WEBVTT - What We've Become LIVE 0:00:11.760 --> 0:00:14.560 Good morning, peeps, and welcome to woke F Daily with 0:00:14.680 --> 0:00:19.000 Me your Girl, Danielle Moody recording from the home bunker, Folks, 0:00:19.760 --> 0:00:26.040 I am super excited that today's episode we've been promoting 0:00:26.640 --> 0:00:30.040 for the last month, and I'm excited that it is 0:00:30.080 --> 0:00:34.839 finally here. Earlier this week, I had the great pleasure 0:00:34.920 --> 0:00:39.760 and honor of interviewing our friend, our in house doctor, 0:00:39.840 --> 0:00:44.320 doctor Jonathan Metzel at the launch of his book tour 0:00:45.040 --> 0:00:50.160 in New York at green Light Bookstore in Brooklyn, and 0:00:50.479 --> 0:00:53.360 it was amazing. First of all, I want to shout 0:00:53.400 --> 0:01:00.960 out the hardcore, wonderful WOKF fans that came out to 0:01:01.000 --> 0:01:05.560 support myself and to support Jonathan and his book. It 0:01:05.640 --> 0:01:11.520 was so great to like meet real people in person. 0:01:12.040 --> 0:01:16.880 I said to a couple of people that I oftentimes 0:01:17.319 --> 0:01:21.240 feel like I'm just like recording into an abyss right 0:01:21.440 --> 0:01:25.440 like I work from home, I record with guests, you know, 0:01:25.800 --> 0:01:32.440 via remote And so to know that the show is 0:01:32.560 --> 0:01:37.280 impacting people, that it is helping people through dark times, 0:01:37.319 --> 0:01:41.440 that folks not only listen to WOKF but apparently do 0:01:41.520 --> 0:01:45.320 an overdose of me and listen to all three pods 0:01:45.640 --> 0:01:49.360 is just like I can't express to you all how 0:01:49.440 --> 0:01:51.920 much that means to me. And to be able to 0:01:52.040 --> 0:01:56.800 put you know, comment section names to faces was really 0:01:56.840 --> 0:02:01.000 beautiful and really truly truly meaning, and so I just 0:02:01.120 --> 0:02:04.520 wanted to thank those folks that came from near and 0:02:04.640 --> 0:02:09.639 far places like Yonkers. Shout out also to Holly who 0:02:09.680 --> 0:02:14.200 asked me, who got permission from Jonathan for me to 0:02:14.280 --> 0:02:18.280 be able to sign Jonathan's book next to Jonathan's signature, 0:02:18.800 --> 0:02:22.360 which was really a treat for me as well. So 0:02:22.440 --> 0:02:25.200 I just wanted to say that. And so this episode 0:02:25.240 --> 0:02:29.839 that you're going to be listening to today was recorded 0:02:30.000 --> 0:02:35.000 at green Light Bookstore with a live audience, which was 0:02:35.440 --> 0:02:40.280 just again such an amazing treat. I also encourage folks, 0:02:40.440 --> 0:02:45.160 if you are what is the term bibliophile like I am, 0:02:45.200 --> 0:02:47.480 and you are drowning in books, to make sure that 0:02:47.520 --> 0:02:51.400 you support independent bookstores and booksellers if in when you can, 0:02:52.120 --> 0:02:55.200 because they're really important, right and they get gobbled up 0:02:55.280 --> 0:03:00.480 by the Amazon's, you know, and the big corporations. So 0:03:00.960 --> 0:03:05.320 this conversation you will hear is on our friend, doctor 0:03:05.400 --> 0:03:09.680 Jonathan Metzel's new book, What We've Become, and it is 0:03:09.800 --> 0:03:12.639 out now. So I tell folks to go and pick 0:03:12.680 --> 0:03:15.480 it up, gift it to folks, share it with folks, 0:03:15.520 --> 0:03:18.240 start a book club, do all of those things to 0:03:18.320 --> 0:03:22.320 help us support Jonathan. And you will also hear our 0:03:22.360 --> 0:03:26.639 conversation as well as questions that were posed from the audience. 0:03:26.680 --> 0:03:30.760 So I hope that you guys enjoy this special episode 0:03:31.080 --> 0:03:45.160 of WOKF. Like Jonathan said, we've been in conversation for 0:03:45.200 --> 0:03:48.440 the last four years, right, which is hard to believe 0:03:48.600 --> 0:03:50.560 that you can speak to somebody every week and have 0:03:50.600 --> 0:03:54.560 not seen them in person in four years. But one 0:03:54.600 --> 0:03:57.480 of the things that I have appreciated about Jonathan and 0:03:57.520 --> 0:03:59.640 the conversations that we've been able to have on wok 0:03:59.840 --> 0:04:03.720 F is how honesty is about the fact that look, 0:04:04.200 --> 0:04:07.720 and this is going to shock everyone. I don't think 0:04:07.760 --> 0:04:10.920 we're getting it right. So maybe we should pivot and 0:04:10.960 --> 0:04:14.320 not double and triple down, which is what our politicians 0:04:14.320 --> 0:04:17.960 are doing right now. Maybe he's saying we're looking at 0:04:17.960 --> 0:04:21.279 public health and I was one of those people who 0:04:21.360 --> 0:04:24.040 said this is a public health crisis. I'm not a doctor, 0:04:24.200 --> 0:04:26.520 but I could see it. I'm like, you're looking. When 0:04:26.520 --> 0:04:29.480 you look and you say that the number one thing 0:04:29.720 --> 0:04:32.920 that is killing kids is not cancer, it is not 0:04:33.400 --> 0:04:36.280 you know, blood disease, it's not diving, it's not heart attacks, 0:04:36.600 --> 0:04:40.040 it's guns, right, And so when you think about that, 0:04:40.080 --> 0:04:43.880 you would say that any normal quote unquote civilized society 0:04:44.160 --> 0:04:47.520 wouldn't want their kids turned into Swiss cheese on a 0:04:47.560 --> 0:04:50.440 regular basis and that be a normal part of their lives. 0:04:50.440 --> 0:04:52.120 So we said, well, we need to pull out the 0:04:52.160 --> 0:04:54.360 heart strengths. And that's what I think that the public 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:58.880 health epidemic started out as. But the question that I 0:04:58.960 --> 0:05:02.719 have for you to start than is why don't you 0:05:02.839 --> 0:05:07.480 think that the pulling at the heartstrings narrative that democrats 0:05:07.520 --> 0:05:10.080 have been trying to do and doctors have been trying 0:05:10.080 --> 0:05:13.279 to do has taken hold in the way that we 0:05:13.360 --> 0:05:14.200 thought that it would. 0:05:15.279 --> 0:05:18.040 I think it's important to recognize what those areas are, 0:05:18.200 --> 0:05:20.240 which I think the issue is we kind of forget. 0:05:20.279 --> 0:05:24.040 So the very short answer is, we have won the 0:05:24.040 --> 0:05:26.279 war of popular opinion. We have won the moral war, 0:05:26.320 --> 0:05:28.320 we have won the health for we haven't won the 0:05:28.400 --> 0:05:31.680 power war. And the power war is ultimately what's going 0:05:31.760 --> 0:05:33.719 to dictate a lot of this stuff. And so the 0:05:33.800 --> 0:05:36.159 short answer is, oh the heck, I'll give you the 0:05:36.200 --> 0:05:39.680 long answer. The long answer is that there was a 0:05:39.720 --> 0:05:42.440 playbook that was in place in the nineteen nineties when 0:05:42.440 --> 0:05:44.800 all of this happened, and the playbook was what does 0:05:44.839 --> 0:05:49.200 public health do. Public health is really good at getting 0:05:51.360 --> 0:05:56.840 health data on the injuries and deaths caused by commercial products. 0:05:57.480 --> 0:06:01.919 It's good at making policies that can circumvent those negative 0:06:01.920 --> 0:06:05.680 health negative health effects. And then it's good at kind 0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:09.120 of bringing corporations and you know, industries to their knees 0:06:09.920 --> 0:06:14.000 by liability lawsuits. Now, if that sounds familiar, that worked 0:06:14.000 --> 0:06:17.719 for cigarettes, that worked for asbestos, that worked for cars 0:06:17.720 --> 0:06:20.000 and seat belts. So that was the playbook we tried, 0:06:20.040 --> 0:06:23.560 and in the nineties it made absolute sense. We're going 0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:25.760 to do this thing. We're going to do this same 0:06:25.800 --> 0:06:30.440 thing for guns, because guns, you know, consumer product killing people, 0:06:30.560 --> 0:06:33.880 industry right for you know, those kind of attacks. But 0:06:33.920 --> 0:06:38.719 the problem was guns are totally different cultural and social 0:06:38.720 --> 0:06:43.039 and political symbols. Number one, they are imbued with the 0:06:43.120 --> 0:06:45.720 history of race and privilege in this country. They are 0:06:45.720 --> 0:06:49.520 also imbued with regionalism. Right, Southern guns means something different 0:06:49.520 --> 0:06:52.400 from northern guns. So part number one is we thought 0:06:52.400 --> 0:06:55.880 a particular playbook was going to work, and that's kind 0:06:55.880 --> 0:06:57.360 of what I show in the nineties, we thought, oh, 0:06:57.360 --> 0:07:01.320 we're just going to cigarette these guys into mission. Now. 0:07:01.360 --> 0:07:05.400 The problem with that is gun makers are protected from liability, 0:07:06.080 --> 0:07:10.720 and they're also tied into a particular history of power 0:07:10.760 --> 0:07:13.360 and privilege that people aren't going to give up. And 0:07:13.400 --> 0:07:16.360 so while everybody all over the country has an ant 0:07:16.400 --> 0:07:19.080 that got lung cancer from smoking, or doesn't like to 0:07:19.120 --> 0:07:21.760 go into a to a restaurant and he smells second 0:07:21.760 --> 0:07:24.240 at simok, or know somebody who got into a car wreck, 0:07:24.960 --> 0:07:28.120 that wasn't true for guns, right, guns that you had 0:07:28.160 --> 0:07:31.480 conservative gun owners in the South, and the people who 0:07:31.480 --> 0:07:36.520 were making the policies were people like liberals, very often 0:07:36.520 --> 0:07:40.640 liberals from blue states, because only blue state universities could 0:07:40.720 --> 0:07:45.600 afford because gun research wasn't very profitable, so only the 0:07:45.640 --> 0:07:49.760 Harvard UCLA, Johns Hopkins other places. So it was a 0:07:49.760 --> 0:07:53.080 lot of liberals making policy that was then going to 0:07:53.120 --> 0:07:57.280 be imposed on Southern, conservative white people. And so that's 0:07:57.320 --> 0:08:00.160 different cigarettes, where everybody has the same relationship to it. 0:08:00.560 --> 0:08:02.600 And so what I show in the book is that 0:08:02.760 --> 0:08:05.920 was a structural imbalance that just made it way too 0:08:05.960 --> 0:08:09.400 easy for the NA to be like, these liberals are 0:08:09.480 --> 0:08:11.960 coming in and they say what we're doing is common sense. 0:08:11.960 --> 0:08:14.520 They're telling you you have no common sense, and they're 0:08:14.560 --> 0:08:16.720 just like, in a way, we made it too easy 0:08:16.720 --> 0:08:20.440 for them by using this very paternal model that was 0:08:20.520 --> 0:08:25.040 also incredibly aligned with red state blue state politics. 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:27.520 I was going to say, because as you're explaining it, 0:08:27.520 --> 0:08:31.040 it sounds where it sounds about where we are in 0:08:31.160 --> 0:08:36.920 terms of going after university professors, going after these educated 0:08:36.960 --> 0:08:40.240 groups of people, and then looking down on us in 0:08:40.280 --> 0:08:43.560 the South and telling us what we should do with 0:08:43.679 --> 0:08:45.800 our guns, even though they're telling us what we should 0:08:45.800 --> 0:08:46.880 do with our bodies. 0:08:46.559 --> 0:08:47.960 And they're telling us what to do with our guns. 0:08:48.000 --> 0:08:49.680 I mean, it came full circle right the Bruin case. 0:08:49.920 --> 0:08:53.120 And so when you see when you're making the case 0:08:53.200 --> 0:08:55.480 now in this book, and you're also making the case 0:08:55.880 --> 0:08:58.120 in Time, which if you all did not read the 0:08:58.160 --> 0:09:00.840 Time article, it's up at Time dot com today, the 0:09:00.920 --> 0:09:06.040 article that Jonathan wrote. When you're making the case and saying, look, 0:09:06.160 --> 0:09:10.319 I'm not saying that public health is wrong. I'm saying 0:09:10.360 --> 0:09:16.160 that our opposition is actually going after power. Donald Trump, 0:09:16.880 --> 0:09:19.599 with the help of Mitch McConnell during the Trump administration, 0:09:20.640 --> 0:09:25.200 elected more federal judges than any other first term president 0:09:25.320 --> 0:09:29.520 at that time, and that was purposeful. It was purposeful 0:09:29.559 --> 0:09:32.040 for Roe, and it's purposeful for guns and all of 0:09:32.080 --> 0:09:34.000 the other things that they want to do. When you're 0:09:34.120 --> 0:09:37.320 telling people to make the shift between public health, the 0:09:37.440 --> 0:09:41.719 moral we're good and power, what are you seeing as 0:09:41.760 --> 0:09:44.479 the pushback to that shift? 0:09:45.320 --> 0:09:49.040 Imagine this, right, people really care about their guns in 0:09:49.080 --> 0:09:52.240 the South where I live part of the time when 0:09:52.240 --> 0:09:54.040 I'm not playing South over with these guys. 0:09:54.080 --> 0:09:54.160 And. 0:09:55.800 --> 0:10:01.560 So imagine that there's this discrepancy already, and one side 0:10:01.640 --> 0:10:04.920 is telling you and this is not everybody. I mean, 0:10:04.960 --> 0:10:07.920 gun owners are complicated, right, The biggest, the fastest growing 0:10:07.960 --> 0:10:11.520 group of gun owners are black women. Actually, like it's 0:10:11.559 --> 0:10:14.319 not like, it's not like this, but this was the core. 0:10:14.440 --> 0:10:16.720 This was the playbook, and there's more to the story. 0:10:17.920 --> 0:10:24.880 But imagine one political side is saying, I'll just summarize 0:10:24.920 --> 0:10:29.200 the Democrats message, we want we want communal safety, and 0:10:29.240 --> 0:10:30.560 how we're going to get that is we're going to 0:10:30.559 --> 0:10:33.439 have a federal government database and you have to enter 0:10:33.480 --> 0:10:36.440 your name into that federal government database every time you 0:10:36.480 --> 0:10:38.680 purchase a gun. And if somebody is looking like they're 0:10:38.760 --> 0:10:44.920 a little cuckoo, we are going to then empower the 0:10:44.920 --> 0:10:47.720 police to come to a welfare check on your family, 0:10:48.160 --> 0:10:51.160 and if the person has seemed to be odd, then 0:10:51.200 --> 0:10:52.840 you take them in front of a judge. So that's 0:10:52.880 --> 0:10:54.760 what we're saying when we say we want background checks 0:10:54.800 --> 0:10:58.840 and red flag laws, and we also say that is 0:10:58.920 --> 0:11:01.880 common sense. To me, again, it's common sense. I personally 0:11:02.120 --> 0:11:04.440 do not like guns at all. I really don't like guns, 0:11:05.160 --> 0:11:07.240 So I think that's great for me, and I believe 0:11:07.280 --> 0:11:10.400 in blah blah blah. But the other side, imagine you're 0:11:10.440 --> 0:11:12.760 like somebody in the South. The other side is saying 0:11:13.520 --> 0:11:16.040 your guns are your power, and I'm going to let 0:11:16.040 --> 0:11:17.400 you keep your guns, and I'm going to let you 0:11:17.520 --> 0:11:19.679 keep your power. In fact, there shouldn't be any regulations 0:11:19.679 --> 0:11:22.320 on you whatsoever. So one side is the Biden platform, 0:11:22.400 --> 0:11:25.120 the other side is the Trump platform. Which one do 0:11:25.120 --> 0:11:27.240 you think people are going to gravitate toward more? And 0:11:27.280 --> 0:11:29.280 so part of the reason is this is what I'm saying, 0:11:29.360 --> 0:11:31.080 is not a surprise. Right, We've been seeing this play 0:11:31.080 --> 0:11:34.480 out for a long time, except that there's a mass 0:11:34.480 --> 0:11:37.360 shooting and we rush in and say it's common sense, 0:11:37.400 --> 0:11:39.800 it's common sense, and we don't understand why half the 0:11:39.840 --> 0:11:42.200 country doesn't agree with us. And this is what I'm 0:11:42.240 --> 0:11:44.080 trying to explain, which is the half the country doesn't 0:11:44.080 --> 0:11:47.800 agree with us because what they hear is government regulation 0:11:48.559 --> 0:11:51.000 and you're going to put regulations on my power. And 0:11:51.040 --> 0:11:53.120 the other thing they hear is the bad guys have guns, 0:11:53.480 --> 0:11:56.400 so why shouldn't we. And that's another important part of 0:11:56.440 --> 0:11:58.600 the narrative because if you think about the things that 0:11:58.720 --> 0:12:00.880 gun I'm just going to say a gun gun control 0:12:00.920 --> 0:12:04.520 for shorthand, even though I don't really like that term, 0:12:05.040 --> 0:12:08.520 but gun control is background checks at point of sale purchase, 0:12:08.559 --> 0:12:10.560 when you buy a gun, that's when you background check, 0:12:11.880 --> 0:12:16.000 assault weapons ban, if you have to be registered, safety lucks. 0:12:16.120 --> 0:12:19.800 These are all things for legal gun owners, like registered gunowners. 0:12:20.040 --> 0:12:21.840 But what they say is that doesn't do anything for 0:12:21.920 --> 0:12:24.960 crime because the criminals have guns, so we want guns 0:12:25.040 --> 0:12:27.400 or something like that. So there's all these these reasons 0:12:27.440 --> 0:12:29.640 why I guess the point I'm trying to make is 0:12:30.400 --> 0:12:34.400 public health is not common sense. In where I live 0:12:34.720 --> 0:12:39.360 and people you know, when I'm here, it seems total 0:12:39.360 --> 0:12:40.960 common sense. But part of what you can hear what 0:12:41.000 --> 0:12:43.800 I'm saying is we have these moments of rupture, and 0:12:43.840 --> 0:12:47.679 sometimes the moments of rupture are after mass shootings, when 0:12:47.720 --> 0:12:50.000 it's like, oh my god, how come they cannot see that. 0:12:50.800 --> 0:12:54.400 Another time, for example, is in the pandemic. Right, yeah, yeah, 0:12:54.400 --> 0:12:57.760 the pandemic, public health comes in, But the gun debate 0:12:57.800 --> 0:13:00.000 had already That's another thing I should in the book. 0:13:00.200 --> 0:13:02.760 The gun debate had already set the stage for the pandemic, 0:13:03.400 --> 0:13:07.600 mistrust of government, regulation, public health, all those kinds of things. 0:13:07.640 --> 0:13:10.320 So the pandemic is a huge player in the book. 0:13:11.640 --> 0:13:13.520 And again this is not to say that I don't 0:13:13.559 --> 0:13:16.040 believe in gun laws. I do. But what I argue 0:13:16.040 --> 0:13:18.680 in the book is we had a strategy for health, 0:13:19.160 --> 0:13:21.840 but we needed in this debate, we needed a strategy 0:13:21.880 --> 0:13:24.760 for power. Right. We should have had our own federalist society, 0:13:24.760 --> 0:13:26.920 We should have had our list of own judges. We 0:13:27.000 --> 0:13:30.880 actually should have thought beyond health regulations to think about 0:13:31.320 --> 0:13:35.600 communal structural incentives, what I talk about in the book. 0:13:36.440 --> 0:13:39.600 So in this one case, the health and you know, 0:13:39.840 --> 0:13:43.400 maybe fifteen years ago, if we would have had liability 0:13:43.480 --> 0:13:45.120 for guns, they would have been a different thing. But 0:13:45.160 --> 0:13:48.320 that wasn't happening. They're protected by Congress. You can't sue 0:13:48.320 --> 0:13:51.600 a gun manufacturer for the way you if your blunder 0:13:51.679 --> 0:13:56.720 kills somebody, and so it's just it's a lot. But 0:13:56.840 --> 0:13:58.959 I think in a way, what I'm trying to explain 0:13:59.040 --> 0:14:01.320 is people wonder like, how do we get here? And 0:14:01.320 --> 0:14:03.160 that's part of what I think the story of the 0:14:03.280 --> 0:14:04.160 shooting shows. 0:14:04.320 --> 0:14:05.959 I think a part of the reason, the part of 0:14:06.000 --> 0:14:08.640 the way that we got here too, is also the 0:14:08.640 --> 0:14:11.400 assumption that people are better than they are. I think 0:14:11.440 --> 0:14:15.320 that the assumption was if you can explain to people 0:14:16.000 --> 0:14:19.480 that guns are hurting, that guns are hurting them, guns 0:14:19.520 --> 0:14:22.680 make your community unsafe. Do you want your kids learning 0:14:22.720 --> 0:14:25.040 how to army crawl across the floor, or do you 0:14:25.040 --> 0:14:27.760 want them to be able to concentrate on school and 0:14:27.800 --> 0:14:30.280 not worry that every single time a bell goes off 0:14:30.480 --> 0:14:33.640 that that that there is a mass shooter. We wanted 0:14:33.680 --> 0:14:36.680 to appeal, I think, to people's common sense in that way, 0:14:36.680 --> 0:14:39.400 but to their heartstrings. And at the end of the day, 0:14:39.880 --> 0:14:43.760 it was this idea that democrats, which they consistently fail at, 0:14:44.520 --> 0:14:48.480 which is power, which is saying no, it's the judges 0:14:48.680 --> 0:14:51.360 that make the policy. It's the judge, because the judges 0:14:51.360 --> 0:14:53.880 are the ones that are passing and saying, you know, 0:14:54.400 --> 0:14:57.920 we live in Tennessee. Your gun is your right and 0:14:58.360 --> 0:15:02.080 that's it. And for a country where you have a 0:15:02.120 --> 0:15:05.760 man like Trump, a white man that is feeding into 0:15:05.800 --> 0:15:09.440 this narrative that they're taking everything away from you. They've 0:15:09.440 --> 0:15:14.040 taken your jobs, they've taken your home right, it's all take, take, take, 0:15:14.080 --> 0:15:18.600 and now they want to take your gun. This conversation 0:15:18.720 --> 0:15:24.120 about power is inextricably tied to race. Is there a 0:15:24.160 --> 0:15:26.960 way for us to part and parcel it, like you 0:15:27.080 --> 0:15:30.640 offer solutions and ideas, But this is more so The 0:15:30.640 --> 0:15:33.800 book is about like a conversation switch, a narrative switch. 0:15:34.080 --> 0:15:38.920 And this is something that Democrats are desperately bad at, 0:15:39.360 --> 0:15:44.160 which is the narrative switch. But here you're saying, look, 0:15:45.120 --> 0:15:47.800 the conversation was never about public health. The conversation is 0:15:47.840 --> 0:15:52.560 about power. Donald Trump appeals to their need to hold 0:15:52.600 --> 0:15:55.680 on to power. What does Biden say to that? What 0:15:55.680 --> 0:15:58.560 do Democrats say to that? In nine months? 0:15:58.600 --> 0:16:03.240 Well, first again, I think in a true psycho psychiatry format, 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:07.120 I'll say the most important thing is understanding first how 0:16:07.160 --> 0:16:09.440 we got here, and so in a way, I just 0:16:09.480 --> 0:16:12.680 think there's so much confusion about how we got here, 0:16:13.040 --> 0:16:16.000 so understanding why we're in a particular and it's not 0:16:16.120 --> 0:16:17.760 like we're in a whole I mean, I want to 0:16:17.760 --> 0:16:20.880 be clear. Thirty years ago, there was no gun safety movement, 0:16:20.920 --> 0:16:23.600 there was no data. We built the whole field out 0:16:23.600 --> 0:16:29.680 of scratch against tremendous headwinds. Gun safety researchers went unfunded 0:16:29.720 --> 0:16:33.960 for a long period of time. Mothers gave their lives 0:16:34.000 --> 0:16:38.040 to this issue. So I'm not trying to say everything sucks. 0:16:38.240 --> 0:16:41.440 What I am trying to say is it's interesting if 0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:44.040 you talk to a lot of conservatives and liberals about 0:16:44.080 --> 0:16:47.720 this issue, which I've done for now over a decade, 0:16:47.880 --> 0:16:52.280 and liberals will say, you know, they will talk in 0:16:52.680 --> 0:16:55.200 moral terms, which is a moral issue. It is a 0:16:55.280 --> 0:16:59.600 very moral issue for a lot of people. But even 0:16:59.720 --> 0:17:03.800 like like I remember it was when I was interfering 0:17:03.800 --> 0:17:07.040 people for dying of whiteness, and it was like twenty 0:17:08.200 --> 0:17:11.440 something or other, like before anybody, and there was really 0:17:11.520 --> 0:17:14.359 sick guys I was interviewing and I'd be like, hey, 0:17:15.760 --> 0:17:18.000 do you want your own healthcare? And he's like, well, no, 0:17:18.040 --> 0:17:20.480 I don't want to get signed up because if I 0:17:20.560 --> 0:17:24.119 sign up for this and this program stays, my side 0:17:24.320 --> 0:17:26.600 will get addicted to this program and then we're going 0:17:26.640 --> 0:17:28.680 to lose, and the most important thing for me really 0:17:28.720 --> 0:17:32.920 isn't my own life. It's that we control the Supreme 0:17:32.920 --> 0:17:37.080 Court to overturn row and have the Second Amendment be nationalized. 0:17:37.119 --> 0:17:40.199 Like the people at the very bottom understood that the 0:17:40.200 --> 0:17:43.239 bigger project was control, and I mean that is like 0:17:43.520 --> 0:17:46.880 I mean, people in like low income housing communities, white 0:17:46.920 --> 0:17:50.119 men were telling me this. So top to bottom people, 0:17:50.200 --> 0:17:54.880 I think understand that what they're doing has real power implications. 0:17:54.880 --> 0:17:58.520 And that's why it makes sense that I mean, how many, 0:17:59.080 --> 0:18:01.760 I mean, maybe the one protest I can think about 0:18:01.960 --> 0:18:04.280 is the one remember when the governor of Virginia he 0:18:04.280 --> 0:18:07.520 got elected, Ralph whatever, his name was, the doctor Orton whatever, 0:18:07.800 --> 0:18:11.920 and he said we're going to do tight gun laws, 0:18:11.920 --> 0:18:13.679 and all these gun guys came out and they had 0:18:13.720 --> 0:18:16.639 a huge rally in the Virginia state Capitol or something 0:18:16.680 --> 0:18:21.000 like that. But largely Democrats are protesting. We all protested 0:18:21.000 --> 0:18:24.560 after my shootings, as we should have. But Republicans are 0:18:24.600 --> 0:18:27.560 like playing the power game. They are like yeah, and 0:18:27.640 --> 0:18:30.640 so for them it's about that, it's like using those marches, 0:18:31.200 --> 0:18:34.159 and so for them, the strategy is the power of 0:18:34.200 --> 0:18:36.040 guns is in the courts, and that's what I write 0:18:36.080 --> 0:18:39.480 about the gun movement that the gun safety movement gave 0:18:39.560 --> 0:18:42.640 us many many important things, but it did not give 0:18:42.720 --> 0:18:45.080 us judges. That's kind of one of the core arguments. 0:18:45.720 --> 0:18:49.639 And without judges, it's we're at the whim of opinion, 0:18:49.840 --> 0:18:52.720 which I think is scary, and it's scary now. But 0:18:52.840 --> 0:18:54.280 as you see what I was saying in the time 0:18:54.280 --> 0:18:57.560 piece today, it's really scary if you think about what 0:18:57.640 --> 0:18:59.840 the Supreme courts look like with guns if Trump wins 0:18:59.840 --> 0:19:02.920 in other term. And so for me right now, shifting 0:19:03.400 --> 0:19:04.879 this is a long way of saying, what do we 0:19:04.920 --> 0:19:08.359 do about it? I had a piece in having to 0:19:08.359 --> 0:19:10.639 post last week that I thought were the five pivot 0:19:10.680 --> 0:19:14.760 points I thought Democrats should make. I've been getting a 0:19:14.760 --> 0:19:18.240 lot of grief from my liberal friends about it, but 0:19:18.320 --> 0:19:21.440 I said, there are ways you can make gun safety 0:19:21.600 --> 0:19:24.119 more material. Now. I don't think we're going to change 0:19:24.200 --> 0:19:27.719 the minds of the most hardcore people, but I do 0:19:27.760 --> 0:19:29.560 think the election is going to come down to purple, 0:19:29.680 --> 0:19:32.240 swing state voters, and so those are the people I'm 0:19:32.240 --> 0:19:34.879 trying to target. The five points in my plan, if 0:19:34.880 --> 0:19:38.240 I can remember them, one is what's called gun entrepreneurialism, 0:19:38.640 --> 0:19:42.359 tie gun safety, to capitalism in much more overt ways. 0:19:42.800 --> 0:19:44.679 And there are really clear ways you can do that 0:19:44.720 --> 0:19:52.720 with AI, with smart guns, in collaboration with building communities, commerce, 0:19:52.760 --> 0:19:56.360 all these things. So one is tie gun safety to commerce, 0:19:56.600 --> 0:20:02.639 make it economically viable. Second is, for these voters, you 0:20:02.760 --> 0:20:04.920 have to do a better job talking about crime than 0:20:04.960 --> 0:20:07.240 we do. We often try to talk them out of 0:20:07.280 --> 0:20:10.320 crime by saying, well, gun safety laws, there's more crime 0:20:10.320 --> 0:20:13.560 in red states than blue states, and gun you know everybody, 0:20:13.560 --> 0:20:16.159 There actually isn't a ton of research that shows that, 0:20:16.160 --> 0:20:19.520 for example, background checks lower homicide. There actually isn't because 0:20:19.640 --> 0:20:22.359 they're not designed for that. And so we need a 0:20:22.400 --> 0:20:25.200 better narrative for crime. Not that I think I need 0:20:25.240 --> 0:20:28.960 it personally, but I think for these particular voters, talking 0:20:28.960 --> 0:20:31.439 about guns and crime is not self evident and they 0:20:31.480 --> 0:20:34.639 feel like they're talked down to if you just tell them, well, 0:20:34.680 --> 0:20:36.720 if you just had gun control the way New York did. 0:20:37.640 --> 0:20:42.880 And so two is crime. Three is be wary of 0:20:43.160 --> 0:20:49.160 who you're talking to about government regulations. Government regulations are 0:20:49.240 --> 0:20:52.119 really poison for a lot of people. So background checks 0:20:52.920 --> 0:20:56.040 is it's a federal database, right, So just telling everybody 0:20:56.080 --> 0:20:59.439 we need background checks, it doesn't work on particular audiences, 0:21:01.080 --> 0:21:03.919 and I'm trying to remember a winning is not just 0:21:03.960 --> 0:21:05.600 we're going to win and we're going to make everybody 0:21:05.600 --> 0:21:08.760 do background checks. Winning is actually trying to upend the 0:21:08.920 --> 0:21:11.880 gun debate and trying to find common cause. And there's 0:21:11.920 --> 0:21:14.639 some fifth one that I'll think of it in a second, 0:21:15.640 --> 0:21:18.840 but it's really like, it's not just rechain framing the narrative, 0:21:18.840 --> 0:21:22.480 it's actually reimagining, reimagining what we're doing. I think it 0:21:22.520 --> 0:21:26.240 had to do with the building safe, safe neighborhoods, like 0:21:26.240 --> 0:21:28.119 what kind of investments in neighborhood There's a lot of 0:21:28.200 --> 0:21:32.920 literature out there that is from like South Chicago that says, 0:21:32.960 --> 0:21:35.919 you know, if you fix the street lights and build 0:21:35.960 --> 0:21:39.159 parks and fix the internet and all these things, that 0:21:39.240 --> 0:21:41.840 actually gun crime goes down. And so for me, that's 0:21:41.880 --> 0:21:45.000 a nationalizable model that if you actually invest in local 0:21:45.000 --> 0:21:48.000 communities in material ways that people see. So none of 0:21:48.040 --> 0:21:50.879 that is about regulations or mandates. It's all about like 0:21:51.000 --> 0:21:54.080 material things that have different kinds of alliances. 0:21:54.080 --> 0:21:57.919 Which I think is so incredibly important because where we 0:21:58.000 --> 0:22:01.919 lack right now is imagine. I don't think that the 0:22:01.960 --> 0:22:05.960 Democratic Party has a ton of imagination in terms of 0:22:06.600 --> 0:22:08.920 why these people were attracted to Donald Trump in the 0:22:08.960 --> 0:22:12.439 first place, why they continue to be attracted to Donald Trump. 0:22:12.640 --> 0:22:16.240 And it isn't just oh he's a talk show host, 0:22:16.359 --> 0:22:22.480 Oh he's a billionaire. He is enticing because he gives 0:22:22.560 --> 0:22:27.600 them this power, this long lost power of whiteness that 0:22:27.640 --> 0:22:30.880 they want to reclaim that liberals told them right, push 0:22:30.960 --> 0:22:33.359 them back to the corners and said this is bad. 0:22:33.520 --> 0:22:35.680 You're bad. You need to make more space. And that's 0:22:35.720 --> 0:22:38.560 what they heard, and then Trump reinforced it. And so 0:22:38.920 --> 0:22:43.119 those pivot points are not about telling people it's common sense. 0:22:43.200 --> 0:22:45.760 Are not about saying background checks are going to save us. 0:22:46.080 --> 0:22:48.960 It is so much more than that. The last question 0:22:49.000 --> 0:22:51.440 I have for you, because we going to have questions 0:22:51.480 --> 0:22:54.920 from all of you, Jonathan, is what do you hope 0:22:54.960 --> 0:22:57.800 that people take from your book? What do you want 0:22:57.840 --> 0:23:00.159 them to walk away with? This book took you so 0:23:00.160 --> 0:23:03.160 many years to write, It was difficult for you to write, 0:23:03.440 --> 0:23:06.840 and you're getting, you know, people pushing back against you, 0:23:06.840 --> 0:23:09.720 your colleagues and friends. What do you hope that people 0:23:09.760 --> 0:23:10.480 take away from it? 0:23:11.040 --> 0:23:13.879 Three things? The first and most important for me is 0:23:13.920 --> 0:23:17.000