marketing to

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Speaker 7: middle aged women.

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Speaker 2: But it's partly what you did because Oprah was so

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Speaker 2: successful at it, Like she likes it's a road that

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Speaker 2: was there because she bush whacked it, you know, right, right.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I actually have a a similar take. I think

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Speaker 3: that why she regrets this is not because of like

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Speaker 3: participating in this harmful, toxic diet culture YadA YadA, YadA,

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Speaker 3: which she was. I think it was sort of throwing

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Speaker 3: red meat to the people Robert that you were just

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Speaker 3: describing who obsessed about her weight Personally, I think that, Yeah,

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Speaker 3: it's probably a low point because she was engaging in

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Speaker 3: this like highly personal public conversation about her weight and

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Speaker 3: like playing into that. I don't I would probably I

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Speaker 3: don't know that she was would say like, oh, I

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Speaker 3: shouldn't have been participating in diet culture written large.

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Speaker 2: Yeah right, yeah, yeah, I think that that's that that

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Speaker 2: might be a fair critique, but we'll talk about it.

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Speaker 2: But first, for these for these couple of episodes, we're

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Speaker 2: going to really be getting into like the parts of

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Speaker 2: Oprah's crew that are mostly or life that are mostly

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Speaker 2: like a lot more empathetic, although you know, there's there's

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Speaker 2: there's some darkness there too, mainly in like the way

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Speaker 2: in which she has kind of lied and judged up

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Speaker 2: some aspects of her background because it makes a better story. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: this will all be interesting to talk about. So in

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Speaker 2: twenty twenty one, one of my sources for this is

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Speaker 2: a book that Oprah released about trauma, much of which

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Speaker 2: she discussed through the lens of her own childhood trauma.

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Speaker 2: She co authored What Happened to You with doctor Bruce Perry,

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Speaker 2: an American psychiatrist who specializes in child trauma, and from

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Speaker 2: what I can tell, is like one of the less

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Speaker 2: toxic doctors that Oprah is famous for launching to start them,

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Speaker 2: although again that doesn't necessarily mean a whole lot. In

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Speaker 2: an interview about that book for today dot Com, Oprah

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Speaker 2: posited that her childihood trauma was responsible for her low

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Speaker 2: moments like the wagon a fat incident. I think that

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Speaker 2: certainly all of the feelings of not fitting in of

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Speaker 2: my disease to please, or feeling like if I don't

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Speaker 2: do what everyone wants me to do, I'm going to

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Speaker 2: be rejected somehow what I was afraid of in every instance,

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Speaker 2: I'm going to get a whipping. I'm afraid I'm going

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Speaker 2: to get that whipping. Thankfully, She adds, the decades of

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Speaker 2: time she spent processing her pain has given her sort

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Speaker 2: of what she calls post traumatic wisdom that she thinks

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Speaker 2: makes her a good spokesperson for every kind of suffering

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Speaker 2: in a mirror or for a lot many kinds of

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Speaker 2: suffering in American society today, right like because of my trauma,

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Speaker 2: That's why I've done some of the things that I regret.

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Speaker 2: It's my disease to please. It's like my fear of

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Speaker 2: not fitting in. But because I have that trauma, I'm

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Speaker 2: also a perfect spokesperson for many of these kinds of

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Speaker 2: like traumas in American society. And the fact that she

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Speaker 2: thinks that way is a really important prism to understand

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Speaker 2: what she does, because Oprah in a lot of ways,

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Speaker 2: if you look at especially the first ten or fifteen

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Speaker 2: years of her show, it's a mirror in some ways

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Speaker 2: of like the Jerry Springer Show. Like they're literally doing

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Speaker 2: some of the same episodes, bringing like clansmen out, you know,

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Speaker 2: to have like big arguments and fights on stage. There's

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Speaker 2: a lot of like, you know, bringing out people in

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Speaker 2: relationships who are having conflicts. It is that kind of

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Speaker 2: like trash teed TV. And then in the late nineties

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Speaker 2: she starts to pivot, and largely the thing that she

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Speaker 2: pivots around is her taking her own childhood trauma, her

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Speaker 2: own experiences of like physical and sexual abuse and whatnot,

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Speaker 2: and using that as sort of a lens through which

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Speaker 2: to explore those things in American society. And there's both

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Speaker 2: a degree to which there are some really important issues

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Speaker 2: that started getting attention because Oprah used herself as a

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Speaker 2: lens to kind of like highlight them. And also there's

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Speaker 2: this sense of like almost profiteering from the same things,

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Speaker 2: which which makes this very complicated to discuss it.

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Speaker 7: I feel like it's so weird too, because it's like

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Speaker 7: at the time, as you're describing it, I probably wouldn't

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Speaker 7: have perceived it as such, but like we're also in

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Speaker 7: an era where like influencer and just like you like

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Speaker 7: that is the product that everyone, you know, the children

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Speaker 7: today are very casually selling. Yeah, it's almost like the

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Speaker 7: concept of like selling out for like between the nineties

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Speaker 7: and the two of it. It's like, you know, it's

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Speaker 7: not something that you would bad any at everything you're

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Speaker 7: describing right now.

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Speaker 2: No, no, no, But it was really unique at the time, right.

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Speaker 3: Yes, it does seem like she was like very ahead

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Speaker 3: of the game on this, like oh yes, I think

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Speaker 3: it's like the influencer bread and butter today, But back then,

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Speaker 3: I mean I do think that it set her apart

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Speaker 3: from like your Jerry Springer's, your Jenny Jones is to

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Speaker 3: really put these kind of trauma like it was like

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Speaker 3: authenticity before that was a thing we expected from TV

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Speaker 3: show hosts.

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Speaker 2: Yep, that's exactly I think that's exactly it, Bridgid. And

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Speaker 2: what's kind of undeniable is that she was able to

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Speaker 2: kind of get access to a lot of stories of

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Speaker 2: people's hurting by from her own background of suffering. Her

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Speaker 2: old executive producer Diane Hudson once told people profiles quote,

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Speaker 2: vulnerability is the key to Oprah's success. People appreciate when

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Speaker 2: you can be honest. It lets them feel more comfortable

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Speaker 2: about themselves. She's got this special kind of connective ability.

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Speaker 2: I see happen over and over again. Everyone who meets

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Speaker 2: her feels like, oh, now I know her. And that's

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Speaker 2: what you're talking about, that kind of authenticity being the

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Speaker 2: buzzword that it is today. It all really starts with Oprah,

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Speaker 2: and yeah, it is one. It's both. I think there

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Speaker 2: is a lot of vulnerability that she's been willing to

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Speaker 2: put out there. But at the same time, Oprah's not

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Speaker 2: like Oprah is a conscious crafter of her own image

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Speaker 2: and her own story.

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Speaker 4: Right.

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Speaker 2: She knows what she's doing. She's not like a naive

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Speaker 2: in this kind of situation, in this kind of scenario,

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Speaker 2: and that muddles the waters too, because some of this

401
00:20:36,960 --> 00:20:43,120
Speaker 2: authenticity is very carefully sculpted rather than something that's kind

402
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Speaker 2: of come out purely just as a natural reaction, you know.

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Speaker 2: And that's going to make talking about some of this

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Speaker 2: very hard because we do have, like especially when we

405
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Speaker 2: talk about the traumas of her childhood, you have different

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Speaker 2: sources who disagree and who disagree with like some of

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00:20:58,760 --> 00:21:01,399
Speaker 2: the things Oprah says about what happens to her. And

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Speaker 2: as a spoiler, like, we're not going to know, like

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Speaker 2: who's actually right here because I certainly wasn't there when

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Speaker 2: Oprah was a little kid. I'm gonna guess neither of

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Speaker 2: you were either. Two of the biggest sources for this

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00:21:13,320 --> 00:21:16,280
Speaker 2: episode are first that book that Oprah wrote with a

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Speaker 2: doctor about her own trauma, and then there's two biographies.

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Speaker 2: One was written kind of early on in Oprah's time

415
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Speaker 2: is a world famous talk show host nineteen ninety Nine's

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Speaker 2: Oprah Winfrey, written by Meryl Noden for People Profiles, and

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Speaker 2: if you want, even like, you know, that's kind of

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00:21:35,080 --> 00:21:39,280
Speaker 2: actually a surprisingly good for being a pop biography, look

419
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Speaker 2: at Oprah's backstory and kind of the different takes on

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Speaker 2: what happened to her as a kid. A more recent

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Speaker 2: biography is Kitty Kelly's Oprah, which is another major source

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Speaker 2: for this episode. Now I'm going to warn you Kitty's

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Speaker 2: twenty ten book is a mean biography, and she is kind,

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Speaker 2: It's the best kind. Is like she is recognized as

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Speaker 2: a lover of gossip and like, you know, there's a

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Speaker 2: tabloid feel to this. She's also someone who does put

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Speaker 2: in the work to dig up dirt on her subjects,

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Speaker 2: but it tends to be like real dirt, you know.

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Speaker 2: But this is a mean book, you know, Like, don't

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Speaker 2: mistake this for a work of like objective biography. Like so,

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Speaker 2: like all great media figures, including you know me, Oprah's

432
00:22:25,720 --> 00:22:27,920
Speaker 2: hometown was a destitute, little slice of hell in the

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Speaker 2: middle of nowhere. This is something I really identify with

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Speaker 2: her with. Right. She comes up in Kuseiusko kus Usko, Mississippi,

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Speaker 2: which is seventy or so miles above Jackson. She once

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Speaker 2: said of her hometown that place is so small you

437
00:22:41,280 --> 00:22:43,440
Speaker 2: can spit and be out of town before your spit

438
00:22:43,520 --> 00:22:48,800
Speaker 2: hits the ground, which I both I get that feeling,

439
00:22:49,119 --> 00:22:51,840
Speaker 2: right that like this isn't even there's nothing here right, Like,

440
00:22:51,880 --> 00:22:55,400
Speaker 2: this isn't even a town, which I like empathize with.

441
00:22:55,480 --> 00:22:57,399
Speaker 2: That's that's how I felt as a kid about fucking

442
00:22:57,400 --> 00:23:00,040
Speaker 2: Ida Belle. It's a little bit of an exaggeration. And

443
00:23:00,080 --> 00:23:02,680
Speaker 2: there were about sixty seven hundred people in town when

444
00:23:02,680 --> 00:23:05,159
Speaker 2: she grew up, which like isn't huge, but it's not

445
00:23:05,640 --> 00:23:09,440
Speaker 2: quite that tiny now. She was born in the home

446
00:23:09,480 --> 00:23:13,320
Speaker 2: of her maternal grandparents, Hattie May and Earlist Lee, who

447
00:23:13,359 --> 00:23:15,679
Speaker 2: was known as Earless by the family because he was

448
00:23:15,800 --> 00:23:20,280
Speaker 2: super old and also deaf as hell. The town has

449
00:23:20,320 --> 00:23:23,439
Speaker 2: that weird Polish name because it's named after a Polish

450
00:23:23,520 --> 00:23:27,879
Speaker 2: Revolutionary War general who was also an ardent abolitionist, and

451
00:23:27,920 --> 00:23:30,520
Speaker 2: as a result, it had a fairly law or not

452
00:23:30,600 --> 00:23:32,920
Speaker 2: as a result, but like that it having that name

453
00:23:33,040 --> 00:23:34,320
Speaker 2: is a result of the fact that it had a

454
00:23:34,400 --> 00:23:39,840
Speaker 2: very large black population. It was extremely segregated and extremely poor.

455
00:23:40,440 --> 00:23:43,320
Speaker 2: So yeah, that's the town that she grows up in,

456
00:23:43,400 --> 00:23:45,320
Speaker 2: and it's one of those places that had largely been

457
00:23:45,320 --> 00:23:48,080
Speaker 2: built around a cotton mill which went bust in nineteen

458
00:23:48,160 --> 00:23:50,679
Speaker 2: forty eight, and that's kind of when things start to

459
00:23:50,680 --> 00:23:53,280
Speaker 2: fall apart in her hometown because people start fleeing for

460
00:23:53,440 --> 00:23:56,719
Speaker 2: northern cities that might still have work. You know, this

461
00:23:56,840 --> 00:24:01,879
Speaker 2: is what's happening in kris Usko is kind of a

462
00:24:01,920 --> 00:24:05,240
Speaker 2: microcosm of like a much larger national trend at the time.

463
00:24:05,359 --> 00:24:08,160
Speaker 2: Right like this, this is a thing that's happening elsewhere

464
00:24:08,160 --> 00:24:12,120
Speaker 2: to a lot of places. Meryl Noden writes, quote. Oprah's

465
00:24:12,119 --> 00:24:15,159
Speaker 2: parents were among those who left military service had already

466
00:24:15,160 --> 00:24:17,840
Speaker 2: given twenty year old Vernon Winfrey a ticket out. He

467
00:24:17,960 --> 00:24:20,639
Speaker 2: was at home on a furlough from Fort Rucker, Alabama,

468
00:24:20,680 --> 00:24:22,960
Speaker 2: on the springs day he met Vernita Lee, an eighteen

469
00:24:23,040 --> 00:24:25,600
Speaker 2: year old high school student and part time domestic worker.

470
00:24:26,000 --> 00:24:27,960
Speaker 2: The two barely knew each other when they had what

471
00:24:28,040 --> 00:24:30,440
Speaker 2: their daughter has described as a one day fling under

472
00:24:30,480 --> 00:24:32,719
Speaker 2: an oak tree. The encounter seems to have been a

473
00:24:32,720 --> 00:24:34,880
Speaker 2: source of shame for the ambitious young man who would

474
00:24:34,880 --> 00:24:36,600
Speaker 2: go on to become a deacon in his church. In

475
00:24:36,640 --> 00:24:39,480
Speaker 2: a Nashville City councilman, I'm not proud of what happened

476
00:24:39,480 --> 00:24:41,920
Speaker 2: with Oprah's mother and me, Winfrey has said. I tell

477
00:24:41,960 --> 00:24:44,040
Speaker 2: people today that if something like that happens, the boy

478
00:24:44,080 --> 00:24:50,480
Speaker 2: should help take care of the child. So that's the Pham, Yeah,

479
00:24:50,920 --> 00:24:55,720
Speaker 2: it's not his. He's not told until she's born, right, Yeah,

480
00:24:55,760 --> 00:24:58,520
Speaker 2: And he does like send financial aid as soon as

481
00:24:58,520 --> 00:25:00,600
Speaker 2: he's told, but like they don't, they don't really let

482
00:25:00,680 --> 00:25:03,920
Speaker 2: him know until there's already a kid. And as another spoiler,

483
00:25:03,960 --> 00:25:07,520
Speaker 2: he might not actually be her biological father. I don't

484
00:25:07,520 --> 00:25:09,399
Speaker 2: know that that doesn't really make a huge deal in

485
00:25:09,440 --> 00:25:12,000
Speaker 2: this story because they all think he is during this

486
00:25:12,040 --> 00:25:14,560
Speaker 2: period of time, and he's like going to be very

487
00:25:14,640 --> 00:25:17,959
Speaker 2: much a responsible dad to the extent that he is

488
00:25:18,040 --> 00:25:22,159
Speaker 2: like allowed to be. But it is kind of like

489
00:25:22,240 --> 00:25:25,600
Speaker 2: a little unclear as to what actually, like who her

490
00:25:25,640 --> 00:25:29,359
Speaker 2: actual like biological dad is. I don't think that there's

491
00:25:29,400 --> 00:25:31,800
Speaker 2: like a solid answer on that. Every biography will give

492
00:25:31,800 --> 00:25:34,800
Speaker 2: you a little bit of a different answer. But Vernon

493
00:25:34,880 --> 00:25:37,440
Speaker 2: is the one that they think is the biological father,

494
00:25:37,640 --> 00:25:40,600
Speaker 2: you know, for most of this period of time. And

495
00:25:40,760 --> 00:25:44,040
Speaker 2: Oprah Gail Winfrey is born on January twenty ninth, nineteen

496
00:25:44,119 --> 00:25:47,159
Speaker 2: fifty four, And the story behind her name is a

497
00:25:47,160 --> 00:25:50,120
Speaker 2: fun one. So does anyone know what Oprah's original name

498
00:25:50,200 --> 00:25:50,840
Speaker 2: was supposed to be?

499
00:25:52,280 --> 00:25:55,320
Speaker 7: This is the one thing I think I know, Oh yeah,

500
00:25:55,400 --> 00:25:57,160
Speaker 7: isn't it Wasn't it supposed to be Orpa?

501
00:25:57,520 --> 00:26:00,560
Speaker 2: It was supposed to be Orpa, Yeah, which was it's

502
00:26:00,600 --> 00:26:03,840
Speaker 2: a biblical name. Ruth's like if you know, I think

503
00:26:03,920 --> 00:26:07,840
Speaker 2: Ruth was like Moses's sister, or because she pretty, she

504
00:26:07,920 --> 00:26:10,680
Speaker 2: was like tight with Moses if I remember the Bible right,

505
00:26:11,560 --> 00:26:15,240
Speaker 2: and Orpo was one of her friends. And this is like,

506
00:26:15,480 --> 00:26:17,560
Speaker 2: it really says a lot about like the people here

507
00:26:17,720 --> 00:26:20,520
Speaker 2: Orpa is a Bible deep cut. This is the This

508
00:26:20,600 --> 00:26:23,080
Speaker 2: is the Biblical equivalent of like a Star Wars fan

509
00:26:23,320 --> 00:26:26,240
Speaker 2: who names his kid after Kitster Banai, who's one of

510
00:26:26,240 --> 00:26:29,840
Speaker 2: Anakin Skywalker's little little friends from Tattooine. So he's gonna

511
00:26:29,840 --> 00:26:32,120
Speaker 2: pull up a picture of Kitster here, not for any

512
00:26:32,160 --> 00:26:34,160
Speaker 2: real reason. I don't know why I thought this joke

513
00:26:34,240 --> 00:26:35,360
Speaker 2: deserved to be presented.

514
00:26:35,720 --> 00:26:41,439
Speaker 3: Because there he is.

515
00:26:41,480 --> 00:26:43,480
Speaker 2: There's kits there looking at him.

516
00:26:44,640 --> 00:26:46,280
Speaker 3: Like something.

517
00:26:46,840 --> 00:26:51,040
Speaker 2: L I'm sure he has, like I'm sure someone out

518
00:26:51,040 --> 00:26:53,480
Speaker 2: there has, like the has like the original model from

519
00:26:53,480 --> 00:26:56,679
Speaker 2: when the Phantom Menace came out of this little child.

520
00:26:57,760 --> 00:27:01,000
Speaker 1: I love, I love I love that haircut, built in bangs.

521
00:27:01,520 --> 00:27:03,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I know he's looking great. He's looking great.

522
00:27:04,240 --> 00:27:04,640
Speaker 3: Anyway.

523
00:27:04,800 --> 00:27:06,679
Speaker 2: I'm no more a Bible scholar than I am a

524
00:27:06,720 --> 00:27:08,760
Speaker 2: fan of the Phantom Menace. I did have to look

525
00:27:08,840 --> 00:27:11,640
Speaker 2: up that kid's name, although I remembered his face. It's

526
00:27:11,640 --> 00:27:13,360
Speaker 2: one of those things that's burnt into.

527
00:27:13,160 --> 00:27:14,640
Speaker 4: My head from my childhood.

528
00:27:16,359 --> 00:27:18,959
Speaker 2: I gotta say, though, from what I can read, and

529
00:27:19,000 --> 00:27:21,720
Speaker 2: maybe I'm missing something here, not being a Bible scholar,

530
00:27:22,080 --> 00:27:25,200
Speaker 2: it feels like her aunt picking Orpa as a name

531
00:27:25,720 --> 00:27:29,200
Speaker 2: might have been her throwing shade at the baby. Because

532
00:27:29,200 --> 00:27:33,080
Speaker 2: in the Book of Ruth Orpa, the person Orpa has

533
00:27:33,080 --> 00:27:35,880
Speaker 2: a chance to go with Ruth and someone named Naomi,

534
00:27:37,040 --> 00:27:39,720
Speaker 2: who are like going down this more godly path, or

535
00:27:39,800 --> 00:27:43,120
Speaker 2: return to her old pagan gods and like her, you know,

536
00:27:43,320 --> 00:27:46,720
Speaker 2: her villager and whatever, and Orpa turns back and goes

537
00:27:46,760 --> 00:27:50,480
Speaker 2: back to like being a pagan right and rabbinic literature.

538
00:27:50,560 --> 00:27:54,560
Speaker 2: According to Wikipedia, so again I'm I'm not a rabbinic

539
00:27:54,640 --> 00:27:59,160
Speaker 2: literature ever. Orpa is identified with Harappa, the mother of Goliath,

540
00:27:59,280 --> 00:28:03,919
Speaker 2: and three other Philistine giants. Also, Harappa had a lively

541
00:28:04,040 --> 00:28:07,480
Speaker 2: social life, by which I mean like got around right.

542
00:28:07,800 --> 00:28:11,120
Speaker 2: The Babylonian Talmud describes her as being threshed by as

543
00:28:11,160 --> 00:28:14,359
Speaker 2: many men as a man would thresh wheat.

544
00:28:14,040 --> 00:28:16,240
Speaker 3: Not threshed thresh.

545
00:28:16,280 --> 00:28:17,880
Speaker 4: That's in the fucking Bible.

546
00:28:18,280 --> 00:28:18,720
Speaker 3: Yeah.

547
00:28:18,920 --> 00:28:22,240
Speaker 4: The Bible. The Bible loves doing like we got threshed.

548
00:28:22,640 --> 00:28:24,920
Speaker 4: How much her body.

549
00:28:24,600 --> 00:28:26,360
Speaker 3: Count was crazy.

550
00:28:27,359 --> 00:28:29,200
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm saying threshed from now on.

551
00:28:29,440 --> 00:28:33,800
Speaker 2: I'm saying threshed too. Uh so all till Yeah, it

552
00:28:33,840 --> 00:28:36,080
Speaker 2: seems like they're kind of shit talking this baby by

553
00:28:36,119 --> 00:28:38,040
Speaker 2: naming it Orpa. I don't know why else you would

554
00:28:38,040 --> 00:28:40,840
Speaker 2: go with Orpa, Like, it's not a it's not a

555
00:28:40,920 --> 00:28:43,760
Speaker 2: super nice name to give a little kid, just based

556
00:28:43,800 --> 00:28:45,840
Speaker 2: on how the Bible talks about this person. Maybe she

557
00:28:45,920 --> 00:28:48,520
Speaker 2: just thought it sounded pretty in anyways.

558
00:28:48,160 --> 00:28:50,440
Speaker 7: Just as someone else in the congregation just named a

559
00:28:50,480 --> 00:28:52,800
Speaker 7: kid Neba Canezer and you just had to like want

560
00:28:52,840 --> 00:28:53,680
Speaker 7: to that's a name.

561
00:28:54,040 --> 00:28:54,640
Speaker 4: That's a name.

562
00:28:54,720 --> 00:28:57,320
Speaker 2: And it's also a size of wine bottle that's now

563
00:28:57,400 --> 00:29:05,280
Speaker 2: legal in Florida. Wow, that just happened. It's massive. Sofa

564
00:29:05,280 --> 00:29:07,240
Speaker 2: can pull up a picture of a Nebukenzer of wine.

565
00:29:07,360 --> 00:29:07,640
Speaker 6: I do.

566
00:29:08,120 --> 00:29:10,560
Speaker 1: I'm not just imagine a really big bottle of wine.

567
00:29:11,040 --> 00:29:14,760
Speaker 2: It's very big. It's like most of your height of wine.

568
00:29:15,120 --> 00:29:18,440
Speaker 2: So this is the first time where Oprah gets really lucky.

569
00:29:18,480 --> 00:29:22,320
Speaker 2: Obviously she's born, you know, into a difficult situation, but

570
00:29:22,400 --> 00:29:24,840
Speaker 2: she gets an early solid in the fact that somebody

571
00:29:24,880 --> 00:29:27,920
Speaker 2: fucks up on her birth certificate and the name. The

572
00:29:28,000 --> 00:29:32,320
Speaker 2: midwife misspells her name as Oprah, and everyone just kind

573
00:29:32,320 --> 00:29:35,960
Speaker 2: of decides good enough, right, And this little error might

574
00:29:36,040 --> 00:29:38,680
Speaker 2: be one of the luckiest breaks that Oprah ever received.

575
00:29:38,760 --> 00:29:42,520
Speaker 2: Because I have trouble imagining Orpa working as well as

576
00:29:42,560 --> 00:29:43,640
Speaker 2: a star's name.

577
00:29:43,720 --> 00:29:46,920
Speaker 3: The Ripo Winfrey Show, the Orba Winfrey Show, I just

578
00:29:47,000 --> 00:29:48,200
Speaker 3: have trouble imagining it.

579
00:29:48,400 --> 00:29:52,640
Speaker 2: You know, Oprah just seems to flow a lot better.

580
00:29:52,840 --> 00:29:54,680
Speaker 2: I don't know, Maybe I'm wrong, Maybe we would all

581
00:29:54,720 --> 00:29:56,680
Speaker 2: be saying that if she had been named Orpa and

582
00:29:56,680 --> 00:29:59,840
Speaker 2: they'd been like, we almost called her Operah. God, can

583
00:29:59,880 --> 00:30:03,480
Speaker 2: you imagine? I don't know, but yeah, anyway, you know

584
00:30:03,520 --> 00:30:08,600
Speaker 2: what doesn't have a name is the nameless horror I

585
00:30:08,640 --> 00:30:10,480
Speaker 2: feel when I think about you all missing out on

586
00:30:10,520 --> 00:30:20,280
Speaker 2: these ads. Wow, and we're back. So we're talking Oprah,

587
00:30:20,280 --> 00:30:24,840
Speaker 2: who has now come into the world. So once she

588
00:30:25,080 --> 00:30:27,720
Speaker 2: is born, the job of caring for this new baby

589
00:30:27,800 --> 00:30:31,200
Speaker 2: is almost immediately made the work of Hattie May Presley,

590
00:30:31,280 --> 00:30:33,880
Speaker 2: her grandmother, and that Presley there is going to be

591
00:30:33,880 --> 00:30:37,200
Speaker 2: the reason why Oprah will, for years, for big chunk

592
00:30:37,240 --> 00:30:40,200
Speaker 2: of her life, claim that she is related to Elvis.

593
00:30:41,600 --> 00:30:44,520
Speaker 2: This does not seem to be the case. I don't

594
00:30:44,520 --> 00:30:47,720
Speaker 2: think anyone in her family ever believed that. But she

595
00:30:47,800 --> 00:30:50,040
Speaker 2: will make statements like that for quite some time, and

596
00:30:50,080 --> 00:30:51,680
Speaker 2: it's one of the things that members of her family

597
00:30:51,720 --> 00:30:53,040
Speaker 2: will be like, I don't know why she does that.

598
00:30:53,240 --> 00:30:55,520
Speaker 2: We're not related to Elvis in any way. Does she

599
00:30:55,560 --> 00:30:56,320
Speaker 2: still do that today?

600
00:30:56,400 --> 00:30:56,760
Speaker 3: You think?

601
00:30:57,560 --> 00:31:00,000
Speaker 2: I don't think she still does it, But maybe I'm

602
00:31:00,080 --> 00:31:02,479
Speaker 2: wrong about that. All of the times I found, like

603
00:31:02,520 --> 00:31:04,479
Speaker 2: all the quotes of her claiming that I found her

604
00:31:04,520 --> 00:31:08,320
Speaker 2: from earlier in her career, that's.

605
00:31:07,960 --> 00:31:10,480
Speaker 3: Truly a wild thing to claim.

606
00:31:10,800 --> 00:31:13,480
Speaker 2: Like true, Yeah, I could see it if it was

607
00:31:13,520 --> 00:31:16,600
Speaker 2: like a widespread family myth that we have, you know,

608
00:31:16,640 --> 00:31:19,560
Speaker 2: Elvis's kin, but like, it doesn't seem to be because

609
00:31:19,560 --> 00:31:21,680
Speaker 2: it's always in these books. It's always your family being like, yeah,

610
00:31:21,680 --> 00:31:23,320
Speaker 2: we got nothing to do with Elvis.

611
00:31:23,680 --> 00:31:26,640
Speaker 7: I don't know what she's doing that without being too

612
00:31:26,720 --> 00:31:30,880
Speaker 7: wildly cynical, the value of being related to Elvis has

613
00:31:30,920 --> 00:31:34,800
Speaker 7: also diminished greatly in the last probably twenty years, So yeah,

614
00:31:34,800 --> 00:31:36,480
Speaker 7: it's like no reason to keep it up.

615
00:31:36,840 --> 00:31:39,640
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it's certainly like there's less Yeah, you get

616
00:31:39,680 --> 00:31:41,920
Speaker 2: less credit from being related to Elvis.

617
00:31:41,920 --> 00:31:45,400
Speaker 3: Oh cool, like just having the same last, the same

618
00:31:45,440 --> 00:31:47,800
Speaker 3: common last It's like me saying, like, my last name

619
00:31:47,840 --> 00:31:49,959
Speaker 3: is Todd. It's like me saying, oh, Chuck Todd and

620
00:31:50,000 --> 00:31:52,360
Speaker 3: I are related. It's like, y'all have a very common

621
00:31:52,480 --> 00:31:55,160
Speaker 3: last name, and what cachet would you be trying to

622
00:31:55,160 --> 00:31:55,680
Speaker 3: get from that?

623
00:31:56,880 --> 00:31:59,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, Or it's like me bringing about my relationship to

624
00:32:00,440 --> 00:32:03,080
Speaker 2: Rick Santorum.

625
00:32:03,960 --> 00:32:07,360
Speaker 7: I mean, but also, like, without getting too gross about

626
00:32:07,400 --> 00:32:10,240
Speaker 7: American history, the obvious thing is when a black person

627
00:32:10,280 --> 00:32:12,960
Speaker 7: and a white person have the same last name, the

628
00:32:13,000 --> 00:32:15,760
Speaker 7: ante seated tends to be a different thing than direct

629
00:32:15,960 --> 00:32:16,520
Speaker 7: well or.

630
00:32:16,480 --> 00:32:18,840
Speaker 4: Whatever I mean, right, lots of awful ways.

631
00:32:18,560 --> 00:32:22,560
Speaker 2: But yeah, I mean one way. But in this case,

632
00:32:22,640 --> 00:32:25,840
Speaker 2: there doesn't seem to be any like evidence of that, right,

633
00:32:25,960 --> 00:32:28,959
Speaker 2: Like that it's because like Presley's not an uncommon last name, right,

634
00:32:29,000 --> 00:32:33,080
Speaker 2: there's a shitload of fucking Presley's out there. So Hattie

635
00:32:33,080 --> 00:32:35,880
Speaker 2: May was the granddaughter of slaves, So that is like

636
00:32:35,960 --> 00:32:38,720
Speaker 2: how kind of you know, we're talking about like the

637
00:32:38,760 --> 00:32:42,000
Speaker 2: fifties here, right, And she worked as the cook for

638
00:32:42,120 --> 00:32:45,040
Speaker 2: the sheriff of KOs Usko and managed the household of

639
00:32:45,080 --> 00:32:48,520
Speaker 2: a rich white family, the Leonards, and at this point,

640
00:32:48,560 --> 00:32:51,479
Speaker 2: we've got two pretty different We start to get two

641
00:32:51,560 --> 00:32:55,520
Speaker 2: very different stories of Oprah's first six years alive. She

642
00:32:55,640 --> 00:32:58,480
Speaker 2: once told reporters, quote, I never had a store bought

643
00:32:58,560 --> 00:33:00,520
Speaker 2: dress or a pair of shoes, and I was six

644
00:33:00,640 --> 00:33:03,040
Speaker 2: years old. The only toy I had was a corn

645
00:33:03,080 --> 00:33:07,440
Speaker 2: cob doll with toothpicks. This is like pretty consistent in

646
00:33:07,520 --> 00:33:11,480
Speaker 2: terms of how Oprah talks about her life. Kitty Kelly writes, quote,

647
00:33:11,680 --> 00:33:13,960
Speaker 2: she recalled her early years as lonely, with no one

648
00:33:14,000 --> 00:33:16,360
Speaker 2: to play with except the pigs that she rode bareback

649
00:33:16,400 --> 00:33:19,680
Speaker 2: around her grandmother's yard. I only had barnyard animals to

650
00:33:19,720 --> 00:33:22,800
Speaker 2: talk to. I read them Bible stories. She regaled her

651
00:33:22,840 --> 00:33:25,360
Speaker 2: audiences with stories of having to carry water from the well,

652
00:33:25,520 --> 00:33:28,360
Speaker 2: milk cows and empty the slop jar. A childhood of

653
00:33:28,400 --> 00:33:30,800
Speaker 2: cinders and ashes that was the stuff of fairy tales.

654
00:33:31,200 --> 00:33:34,320
Speaker 2: Oprah morphed into Operella as she spun her tales about

655
00:33:34,360 --> 00:33:37,600
Speaker 2: the switch wielding grandmother and cane thumping grandfather who raised

656
00:33:37,600 --> 00:33:40,320
Speaker 2: her until she was six years old. Oh the whoopings

657
00:33:40,320 --> 00:33:43,120
Speaker 2: I got, she said. And the degree to which this

658
00:33:43,200 --> 00:33:46,760
Speaker 2: is mythmaking is up for debate. It is worth noting

659
00:33:47,000 --> 00:33:49,840
Speaker 2: that a lot of a number of her family members

660
00:33:49,920 --> 00:33:51,920
Speaker 2: and friends of the family who knew Oprah during this

661
00:33:52,000 --> 00:33:56,600
Speaker 2: period very much don't agree with this take on her childhood.

662
00:33:56,800 --> 00:33:58,280
Speaker 2: And I want to read a quote from that People

663
00:33:58,320 --> 00:34:02,680
Speaker 2: Profiles biography here. Among Oprah's many assets, maybe a gift

664
00:34:02,720 --> 00:34:06,280
Speaker 2: for self dramatization. As Vernita once put it, Oprah toots

665
00:34:06,320 --> 00:34:09,280
Speaker 2: it up a little. In one tale Oprah has often told,

666
00:34:09,320 --> 00:34:11,879
Speaker 2: she has cast herself as a lonely child whose main

667
00:34:11,920 --> 00:34:14,880
Speaker 2: comfort was talking to the farm animals. The nearest neighborhood

668
00:34:14,960 --> 00:34:16,960
Speaker 2: was a blind neighbor was a blind man up the road.

669
00:34:17,040 --> 00:34:19,719
Speaker 2: She once said, There weren't other kids, no playmates, no

670
00:34:19,800 --> 00:34:22,279
Speaker 2: toys except for one corn cob doll. I played with

671
00:34:22,320 --> 00:34:26,520
Speaker 2: the animals, and I made speeches to the cows. Esther's

672
00:34:26,560 --> 00:34:28,600
Speaker 2: which is who her aunt, has a different explanation for

673
00:34:28,640 --> 00:34:32,160
Speaker 2: the loneliness Oprah remembers. Right across the road were Oprah's cousins,

674
00:34:32,160 --> 00:34:34,600
Speaker 2: the Presley twins, who were her age. They played together

675
00:34:34,680 --> 00:34:37,440
Speaker 2: when Oprah was allowed to come outside because Aunt hat

676
00:34:37,640 --> 00:34:41,799
Speaker 2: was very protective of her. And it seems that there's

677
00:34:41,840 --> 00:34:44,360
Speaker 2: at least a good amount of evidence that the real

678
00:34:44,480 --> 00:34:47,000
Speaker 2: Oprah's story at least the story of her childhood that

679
00:34:47,040 --> 00:34:49,080
Speaker 2: the majority of the people who were there for at

680
00:34:49,080 --> 00:34:52,200
Speaker 2: Tell is not that she was like locked, you know,

681
00:34:52,440 --> 00:34:54,640
Speaker 2: is that she was isolated because this was some like

682
00:34:54,920 --> 00:34:58,200
Speaker 2: middle of the nowhere dirt farm. It's because she had

683
00:34:58,200 --> 00:35:01,200
Speaker 2: a grandmother who was something of a hell copter parent, right,

684
00:35:02,360 --> 00:35:05,800
Speaker 2: And while the family certainly wasn't rich, they weren't dirt poor.

685
00:35:05,960 --> 00:35:08,080
Speaker 2: And in fact, everyone seems to agree that Oprah had

686
00:35:08,120 --> 00:35:10,040
Speaker 2: a lot of toys. The whole I only had a

687
00:35:10,080 --> 00:35:13,520
Speaker 2: corn cob doll thing is definitely not true. But the

688
00:35:13,600 --> 00:35:15,839
Speaker 2: reason she had a lot of nice toys is that

689
00:35:15,880 --> 00:35:17,920
Speaker 2: they were all hand me downs from their rich white

690
00:35:17,920 --> 00:35:21,759
Speaker 2: family that Haddie may worked for, which is a complicated thing,

691
00:35:21,840 --> 00:35:25,080
Speaker 2: right when you're thinking about, like, why would somebody kind

692
00:35:25,120 --> 00:35:29,120
Speaker 2: of exaggerate the lack of stuff that they had as

693
00:35:29,160 --> 00:35:30,920
Speaker 2: a kid when it's like, well, but also the stuff

694
00:35:30,960 --> 00:35:33,600
Speaker 2: that you have comes to you as a result of

695
00:35:33,640 --> 00:35:36,759
Speaker 2: this relationship that's kind of very fundamentally unequal and that

696
00:35:36,800 --> 00:35:39,040
Speaker 2: you were probably somewhat aware of at the time. And

697
00:35:39,080 --> 00:35:42,120
Speaker 2: Oprah in fact talks a lot about how she was

698
00:35:42,160 --> 00:35:44,800
Speaker 2: aware of the fact that like, white girls were treated

699
00:35:45,000 --> 00:35:48,239
Speaker 2: very differently in her town and wanted to be white

700
00:35:48,360 --> 00:35:52,280
Speaker 2: as a little kid, So like this is all very messy.

701
00:35:52,800 --> 00:35:54,880
Speaker 3: Yeah, it goes back to what you were saying, Robert,

702
00:35:54,880 --> 00:35:58,279
Speaker 3: about how a lot of her early story is quite

703
00:35:58,360 --> 00:36:02,399
Speaker 3: sympathetic and it's very easy. Like it's on the one hand,

704
00:36:02,480 --> 00:36:04,279
Speaker 3: it's easy to say, oh, well she was doing some

705
00:36:04,360 --> 00:36:07,080
Speaker 3: myth making and saying she didn't have any toys, But

706
00:36:07,120 --> 00:36:09,920
Speaker 3: it's also like more complicated and sort of truer to

707
00:36:09,960 --> 00:36:12,399
Speaker 3: be like, well, she had toys, but they came from

708
00:36:12,400 --> 00:36:14,600
Speaker 3: the white kids, and that she didn't maybe maybe was

709
00:36:14,640 --> 00:36:19,200
Speaker 3: aware of the dynamic there. Like it's less satisfying and

710
00:36:19,760 --> 00:36:22,400
Speaker 3: more complex, but it doesn't make it any less true.

711
00:36:23,200 --> 00:36:26,600
Speaker 2: Right, right, And it's also one of those things where

712
00:36:27,760 --> 00:36:30,760
Speaker 2: like she talks a lot about being whipped and switched

713
00:36:30,800 --> 00:36:33,560
Speaker 2: in how like she didn't feel like the same thing

714
00:36:33,600 --> 00:36:35,719
Speaker 2: happened to the white kids. Now does that mean, like,

715
00:36:35,960 --> 00:36:38,239
Speaker 2: I'm white kids in Alabama. I'm sure plenty of them

716
00:36:38,280 --> 00:36:41,319
Speaker 2: got beat by their parents too, But what kind of

717
00:36:41,360 --> 00:36:43,640
Speaker 2: matters more there is her feeling on it, right, that

718
00:36:43,680 --> 00:36:46,720
Speaker 2: there were these kids that my grandma's job is to serve,

719
00:36:46,760 --> 00:36:49,359
Speaker 2: and they clearly get these much nicer things than I am,

720
00:36:50,000 --> 00:36:52,080
Speaker 2: and it's not surprising to me that that would color

721
00:36:52,120 --> 00:36:57,480
Speaker 2: her her concept of her childhood much more than like

722
00:36:57,560 --> 00:36:59,759
Speaker 2: what her older aunts would have picked up on, which

723
00:36:59,800 --> 00:37:03,120
Speaker 2: is like, well she always had the nice things, right, yeah,

724
00:37:03,160 --> 00:37:06,680
Speaker 2: Like neither of them can be lying and there can

725
00:37:06,719 --> 00:37:09,640
Speaker 2: still be a discrepancy between what they remember, if that

726
00:37:09,680 --> 00:37:10,240
Speaker 2: makes sense.

727
00:37:11,000 --> 00:37:12,879
Speaker 7: But it feels like myth making is sort of a

728
00:37:12,920 --> 00:37:14,799
Speaker 7: fair way to say it, like this is just kind

729
00:37:14,800 --> 00:37:18,120
Speaker 7: of part of it. The exact shorthand especially in a

730
00:37:18,320 --> 00:37:22,040
Speaker 7: like entertainment capacity, like.

731
00:37:22,520 --> 00:37:25,200
Speaker 2: The whole I only had the cows to talk to

732
00:37:25,360 --> 00:37:27,400
Speaker 2: thing is definitely a bit of myth making because like

733
00:37:27,440 --> 00:37:29,680
Speaker 2: everyone doesn't really No, she had more family around her

734
00:37:29,719 --> 00:37:31,959
Speaker 2: than that. Yeah, that's that's a little that's a little

735
00:37:31,960 --> 00:37:33,000
Speaker 2: bit playing it up right.

736
00:37:33,080 --> 00:37:35,959
Speaker 3: That's like straight out of the movie Pearl, Like yeah, yeah,

737
00:37:37,120 --> 00:37:42,920
Speaker 3: the pigs, so yeah, Oprah.

738
00:37:43,040 --> 00:37:45,040
Speaker 2: One of the stories she tells that tells is that

739
00:37:45,080 --> 00:37:49,080
Speaker 2: she was like forced to make friends with cockroaches, which

740
00:37:49,120 --> 00:37:51,879
Speaker 2: is actually like a reoccurrent bit of hers in her

741
00:37:51,920 --> 00:37:54,120
Speaker 2: early years. Quote, we were so poor we couldn't afford

742
00:37:54,160 --> 00:37:56,399
Speaker 2: a catter a dog, so I made pat pets out

743
00:37:56,440 --> 00:37:58,719
Speaker 2: of two cockroaches. I put him in a jar and

744
00:37:58,800 --> 00:38:02,520
Speaker 2: named them Melinda and sand and Oprah's sister Patricia Lloyd,

745
00:38:02,840 --> 00:38:06,359
Speaker 2: does not entirely agree with this take. Oprah exaggerated how

746
00:38:06,400 --> 00:38:08,719
Speaker 2: bad we had it, I guess to get sympathy from

747
00:38:08,719 --> 00:38:11,920
Speaker 2: her viewers and widen her audience. She never had cockroaches

748
00:38:11,960 --> 00:38:13,839
Speaker 2: for pets. She always had a dog. She also had

749
00:38:13,840 --> 00:38:16,080
Speaker 2: a white cat an eel and an aquarium and a

750
00:38:16,120 --> 00:38:18,840
Speaker 2: parakeet called bo Peep that she tried to teach to talk,

751
00:38:19,480 --> 00:38:19,960
Speaker 2: and she.

752
00:38:21,200 --> 00:38:21,440
Speaker 6: Had a.

753
00:38:23,760 --> 00:38:29,799
Speaker 7: Hard you really blasted past the eyel point.

754
00:38:30,280 --> 00:38:32,920
Speaker 2: Well, here's the thing, though, because, like Patricia Lloyd is

755
00:38:32,960 --> 00:38:35,399
Speaker 2: telling the truth, I think I'm sure that Oprah had

756
00:38:35,440 --> 00:38:38,960
Speaker 2: those pets. But Patricia is younger than Oprah and doesn't

757
00:38:38,960 --> 00:38:42,840
Speaker 2: meet Oprah until Oprah is not living with her grandmother anymore.

758
00:38:43,320 --> 00:38:46,400
Speaker 2: Patricia and Oprah never get along. And a big chunk

759
00:38:46,400 --> 00:38:48,680
Speaker 2: of this is I'm not going to throw out stories

760
00:38:48,719 --> 00:38:50,440
Speaker 2: like this from family members who were like, yeah, it

761
00:38:50,480 --> 00:38:52,480
Speaker 2: wasn't as bad as she says it was, because there's

762
00:38:52,520 --> 00:38:54,600
Speaker 2: definitely a good amount of myth making going on here.

763
00:38:54,960 --> 00:38:57,160
Speaker 2: But also there's a lot of people who are angry

764
00:38:57,200 --> 00:38:59,399
Speaker 2: that Oprah got rich in that they didn't get as

765
00:38:59,480 --> 00:39:01,719
Speaker 2: much of that money as they wanted to get, and

766
00:39:01,800 --> 00:39:03,920
Speaker 2: so that's also a factor in some of these like

767
00:39:04,280 --> 00:39:06,200
Speaker 2: like Patricia doesn't know what was going on in that

768
00:39:06,280 --> 00:39:08,120
Speaker 2: farmhouse because she wasn't alive then.

769
00:39:08,600 --> 00:39:12,000
Speaker 3: And she's probably just a hater she that's not.

770
00:39:12,239 --> 00:39:16,759
Speaker 2: Zero percent of why she's saying this, right. Yeah, Now

771
00:39:16,800 --> 00:39:19,520
Speaker 2: that said, there's also some evidence that like Oprah really

772
00:39:19,520 --> 00:39:22,800
Speaker 2: pushes aside how doting her family was to her, because

773
00:39:22,800 --> 00:39:25,839
Speaker 2: that's not kind of the conception she She always has

774
00:39:25,880 --> 00:39:28,759
Speaker 2: this sort of like I've always been alone attitude, and

775
00:39:28,760 --> 00:39:31,760
Speaker 2: maybe that's how she felt. But her maternal aunt Susie

776
00:39:31,960 --> 00:39:34,640
Speaker 2: said this to Kitty Kelly. We all just adored her.

777
00:39:34,719 --> 00:39:37,359
Speaker 2: We just worshiped her in everything. My mother Hattie gave

778
00:39:37,400 --> 00:39:40,280
Speaker 2: Oprah everything she wanted her to have and everything Oprah wanted,

779
00:39:40,560 --> 00:39:42,719
Speaker 2: and so we were poor people, but we got it

780
00:39:42,760 --> 00:39:45,120
Speaker 2: for her. She claimed she had no dolls, but she

781
00:39:45,200 --> 00:39:49,279
Speaker 2: had lots of dolls, all kinds of dolls. And I,

782
00:39:49,400 --> 00:39:52,120
Speaker 2: you know, I don't think that's lying either. I don't

783
00:39:52,120 --> 00:39:54,640
Speaker 2: think it's uncommon for a kid to be like, well,

784
00:39:54,680 --> 00:39:57,200
Speaker 2: I felt alone, and for the people around that coid

785
00:39:57,239 --> 00:40:00,839
Speaker 2: to be like but you weren't, you know, and again,

786
00:40:00,960 --> 00:40:03,879
Speaker 2: neither of those people are necessarily lying. That just gets

787
00:40:03,920 --> 00:40:08,200
Speaker 2: down to people taking very different things, and like childhood,

788
00:40:09,160 --> 00:40:13,080
Speaker 2: you're not aware of the stuff that maybe adults see,

789
00:40:14,719 --> 00:40:17,680
Speaker 2: Yeah how old how old is she in this time period?

790
00:40:18,160 --> 00:40:18,800
Speaker 2: One to six?

791
00:40:19,520 --> 00:40:20,080
Speaker 4: Oh my god?

792
00:40:20,200 --> 00:40:24,200
Speaker 2: Yeah, or birth to six? I should say, right, I.

793
00:40:24,120 --> 00:40:26,560
Speaker 7: Feel like that that's exactly the type of disagreement that

794
00:40:26,600 --> 00:40:30,600
Speaker 7: you always have with you You don't really remember how

795
00:40:30,719 --> 00:40:33,120
Speaker 7: nice everyone was to you when you were six.

796
00:40:33,320 --> 00:40:35,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, because I have a lot of like complaints about

797
00:40:35,800 --> 00:40:38,680
Speaker 2: my own childhood like one to seven or eight, And

798
00:40:39,080 --> 00:40:40,640
Speaker 2: I'm sure my mom would say like, well, we were

799
00:40:40,640 --> 00:40:42,640
Speaker 2: all working our asses off to take care of you,

800
00:40:42,680 --> 00:40:44,360
Speaker 2: and it's like, well, yeah, but also you weren't around

801
00:40:44,440 --> 00:40:46,239
Speaker 2: a lot of the time, you know, like that's just

802
00:40:46,280 --> 00:40:49,480
Speaker 2: a nobody is wrong there. As the parent, you're like,

803
00:40:49,520 --> 00:40:51,720
Speaker 2: but you understand that what I was doing was trying

804
00:40:51,719 --> 00:40:54,040
Speaker 2: to take care of you, And as the kid, you're like, yeah,

805
00:40:54,040 --> 00:40:56,799
Speaker 2: but I was still really unhappy, you know, like that's

806
00:40:56,880 --> 00:40:58,759
Speaker 2: just childhood, you know.

807
00:40:59,320 --> 00:41:00,239
Speaker 4: Yeah, yuh.

808
00:41:01,320 --> 00:41:04,200
Speaker 2: Anyway, Kitty makes an interesting note here, pulling from a

809
00:41:04,280 --> 00:41:07,160
Speaker 2: two thousand and nine interview Oprah did with Barbara Streisand

810
00:41:07,239 --> 00:41:09,759
Speaker 2: in which Barbara, who grew up in poverty, talked about

811
00:41:09,760 --> 00:41:13,160
Speaker 2: the fact that her only doll was a hot water bottle. Oprah,

812
00:41:13,200 --> 00:41:15,360
Speaker 2: who had previously claimed to only have a doll she

813
00:41:15,400 --> 00:41:18,680
Speaker 2: made from a corn cob, replied, Wow, you were poorer

814
00:41:18,680 --> 00:41:22,040
Speaker 2: than I was. So again myth making is going on here.

815
00:41:22,080 --> 00:41:25,920
Speaker 2: She's not ever totally consistent. You know, how poor she

816
00:41:26,040 --> 00:41:28,160
Speaker 2: was depends on who she's talking to. When she's talking

817
00:41:28,160 --> 00:41:30,800
Speaker 2: to someone who was like really growing up also very poor,

818
00:41:31,360 --> 00:41:34,240
Speaker 2: Oprah maybe like, you know, eases up on the throttle

819
00:41:34,280 --> 00:41:34,799
Speaker 2: a little bit.

820
00:41:37,560 --> 00:41:39,000
Speaker 4: Yeah.

821
00:41:39,080 --> 00:41:42,840
Speaker 3: I remember that Barbara Walters Oprah crossover very well because

822
00:41:42,840 --> 00:41:46,720
Speaker 3: it ends with a very good performance where yeah, painted

823
00:41:47,040 --> 00:41:53,320
Speaker 3: from Jesus microphone white because she was Barbara Streithean painted

824
00:41:53,320 --> 00:41:55,799
Speaker 3: her microphone's white because her thing is like, wait, are

825
00:41:55,840 --> 00:41:57,680
Speaker 3: you talking about streisand or Walters.

826
00:41:57,960 --> 00:41:59,799
Speaker 2: I think I'm talking about Streisand let me double check

827
00:41:59,840 --> 00:42:03,120
Speaker 2: in the US, so I don't have fussed this up.

828
00:42:03,200 --> 00:42:07,080
Speaker 3: If it's Straithan. That was like a very big moment

829
00:42:07,160 --> 00:42:08,120
Speaker 3: in Oprah lore.

830
00:42:08,880 --> 00:42:11,239
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's I'm pretty sure it's Streisand it's

831
00:42:11,239 --> 00:42:13,640
Speaker 2: just that she also talked, she talked to everyone. There's

832
00:42:13,680 --> 00:42:16,560
Speaker 2: because we just talked about Barbara Walters in here, who

833
00:42:16,560 --> 00:42:19,799
Speaker 2: she mentioned like wishing that she had been white as

834
00:42:19,800 --> 00:42:22,600
Speaker 2: a little girl to Barbara Walters, Barbara Streisand I think

835
00:42:22,680 --> 00:42:24,040
Speaker 2: is the interview about how poor they were.

836
00:42:24,160 --> 00:42:26,759
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, all the Barbara's.

837
00:42:26,680 --> 00:42:29,560
Speaker 2: All the barber's. Too many barbers in this story. If

838
00:42:29,560 --> 00:42:32,200
Speaker 2: they were famous in the nineties or early two thousands,

839
00:42:32,239 --> 00:42:36,160
Speaker 2: Oprah had a tearful conversation with them. So yeah. Kitty

840
00:42:36,239 --> 00:42:38,759
Speaker 2: Kelly quotes from a Life article in nineteen ninety seven

841
00:42:38,760 --> 00:42:41,799
Speaker 2: which includes this line, Oprah was the least powerful of

842
00:42:41,880 --> 00:42:45,040
Speaker 2: girls born poor and illegitimate on the segregated south on

843
00:42:45,080 --> 00:42:48,319
Speaker 2: a town in Kouzusko, Mississippi. She spent her first six

844
00:42:48,400 --> 00:42:52,440
Speaker 2: years there abandoned to her maternal grandmother. And so you

845
00:42:52,480 --> 00:42:56,080
Speaker 2: can see that like this spin on the story, which

846
00:42:56,120 --> 00:42:58,920
Speaker 2: is parts of it I'm sure are emotionally true. Some

847
00:42:58,960 --> 00:43:01,480
Speaker 2: of it is certainly literally true, but also the idea

848
00:43:01,520 --> 00:43:05,160
Speaker 2: that she was abandoned, I think it's more. I think

849
00:43:05,480 --> 00:43:07,600
Speaker 2: that doesn't quite get at the truth, which is that

850
00:43:07,719 --> 00:43:10,560
Speaker 2: her grandmother took her over because her mother was not

851
00:43:10,800 --> 00:43:15,399
Speaker 2: a reliable parent, and this was she benefited a lot

852
00:43:15,400 --> 00:43:17,319
Speaker 2: from the fact that she had her grandmother during this

853
00:43:17,640 --> 00:43:20,640
Speaker 2: very similar actually to Clarence Thomas's story, right where you

854
00:43:20,719 --> 00:43:23,040
Speaker 2: had this kid who was growing up in a very

855
00:43:23,040 --> 00:43:26,359
Speaker 2: impoverished background but wound up being taken care of their

856
00:43:26,400 --> 00:43:31,200
Speaker 2: grandparent who was the absolute most responsible person to raise

857
00:43:31,239 --> 00:43:33,239
Speaker 2: them in that period of time. And so it is

858
00:43:33,239 --> 00:43:36,840
Speaker 2: this situation where that's both I'm sure very difficult for

859
00:43:36,920 --> 00:43:39,400
Speaker 2: the child who's not being raised by their parents, but

860
00:43:39,480 --> 00:43:42,000
Speaker 2: it's also not this situation of like like, this is

861
00:43:42,320 --> 00:43:45,799
Speaker 2: an example of there being a strong safety net in

862
00:43:45,840 --> 00:43:48,000
Speaker 2: her childhood that a number of a lot of other

863
00:43:48,080 --> 00:43:51,480
Speaker 2: kids in the same situation wouldn't necessarily benefited from. And

864
00:43:51,560 --> 00:43:53,959
Speaker 2: both of those things are i think critical to talk about,

865
00:43:53,960 --> 00:43:56,440
Speaker 2: whether we're talking about Thomas or we're talking about Winfrey.

866
00:43:57,000 --> 00:43:58,399
Speaker 2: And this is where you get kind of a lot

867
00:43:58,440 --> 00:44:02,680
Speaker 2: of the discrepancies because the Winfrey family historian Catherine Esters,

868
00:44:02,680 --> 00:44:04,840
Speaker 2: who is i think technically a cousin but one of

869
00:44:04,840 --> 00:44:07,720
Speaker 2: those cousins who Oprah grew up seeing as an aunt,

870
00:44:08,280 --> 00:44:11,680
Speaker 2: has really taken a lot of issues with Oprah's description

871
00:44:11,840 --> 00:44:15,279
Speaker 2: of her childhood. And she told Kitty Kelly this, all

872
00:44:15,320 --> 00:44:17,640
Speaker 2: things considered, those years with Hattie May were the best

873
00:44:17,680 --> 00:44:19,640
Speaker 2: thing that could have happened to a baby girl born

874
00:44:19,680 --> 00:44:22,520
Speaker 2: to poor kin. Oprah grew up as an only child

875
00:44:22,560 --> 00:44:24,920
Speaker 2: with the full and undivided attention of every one of us,

876
00:44:24,960 --> 00:44:27,440
Speaker 2: her grandparents, her aunt's, uncles, and cousins, as well as

877
00:44:27,440 --> 00:44:30,120
Speaker 2: her mother, who Oprah never mentions was with her every

878
00:44:30,160 --> 00:44:31,719
Speaker 2: day for the first four and a half years of

879
00:44:31,719 --> 00:44:34,239
Speaker 2: Oprah's life until she went north to Milwaukee to find

880
00:44:34,239 --> 00:44:36,200
Speaker 2: a better job. And when I read this, I was

881
00:44:36,280 --> 00:44:38,560
Speaker 2: very surprised because all of the other things I'd read

882
00:44:38,560 --> 00:44:41,000
Speaker 2: about her childhood said that her mom had left immediately,

883
00:44:41,520 --> 00:44:43,560
Speaker 2: but Esther's claims like, no, her mom was there for

884
00:44:43,600 --> 00:44:45,560
Speaker 2: four and a half years and then just bounced for

885
00:44:45,719 --> 00:44:48,400
Speaker 2: like eighteen months to try and set up a life

886
00:44:48,400 --> 00:44:51,000
Speaker 2: and does eventually bring her up to Milwaukee, which is

887
00:44:51,000 --> 00:44:54,439
Speaker 2: a different version of her story, right, Like, again, there's

888
00:44:54,440 --> 00:44:58,160
Speaker 2: a lot there's less abandonment here than at least certain

889
00:44:58,280 --> 00:45:00,439
Speaker 2: versions of the story. And obviously I was isn't there

890
00:45:00,960 --> 00:45:02,200
Speaker 2: so who was lying or not?

891
00:45:02,560 --> 00:45:05,760
Speaker 7: But yeah, I don't know, just that feels like exactly

892
00:45:05,840 --> 00:45:09,319
Speaker 7: like perception though, like between zero and four if your

893
00:45:09,360 --> 00:45:14,560
Speaker 7: mom leaves, how would you materially know the difference between

894
00:45:14,920 --> 00:45:16,440
Speaker 7: four and one?

895
00:45:17,040 --> 00:45:21,359
Speaker 4: You know, really you're barely there, right, kid, Right?

896
00:45:21,440 --> 00:45:24,120
Speaker 2: And that is kind of the difficulty of how formative

897
00:45:24,120 --> 00:45:27,120
Speaker 2: that period is and then how like shitty our memory

898
00:45:27,360 --> 00:45:29,720
Speaker 2: is of it, because like I always would like, especially

899
00:45:29,719 --> 00:45:31,839
Speaker 2: when I do stuff like this and I read about like, well,

900
00:45:31,840 --> 00:45:35,000
Speaker 2: if I were to write my own recollection of like

901
00:45:35,040 --> 00:45:37,840
Speaker 2: my early childhood out and then talk to my relatives

902
00:45:37,880 --> 00:45:39,759
Speaker 2: about it, how many of them would be like, no,

903
00:45:39,840 --> 00:45:44,960
Speaker 2: that's not what happened. No, right, yeah, you're a small child.

904
00:45:45,640 --> 00:45:46,960
Speaker 2: So again, I don't even know how much of this

905
00:45:47,040 --> 00:45:51,120
Speaker 2: is myth making, and just that was her she felt abandoned,

906
00:45:51,160 --> 00:45:53,919
Speaker 2: and so maybe then it is like, is that even

907
00:45:53,960 --> 00:45:56,920
Speaker 2: more accurate than the truth that her mom was actually

908
00:45:56,960 --> 00:45:59,520
Speaker 2: there most of the time, if that's what she took

909
00:45:59,600 --> 00:46:00,880
Speaker 2: out of that period of time.

910
00:46:01,320 --> 00:46:02,839
Speaker 3: I don't know if you know the answer to this,

911
00:46:03,040 --> 00:46:08,080
Speaker 3: But no, are the family members that are speaking on

912
00:46:08,120 --> 00:46:10,799
Speaker 3: this sort of correcting the record. Are they alleging that

913
00:46:10,800 --> 00:46:14,640
Speaker 3: Oprah is sort of outright falsifying? Oh yet her childhood was.

914
00:46:14,680 --> 00:46:20,239
Speaker 2: Like Aunt Catherine definitely is she she is very much.

915
00:46:20,520 --> 00:46:23,520
Speaker 2: She's talking a lot of shade about Oprah. I think

916
00:46:23,560 --> 00:46:25,960
Speaker 2: she takes it very personally because she was one of

917
00:46:26,000 --> 00:46:28,200
Speaker 2: the people helping to raise her, that she talks about

918
00:46:28,200 --> 00:46:32,359
Speaker 2: her childhood this way. And there's always the question of,

919
00:46:32,400 --> 00:46:37,439
Speaker 2: like how much does money and people being unhappy about

920
00:46:37,520 --> 00:46:40,239
Speaker 2: money play into some of this. I can't answer that.

921
00:46:40,320 --> 00:46:44,360
Speaker 2: There's been allegations of that too. You know, nobody's like

922
00:46:44,680 --> 00:46:48,560
Speaker 2: coming into this without an angle, but Aunt Catherine is

923
00:46:48,600 --> 00:46:51,719
Speaker 2: definitely alleging Oprah lies a lot about her childhood. That

924
00:46:51,840 --> 00:46:54,680
Speaker 2: is her is precisely how she frames it. Is that

925
00:46:54,760 --> 00:47:02,040
Speaker 2: like she's she's telling a lot of tall tales, you know, yeah, complicated.

926
00:47:03,520 --> 00:47:06,160
Speaker 7: So it's just like when the successful person in your

927
00:47:06,200 --> 00:47:08,960
Speaker 7: family is the most like the richest person in media.

928
00:47:09,080 --> 00:47:13,040
Speaker 7: That's that's what it becomes. A thing that's sounds so

929
00:47:13,320 --> 00:47:15,480
Speaker 7: standard to any sit talking family.

930
00:47:15,520 --> 00:47:18,000
Speaker 3: I have to say, right, I would be such a

931
00:47:18,040 --> 00:47:21,360
Speaker 3: hater if my sibling became Oprah famous.

932
00:47:21,239 --> 00:47:22,400
Speaker 2: Any billion dollars.

933
00:47:22,800 --> 00:47:24,760
Speaker 3: Put a microphone on my face and I'll say whatever.

934
00:47:24,840 --> 00:47:25,919
Speaker 3: I would be such a hater.

935
00:47:27,000 --> 00:47:29,080
Speaker 2: No, just just buy me a vineyard and I'll shut up.

936
00:47:29,120 --> 00:47:32,800
Speaker 2: You'll never hear from me again. Go date Steadman. We're good.

937
00:47:36,800 --> 00:47:38,200
Speaker 3: So there's also.

938
00:47:38,000 --> 00:47:40,799
Speaker 2: Another aspect of this that that didn't really come out

939
00:47:40,880 --> 00:47:43,759
Speaker 2: until more recently. I'll be Oprah was open a lot

940
00:47:43,840 --> 00:47:46,840
Speaker 2: about physical abuse that she endured. Although I should say

941
00:47:46,960 --> 00:47:49,440
Speaker 2: when I say physical abuse, it is accurate to cold abuse.

942
00:47:49,800 --> 00:47:53,879
Speaker 2: It is also totally normal corporal punishment for the time, right,

943
00:47:54,200 --> 00:47:56,080
Speaker 2: Like the stuff she is talking about, My grandma would

944
00:47:56,080 --> 00:47:57,719
Speaker 2: make me go get a switch and then would beat

945
00:47:57,760 --> 00:47:59,880
Speaker 2: me if I did things that were bad. That is

946
00:48:00,080 --> 00:48:02,640
Speaker 2: extremely normal for this place in.

947
00:48:02,640 --> 00:48:03,279
Speaker 4: Time, right.

948
00:48:03,440 --> 00:48:06,000
Speaker 3: I have to say, like, that is how I was raised.

949
00:48:06,080 --> 00:48:08,160
Speaker 3: I grew up in the South. That's I mean, that's

950
00:48:08,200 --> 00:48:12,000
Speaker 3: just like I know a lot of people same, like

951
00:48:12,080 --> 00:48:14,279
Speaker 3: I know a lot of people today for whom that

952
00:48:14,480 --> 00:48:15,840
Speaker 3: is like a normal vibe.

953
00:48:16,080 --> 00:48:18,640
Speaker 2: Even though it is abuse, and it's one of those

954
00:48:18,680 --> 00:48:21,000
Speaker 2: things people will critique her for like and be like, ah,

955
00:48:21,080 --> 00:48:23,560
Speaker 2: she wasn't relieved, she wasn't beat more than anybody else

956
00:48:23,600 --> 00:48:26,440
Speaker 2: that Like, you know, Hattie was not particularly violent for

957
00:48:26,480 --> 00:48:28,480
Speaker 2: a parent in that era. But also, I don't think

958
00:48:28,520 --> 00:48:30,839
Speaker 2: Oprah's wrong for being like, this is really fucked up,

959
00:48:30,840 --> 00:48:34,319
Speaker 2: and you shouldn't hit kids with switches. So I think

960
00:48:34,320 --> 00:48:36,160
Speaker 2: I give that point to Oprah on the whole.

961
00:48:36,640 --> 00:48:39,200
Speaker 3: Yeah, and especially making the kid go out and get

962
00:48:39,239 --> 00:48:42,120
Speaker 3: their own switch if you want to do that, that's

963
00:48:42,160 --> 00:48:45,280
Speaker 3: like a special kind of psychological torture.

964
00:48:46,080 --> 00:48:47,960
Speaker 2: A lot of it does sound very familiar. Yeah, just

965
00:48:47,960 --> 00:48:50,400
Speaker 2: growing up in the South, Like I got smacked, you know,

966
00:48:50,760 --> 00:48:53,080
Speaker 2: I don't think more than my fair share. And it's

967
00:48:53,080 --> 00:48:54,440
Speaker 2: the kind of thing where like there's a part of

968
00:48:54,440 --> 00:48:55,879
Speaker 2: me that wants to be if I were to hear

969
00:48:55,960 --> 00:48:58,120
Speaker 2: someone else complaining about the kind of stuff that was

970
00:48:58,160 --> 00:49:00,399
Speaker 2: done to me as a kid, I'd be like, oh, man,

971
00:49:00,440 --> 00:49:02,000
Speaker 2: that she was just growing up as a kid in

972
00:49:02,440 --> 00:49:06,239
Speaker 2: rural Oklahoma in the nineties. But it's also bad you

973
00:49:06,280 --> 00:49:09,080
Speaker 2: should do that to kids, So maybe I'll just shut

974
00:49:09,160 --> 00:49:09,759
Speaker 2: up about that.

975
00:49:10,040 --> 00:49:10,239
Speaker 6: You know.

976
00:49:10,960 --> 00:49:13,279
Speaker 2: It's that kind of like it's that attitude where like

977
00:49:13,320 --> 00:49:15,479
Speaker 2: if you went through something and you never really thought

978
00:49:15,480 --> 00:49:17,600
Speaker 2: of it as that bad, then you get kind of

979
00:49:17,600 --> 00:49:20,680
Speaker 2: offended when other people speak up, even if they should be.

980
00:49:21,480 --> 00:49:23,400
Speaker 2: You know, it's that's probably just a thing we have

981
00:49:23,440 --> 00:49:24,520
Speaker 2: to get over as people.

982
00:49:26,200 --> 00:49:28,799
Speaker 7: Yeah, well, see I went through it, I paid off

983
00:49:28,840 --> 00:49:34,080
Speaker 7: my student loans, I did at it, and it's like, well, yeah,

984
00:49:33,960 --> 00:49:35,319
Speaker 7: why should have.

985
00:49:35,200 --> 00:49:40,160
Speaker 2: Been hitting me as a kid? I guess. Earlier I

986
00:49:40,280 --> 00:49:43,600
Speaker 2: mentioned that twenty twenty one book with doctor Bruce Perry, who,

987
00:49:43,600 --> 00:49:46,920
Speaker 2: by Oprah's standards, is a pretty good doctor, but also

988
00:49:46,960 --> 00:49:50,680
Speaker 2: seems to think ADHD isn't real, So again, by Oprah standards,

989
00:49:50,719 --> 00:49:52,800
Speaker 2: does a lot of heavy lifting there. Like I was

990
00:49:52,840 --> 00:49:54,400
Speaker 2: reading through this guy's by and I was like, Okay,

991
00:49:54,560 --> 00:49:56,719
Speaker 2: he seems like a real Oh he doesn't think ADHD

992
00:49:56,880 --> 00:50:02,040
Speaker 2: is a thing. Huh Okay. We got some RFK vibes

993
00:50:02,080 --> 00:50:06,080
Speaker 2: coming off of this fella. In that book, What Happened

994
00:50:06,080 --> 00:50:09,840
Speaker 2: to You? Conversations on trauma, resilience, and healing. Each chapter

995
00:50:09,920 --> 00:50:12,359
Speaker 2: opens up with a brief vignette or essay by either

996
00:50:12,440 --> 00:50:15,280
Speaker 2: Oprah or doctor Perry, and the rest of each chapter

997
00:50:15,400 --> 00:50:19,000
Speaker 2: is literally just like a conversation transcript between the two,

998
00:50:19,120 --> 00:50:21,160
Speaker 2: written out in Q and A format. It is a

999
00:50:21,280 --> 00:50:23,560
Speaker 2: very lazy book in my opinion. Right, this is the

1000
00:50:23,640 --> 00:50:26,360
Speaker 2: easiest way to write a fucking book. Everyone does like

1001
00:50:26,440 --> 00:50:29,040
Speaker 2: ten pages of essays and then you just fucking record

1002
00:50:29,040 --> 00:50:32,520
Speaker 2: a conversation. Man, how do I get that job? Right? Like,

1003
00:50:32,600 --> 00:50:37,680
Speaker 2: that's beautiful grift, beautiful grift. That said, there's also some

1004
00:50:37,719 --> 00:50:40,960
Speaker 2: like pretty poignant vignettes from Oprah here, which I think

1005
00:50:41,000 --> 00:50:43,520
Speaker 2: maybe fills it out a little bit more. That includes

1006
00:50:43,560 --> 00:50:46,240
Speaker 2: some stark claims from her childhood. Now we should remember

1007
00:50:46,560 --> 00:50:48,319
Speaker 2: this book came out just a couple of years ago.

1008
00:50:48,440 --> 00:50:51,400
Speaker 2: So this is a senior citizen reflecting half a century

1009
00:50:51,480 --> 00:50:53,080
Speaker 2: later on things that would have happened when she was

1010
00:50:53,160 --> 00:50:56,520
Speaker 2: six at the oldest. So the best case scenario here,

1011
00:50:56,560 --> 00:50:59,040
Speaker 2: there's no way, you know, even if we discount like

1012
00:50:59,080 --> 00:51:02,080
Speaker 2: some myth making, you're never going to be perfectly accurate

1013
00:51:02,120 --> 00:51:04,640
Speaker 2: in your recollections of stuff that happened in this time.

1014
00:51:05,160 --> 00:51:08,080
Speaker 2: But here's how Oprah writes about the way in which

1015
00:51:08,120 --> 00:51:11,160
Speaker 2: discipline was done when she was a child. At the time,

1016
00:51:11,200 --> 00:51:14,120
Speaker 2: it was accepted practice for caregivers to use corporal punishment

1017
00:51:14,160 --> 00:51:17,160
Speaker 2: to discipline a child. My grandmother Hadi may embraced it,

1018
00:51:17,200 --> 00:51:18,960
Speaker 2: but even at three years old, I knew what I

1019
00:51:19,000 --> 00:51:21,640
Speaker 2: was experiencing was wrong. One of the worst beatings I

1020
00:51:21,640 --> 00:51:24,239
Speaker 2: can recall happened on a Sunday morning going to church

1021
00:51:24,239 --> 00:51:26,600
Speaker 2: played a major role in our lives. Just before we

1022
00:51:26,600 --> 00:51:28,319
Speaker 2: were to leave for service, I was sent to the

1023
00:51:28,320 --> 00:51:31,040
Speaker 2: well behind our house to pump water. The farmhouse where

1024
00:51:31,040 --> 00:51:33,360
Speaker 2: I lived with my grandparents did not have indoor plumbing.

1025
00:51:33,560 --> 00:51:35,560
Speaker 2: From the window, my grandmother caught a glimpse of me

1026
00:51:35,600 --> 00:51:38,399
Speaker 2: twirling my fingers in the water and became enraged. Though

1027
00:51:38,400 --> 00:51:41,239
Speaker 2: I was only daydreaming innocently as any child might. She

1028
00:51:41,320 --> 00:51:43,279
Speaker 2: was angry because this was our drinking water and I

1029
00:51:43,280 --> 00:51:45,279
Speaker 2: had put my fingers in it. She then asked me

1030
00:51:45,320 --> 00:51:46,759
Speaker 2: if I had been playing in the water, and I

1031
00:51:46,800 --> 00:51:49,120
Speaker 2: said no. She bent me over and whipped me so

1032
00:51:49,280 --> 00:51:52,360
Speaker 2: violently my flesh welted. Afterward, I managed to put on

1033
00:51:52,360 --> 00:51:55,080
Speaker 2: my white Sunday best dress, blood began to seep through

1034
00:51:55,120 --> 00:51:57,920
Speaker 2: and stain the crisp fabric a deep crimson. Livid at

1035
00:51:57,960 --> 00:52:00,640
Speaker 2: the site, she chastised me for getting blood in my dress,

1036
00:52:00,840 --> 00:52:03,200
Speaker 2: then sent me to Sunday school in the rural South.

1037
00:52:03,360 --> 00:52:09,960
Speaker 2: This is how black children were raised. Yeah, and it's

1038
00:52:09,960 --> 00:52:13,480
Speaker 2: one of those Esther's aunt Catherine takes a lot of

1039
00:52:13,520 --> 00:52:15,719
Speaker 2: issue with this. She was like, Hattie made it not

1040
00:52:15,800 --> 00:52:18,600
Speaker 2: beat Oprah every day of her life, And like, I'm

1041
00:52:18,600 --> 00:52:20,840
Speaker 2: sure it wasn't every day, but I don't think Oprah's

1042
00:52:20,840 --> 00:52:23,680
Speaker 2: probably that's a very specific story to have lied about.

1043
00:52:24,600 --> 00:52:27,360
Speaker 3: And it's like so visceral that you if that happened

1044
00:52:27,360 --> 00:52:29,239
Speaker 3: to you while you were a little kid, no shit,

1045
00:52:29,280 --> 00:52:30,880
Speaker 3: it's going to be memorable, No shit, it's going to

1046
00:52:30,920 --> 00:52:32,799
Speaker 3: be something you can stick with you.

1047
00:52:33,120 --> 00:52:39,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, of course, that would stick with you. Yeah,

1048
00:52:39,480 --> 00:52:41,359
Speaker 2: And I think this might be again when we talk

1049
00:52:41,360 --> 00:52:43,759
Speaker 2: about because it'd be very easy, especially since this is

1050
00:52:43,800 --> 00:52:46,920
Speaker 2: a bastard's episode, to just lean on Esther's being like

1051
00:52:46,960 --> 00:52:49,560
Speaker 2: she lied about this, She led about that, but like, well,

1052
00:52:49,640 --> 00:52:51,640
Speaker 2: she was one of the people who was taking care

1053
00:52:51,680 --> 00:52:54,520
Speaker 2: of Oprah when Oprah was getting smacked around as a kid,

1054
00:52:54,560 --> 00:52:56,799
Speaker 2: and maybe did some of the smacking And maybe he

1055
00:52:56,800 --> 00:52:59,680
Speaker 2: doesn't want to think about that as having been a problem, right,

1056
00:53:02,480 --> 00:53:08,040
Speaker 2: cool stuff. I think Oprah does genuinely care about child abuse.

1057
00:53:08,080 --> 00:53:10,040
Speaker 2: It's something she has devoted a lot of her life

1058
00:53:10,080 --> 00:53:13,000
Speaker 2: to trying to fight, although ways in ways that have

1059
00:53:13,080 --> 00:53:16,200
Speaker 2: been on perfect imperfect. There's like criticisms of some of

1060
00:53:16,200 --> 00:53:18,360
Speaker 2: the stuff that she's tried to do for this, but

1061
00:53:18,400 --> 00:53:20,200
Speaker 2: it is something that she's like put a lot of

1062
00:53:20,320 --> 00:53:22,960
Speaker 2: time and effort into and that kind of does make

1063
00:53:23,040 --> 00:53:25,919
Speaker 2: me think she's probably telling the truth all in all

1064
00:53:26,040 --> 00:53:29,399
Speaker 2: about like what she experienced as a kid. Now, what's

1065
00:53:29,440 --> 00:53:31,799
Speaker 2: interesting to me is that Oprah, while she's all you know,

1066
00:53:32,040 --> 00:53:34,879
Speaker 2: been mostly seems to have negative things to say about

1067
00:53:34,920 --> 00:53:38,239
Speaker 2: her grandma. She's also very clear that like Hattie May

1068
00:53:38,480 --> 00:53:42,200
Speaker 2: is the first person who inculcated with her within her

1069
00:53:42,200 --> 00:53:45,240
Speaker 2: the behavior that made her a success later on, quote,

1070
00:53:45,560 --> 00:53:48,160
Speaker 2: I developed a keen sense of when trouble was brewing.

1071
00:53:48,400 --> 00:53:50,960
Speaker 2: I recognized the shift in my grandmother's voice or the

1072
00:53:51,000 --> 00:53:53,319
Speaker 2: look that meant I had displeased her. She was not

1073
00:53:53,400 --> 00:53:55,400
Speaker 2: a mean person. I believe she cared for me and

1074
00:53:55,400 --> 00:53:57,560
Speaker 2: wanted me to be a good girl. And I understood

1075
00:53:57,600 --> 00:53:59,680
Speaker 2: that hushing my mouth or silence was the only way

1076
00:53:59,719 --> 00:54:02,319
Speaker 2: to sure a quick end to punishment and pain. For

1077
00:54:02,360 --> 00:54:05,160
Speaker 2: the next forty years, that pattern of condition compliance, the

1078
00:54:05,200 --> 00:54:08,920
Speaker 2: result of deeply rooted trauma, would define every relationship, interaction,

1079
00:54:09,000 --> 00:54:11,480
Speaker 2: and decision in my life. The long term impact of

1080
00:54:11,520 --> 00:54:14,240
Speaker 2: being whooped then forced to sh hush and even smile

1081
00:54:14,280 --> 00:54:17,040
Speaker 2: about it turned me into a world class people pleaser

1082
00:54:17,040 --> 00:54:20,319
Speaker 2: for most of my life. And I think there's an

1083
00:54:20,840 --> 00:54:23,279
Speaker 2: Oprah would suggest that like part of why she got

1084
00:54:23,280 --> 00:54:25,680
Speaker 2: to be so good at what we call myth making,

1085
00:54:26,200 --> 00:54:29,640
Speaker 2: at entertaining people, because what is entertainment but people pleasing,

1086
00:54:30,360 --> 00:54:33,120
Speaker 2: is that she spends so much of her early childhood

1087
00:54:33,680 --> 00:54:36,920
Speaker 2: trying to keep her grandmother happy.

1088
00:54:37,200 --> 00:54:41,560
Speaker 3: Right, yeah, I I mean, I not to be sympathizing

1089
00:54:41,560 --> 00:54:45,520
Speaker 3: with our bastard, but I should. Yeah, I mean, like

1090
00:54:45,680 --> 00:54:48,040
Speaker 3: that is that is my childhood, right, Like I think

1091
00:54:48,360 --> 00:54:51,840
Speaker 3: that is like classic kid who grew up getting that

1092
00:54:51,960 --> 00:54:54,239
Speaker 3: kind of punishment in a household where even as an

1093
00:54:54,280 --> 00:54:57,799
Speaker 3: adult you become so perceptive to like the tiniest little

1094
00:54:57,880 --> 00:55:00,640
Speaker 3: changes in someone's demeanor and kind of had to be

1095
00:55:00,760 --> 00:55:03,680
Speaker 3: to survive in households like that, Like that is like

1096
00:55:04,480 --> 00:55:05,480
Speaker 3: that rings to me.

1097
00:55:06,360 --> 00:55:08,839
Speaker 2: Yeah, my child I wouldn't say was as extreme as

1098
00:55:08,880 --> 00:55:11,520
Speaker 2: what Oprah has related, but I definitely vibe with the

1099
00:55:11,960 --> 00:55:14,040
Speaker 2: feeling of like there is someone in my house who

1100
00:55:14,239 --> 00:55:17,080
Speaker 2: gets angry at me easily, and I'm going to get

1101
00:55:17,239 --> 00:55:20,920
Speaker 2: very good at like people pleasing and it lying in

1102
00:55:21,000 --> 00:55:22,600
Speaker 2: order to avoid pissing them off.

1103
00:55:22,760 --> 00:55:25,240
Speaker 3: And I have to ask Robert, like, as a podcast

1104
00:55:25,360 --> 00:55:27,560
Speaker 3: to podcaster, do you kind of feel like this is

1105
00:55:27,640 --> 00:55:31,360
Speaker 3: like why you are good at like storytelling and entertaining

1106
00:55:31,400 --> 00:55:34,120
Speaker 3: and keeping people happy and laughing and smiling with you, right,

1107
00:55:34,200 --> 00:55:35,960
Speaker 3: Like she's wrong.

1108
00:55:36,719 --> 00:55:38,640
Speaker 2: I don't think she's wrong at all, and like it's

1109
00:55:38,640 --> 00:55:40,520
Speaker 2: it's all of that, and it's also why I've always

1110
00:55:40,560 --> 00:55:42,680
Speaker 2: been really good at talking to the cops and like

1111
00:55:42,800 --> 00:55:44,960
Speaker 2: lying to the cops and getting out of trouble with

1112
00:55:45,040 --> 00:55:50,440
Speaker 2: the police. Is that I know when somebody I like

1113
00:55:51,239 --> 00:55:57,480
Speaker 2: allegedly lying, Yeah, like you learned to protect.

1114
00:55:56,000 --> 00:55:58,960
Speaker 5: Allegedly allegedly allegedly.

1115
00:55:59,160 --> 00:56:02,880
Speaker 2: Yeah. A lot of successful entertainers have something like this

1116
00:56:02,960 --> 00:56:05,719
Speaker 2: in their background. Right. I actually had this written out,

1117
00:56:05,760 --> 00:56:07,600
Speaker 2: like you learn to please people, and that teaches you

1118
00:56:07,600 --> 00:56:08,560
Speaker 2: how to please crowds.

1119
00:56:08,640 --> 00:56:12,120
Speaker 1: Right, speaking of please pleasing crowds.

1120
00:56:12,480 --> 00:56:15,280
Speaker 2: Fuck the crowds. Let's please our advertisers.

1121
00:56:15,560 --> 00:56:16,800
Speaker 4: The only crowd that matters.

1122
00:56:17,280 --> 00:56:26,200
Speaker 2: Yeah, So on the whole, you know, I think Oprah

1123
00:56:26,680 --> 00:56:28,759
Speaker 2: lies a lot about the specific. I think there are

1124
00:56:28,800 --> 00:56:32,560
Speaker 2: specifics that get exaggerated and just specifics that are misremembered

1125
00:56:32,960 --> 00:56:35,799
Speaker 2: about her past. But I don't think that means her

1126
00:56:36,320 --> 00:56:40,359
Speaker 2: We should discount what she says, right, And I think

1127
00:56:40,400 --> 00:56:42,840
Speaker 2: particularly we should pay attention when she says, quote, the

1128
00:56:42,840 --> 00:56:46,399
Speaker 2: most pervasive feeling I remember from my own childhood is loneliness.

1129
00:56:47,040 --> 00:56:48,759
Speaker 2: And I can believe that at the same time as

1130
00:56:48,760 --> 00:56:51,800
Speaker 2: I believe her Aunt Catherine when she tells Kitty Kelly quote,

1131
00:56:52,080 --> 00:56:54,160
Speaker 2: Oprah makes her first six years sound like the worst

1132
00:56:54,200 --> 00:56:56,279
Speaker 2: thing that ever befell, a child born to folks just

1133
00:56:56,320 --> 00:56:58,839
Speaker 2: trying to survive. I was there for most of the time,

1134
00:56:58,880 --> 00:57:00,680
Speaker 2: and I can tell you she was oiled and petted

1135
00:57:00,719 --> 00:57:03,200
Speaker 2: and indulged better than any little girl in these parts.

1136
00:57:03,560 --> 00:57:05,879
Speaker 2: Every parent knows that a child's first six years lays

1137
00:57:05,920 --> 00:57:08,640
Speaker 2: the foundation for life, and those for six years down

1138
00:57:08,640 --> 00:57:10,960
Speaker 2: here with Hetty, Meg gave Oprah the foundation for her

1139
00:57:11,000 --> 00:57:14,360
Speaker 2: self confidence, her speaking ability, and her desire to succeed.

1140
00:57:16,160 --> 00:57:18,920
Speaker 2: I don't actually think both of those things are in

1141
00:57:19,000 --> 00:57:21,320
Speaker 2: conflict the way that they both think it does.

1142
00:57:21,680 --> 00:57:24,520
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think that's exactly.

1143
00:57:24,600 --> 00:57:27,200
Speaker 7: Like as as we've been saying, like, these are all

1144
00:57:27,280 --> 00:57:30,520
Speaker 7: the skills you gain, I do feel it's worth saying

1145
00:57:30,560 --> 00:57:34,360
Speaker 7: that though sometimes you gain these skills, also the majority

1146
00:57:34,400 --> 00:57:37,880
Speaker 7: of the time people are crushed and hurt by this

1147
00:57:38,000 --> 00:57:38,440
Speaker 7: type of.

1148
00:57:38,600 --> 00:57:41,479
Speaker 3: Uh it can be you can be crushed but also

1149
00:57:41,520 --> 00:57:42,360
Speaker 3: a good entertainer.

1150
00:57:43,000 --> 00:57:46,040
Speaker 4: Yeah, you can be. I mean like a magic spell.

1151
00:57:46,200 --> 00:57:52,320
Speaker 8: No, no, I would not recommend entertainers, but in more cases,

1152
00:57:52,360 --> 00:57:54,920
Speaker 8: like if you're an entertainer, like this story still ends

1153
00:57:54,960 --> 00:57:56,960
Speaker 8: in a place like the fucking floor in front of

1154
00:57:56,960 --> 00:58:00,200
Speaker 8: the viper room, as opposed to having two billion dollars.

1155
00:58:01,360 --> 00:58:07,360
Speaker 2: Rip River Phoenix. So there's another story Oprah tells in

1156
00:58:07,400 --> 00:58:11,000
Speaker 2: this book, which again I don't like this book overall,

1157
00:58:11,040 --> 00:58:13,320
Speaker 2: but this passage struck me and if it's if it

1158
00:58:13,400 --> 00:58:16,080
Speaker 2: is accurate, I think it's something that may hint of

1159
00:58:16,120 --> 00:58:19,480
Speaker 2: some darkness buried in the family history that it's historian

1160
00:58:19,520 --> 00:58:23,760
Speaker 2: Aunt Catherine may not be willing to see quote. Growing

1161
00:58:23,840 --> 00:58:26,960
Speaker 2: up in Mississippi, I always slept with my grandmother. My grandfather,

1162
00:58:27,000 --> 00:58:29,800
Speaker 2: who had dementia, slept in a side room. One night,

1163
00:58:29,840 --> 00:58:32,800
Speaker 2: I was suddenly awakened to see my grandfather standing over

1164
00:58:32,800 --> 00:58:35,120
Speaker 2: the bed. Even before I opened my eyes, I could

1165
00:58:35,160 --> 00:58:38,040
Speaker 2: sense my grandmother's fear. I could feel her heightened awareness

1166
00:58:38,040 --> 00:58:41,360
Speaker 2: as she slowly repeated, earlist, get back to bed, earlist,

1167
00:58:41,440 --> 00:58:44,520
Speaker 2: get back to bed. He wouldn't go. He was trying

1168
00:58:44,520 --> 00:58:46,840
Speaker 2: to choke her, fighting to get his hands around her neck.

1169
00:58:47,120 --> 00:58:49,040
Speaker 2: When she finally managed to push him off of her

1170
00:58:49,080 --> 00:58:50,680
Speaker 2: and run to the door, she cried out for one

1171
00:58:50,720 --> 00:58:53,160
Speaker 2: of our neighbors, called cousin Henry, who lived down the road.

1172
00:58:53,520 --> 00:58:57,000
Speaker 2: Henry Henry. Henry Henry was blind, but without hesitation, he

1173
00:58:57,040 --> 00:58:58,400
Speaker 2: came in the middle of the night to help my

1174
00:58:58,480 --> 00:59:02,200
Speaker 2: grandmother put my grandfather back in his bedroom. My grandmother

1175
00:59:02,240 --> 00:59:04,600
Speaker 2: then wedged a chair into the doorknob to her bedroom

1176
00:59:04,640 --> 00:59:06,840
Speaker 2: door and found some cans to put around the door.

1177
00:59:07,160 --> 00:59:09,400
Speaker 2: The next morning, she tied those cans together and hung

1178
00:59:09,440 --> 00:59:11,480
Speaker 2: them from the door. And every night for the rest

1179
00:59:11,480 --> 00:59:14,040
Speaker 2: of my days living with my grandmother, the cans were

1180
00:59:14,040 --> 00:59:16,360
Speaker 2: on the door and the chair was up under the knob.

1181
00:59:16,640 --> 00:59:18,640
Speaker 2: I would try to sleep while listening to make sure

1182
00:59:18,640 --> 00:59:19,800
Speaker 2: that the cans didn't move.

1183
00:59:21,000 --> 00:59:21,320
Speaker 4: Fuck.

1184
00:59:22,040 --> 00:59:28,640
Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's so scary. Yeah, it's interesting. She tells

1185
00:59:28,640 --> 00:59:32,040
Speaker 2: this anecdote in the book because it goes along with

1186
00:59:32,080 --> 00:59:34,360
Speaker 2: another story she's telling, which is that she's talking about

1187
00:59:34,400 --> 00:59:38,160
Speaker 2: like this school shooting right in nineteen eighty eight, when

1188
00:59:38,280 --> 00:59:40,640
Speaker 2: a girl, a woman named Lori Dan entered a second

1189
00:59:40,640 --> 00:59:43,800
Speaker 2: grade classroom classroom and Winetka and started shooting, killing an

1190
00:59:43,840 --> 00:59:46,840
Speaker 2: eight year old and wounding five other kids. And Oprah

1191
00:59:46,880 --> 00:59:50,040
Speaker 2: tells her own story because like, in the aftermath of

1192
00:59:50,080 --> 00:59:52,280
Speaker 2: this shooting, there had been like a discussion about whether

1193
00:59:52,320 --> 00:59:54,560
Speaker 2: or not to like chain and lock the school doors

1194
00:59:54,600 --> 00:59:57,280
Speaker 2: and have them manned by security guards. And the principal

1195
00:59:57,320 --> 00:59:59,440
Speaker 2: refused to implement these changes because he was like, if

1196
00:59:59,440 --> 01:00:01,400
Speaker 2: there's a chain on the door, it sends a message

1197
01:00:01,400 --> 01:00:04,240
Speaker 2: to the kids that they're unsafe, and kind of Oprah

1198
01:00:04,280 --> 01:00:06,720
Speaker 2: brings up the story to be like, I really feel

1199
01:00:06,720 --> 01:00:09,800
Speaker 2: that because of this, these cans hung from the door

1200
01:00:09,840 --> 01:00:12,800
Speaker 2: that we're supposed to make us safer. That just reminded

1201
01:00:12,840 --> 01:00:15,160
Speaker 2: me that there was this constant danger, you know, from

1202
01:00:15,200 --> 01:00:20,000
Speaker 2: my grandfather. So yeah, anyway, interesting, I don't.

1203
01:00:19,840 --> 01:00:22,720
Speaker 7: Have children, but it is so fucked up to me

1204
01:00:22,840 --> 01:00:25,240
Speaker 7: that it's like, I mean, we're not going to make

1205
01:00:25,280 --> 01:00:29,000
Speaker 7: them safe, but we don't want to make them feel unsafe,

1206
01:00:29,520 --> 01:00:30,320
Speaker 7: which they hire.

1207
01:00:31,160 --> 01:00:37,160
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and it's you know, uh, Aunt Catherine, I

1208
01:00:37,200 --> 01:00:41,320
Speaker 2: think would probably say again, would doubt that that had happened.

1209
01:00:42,600 --> 01:00:44,840
Speaker 2: One of the statements she made to Kittie Kelly was

1210
01:00:44,920 --> 01:00:46,880
Speaker 2: I've talked to her about this over the years. I've

1211
01:00:46,920 --> 01:00:49,240
Speaker 2: confronted her and asked, why do you tell such lies?

1212
01:00:49,840 --> 01:00:52,120
Speaker 2: Oprah told me that's what people want to hear. The

1213
01:00:52,160 --> 01:00:54,880
Speaker 2: truth is boring, Aunt Catherine. People don't want to be bored.

1214
01:00:54,960 --> 01:00:57,640
Speaker 2: They want stories with drama, and so it is like

1215
01:00:58,440 --> 01:01:00,320
Speaker 2: you can't help think to a little bit like, well

1216
01:01:00,360 --> 01:01:04,640
Speaker 2: did she did she make that up or add to

1217
01:01:04,760 --> 01:01:07,440
Speaker 2: that in order to have something that was relevant to

1218
01:01:07,520 --> 01:01:09,680
Speaker 2: the story of a shooting from her own life, which

1219
01:01:09,720 --> 01:01:12,840
Speaker 2: is like a thing, you know, being able to like like,

1220
01:01:13,640 --> 01:01:17,840
Speaker 2: And it's like you can't know it is. It is

1221
01:01:17,920 --> 01:01:20,600
Speaker 2: kind of worth stating that, like a lot of the

1222
01:01:21,600 --> 01:01:23,840
Speaker 2: people who will argue that about Oprah, and these are

1223
01:01:23,920 --> 01:01:26,840
Speaker 2: arguments coming from members of her family, aunt Catherine ahead

1224
01:01:26,840 --> 01:01:30,680
Speaker 2: of them, are also people who probably have a deep

1225
01:01:30,720 --> 01:01:35,080
Speaker 2: emotional interest in remembering, you know, Grandma Hattie and her

1226
01:01:35,160 --> 01:01:39,600
Speaker 2: husband as one kind of person and Oprah. The fact

1227
01:01:39,600 --> 01:01:43,200
Speaker 2: that Oprah doesn't remember them that way is probably deeply

1228
01:01:43,200 --> 01:01:47,080
Speaker 2: offensive to these people. And maybe, yeah, yeah, I don't know,

1229
01:01:47,120 --> 01:01:49,120
Speaker 2: there's like no way to know what actually happened, right,

1230
01:01:49,160 --> 01:01:51,200
Speaker 2: none of us were there, But the fact that this

1231
01:01:51,320 --> 01:01:54,280
Speaker 2: conflict is present is as much a part of the

1232
01:01:54,320 --> 01:01:56,080
Speaker 2: story as what actually happened, right.

1233
01:01:56,400 --> 01:01:58,440
Speaker 3: I would also say, just growing up in like a

1234
01:01:58,720 --> 01:02:01,440
Speaker 3: southern black family, I do think there might be some

1235
01:02:01,560 --> 01:02:05,200
Speaker 3: aspect of like, you're not meant to talk about whatever

1236
01:02:05,280 --> 01:02:09,360
Speaker 3: happens in our house. Yeah, And so like her aunt

1237
01:02:09,400 --> 01:02:13,040
Speaker 3: being offended that she would even be talking about anything

1238
01:02:13,040 --> 01:02:15,800
Speaker 3: that went on, you know, behind closed doors in their house,

1239
01:02:15,880 --> 01:02:18,040
Speaker 3: that I could really see that, And like, again, I

1240
01:02:18,120 --> 01:02:20,840
Speaker 3: don't think it's all one or the other, that she's

1241
01:02:20,920 --> 01:02:23,760
Speaker 3: just like callously making this up because people need a story.

1242
01:02:23,960 --> 01:02:26,520
Speaker 3: Probably some of that, But that doesn't mean that her

1243
01:02:26,640 --> 01:02:29,360
Speaker 3: family members would not be invested in these stories that

1244
01:02:29,520 --> 01:02:31,760
Speaker 3: paint them in not so great light. You know, not

1245
01:02:31,800 --> 01:02:34,600
Speaker 3: so great light be not something that's talked about on

1246
01:02:34,600 --> 01:02:36,280
Speaker 3: a national stage.

1247
01:02:36,400 --> 01:02:39,200
Speaker 2: Right right, right, Yeah, And I think that's like that's

1248
01:02:39,200 --> 01:02:40,840
Speaker 2: a pretty important part of it as well.

1249
01:02:41,640 --> 01:02:44,760
Speaker 7: I will say another thing that is kind of weird,

1250
01:02:45,280 --> 01:02:49,360
Speaker 7: and partially because I am relatively not versed in Oprah

1251
01:02:49,440 --> 01:02:52,760
Speaker 7: and the elements of her beast diardiness. You know, the

1252
01:02:52,760 --> 01:02:54,800
Speaker 7: ones that I know about mostly seem to be about

1253
01:02:54,800 --> 01:02:58,520
Speaker 7: elevating horrible men, right, which is almost sort of do

1254
01:03:00,040 --> 01:03:02,000
Speaker 7: you know I could see paths to that anyway. I

1255
01:03:02,000 --> 01:03:06,000
Speaker 7: guess what I mean is like none of these like trauma,

1256
01:03:06,160 --> 01:03:08,000
Speaker 7: well not even not the traumas, but none of these

1257
01:03:08,040 --> 01:03:12,720
Speaker 7: like lies or like questionable stories. It's like weird because

1258
01:03:12,760 --> 01:03:15,960
Speaker 7: that doesn't seem like the dimension of which, like the

1259
01:03:16,000 --> 01:03:19,080
Speaker 7: type of bad person that does those things tends to

1260
01:03:19,120 --> 01:03:21,680
Speaker 7: be more of like just a general asshole or a

1261
01:03:21,720 --> 01:03:24,760
Speaker 7: liar in some way. And it's just interesting that I'm like,

1262
01:03:25,560 --> 01:03:27,400
Speaker 7: this doesn't seem to be the bad part.

1263
01:03:27,640 --> 01:03:31,360
Speaker 2: I guess, no, no, Well, also, she's six up to

1264
01:03:31,400 --> 01:03:32,280
Speaker 2: this point in the story.

1265
01:03:32,360 --> 01:03:36,840
Speaker 7: Yeah, even in the retellings. Sorry, Like even if they

1266
01:03:36,880 --> 01:03:40,600
Speaker 7: are exaggerations, Like it's so weird because it's like she

1267
01:03:40,680 --> 01:03:43,520
Speaker 7: could do all that stuff and still not promote doctor

1268
01:03:43,560 --> 01:03:44,480
Speaker 7: oz R.

1269
01:03:44,800 --> 01:03:45,400
Speaker 4: She could be a.

1270
01:03:45,360 --> 01:03:49,640
Speaker 7: Weird kind of like shady, you know, Hollywood person, which happens.

1271
01:03:50,080 --> 01:03:52,959
Speaker 2: Most people who lie about their childhoods don't also start

1272
01:03:53,000 --> 01:03:53,959
Speaker 2: doctor Roz's career.

1273
01:03:54,040 --> 01:03:56,480
Speaker 4: Yes, I think that's that's like maybe what I'm saying.

1274
01:03:57,160 --> 01:04:02,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, so well, you know the attitude of her a

1275
01:04:02,560 --> 01:04:05,000
Speaker 2: number of members of her family, including her mom Brenita,

1276
01:04:05,000 --> 01:04:08,280
Speaker 2: and her aunt Katherine, is that And this is Aunt

1277
01:04:08,360 --> 01:04:10,680
Speaker 2: Catherine again, she always wanted to have the spotlight. If

1278
01:04:10,720 --> 01:04:13,040
Speaker 2: adults were talking and she couldn't get their attention, she'd

1279
01:04:13,120 --> 01:04:15,240
Speaker 2: walk over and hit them to make them pay attention

1280
01:04:15,320 --> 01:04:18,960
Speaker 2: to her. And I think that that's you know, that's

1281
01:04:19,000 --> 01:04:22,560
Speaker 2: probably true because I have seen other kids do that.

1282
01:04:22,960 --> 01:04:24,880
Speaker 2: You know, it's a thing you have to like stop

1283
01:04:24,960 --> 01:04:26,800
Speaker 2: when a kid is doing that. But like that's not

1284
01:04:26,920 --> 01:04:29,920
Speaker 2: an uncommon stage of development or like for kids to

1285
01:04:30,000 --> 01:04:32,440
Speaker 2: scream and pout when they don't get attention, you know,

1286
01:04:33,000 --> 01:04:35,840
Speaker 2: like they're small children. They are still learning these sorts

1287
01:04:35,840 --> 01:04:40,560
Speaker 2: of things. That said, it's not inconsistent with what Oprah

1288
01:04:40,600 --> 01:04:42,640
Speaker 2: says about being lonely or about wanting to be a

1289
01:04:42,640 --> 01:04:45,240
Speaker 2: people please. This is also a kid that is obsessed

1290
01:04:45,280 --> 01:04:48,200
Speaker 2: with having people pay attention to her, and as a result,

1291
01:04:48,320 --> 01:04:51,240
Speaker 2: she is from a very early age a performer, which

1292
01:04:51,280 --> 01:04:55,120
Speaker 2: is really interesting to me. She like every black church

1293
01:04:55,200 --> 01:04:58,400
Speaker 2: in her hometown, she's given like speeches at, and like

1294
01:04:58,480 --> 01:05:01,240
Speaker 2: read poems at and and whatnot. By the time she

1295
01:05:01,360 --> 01:05:04,720
Speaker 2: is six or seven, which is a continuing thing in

1296
01:05:04,760 --> 01:05:07,640
Speaker 2: her life. When she moves, you know, to the big city,

1297
01:05:07,720 --> 01:05:09,680
Speaker 2: she'll be doing the same thing, going at every single

1298
01:05:09,800 --> 01:05:12,720
Speaker 2: church she can find, and like doing these kind of

1299
01:05:12,800 --> 01:05:15,080
Speaker 2: live performances. She's doing that from the age of like

1300
01:05:15,200 --> 01:05:18,120
Speaker 2: four or five. And this appears to be something in

1301
01:05:18,160 --> 01:05:22,120
Speaker 2: which she is entirely self motivated to do. Like she

1302
01:05:22,320 --> 01:05:24,880
Speaker 2: is pushing for her family to take her to these

1303
01:05:24,960 --> 01:05:29,680
Speaker 2: churches so that she can do like live performances, right, Like,

1304
01:05:29,760 --> 01:05:33,680
Speaker 2: this is always a thing that she wants in her life,

1305
01:05:33,720 --> 01:05:35,560
Speaker 2: which is you know, interesting to me and something that's

1306
01:05:35,600 --> 01:05:37,640
Speaker 2: going to be a bigger thing in part two of

1307
01:05:37,640 --> 01:05:40,760
Speaker 2: our episodes. But that concludes part one of the Oprah

1308
01:05:40,760 --> 01:05:41,560
Speaker 2: Winfrey story.

1309
01:05:45,640 --> 01:05:46,240
Speaker 4: That's wild.

1310
01:05:46,280 --> 01:05:48,800
Speaker 7: I didn't realize that the church circuit was basically like

1311
01:05:48,880 --> 01:05:50,960
Speaker 7: open mic night for being a top show host.

1312
01:05:51,200 --> 01:05:53,160
Speaker 2: Oh my god, it's a specific kind of open night,

1313
01:05:53,240 --> 01:05:56,000
Speaker 2: Mike Knight, Yeah.

1314
01:05:55,120 --> 01:05:57,840
Speaker 3: It's yeah, it definitely is. I have seen the folks

1315
01:05:57,880 --> 01:06:00,800
Speaker 3: who like, have you ever it makes sense, Yeah, like

1316
01:06:00,840 --> 01:06:03,960
Speaker 3: people who speak at a certain kind of cadence. You're like, oh,

1317
01:06:04,000 --> 01:06:06,200
Speaker 3: you're a church game, you were like raised given as

1318
01:06:06,200 --> 01:06:07,960
Speaker 3: a church Wow.

1319
01:06:08,400 --> 01:06:11,440
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and it makes it. It's really interesting to

1320
01:06:11,480 --> 01:06:15,280
Speaker 2: me that like she has because like this does kind

1321
01:06:15,320 --> 01:06:18,440
Speaker 2: of speak to some of the things her aunt was

1322
01:06:18,440 --> 01:06:20,680
Speaker 2: saying about, Like, you know, we were all really focused

1323
01:06:20,680 --> 01:06:23,600
Speaker 2: on her. There was so much attention that went her

1324
01:06:23,640 --> 01:06:25,560
Speaker 2: way because well, yeah, I mean it would probably be

1325
01:06:25,560 --> 01:06:28,960
Speaker 2: pretty hard for her to have gotten taken to all

1326
01:06:29,000 --> 01:06:32,600
Speaker 2: of these different like places, right to all of these

1327
01:06:32,600 --> 01:06:35,680
Speaker 2: different like churches and whatnot, if her family wasn't interested

1328
01:06:35,840 --> 01:06:39,439
Speaker 2: in her and like focused on her success. That said

1329
01:06:39,480 --> 01:06:41,919
Speaker 2: it also, that's exactly the kind of thing a kid

1330
01:06:41,960 --> 01:06:45,320
Speaker 2: who was deeply lonely would really want to do, right,

1331
01:06:45,440 --> 01:06:47,280
Speaker 2: Like that's because those are the kind of kids who

1332
01:06:47,280 --> 01:06:48,680
Speaker 2: become entertainers and a lot of.

1333
01:06:49,000 --> 01:06:51,600
Speaker 4: It is a pretty unique thing. I can't imagine.

1334
01:06:51,800 --> 01:06:54,760
Speaker 7: I mean, I don't think I got comfortable speaking publicly

1335
01:06:54,880 --> 01:07:00,439
Speaker 7: till I was like twenty eight, so like, yeah, six

1336
01:07:00,520 --> 01:07:03,800
Speaker 7: year old was like, let me, I just need I

1337
01:07:03,840 --> 01:07:05,760
Speaker 7: just need some stage time this Sunday morning.

1338
01:07:06,680 --> 01:07:09,400
Speaker 2: I loved it. I was a little church wasn't where

1339
01:07:09,400 --> 01:07:13,040
Speaker 2: I did it, but like, yeah, I was an attention.

1340
01:07:13,200 --> 01:07:17,440
Speaker 7: I guess I was attention. But like, truly public speaking

1341
01:07:18,040 --> 01:07:19,160
Speaker 7: is I think different?

1342
01:07:19,760 --> 01:07:20,600
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1343
01:07:20,760 --> 01:07:22,560
Speaker 2: And what she's doing the fact that she is like

1344
01:07:23,080 --> 01:07:26,120
Speaker 2: she is. She has the confidence in her speaking abilities

1345
01:07:26,120 --> 01:07:27,560
Speaker 2: to want to get up at church, which is like

1346
01:07:27,640 --> 01:07:30,400
Speaker 2: a big thing in a lot of way, especially to

1347
01:07:30,440 --> 01:07:34,120
Speaker 2: a little kid, that's really interesting to me. Yeah, anyone

1348
01:07:34,200 --> 01:07:35,560
Speaker 2: surprised about anything so far?

1349
01:07:37,280 --> 01:07:40,920
Speaker 1: I think it's surprising to see the like conflicting stories.

1350
01:07:41,560 --> 01:07:42,000
Speaker 4: M hmm.

1351
01:07:42,880 --> 01:07:48,080
Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah, I will say I don't think anyone's scrutiny

1352
01:07:48,120 --> 01:07:50,760
Speaker 7: of any of the tales they tell about being six

1353
01:07:50,880 --> 01:07:55,120
Speaker 7: or younger would hold up to anything that's been put

1354
01:07:55,120 --> 01:07:59,320
Speaker 7: through this. No, So like every every knock against Oprah

1355
01:07:59,440 --> 01:08:04,080
Speaker 7: in this capacity, I am wildly sympathetic too. I'm just like,

1356
01:08:04,200 --> 01:08:06,520
Speaker 7: I don't know you're talking about when you're six and

1357
01:08:06,960 --> 01:08:09,680
Speaker 7: you're doing it in front of presumably a bunch of

1358
01:08:09,720 --> 01:08:13,160
Speaker 7: like white producers and network executives. Mostly so it's like,

1359
01:08:14,240 --> 01:08:15,320
Speaker 7: gotta do what you gotta do.

1360
01:08:15,440 --> 01:08:20,479
Speaker 3: Sometimes I am surprised that I pretty much uncritically just

1361
01:08:20,920 --> 01:08:25,040
Speaker 3: every thing that Oprah ever said about her childhood. I

1362
01:08:25,120 --> 01:08:28,200
Speaker 3: believed I repeated it in my fifth grade report, Sophie.

1363
01:08:28,200 --> 01:08:30,240
Speaker 3: I don't know if you did too, but that like that,

1364
01:08:30,439 --> 01:08:32,679
Speaker 3: like the thing about the dolls and her first getting

1365
01:08:32,720 --> 01:08:35,320
Speaker 3: her first pair of shoes at six, I specifically put

1366
01:08:35,360 --> 01:08:37,840
Speaker 3: that in my report. And now I'm like, dang, should

1367
01:08:37,840 --> 01:08:38,559
Speaker 3: a fact check that?

1368
01:08:41,280 --> 01:08:42,560
Speaker 1: Fifth grade US?

1369
01:08:43,640 --> 01:08:45,480
Speaker 4: I know, terrible journalists.

1370
01:08:49,160 --> 01:08:53,120
Speaker 2: Oh man, Yeah, it's uh. I'm always fascinated by like

1371
01:08:53,160 --> 01:08:57,960
Speaker 2: the vagaries of memory, you know, like the past is

1372
01:08:58,000 --> 01:09:01,640
Speaker 2: not just a foreign country. It's didn't happen. It's a fantasy.

1373
01:09:01,720 --> 01:09:04,559
Speaker 2: It's a fiction dementia. Right, it's a fiction novel that

1374
01:09:04,600 --> 01:09:07,920
Speaker 2: you've been writing your entire life without even knowing it. Anyway,

1375
01:09:08,320 --> 01:09:10,439
Speaker 2: go sleep on that, everybody. We'll be back in a

1376
01:09:10,439 --> 01:09:14,200
Speaker 2: couple of days. Oh wait, pluggables.

1377
01:09:13,840 --> 01:09:15,200
Speaker 4: Yep from us.

1378
01:09:15,400 --> 01:09:18,360
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, yes, yes, plug I'll just go.

1379
01:09:18,560 --> 01:09:20,240
Speaker 4: Jos is racist. That's my podcast.

1380
01:09:21,160 --> 01:09:25,560
Speaker 7: We have the premium shows at Suboptimal pods dot com.

1381
01:09:25,960 --> 01:09:27,920
Speaker 7: I'm trying to think mostly just been talking about this

1382
01:09:28,000 --> 01:09:30,599
Speaker 7: amazing celery salad I had I made the other day.

1383
01:09:30,640 --> 01:09:33,240
Speaker 7: I've had it three times since I made it. Well, Celery,

1384
01:09:33,320 --> 01:09:39,479
Speaker 7: lemon shalat and dates. Okay, it's pretty. It's a crazy

1385
01:09:39,479 --> 01:09:42,120
Speaker 7: ass salad. I put blue cheese in it too, but yeah,

1386
01:09:42,840 --> 01:09:43,640
Speaker 7: and walnuts.

1387
01:09:44,040 --> 01:09:45,439
Speaker 4: All right now, I'm good. That's my plug.

1388
01:09:45,680 --> 01:09:49,760
Speaker 3: Bridgie definitely making that salad. Yeah. Listen to my podcast

1389
01:09:49,920 --> 01:09:52,000
Speaker 3: There Are No Girls on the Internet, about the exploration

1390
01:09:52,160 --> 01:09:56,240
Speaker 3: of the intersection of identity and social media and technology.

1391
01:09:56,479 --> 01:09:58,799
Speaker 3: And listen to my podcast that I do with Mozilla

1392
01:09:58,840 --> 01:10:02,519
Speaker 3: Foundation called ir. It explores who has the power in

1393
01:10:02,600 --> 01:10:05,720
Speaker 3: AI and ethics in AI. New season coming soon. Check

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Speaker 3: it out.

1395
01:10:07,680 --> 01:10:08,960
Speaker 1: I want to plug at the end here just a

1396
01:10:09,000 --> 01:10:11,960
Speaker 1: couple of organizations just because of the devastating fires in

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Speaker 1: Los Angeles. If you are able to help, just check

1398
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Speaker 1: out water Drop LA and kton for All for reliable

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Speaker 1: resources ab how to help people with mutual Aid. Behind

1400
01:10:25,920 --> 01:10:28,680
Speaker 1: the Bastards is a production of cool Zone Media. For

1401
01:10:28,840 --> 01:10:32,320
Speaker 1: more from cool Zone Media, visit our website Coolzonemedia dot

1402
01:10:32,360 --> 01:10:35,639
Speaker 1: com or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple

1403
01:10:35,720 --> 01:10:38,960
Speaker 1: Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Behind the Bastards

1404
01:10:39,040 --> 01:10:43,320
Speaker 1: is now available on YouTube. New episodes every Wednesday and Friday.

1405
01:10:43,640 --> 01:10:47,400
Speaker 1: Subscribe to our channel YouTube dot com slash At Behind

1406
01:10:47,400 --> 01:10:48,800
Speaker 1: the Bastards