WEBVTT - Dying From American Despair 0:00:11.760 --> 0:00:14.720 Good morning, peeps, and welcome to wok F Daily with 0:00:14.840 --> 0:00:19.000 Meet your Girl Daniel Moody recording from the Home Bunker. 0:00:19.480 --> 0:00:24.320 You know, this week, a clip that I have posted 0:00:24.520 --> 0:00:31.880 onto my Instagram of Sonny Houston of the View has 0:00:32.240 --> 0:00:40.479 gone viral, and in the clip, Sonny very clearly lays 0:00:40.520 --> 0:00:47.279 out the path and plan of the Republican Party and 0:00:48.600 --> 0:00:56.200 very articulately tells people that are watching that this election 0:00:56.960 --> 0:00:59.959 is not about a candidate. It is about the few 0:01:00.000 --> 0:01:05.520 future of this country. And I urge everybody to watch it, 0:01:05.680 --> 0:01:08.440 to watch you know that I think it's a little over, 0:01:08.840 --> 0:01:13.960 you know, close to two and a half minutes, because 0:01:15.600 --> 0:01:20.920 like I said yesterday, I get it, you know, I 0:01:21.520 --> 0:01:24.800 get it, and I feel it. I feel the anger 0:01:25.120 --> 0:01:31.400 and the rage that I have against this administration and 0:01:31.440 --> 0:01:39.959 their actions in Gaza. I have rage and anger about 0:01:40.480 --> 0:01:48.880 their inability to create a large enough narrative to disrupt 0:01:49.160 --> 0:01:59.120 Maga supremacy. And I just need folks to realize that 0:02:00.800 --> 0:02:08.160 these people, these white supremacists, they are not fucking around. 0:02:10.040 --> 0:02:13.680 And for folks who think that like I'm gonna sit 0:02:13.800 --> 0:02:17.400 this one out as my protest because Biden doesn't align 0:02:17.480 --> 0:02:20.080 with my values, well, Donald Trump, sure as fucked doesn't 0:02:20.080 --> 0:02:25.760 align with your values either, right, none of them do. 0:02:27.240 --> 0:02:31.960 But the fact is is that with a person in 0:02:32.080 --> 0:02:38.880 office that is imperfect and actually still believes in the 0:02:38.960 --> 0:02:41.519 rule of law and the constitution, you can fight them, 0:02:43.000 --> 0:02:47.280 You can protest them, you can push them and call 0:02:47.360 --> 0:02:58.080 them out to be better. That does not happen in 0:02:58.120 --> 0:03:04.919 an authoritarian, dick tatorship or fascistic rule. It does not happen. 0:03:04.960 --> 0:03:09.760 People are disappeared, they are killed, they are silenced, their 0:03:09.800 --> 0:03:12.720 families are threatened. And if you think like, oh my god, 0:03:12.760 --> 0:03:15.920 well that's not happening, folks, how many fucking times have 0:03:16.000 --> 0:03:20.000 the judges that are sitting on Donald Trump's cases now 0:03:20.080 --> 0:03:29.720 been swatted? How many elected officials right? How many poll workers? 0:03:31.760 --> 0:03:40.840 How many election workers have been threatened since twenty twenty. 0:03:40.920 --> 0:03:45.120 So if you think that the escalation is not possible, 0:03:45.280 --> 0:03:48.920 I tell you that this shit will happen in a 0:03:49.040 --> 0:03:52.120 blink of a fucking eye, and there'll be not a 0:03:52.160 --> 0:03:55.760 goddamn thing that we can do about it, because Donald 0:03:55.800 --> 0:03:59.800 Trump will control the military and there will be no 0:04:00.120 --> 0:04:05.480 General Millie, there will be no fucking guardrails as shitty 0:04:05.520 --> 0:04:10.280 as we thought they were in the four years that 0:04:10.360 --> 0:04:14.920 he was president. What we know is that those people, 0:04:15.800 --> 0:04:18.400 the handful of them that wanted to write books after 0:04:18.440 --> 0:04:24.000 the fact, really did save our democracy from going into 0:04:24.040 --> 0:04:30.760 a nuclear, literal fucking meltdown. They will be gone, and 0:04:30.839 --> 0:04:36.400 everybody that has money and access and influence will flee 0:04:36.520 --> 0:04:41.400 because they will see the writing on the wall. The rest, however, 0:04:42.760 --> 0:04:47.160 will be left here to suffer, because cruelty is the 0:04:47.200 --> 0:04:59.320 fucking point. So I can't express enough the legitimate fears 0:04:59.640 --> 0:05:03.479 that I I have that much like climate change and 0:05:03.520 --> 0:05:06.440 the experience that I had and people on the East 0:05:06.440 --> 0:05:09.919 Coast had, you know, with a mini tropical storm that 0:05:10.000 --> 0:05:13.600 decided to roll through in the middle of the night 0:05:13.720 --> 0:05:17.120 last night with sixty mile per hour fucking winds and 0:05:17.360 --> 0:05:21.120 rain in fifty degree weather in January, just like we 0:05:21.200 --> 0:05:24.680 continue to ignore the very real effects that are happening 0:05:24.720 --> 0:05:27.640 outside of our window of climate change, and elected officials 0:05:27.680 --> 0:05:30.279 who have the ability to do more than put together 0:05:30.960 --> 0:05:35.560 packs that they don't actually uphold, do anything about. There 0:05:35.640 --> 0:05:40.200 will be no fucking recourse if we fuck this election 0:05:40.400 --> 0:05:46.320 up by not voting, or voting third party, or voting 0:05:46.360 --> 0:05:49.520 for Donald Trump, because they all amount to the same thing. 0:05:51.080 --> 0:05:56.159 White supremacist Christian fascist rule for generations to fucking come. 0:06:00.720 --> 0:06:04.760 The conversation that will be coming up with our friend, 0:06:05.040 --> 0:06:10.400 doctor Jonathan Metzel is talking about a public health crisis 0:06:10.480 --> 0:06:14.800 around despair and anxiety and depression and loneliness that is 0:06:14.880 --> 0:06:23.359 all stemming from the same places. The thing that a 0:06:23.440 --> 0:06:31.040 democrat in the White House provides is possibility, and possibility 0:06:32.160 --> 0:06:37.920 is what eventually leads us to change without possibility and 0:06:38.040 --> 0:06:46.760 hope we die plain and simple. Coming up next my 0:06:46.920 --> 0:06:54.560 conversation with our friend, our in house doctor, doctor Jonathan Metzel, who, 0:06:54.600 --> 0:06:57.000 by the way, folks, if you happen to be in 0:06:57.080 --> 0:06:59.880 the New York area, I will be live and in 0:07:00.080 --> 0:07:05.800 person with Jonathan February fifth in Brooklyn at green Light 0:07:05.839 --> 0:07:10.680 Bookstore in conversation with him about his latest book, What 0:07:10.800 --> 0:07:18.520 We've Become, that you can pre order now folks. It 0:07:18.600 --> 0:07:20.679 is Oh my god. I think it is the first 0:07:20.680 --> 0:07:24.320 conversation of the new year with our friend, our in 0:07:24.480 --> 0:07:29.840 house doctor, doctor Jonathan metsl That has you know, Jonathan, 0:07:29.880 --> 0:07:31.960 when I think about it in hindsight, I actually have 0:07:32.040 --> 0:07:34.880 no idea how many years we've been in conversation on 0:07:34.920 --> 0:07:39.920 this to go seventy five, But I have absolutely continued 0:07:39.960 --> 0:07:41.960 to be so grateful for the way that you show 0:07:42.040 --> 0:07:46.760 up for me and the WOKF audience, particularly as we 0:07:47.000 --> 0:07:54.120 are navigating just I mean unprecedented times, I miss precedented. 0:07:53.480 --> 0:07:54.120 Times, I. 0:07:56.040 --> 0:07:56.840 Miss it a lot. 0:07:56.920 --> 0:07:57.840 Give us some precedent. 0:07:59.160 --> 0:08:02.840 So I want to start off today, folks. Jonathan had 0:08:02.880 --> 0:08:08.720 sent me two really interesting pieces that I think kind 0:08:08.800 --> 0:08:13.200 of play into where a lot of people find themselves 0:08:13.240 --> 0:08:19.640 in terms of understanding mental illness, understanding emotional well being, 0:08:19.840 --> 0:08:25.200 and how these unprecedented times continue to affect us. And 0:08:25.240 --> 0:08:30.880 so Jonathan, first off, you had sent I want to 0:08:30.920 --> 0:08:35.160 start with the with the with the graphs. And there 0:08:35.400 --> 0:08:41.040 was a report that was done to who is more 0:08:41.200 --> 0:08:45.319 likely to be diagnosed with a mental illness And the 0:08:45.360 --> 0:08:47.880 person that is writing this is Ryan Burge, and it 0:08:48.120 --> 0:08:53.160 says liberals that consistently, that's consistently true across all kinds 0:08:53.160 --> 0:08:57.040 of measures, but when it comes to religion, Liberal Protestants 0:08:57.120 --> 0:09:00.760 and Catholics are less likely to be diagnosed an atheists 0:09:00.760 --> 0:09:07.360 and agnostics. And so he runs through what we're talking 0:09:07.400 --> 0:09:10.959 about when we're talking about mental illness. For this particular study, 0:09:10.960 --> 0:09:17.120 they're talking about anxiety, depression, and loneliness in in that way. 0:09:17.200 --> 0:09:21.240 So talk to us about this report and why you 0:09:21.280 --> 0:09:25.240 think that it's important that we understand kind of the 0:09:25.440 --> 0:09:28.560 context around it and how it's being measured. 0:09:30.160 --> 0:09:36.439 Well, First, happy New Year, everybody, and I want to first, 0:09:38.160 --> 0:09:40.840 you know, hopefully before we start talking about depressing stuff again. 0:09:42.280 --> 0:09:43.920 I hope that everybody got a little bit of a 0:09:43.920 --> 0:09:48.160 break over the over the holiday. And also just put 0:09:48.200 --> 0:09:50.080 in a quick plug which we can do a lot now, 0:09:50.120 --> 0:09:52.559 which is that you and I are going to be live. 0:09:52.920 --> 0:09:56.160 We're taking our show on the road, or like on 0:09:56.200 --> 0:09:59.560 our road. So we're going to be in Brooklyn doing 0:09:59.559 --> 0:10:01.840 my book lunch the first week of February, so we 0:10:01.880 --> 0:10:04.320 can talk more about that and all this stuff. But 0:10:04.400 --> 0:10:07.520 it's an interesting time for me, right because I have 0:10:07.559 --> 0:10:10.840 two books coming out. I've got the book about mass 0:10:10.880 --> 0:10:15.080 shootings and the ways our country normalizes mass shootings, and 0:10:15.080 --> 0:10:17.400 that's really a book about mental illness, right. That book 0:10:17.720 --> 0:10:21.560 is a story of how a naked white man who 0:10:21.640 --> 0:10:26.960 was really psychotic broke into a waffle house and killed 0:10:27.520 --> 0:10:30.320 four young adults of color and injured for more. And 0:10:30.360 --> 0:10:32.640 that's really a book about, you know, how do we 0:10:32.720 --> 0:10:35.760 define sanity and safety in the context of a country 0:10:36.120 --> 0:10:40.440 that is armed to the teeth basically. And then also 0:10:40.559 --> 0:10:42.360 I have a new version of Dying of Whiteness coming 0:10:42.400 --> 0:10:46.960 out February fourth that looks at my argument from twenty 0:10:47.040 --> 0:10:52.920 nineteen twenty twenty, which looked at how health policies that 0:10:52.960 --> 0:10:57.640 were rejected by white America were killing white Americans at 0:10:57.679 --> 0:11:01.720 a greater rate. You rejecting the Affordable Care Act, doing 0:11:01.760 --> 0:11:04.680 all these pro gun stuff, all these things. And so 0:11:04.800 --> 0:11:07.400 it's really interesting for me because in light of these 0:11:07.440 --> 0:11:10.559 two books really coming out that are about whiteness, I've 0:11:10.559 --> 0:11:14.160 been tracking a lot of articles that really complicate my argument, 0:11:14.200 --> 0:11:18.160 particularly my Dying of Whiteness art art argument, which basically 0:11:18.240 --> 0:11:23.640 say that maybe before the pandemic or twenty nineteen or 0:11:24.200 --> 0:11:28.520 twenty ten to twenty something or other, there really was 0:11:28.600 --> 0:11:32.880 a clear correlation between conservative politics and negative health outcomes, 0:11:33.480 --> 0:11:40.359 but now we're seeing those issues creep into liberal populations 0:11:40.400 --> 0:11:43.240 as well, or maybe we're just doing research differently that 0:11:43.320 --> 0:11:45.680 ask the same question of the question, is is it 0:11:45.720 --> 0:11:48.040 the research or is it really happening? And so there 0:11:48.040 --> 0:11:50.320 were two articles that have been on my mind, and 0:11:50.360 --> 0:11:52.360 this is a long preamble to get to your question, 0:11:53.080 --> 0:11:54.800 but the one that we'll talk about in a minute. 0:11:54.800 --> 0:11:58.240 Here was an article in the Economist that showed how 0:11:58.360 --> 0:12:01.960 deaths of despair is not just a metric for poor 0:12:02.000 --> 0:12:05.760 white people anymore. Actually, if you look at different pathogens, 0:12:06.440 --> 0:12:09.880 that's happening across multiple populations. But the one that you're 0:12:09.880 --> 0:12:12.000 talking about really caught my eye because the header, of 0:12:12.040 --> 0:12:16.640 course was does liberalism lead to mental illness? Basically? 0:12:18.080 --> 0:12:20.000 And we and we know. I mean the reason why 0:12:20.200 --> 0:12:25.160 I laugh, right is because we've heard that refrain from 0:12:25.880 --> 0:12:29.520 the Maga supremis where they're you know, they they say 0:12:29.600 --> 0:12:33.199 all types of things about liberals and liberal brain disease 0:12:33.280 --> 0:12:35.840 and woke brain disease and blah blah blah. And so 0:12:35.920 --> 0:12:37.720 when you sent it to me, initially I thought it 0:12:37.800 --> 0:12:38.360 was a joke. 0:12:40.040 --> 0:12:42.600 It was like, oh damn, there's some data here, here's 0:12:42.640 --> 0:12:45.440 some data, and what's really interesting about it. So I 0:12:45.440 --> 0:12:47.560 first let me just say, as a caveat, I would 0:12:47.559 --> 0:12:50.120 take this research as a grain of salt, because it's done. 0:12:50.400 --> 0:12:53.480 It was published by a religious outlet that has a 0:12:53.600 --> 0:12:57.200 vested interest in telling people, yeah to go to for 0:12:57.200 --> 0:12:59.760 their mental health. But that thing said it did kind 0:12:59.800 --> 0:13:03.360 of feel right. I Mean, the basic argument was that liberals, 0:13:04.000 --> 0:13:07.679 particularly liberals who identify as atheist or agnostic and are 0:13:07.760 --> 0:13:11.080 non church going. So that's the big you know, red 0:13:11.120 --> 0:13:13.800 flag or about the research right there. But it said 0:13:13.800 --> 0:13:18.080 that basically, if you're socially unconnected, you have a higher 0:13:18.200 --> 0:13:23.080 chance of getting a diagnosed with anxiety or depression or 0:13:23.120 --> 0:13:26.600 other kind of loneliness disorders. Now, of course, you could 0:13:26.880 --> 0:13:29.720 poke holes in this until the sun goes down. You know, 0:13:30.080 --> 0:13:33.160 liberals are probably more likely to go to psychiatrists. If 0:13:33.160 --> 0:13:36.440 you're atheist or agnostic, you're probably more likely to go 0:13:36.480 --> 0:13:39.439 to a mental health practitioner than go to a confession 0:13:39.840 --> 0:13:44.280 and things like that. But it did seem like something 0:13:44.280 --> 0:13:47.600 that we used to I guess when I read the study, 0:13:47.640 --> 0:13:51.280 I thought about the research that depression and heart attacks 0:13:51.280 --> 0:13:55.720 are higher if your sports team loses. You know that basically, 0:13:55.800 --> 0:13:57.920 if you feel like you're on the losing side or 0:13:57.920 --> 0:14:00.840 there's no momentum, there's no community built thing around this, 0:14:02.240 --> 0:14:05.000 that people feel isolated, particularly when they don't have a 0:14:05.040 --> 0:14:07.520 fallback community. And I do think that there's a sense 0:14:07.600 --> 0:14:10.760 of the world spinning away from us right now as 0:14:10.800 --> 0:14:16.400 liberals that's not tied to like imagine if you don't believe, 0:14:16.800 --> 0:14:18.400 or you don't go to church, or you know, you're 0:14:18.400 --> 0:14:21.760 an atheist or something. Imagine like being a democrat in 0:14:21.800 --> 0:14:24.320 the time of Obama, for example, there was a massive 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:28.160 social movement, you know, believe and hope and all these 0:14:28.200 --> 0:14:30.720 kind of things. You were part of some bigger social movement. 0:14:32.320 --> 0:14:34.440 And I don't know do liberals or democrats have that 0:14:34.520 --> 0:14:37.440 right now. I don't think fighting the end of democracy 0:14:38.000 --> 0:14:42.880 is like an uplifting movement in that way. And certainly 0:14:42.920 --> 0:14:44.720 there is just a lot more depressing stuff, as you 0:14:44.760 --> 0:14:47.960 and I talk about every week. And so the interesting 0:14:48.000 --> 0:14:50.840 thing was it was kind of making this argument which 0:14:50.880 --> 0:14:53.600 I'm curious, I'm curious about your thoughts about it, but 0:14:53.680 --> 0:14:56.960 it basically said, even when you control for the fact 0:14:57.000 --> 0:15:00.800 of who goes to psychiatrists more or less, us that 0:15:01.000 --> 0:15:10.320 liberals are more likely to have mental illnesses link to loneliness. 0:15:10.360 --> 0:15:14.440 In all honesty, we started to get into a greater 0:15:14.560 --> 0:15:19.640 conversation about loneliness and the effects of loneliness in COVID, right, 0:15:20.640 --> 0:15:24.400 you know, and there being a lot of research that 0:15:24.640 --> 0:15:27.680 was done and just you know, our own anecdotal research, 0:15:27.840 --> 0:15:32.560 like humans are pack animals, we are communal animals, and 0:15:32.640 --> 0:15:36.200 so when we are left in isolation, obviously you're going 0:15:36.240 --> 0:15:40.960 to see a deterioration that happens in your mental health 0:15:41.520 --> 0:15:45.280 and in connectivity. And then after right quote unquote, after 0:15:45.360 --> 0:15:48.400 even though, folks, I just learned the other day that 0:15:48.440 --> 0:15:50.640 a thousand people a week are still dying of COVID, 0:15:50.680 --> 0:15:55.000 but we don't talk about it. Nonetheless, but after we 0:15:55.120 --> 0:15:59.520 came out of isolation, re engaging with one another was 0:15:59.600 --> 0:16:03.360 also really difficult thing to do. So I mean to me, 0:16:04.560 --> 0:16:08.120 if you are involved in any type of regular community 0:16:08.160 --> 0:16:11.880 based activity, whether that be through a religious institution, through 0:16:11.920 --> 0:16:15.480 a sports team, you know, through a writing group or 0:16:16.040 --> 0:16:19.480 dancing or what have you, like, that is going to 0:16:19.600 --> 0:16:24.520 be fundamentally better for you than to remain in isolation 0:16:25.000 --> 0:16:28.400 all day every day, particularly when you know a lot 0:16:28.440 --> 0:16:34.480 of people still like myself, work from home, right and 0:16:34.560 --> 0:16:37.720 so you know, while I communicate with people all day 0:16:37.800 --> 0:16:41.520 long and talk NonStop, it isn't like I'm going into 0:16:41.720 --> 0:16:44.920 a studio every single day and connecting with people in 0:16:44.960 --> 0:16:50.040 real life. So taking those extra steps are really important. 0:16:50.400 --> 0:16:52.920 But Jonathan, the other the other piece that you had 0:16:52.960 --> 0:16:57.400 sent me is one that I that I also found 0:16:57.480 --> 0:17:00.200 really troubling, which was the one that was in the 0:17:00.240 --> 0:17:05.760 economists the depths of despair narrative is out of date. 0:17:06.200 --> 0:17:09.560 Can you give us a kind of like fifty thousand 0:17:09.600 --> 0:17:15.800 foot view on again, this kind of connecting to mental illness, 0:17:16.160 --> 0:17:21.600 this rise that we're seeing, and why this should be 0:17:21.640 --> 0:17:22.240 on our radar. 0:17:23.400 --> 0:17:28.560 Sure. Well, So there were two very esteemed economists who 0:17:28.600 --> 0:17:34.840 were coupled who had a argument basically that tracked where 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:39.760 it was really an unprecedented it's really unprecedented in industrialized 0:17:39.800 --> 0:17:43.920 countries to see a fall in lifespan among people who 0:17:43.920 --> 0:17:47.680 are in the demographic majority in other words, white men 0:17:47.880 --> 0:17:50.040 a lot of times. And what they saw was the 0:17:50.080 --> 0:17:55.879 across rust Belt America, Red state America, white longevity, white 0:17:55.880 --> 0:17:59.880 lifespan was falling by two to four years in some instances, 0:18:00.960 --> 0:18:04.240 which is again unprecedented if you were like in the 0:18:04.280 --> 0:18:07.760 privileged quote unquote group. And so they looked in detail 0:18:07.800 --> 0:18:09.639 at that and it was a lot of stuff that 0:18:09.680 --> 0:18:11.600 I talk about in Dying of whiteness, you know, no 0:18:11.800 --> 0:18:14.959 access to healthcare, but it was also a lot of 0:18:15.040 --> 0:18:19.600 addiction fentanyl factors like that or you know, earlier versions 0:18:19.760 --> 0:18:24.639 at that time. And so the idea was basically, you know, 0:18:24.760 --> 0:18:30.320 their finding was white Americans are having a worse, worse 0:18:30.440 --> 0:18:33.760 drop in life expectancy than pretty much any other group. 0:18:34.040 --> 0:18:37.920 Other groups or more communal, They're less into guns, they're 0:18:38.000 --> 0:18:41.160 less addicted, all these kind of things. They had two 0:18:41.240 --> 0:18:43.879 versions of their book come out about Death to Despair 0:18:43.920 --> 0:18:47.280 and a number of articles, and it was the jumping 0:18:47.320 --> 0:18:49.040 up point for a lot of stuff, including for me. 0:18:49.080 --> 0:18:50.919 It was very useful in dying of whiteness, even though 0:18:50.960 --> 0:18:54.399 of course I tied it to the ideology the performativity 0:18:54.400 --> 0:18:57.240 of what it means to be white in America. But 0:18:57.320 --> 0:19:01.000 what we're seeing is economists are now al ying these 0:19:01.160 --> 0:19:05.439 same metrics to other groups, and we're now seeing falling 0:19:05.520 --> 0:19:09.800 lifespan among other groups as well. It's not just a 0:19:09.840 --> 0:19:14.600 white people disorder. So Black Americans are dying of overdose 0:19:14.760 --> 0:19:17.919 and gun violence and other factors in ways that are 0:19:17.960 --> 0:19:21.120 impacting longevity. And the article in the Economists, I think, 0:19:21.119 --> 0:19:24.720 did a really good job of talking about suicide in 0:19:24.840 --> 0:19:29.440 Native American communities, for example, which is really impacting longevity. 0:19:30.040 --> 0:19:33.639 And so trends that started as being a dying of 0:19:33.720 --> 0:19:37.800 whiteness kind of disorder now look like they're a dying 0:19:37.840 --> 0:19:40.320 of everybody kind of disorder. And to me, that's not 0:19:40.359 --> 0:19:45.120 really surprising, right because, as you said, we're not tracking COVID, 0:19:45.400 --> 0:19:48.960 and our health infrastructure is falling apart, and it's really 0:19:49.000 --> 0:19:52.400 spotty across the country, and we're not having the kind 0:19:52.400 --> 0:19:56.160 of unifying national programs that you would think in industrialized, 0:19:56.400 --> 0:20:00.400 advanced society would do, like national health care for example, 0:20:00.440 --> 0:20:02.560 and other things like that. And so in a way, 0:20:02.840 --> 0:20:06.200 what we're seeing is that those same factors and also addiction, 0:20:06.359 --> 0:20:09.359 right which has been a driving point of right wing 0:20:09.400 --> 0:20:13.080 talking point that I personally don't feel like, with no disrespect, 0:20:13.160 --> 0:20:15.480 liberals have done anywhere near a good enough job of 0:20:16.600 --> 0:20:19.520 addressing or refuting or rebutting. Now their hands are tied 0:20:19.560 --> 0:20:22.840 in many ways, but it gets tied into immigration and 0:20:22.840 --> 0:20:24.520 then we can't answer and things like that. But it 0:20:24.560 --> 0:20:28.159 really is having an effect on longevity. And so this 0:20:28.320 --> 0:20:30.800 question of dying of whiteness, you know, it kind of 0:20:30.800 --> 0:20:33.000 begs the question should I write another version of dying 0:20:33.000 --> 0:20:36.720 of whiteness? I don't want to called that dying of 0:20:36.720 --> 0:20:38.560 americanness in a way, which is what. 0:20:38.480 --> 0:20:41.640 We're seeing, you know, And I think that that is 0:20:42.280 --> 0:20:45.200 I mean, it's so troubling and so deep. First of all, 0:20:45.520 --> 0:20:49.040 you know, again going back to COVID, that we learned 0:20:49.160 --> 0:20:54.919 that our life expectancy fell by three years collectively. I 0:20:54.960 --> 0:20:58.080 think back down to what seventy three years old. But 0:20:58.200 --> 0:21:02.359 when you are when you were basing that on various 0:21:02.359 --> 0:21:06.400 demographics and various groups, the numbers, just like equal pay, 0:21:06.920 --> 0:21:09.679 vary across the board. But I think that what is 0:21:09.760 --> 0:21:14.120 startling is that to your point, for a highly quote 0:21:14.160 --> 0:21:18.080 unquote one of the wealthiest nations and industrialized nations, a 0:21:18.240 --> 0:21:22.440 democratic nation, for us not to have the healthcare system 0:21:22.520 --> 0:21:26.600 that is preventative right for us to for for people. 0:21:26.840 --> 0:21:29.359 I mean, now you have women that are basically waiting 0:21:29.400 --> 0:21:32.600 in parking lots to die, you know, in order before 0:21:32.640 --> 0:21:35.720 they get any type of care. You're you know, doctors 0:21:35.760 --> 0:21:39.000 are giving you more medication because that, you know, feeds 0:21:39.040 --> 0:21:41.760 into their bottom line as opposed to telling you, you know, 0:21:42.040 --> 0:21:46.679 to get outside, maybe eat some plants and like, you know, 0:21:47.080 --> 0:21:49.600 change your lifestyle. Well, that doesn't help the part of 0:21:49.720 --> 0:21:55.400 sumical pharmaceutical industry. And so you know what I see, Jonathan, 0:21:55.600 --> 0:21:59.040 which is very scary. The movie that I bring up 0:21:59.080 --> 0:22:05.000 all the time, Elysium, terrible movie. Matt Damon, Jodie Foster, 0:22:05.560 --> 0:22:09.359 you know, but all of the healthy, happy, you know, 0:22:09.680 --> 0:22:14.280 fit people are in this place called Elysium, and Earth 0:22:14.320 --> 0:22:21.080 has turned into a disease ridden, you know, toxic, horrible environment. 0:22:21.200 --> 0:22:25.280 Stop me if it sounds like a documentary, and you 0:22:25.280 --> 0:22:28.520 know what you are going to see, I think is 0:22:28.560 --> 0:22:32.880 an incredible increase in divide and it's going to look 0:22:33.000 --> 0:22:35.400 like help. So when you see people that are fit, 0:22:35.520 --> 0:22:38.159 that are well rested, right, it is going to be 0:22:38.240 --> 0:22:41.720 the privileged class. And I'm like, how do you combat 0:22:41.800 --> 0:22:44.240 that inside of a system that doesn't want to give 0:22:44.280 --> 0:22:48.760 health care to everybody? Because the politicians are racist, right, 0:22:48.840 --> 0:22:51.480 and they don't want everyone to have care. They want 0:22:51.520 --> 0:22:52.720 white people to have care. 0:22:53.359 --> 0:22:55.959 Well, I think that's part of it, absolutely, But I mean, 0:22:56.000 --> 0:22:59.399 how many people got a COVID booster for example, COVID 0:22:59.400 --> 0:23:02.439 boosters are the COVID booster. I have to say they 0:23:02.520 --> 0:23:04.760 hit a home run with this booster. I mean, the 0:23:04.880 --> 0:23:09.160 numbers on this COVID booster are incredible, but they couldn't 0:23:09.160 --> 0:23:12.239 get anybody to get the COVID booster. Nobody got it. 0:23:13.240 --> 0:23:16.440 And now there are states like Florida that even though 0:23:16.480 --> 0:23:18.639 the data the data either there's another study this morning, 0:23:18.640 --> 0:23:20.760 the data is a slam dunk on the COVID booster 0:23:20.840 --> 0:23:25.840 in terms of safety, blocking long COVID, you know, not 0:23:26.000 --> 0:23:29.359 having you know, seventy two percent reduction in hospitalization, all 0:23:29.400 --> 0:23:33.800 these factors. But it's also it's not it's for me. 0:23:33.920 --> 0:23:35.440 I have to say, I agree with you, of course 0:23:35.480 --> 0:23:39.159 about socioeconomic class, but it's also an information and trust 0:23:39.200 --> 0:23:44.360 issue because they're just the disinformation that's out there, the 0:23:44.359 --> 0:23:47.879 trust in science, the defunding of science. I mean, again, 0:23:48.040 --> 0:23:52.199 we have a vaccine that's that's effective, honestly effective, and 0:23:52.280 --> 0:23:55.480 an entire state of Florida that is trying to block 0:23:55.560 --> 0:23:58.520 the entire vaccine in that state. And so it's just 0:23:58.560 --> 0:24:03.480 a weird moment that is tied to socioeconomics. But I 0:24:03.520 --> 0:24:07.359 have to say, I think we're it's obviously politics, ideology, 0:24:07.400 --> 0:24:09.960 all the things we've been talking about in terms of 0:24:11.160 --> 0:24:14.040 the despair of American ness and things like that. Just 0:24:14.119 --> 0:24:16.360 I think that a class analysis is part of this. 0:24:17.000 --> 0:24:19.800 But I also think our country is ripping apart ideologically, 0:24:19.840 --> 0:24:22.480 and it's impossible to have any kind of coherent narrative, 0:24:22.920 --> 0:24:25.760 even if that narrative is like add four years to 0:24:25.800 --> 0:24:26.520 your life. 0:24:27.440 --> 0:24:30.720 You know, And that's the thing I just again, yes, 0:24:30.840 --> 0:24:33.560 I believe that there is an information vacuum. I think 0:24:33.560 --> 0:24:35.280 that there is a trust level, and I think that 0:24:35.320 --> 0:24:37.840 all of these things were strategic and have been done 0:24:37.880 --> 0:24:40.840 to continually rip this country apart, to make room for 0:24:41.160 --> 0:24:44.720 a big strong man right, to make room for authoritarianism. 0:24:44.760 --> 0:24:47.399 Because if all of the systems fail and then somebody 0:24:47.440 --> 0:24:49.760 comes in and says, oh, I alone can fix this, 0:24:50.000 --> 0:24:52.080 and you're in a place of desperation, well guess what 0:24:52.160 --> 0:24:54.119 you're going to do. You're going to drink the sand 0:24:54.160 --> 0:24:59.440 and think that it's water. All I have to say 0:24:59.520 --> 0:25:03.920 to Peep is that you have to take your health 0:25:04.000 --> 0:25:07.680 and wellness all across the board into your own hands, 0:25:08.160 --> 0:25:11.919 because there are full systems in place to try and 0:25:12.000 --> 0:25:15.920 make sure that you don't access health care. And even 0:25:15.960 --> 0:25:19.679 though that there are the Biden administration tells people to 0:25:19.680 --> 0:25:23.040 get their shots, tells people to get their boosters. We 0:25:23.160 --> 0:25:27.840 know that medicine and medical information and public health have 0:25:27.920 --> 0:25:31.879 been weaponized. So Jonathan, last question for you, which is, 0:25:32.200 --> 0:25:34.560 you know, what do you want people to take away 0:25:35.720 --> 0:25:40.240 from the from from kind of this narrative, this alarm 0:25:40.640 --> 0:25:43.760 around despair and americanism. 0:25:44.320 --> 0:25:47.840 We have an opportunity now as Democrats to reverse all 0:25:47.880 --> 0:25:50.720 of these narratives, right I mean, there's really two choices, 0:25:50.760 --> 0:25:53.920 as you've been saying, I think, very articulately on media 0:25:54.040 --> 0:25:57.240 NonStop for the past couple of weeks. We can either 0:25:57.480 --> 0:26:02.439 join in a cross cut movement to save democracy that 0:26:02.600 --> 0:26:06.560 also has tons of health benefits, joining in a broader 0:26:06.600 --> 0:26:10.600 coalition reaching across divides that you didn't think were possible, 0:26:11.440 --> 0:26:16.280 being activists, being hopeful and advocating for things like better 0:26:16.320 --> 0:26:21.399 healthcare and more universal gun safety and other factors like that. 0:26:21.480 --> 0:26:25.840 So are the Democrats to going to create a big 0:26:25.920 --> 0:26:27.880 tent where people feel like they're all under the tent? 0:26:28.000 --> 0:26:31.560 Which is I don't know, it seems almost laughably impossible 0:26:31.680 --> 0:26:36.520 right now, but that you know, right now, you've got 0:26:37.880 --> 0:26:44.480 about ten months really to create. You have autonomy for 0:26:44.520 --> 0:26:49.080 the next ten months to create that movement to you know, 0:26:49.240 --> 0:26:54.639 as they said in my childhood Kumbaya or that decision 0:26:54.680 --> 0:26:56.479 is going to be made for you and it's going 0:26:56.560 --> 0:27:00.200 to be leading to a lot more despair. And there's 0:27:00.200 --> 0:27:03.199 a pretty clear choice of a big tent right now. 0:27:03.840 --> 0:27:06.600 So I don't I know that it's almost funny hearing 0:27:06.640 --> 0:27:08.120 the words come out of my mouth because it feels 0:27:08.119 --> 0:27:10.240 so impossible. But I would just say, we have a 0:27:10.320 --> 0:27:12.280 choice right now, which is are we going to build 0:27:12.520 --> 0:27:17.439 alliances that improve these metrics or are we going to 0:27:17.440 --> 0:27:19.760 go the other direction? And so I realize I'm just 0:27:20.680 --> 0:27:23.359 riffing off of your talking point, but it has to 0:27:23.359 --> 0:27:24.120