Speaker 1: What's Jeffrey my Epstein's Oh boy, this is the topic
Speaker 1: that was a horrible idea. Sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet sweet,
Speaker 1: Margaret killed Joy. This is Behind the Bastards, the podcast
Speaker 1: where Robert gets himself canceled with that introduction, Margaret, I can't,
Speaker 1: I can't even you. This is the topic you chose
Speaker 1: for our dear friend, Margaret kill Joy. Mars people right,
Speaker 1: this this is a nice one, kind of not really, Um, Margaret,
Speaker 1: you know you you're, you're, you're, you're, you're familiar with
Speaker 1: a friend of the pod Jeffrey Epstein, Right, I am
Speaker 1: aware of this person. Yeah, yeah, Um, everybody is real bad. Um,
Speaker 1: not great, Um, not not very well, although by some judgments,
Speaker 1: better than ever because he's dead. Um. That might be
Speaker 1: my attitude towards how Jeffrey Epstein's doing. Um, a pretty
Speaker 1: bad guy. He's kind of become like shorthand for a
Speaker 1: specific kind of monster, like a man who traffics women
Speaker 1: and children. Um, and is like fucking child sex trafficker
Speaker 1: to the rich and famous and powerful, just like this
Speaker 1: embodiment of corruption. And I'm here to tell you today, Margaret,
Speaker 1: I found a guy I think might be worse. Um, goddamnit. Yeah,
Speaker 1: um wow, this guy real, real piece of shit. Have
Speaker 1: you heard of Peter Nigrid? I have not. Okay, well,
Speaker 1: put on your I once again, I'm saying, how could
Speaker 1: you do this to our dear friend. I'm not sure
Speaker 1: what you what? You put on? Strap on your anti
Speaker 1: pedophile cream, vote up your anti garment industry monster fashion
Speaker 1: demon hammer, and get ready for an episode behind the Bastards.
Speaker 1: Just nine mill I feel like a nine millimeter might
Speaker 1: work out great. I keep one in my desk in
Speaker 1: case anyone involved in the fashion industry comes to my house.
Speaker 1: I do. I do sincerely look forward to the point
Speaker 1: where I get to show Margaret a picture. Yeah, this
Speaker 1: guy looks incredible. Almost. I almost brought our good friend
Speaker 1: Tom Ryman onto the podcast, who we had on for
Speaker 1: our episodes on right wing media Grifters, just to react
Speaker 1: to this man's appearance and then leave. But I DESI
Speaker 1: had not. Um Pecca Juhani Nigard was born in Helsinki, Finland,
Speaker 1: on July nine. His mother and his father ran a bakery,
Speaker 1: or maybe it was just his dad. Sources I found
Speaker 1: her a little bit unclear. Now you might guess by
Speaker 1: the year that this was not the easiest period in
Speaker 1: history to be a finn Um. Some real the late
Speaker 1: thirties early forties real rough years for the Finnish people.
Speaker 1: There's for a lot of people in that region to
Speaker 1: be fair, not just some good decisions and some bad
Speaker 1: decisions and rapid succession. It was a complicated time. No
Speaker 1: one was going to handle it perfectly. Um. And after
Speaker 1: the war, his family were like, maybe this chunk of
Speaker 1: Europe is not the best place to raise a child.
Speaker 1: I don't I don't know, if I don't know, if
Speaker 1: the bad stuff is done happening over here, you know. Um.
Speaker 1: So they moved to Winnipeg, Canada, where they lived in
Speaker 1: They get hired by a bakery, and the bakery kind
Speaker 1: of moves them in to some land that it owns,
Speaker 1: which means that they take up residents in a fifteen
Speaker 1: foot by thirteen foot converted colbin um. So that's also
Speaker 1: not a great place to raise a family. Not a
Speaker 1: great place to raise a family. Although if you've just
Speaker 1: lived through several both the invasion of Finland by Russia
Speaker 1: and then World War Two, you'll be like a coalbin
Speaker 1: where nobody is shooting at us. Sounds dope, yeah, let's
Speaker 1: get the funk out of Finland. Probably would stop some bullets.
Speaker 1: I probably would. There's a good chance that was on
Speaker 1: their mind. How big is this Cobin? Oh yeah, no,
Speaker 1: absolutely yeah. Um. So they lived there for a little while.
Speaker 1: Peter was about or Pecca at this point was eight
Speaker 1: or nine years old, maybe eleven when he moved again.
Speaker 1: Sources are kind of unclear, and it's not entirely clear
Speaker 1: to me. If he was born at a time when
Speaker 1: everybody who got born in Finland got up an accurate
Speaker 1: birth certificate, right like the forties, you still are kind
Speaker 1: of in that that period. Um. Now, since Finnish names
Speaker 1: are simply unacceptable in English speaking nations, he began going
Speaker 1: by Peter instead of Peca and substituted the Johani for
Speaker 1: a j um. Now we have a lot less to
Speaker 1: tail about his early life than I would prefer. And
Speaker 1: because he becomes basically a billionaire, Peter was successful for
Speaker 1: many years and limiting the scope of inquiry that reporters
Speaker 1: could could delve into his past. I did find it
Speaker 1: right up on celeb family dot com, which is a
Speaker 1: clearly credible source by someone I think was either Peter
Speaker 1: Niagart or someone he had paid to write it. Um
Speaker 1: and that source notes quote er Nigard credits his vast
Speaker 1: success to three things genetics, his finished roots, and perseverance.
Speaker 1: He is immensely grateful to his parents for having immigrated
Speaker 1: to Canada. He remembers never having to go without the
Speaker 1: basic necessities, even though money was often scarce in his household.
Speaker 1: And I think actually is probably more just based on
Speaker 1: some things he paid other people to write on other websites,
Speaker 1: and then he gets it wounds up getting filtered to
Speaker 1: these kind of clickbait sites after some stories break about him.
Speaker 1: But whatever, the person he is about, how good of
Speaker 1: a person he well, yeah, that's early on. Yes. Um,
Speaker 1: So his mother and his father opened their own bakery
Speaker 1: soon after arriving in Canada. Um, they move out of
Speaker 1: the coal bin pretty quick, so they're doing good. They're
Speaker 1: doing good. Uh. They wind up in the big city,
Speaker 1: which is Winnipeg, so not really a big scene, a
Speaker 1: moderately large town, birthplace of Winnie the Pooh. Um, he
Speaker 1: was a meeting, Yeah, Winnipeg, that's yeah. Does hear one lie?
Speaker 1: It might be crap. There's no way to know. It's
Speaker 1: impossible to say. Um, but Yes, the city where Winnie
Speaker 1: the Pooh lived briefly before going to die on the
Speaker 1: Western Front. Look it up. You you'd be surprised at
Speaker 1: how accurate that one is. Um. So, yeah, they open
Speaker 1: a bakery and uh, they things go well, you know,
Speaker 1: they wind up kind of It's kind of hard for
Speaker 1: me to tell exactly, but I would probably say upper
Speaker 1: middle class ish or maybe at least solidly middle class. Right,
Speaker 1: they're doing fairly well. Um, And yeah, they seem to
Speaker 1: have a lot of gratitude to their adopted new home country.
Speaker 1: Once Peter gets rich, his mom's going to use some
Speaker 1: of his money to create a park in Winnipeg in
Speaker 1: their father's armor honor, where the coal beIN homestead they've
Speaker 1: lived on is featured. Uh. I don't know that they
Speaker 1: keep that cold been around anymore. After the stuff that
Speaker 1: happens in this story. But now again Peter becomes almost
Speaker 1: a billionaire, close enough that it doesn't really matter all
Speaker 1: that much. The internet winds up littered with all these
Speaker 1: weird little websites that he paid to create and have
Speaker 1: someone right nice things about him on. There's like a
Speaker 1: bunch of websites he makes. We'll be talking about this
Speaker 1: more in part two. Because it's part of a a
Speaker 1: kind of rich guy battle. He winds up and and
Speaker 1: what'll do this for? Like ten dollars that much? Right?
Speaker 1: You get some people in other countries to write some
Speaker 1: nice stuff about you. Yeah, use like a task rabbit
Speaker 1: style app to get Yeah. Yeah, um, it's not a
Speaker 1: bad idea, right, Margaret. We could, we could, We could
Speaker 1: at least take down one enemy. I feel like if
Speaker 1: we if we wrangled together six to eight writers, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that could be the end. That could be the end
Speaker 1: of of Will Wheaton. Oh sure. Uh So in one
Speaker 1: of these, uh these random little websites about him, which
Speaker 1: was titled the Real Peter Niger dot Com, I found
Speaker 1: this claim that's again incredibly incredible. Yeah yeah, well, wouldn't
Speaker 1: say real if it wasn't, Margaret. It's like being a cop.
Speaker 1: You're not allowed to lie about that. No, absolutely, not
Speaker 1: so quote. Peter excelled at school and received recognition and
Speaker 1: awards for both academics and athletics. During his secondary school years.
Speaker 1: He constantly contributed money to assist his family through varied
Speaker 1: and multiple jobs. He concluded, and he concluded his high
Speaker 1: school years as the most accomplished student in the graduating class.
Speaker 1: Peter was later asked by the school to return and
Speaker 1: deliver a speech to the graduating class. This speech provides
Speaker 1: a roadmap to his success in business in life, and
Speaker 1: was still being quoted fifty years later. Now I haven't
Speaker 1: found a copy of this speech, Margaret. I don't. I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't know that it's still being quoted fifty years later,
Speaker 1: unless it's by people Peter and igerd paid to write
Speaker 1: articles about him. Um. But yeah, there there you go.
Speaker 1: That's his claims about this period. We know that he
Speaker 1: goes to the United States, you know, basically as soon
Speaker 1: as he graduates high school. Um. And he graduates from
Speaker 1: the University of North Dakota a couple of years later
Speaker 1: with a business degree. This is in nineteen sixty four,
Speaker 1: when he is twenty three years old. Would go on
Speaker 1: to praise one of his professors, Tom Clifford, as a mentor.
Speaker 1: Now Tom round Up went up running the college, and
Speaker 1: he seems that I found like his You like obituaries
Speaker 1: and stuff, um, which obviously aren't unbiased. But the obituaries
Speaker 1: make him look like a decent guy. He killed a
Speaker 1: Japanese soldier during World War Two with a shovel, but
Speaker 1: that's you know that happens, also pretty rad. I gotta
Speaker 1: get anyone who kills a man with a shovel. That's
Speaker 1: pretty badass. Yeah yeah, not boring, um, not boring um.
Speaker 1: He was also apparently pushed for more recognition of Indigenous
Speaker 1: people on campus, which is nice. Um. There's only one
Speaker 1: detail from the obituary that gives us maybe some insight
Speaker 1: into what niggards saw in him. Quote in the preface
Speaker 1: to Good Medicine, a two thousand three account of intrigue
Speaker 1: behind the creation of the four year medical school. He
Speaker 1: created a medical school at the University of North Canada,
Speaker 1: Clifford told how we cut corners, sometimes at blinding speed,
Speaker 1: and got around red tape in many cases by simply
Speaker 1: ignoring it. Right. So Clifford Clifford is kind of an
Speaker 1: education Asian. And again I haven't really run into terrible
Speaker 1: criticisms of this guy, but he's he's Peter's mentor, and
Speaker 1: he's a big if you've got to cut corners, cut
Speaker 1: them kind of guy, right. Um, So that might that
Speaker 1: might have an impact on the man that Peter becomes
Speaker 1: a little bit late. Right corners like getting consent from
Speaker 1: your workers and consents. Not something Peter is going to
Speaker 1: grow up to be great at Margaret In a number
Speaker 1: of ways, He's not. That's not a strong suit of his. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: his other strength he I mean, he does have other strengths. Uh,
Speaker 1: we can debate whether or not they're good ones. So
Speaker 1: Peter spends very little time working for anybody else in
Speaker 1: his life. He returns to Winnipeg right after graduating. He
Speaker 1: gets hired by the Tea Eaton's Company, which one of
Speaker 1: his websites describes as quote the premier and most sophisticated
Speaker 1: department store chain in North America. I have no way
Speaker 1: to to judge those claims, three of them, and they
Speaker 1: had like a yeah, yeah, it's some weird little Canadian
Speaker 1: like I haven't heard of Tea Eatons. It sounds like
Speaker 1: it's a it's like the Tim Horton's of clothing. Um. Anyway,
Speaker 1: he was part of their young executive program, and Peter
Speaker 1: is very careful to let us know that quote. He
Speaker 1: worked side by side with the Eaton brothers and was
Speaker 1: identified by the Eaton family and their executive management team
Speaker 1: as having the potential to eventually run the entire Eaton's operation.
Speaker 1: But he doesn't do that, Margaret. He doesn't do that,
Speaker 1: and we don't really know why. Although it's possible he's
Speaker 1: just lying about this and he wasn't really very good
Speaker 1: at that job, we have absolutely no way of I mean, theoretically,
Speaker 1: if I was to make an article about him, I
Speaker 1: could try to track down people in the Eaton's management team,
Speaker 1: but they're all probably dead now because this was nineteen
Speaker 1: sixty six. Um, he was really the most accomplished student
Speaker 1: at a school in all fields or whatever. He was
Speaker 1: probably the one who made the most money. I have
Speaker 1: not I can't tell you off the top of my head,
Speaker 1: and did not find in limited research at University of
Speaker 1: North Dakota graduate who I'm certain made more money than
Speaker 1: your niagred. So he makes a lot of an okay.
Speaker 1: In nineteen sixty seven, he gathers up his life savings
Speaker 1: and receives an eight thousand dollar loan to purchase a
Speaker 1: steak in a woman's garment manufacturer called Nathan Jacobs. Now
Speaker 1: kind of unclear to me whether the loan came from
Speaker 1: a bank or his family. Uh Niagard does not specify
Speaker 1: on any of the defunct websites I found and I
Speaker 1: haven't really found clarity anywhere else. Um. It's noted in
Speaker 1: several sources that he quickly came to own the business
Speaker 1: outright on one of his websites. Niagard says the speed
Speaker 1: with which Niagard claimed his number one position in the
Speaker 1: industry has attributed to the uniqueness of his business decisions
Speaker 1: and his work ethic that includes fourteen to sixteen hour days,
Speaker 1: seven days a week. But then, as Niagard says, the
Speaker 1: only time you are working is when you wish you
Speaker 1: were doing something else. And that's, uh, that's gonna be good.
Speaker 1: When we have our podcasting seminars. I feel like that's
Speaker 1: going to be a that's right, that's gonna be at
Speaker 1: You all got that for free. Yeah, you got that
Speaker 1: for free, but if you I mean honestly, I do
Speaker 1: feel like we should get a collections agency to just
Speaker 1: go around and crack a couple of kneecaps of some
Speaker 1: listeners until they pay up. That was worth just random
Speaker 1: three or fifty dollars. You feel like that's a three
Speaker 1: fifty margaret, Yeah, I think so, as long as it's
Speaker 1: enough people, well ten ten people, yeah, at least ten
Speaker 1: of you better send us some fucking cash or um,
Speaker 1: it's it'll it'll be bad. That's a threat, that's a
Speaker 1: legally binding threat that that I'm party to somehow that
Speaker 1: you cool, Zone Media, Sophie, the I Heart Radio Corporation.
Speaker 1: We're all all making it anyway. On one of his
Speaker 1: personal websites, Nigard describes this process differently. Rather than buying
Speaker 1: into own part of a company, he was quote recruited
Speaker 1: to become an equity partner, which makes it sound more
Speaker 1: like the company brought him on to buy them out.
Speaker 1: He makes sure to let you know that he was
Speaker 1: recruited quote despite having no direct knowledge or experience. And
Speaker 1: the ladies apparel manufacturing industry, do you think it's just
Speaker 1: like going out of business and they're like fun, fun fun.
Speaker 1: I kind of think it was. I kind of think
Speaker 1: that's what happened. That he was not recruited. They thought
Speaker 1: they were pulling over one on over on him. Um,
Speaker 1: but that's not how things are going to work out,
Speaker 1: because this is the thing he's actually good at in anyway,
Speaker 1: He by gets enough money together one way or the other,
Speaker 1: by hook or by crook over the next year or
Speaker 1: two couple of years to buy a majority stake in
Speaker 1: the business, which he renames from Jacobs to tan J
Speaker 1: Fashions um now. He would later market the products under
Speaker 1: his own name, Niagard, and eventually expand to produce products
Speaker 1: under tinned brand names. His clothing was sold in Niagard stores,
Speaker 1: but also in major department stores like Sears and Dillards.
Speaker 1: Remember Sears and Dillard's. I remember Sears. I feel like
Speaker 1: Dillard's missed me. I mean, I can picture it. But yeah,
Speaker 1: if you want, right today, if you want to encounter
Speaker 1: very large rats, find your nearest Dillard's and break in.
Speaker 1: Don't worry. There's no security guards there. Um, there's no
Speaker 1: people there at all. It's it's it's the Boulevard of
Speaker 1: broken dreams. A Dillard's in two serious security guard uniform,
Speaker 1: like you'll find the desiccated remains of a security guard
Speaker 1: with rats kind of filling out the uniform in a
Speaker 1: sort of body shape. Yeah. They left him there when
Speaker 1: they when they locked the doors from the outside and
Speaker 1: they said they'll be right back. Yeah, and now the
Speaker 1: rats inhabit his soul um, but they don't know about
Speaker 1: cell phones, so they can't reach his family. He had
Speaker 1: a six month old shot I don't know why I'm
Speaker 1: making this so sad. One early strength that helped Nigart
Speaker 1: expand beyond the bounds of the business he'd invested in
Speaker 1: was a focus on the growing field of information technology. Peter,
Speaker 1: and again, this is like the fucking seventies that this
Speaker 1: is all starting to come together, invested in software that
Speaker 1: linked manufacturing with a network of retail stores to keep
Speaker 1: them fully stocked. Peter expanded his business from Canada to
Speaker 1: the United States. He did this by again investing in
Speaker 1: an existing company, a sportswear designer run by Nancy Ebker.
Speaker 1: She claims Peter came to her and agreed to split
Speaker 1: profits fifty fifty and kicking seven hundred thousand dollars of
Speaker 1: her own money to finance the production of two new
Speaker 1: sportswear lines sold out of her showroom. According to Ebgar,
Speaker 1: Niagard smooth talked her out of putting any of this
Speaker 1: agreement down in writing. He complained that bringing lawyers into
Speaker 1: the situation would make everything a big mess. As soon
Speaker 1: as the deal closed, Niagard fired Ebger from her own
Speaker 1: company and took over the offices. Um, yeah, he is,
Speaker 1: he is. He is a cool customer. I'm going to
Speaker 1: quote from a write up and form and that's the
Speaker 1: worst thing he did. M Well, yeah, Edgar is still fuming.
Speaker 1: He literally ruined my life, she says. Ebgar claimed in
Speaker 1: court testimony that in their heated final conversation, Niagard told
Speaker 1: her I have all your patterns. I have everything, I
Speaker 1: own everything. I never intended to put anything in writing.
Speaker 1: You have nothing and I am a millionaire. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: straight up. Um, he's the one who locked that guy
Speaker 1: into Dillard's. He's dead. He did. Oh my god, of
Speaker 1: course he did. Um, why wouldn't he. Let's try to reason,
Speaker 1: she interjected, to which Nagard responded, if you don't have
Speaker 1: one million dollars by Friday, I'm going to see to
Speaker 1: it that your name and reputation are totally destroyed in
Speaker 1: this market. Um. Just a cool guy. Now. Niagard tells
Speaker 1: the court a different story, saying the two had a
Speaker 1: calm conversation in which he suggested the amicably part ways.
Speaker 1: The judge found Edgar to be highly credible and deemed
Speaker 1: Niggard evasive, insincere, and utterly lacking incredibility. We deplore the
Speaker 1: unseemly conduct of Niagard. Judge Irving Cooper wrote but ultimately
Speaker 1: ruled that Edgar failed to prove she was damaged by
Speaker 1: his actions. Nigard's counterclaim was also dismissed. Edgar, who calls
Speaker 1: him a true villain of the world, is writing a
Speaker 1: book about the case. I don't think she ever did.
Speaker 1: She did. I'll read it, um. So his business takes
Speaker 1: off in the years that follow Niagart hires his mom,
Speaker 1: He brings his sister on a spokesman for the brand,
Speaker 1: and he's building this clothing building he's making is really
Speaker 1: tailor made for middle aged women. This is not high fashion.
Speaker 1: I don't mean that as an insult, but he's not.
Speaker 1: He's not building this is like, this is the Paris
Speaker 1: Runway kind of stuff. This is like clothing for women
Speaker 1: from like thirty to fifty, um, who have a couple
Speaker 1: of kids. It's meant to be like affordable, have like
Speaker 1: a wide selection, and he's trying to both make it
Speaker 1: kind of something that's attractive to them but also something
Speaker 1: that they feel good about buying from. So he makes
Speaker 1: sure that, like his sister is the spokeswoman, he makes
Speaker 1: sure to bring his mom on so that he can
Speaker 1: talk about how while he treats his mom um, he
Speaker 1: emphasizes his annual two million dollar donation to breast cancer research.
Speaker 1: He claims makes big claims about having an ethical supply chain. Uh.
Speaker 1: Niagard's former website bragged as achievements to be the number
Speaker 1: one the first manufacturer to have air conditioned factories. Um
Speaker 1: and in the real Peter Niagar dot com. He also claims,
Speaker 1: quote Peter was always committed to the health and comfort
Speaker 1: of his associates. He was the first company in Canada
Speaker 1: to ban smoking by associates or visitors in the buildings
Speaker 1: or elsewhere on the premises. He created the first air
Speaker 1: conditioned manufacturing and visitors Yeah, well he banned them from smoking.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, and he he created the first air conditioned
Speaker 1: manufacturing plants, transforming the industry from sweatshops to fashion houses. Uh,
Speaker 1: this guy's fucking clever. Mhm, Margaret, you want to guess
Speaker 1: if they weren't sweatshops anymore? Uh? Was this his one lie? Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is the only one. So um, we'll get to
Speaker 1: that in a second. Obviously, top reviews for Niagard clothing
Speaker 1: on Amazon include praise that their polyester pants are quote
Speaker 1: very comfortable and wash well. Um, so it gives you
Speaker 1: an idea of kind of like what people are looking
Speaker 1: for in these right, Like I want something comfortable. I
Speaker 1: want something that's convenient, Like I'm a busy mom, right
Speaker 1: like that? That that's like what this is angled at
Speaker 1: um And it's a good strategy. In very short order,
Speaker 1: his clothing is in more than thirty states. Sixty of
Speaker 1: his corporate revenue was soon coming from outside of Canada,
Speaker 1: and it spreads to other countries too. It's not just
Speaker 1: the US and Canada's all over the place. And as
Speaker 1: you might have guessed by now, the reality of niagard
Speaker 1: ink labor practices did not quite matched the rosy claims
Speaker 1: made by their old website. And I'm gonna quote from
Speaker 1: Forbes here. In late April, the National Labor Committee n LC,
Speaker 1: a private group in Pittsburgh, issued a report claiming that
Speaker 1: Niggard pants from its Alie line were being sewn in
Speaker 1: a Jordanian sweat shop. The factory in al Zarka. The
Speaker 1: report says, employed guest workers from Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and
Speaker 1: India who had quote been trafficed to Jordan's, stripped of
Speaker 1: their passports and held under conditions of indentured servitude. According
Speaker 1: to the investigation, women were forced to work fifteen hour
Speaker 1: shifts seven days a week, and we're paid half the
Speaker 1: wages they were owed. A Niagard spokeswoman says that a
Speaker 1: government inquiry found no truth to the allegations, but since
Speaker 1: the report, the NLC says factory conditions have improved significantly.
Speaker 1: Passports have been returned and workers now get Fridays off. Wow,
Speaker 1: and they get their own passports back. They get to
Speaker 1: keep their passports while they're working fifteen hour days, six
Speaker 1: days a week. Um, and six days a week. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's not as many to days as there are
Speaker 1: in the week. That's not that's not that's a whole
Speaker 1: day they don't have to work. Other cool fact. The
Speaker 1: factory is in al Zarka, which is also the hometown
Speaker 1: of Abu Musab al Zarkawi, the founder of al Qaeda
Speaker 1: in Iraq, which is kind of the group that immediately
Speaker 1: led to isis Yeah, okay, cool guy. Anyway, that has
Speaker 1: nothing to do with Peter Niagard coincidence. It's just a
Speaker 1: fun well or does it. Did Peter Niagard uh create
Speaker 1: isis in order to sell more comfortable, easily washed polyester sweatpants.
Speaker 1: Did a world will never know. There's no babe that
Speaker 1: it didn't happen. Maybe it's possible, but that's not a
Speaker 1: legally binding allegation, so it gets worse. The one detail
Speaker 1: I did find on his website that actually surprised me
Speaker 1: was this tidbit. Nothing has made a bigger impact on
Speaker 1: the Canadian fashion industry than the NAFTA agreement. The seeds
Speaker 1: of this agreement were sewn in nineteen two when Peter
Speaker 1: Nyagard wrote a strategic position paper to initiate free trade.
Speaker 1: This paper resulted in his appointment to chair in the
Speaker 1: Advisory Committee on Future Canadian Long Term Industrial Strategy. From
Speaker 1: that committee grew Niger's recommendation to negotiate a free trade
Speaker 1: Agreement f t A first with the United States, which
Speaker 1: ultimately became the foundation agreement from Mexico's entry in d
Speaker 1: e c. Ninety two, nor known as the North American
Speaker 1: Free Trade Agreement or NAFTA. No other person in the
Speaker 1: apparel industry has played a more significant role with the
Speaker 1: creation of NAFTA than Peter Niagart. Holy sh it right, Yeah, now, okay,
Speaker 1: Well that means the zapatista. We get the Zapatistas out
Speaker 1: of him. We do kind of get the zapatistas out
Speaker 1: of him. Um, it's now obviously this is a claim
Speaker 1: being made on his website. He thinks of his personals
Speaker 1: and he is taking personal credit for making it. I
Speaker 1: think he is overselling his role here. But he winds
Speaker 1: up on a couple joint Canadian US like government panels,
Speaker 1: like several a number over the years, like a number
Speaker 1: of pretty significant positions that he holds, like helping to
Speaker 1: carry out aspects of like what's going to become NAFTA.
Speaker 1: So he's not entirely lying here either. We're going to
Speaker 1: get into this in a bit. But he is not
Speaker 1: an insignificant part of the creation or the establishment of NAFTA,
Speaker 1: although he is a little bit over selling it here. UM,
Speaker 1: he's definitely one of the people in the apparel industry
Speaker 1: who's most involved in the creation of NAFTA. That's probably
Speaker 1: fair to UM. So we're gonna talk about that and
Speaker 1: why that's not entirely a good thing. But first, Margaret,
Speaker 1: you know, people don't like about NAFTA the fact that
Speaker 1: it strips resources from developing nations to fuel the lifestyles
Speaker 1: of the wealthy that are destroying the earth exactly. You
Speaker 1: know what doesn't do that? Potatoes. Potatoes don't. But let
Speaker 1: me let me paint a picture of you, Margaret. Want
Speaker 1: you to think about the Great Lakes superior the other ones,
Speaker 1: shining out beautiful, surrounded by basically Hanada, Canada, which is
Speaker 1: the bad guy of this story. Now imagine, now imagine Margaret,
Speaker 1: a beautiful sheet of I C. B M s coming
Speaker 1: down over the Great Lakes, and instead of robbing poorer
Speaker 1: and low income nations in order to finance the lifestyles
Speaker 1: of the rich and the famous, we irradiate fish in
Speaker 1: the Great Lakes to provide the world with fish. That's huge,
Speaker 1: because whatever, probably who knows what happens. I just think
Speaker 1: we should do it. Ylvie, how are we doing here?
Speaker 1: I'm so tired that I'm like, let's let me show
Speaker 1: you some pamphlets while while the listeners check out these
Speaker 1: other ads. Okay, oh we're back. And you know, I
Speaker 1: think if the US has six thousand nuclear weapons, we
Speaker 1: can spare a handful. Convinced. The pamphlets had lots of charts,
Speaker 1: yep and it and uh warning labels that have been
Speaker 1: scratched out, so they probably don't matter. They probably don't matter.
Speaker 1: And several times I repeated the lyrics to the wreck
Speaker 1: of the Edmund Fitzgerald to remind you of all the
Speaker 1: brave men who died in those lakes. Yeah. Absolutely, So
Speaker 1: I looked at your many personal websites, and I have
Speaker 1: hired to we have a lot of websites made. I
Speaker 1: cross referenced from one of your personal websites to the other,
Speaker 1: and they all checked out. That's right, that's what we
Speaker 1: call research. That's nocent um. Yeah, you know, people, look,
Speaker 1: Sophie has driven a hard line that we have to
Speaker 1: stop the blue Apron child island bit um because it's
Speaker 1: it's just it's just creates so much work on the
Speaker 1: bleeping end um, and then when we don't bleep it,
Speaker 1: people are like is it real, which is a question
Speaker 1: we've had to deal with a lot lately. So now
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about nuking the Great Lakes for
Speaker 1: a couple of months and then I'll figure out something else.
Speaker 1: Because you believe, mistakenly that if you go all of
Speaker 1: the producers and go more and more drastically absurd, that
Speaker 1: people will stop believing you I do hope because it
Speaker 1: will be really funny. It'll be the end of life
Speaker 1: on this earth, but it'll be really funny that like
Speaker 1: this bit ends with me being elected president in a
Speaker 1: landslide with a mandate to deploy nuclear weapons to the
Speaker 1: Great Lakes. Yeah, I mean you don't have zero Mostel,
Speaker 1: so off. But anyway, back to NAFTA. Speaking of bad things, um,
Speaker 1: not bad things like zero Mustel. He was rad didn't
Speaker 1: name names anyway, Sorry Jesus, this is going off the
Speaker 1: rails a little bit. Let's talk about NAFTA. So Peter
Speaker 1: n Iagart, obviously he's a narcissist. Take what he says
Speaker 1: about being like integral to the creation of NAFTA with
Speaker 1: a grain of salt. But it's not an invented claim.
Speaker 1: It's probably fair to say that niagard strategic papers were
Speaker 1: less the inspiration for NAFTA than one of a number
Speaker 1: of people with influence who were pushing for trade liberalization
Speaker 1: to allow US and Canadian companies to do their manufacturing overseas,
Speaker 1: particularly in Mexico. I found a right up by the
Speaker 1: makila Uh Solidarity Network, which is a Canadian organization promoting
Speaker 1: solidarity with laborers in places like Mexico and other parts
Speaker 1: of Central America to improve conditions and win a living
Speaker 1: wage for workers. Right at the beginning of NAFTA, they
Speaker 1: published a position paper analyzing the trade agreement and it's
Speaker 1: likely impact on laborers and the manufacturer they chose to
Speaker 1: highlight in order to analyze this was Niagard. So whatever
Speaker 1: he's saying, and however much he kind of exaggerates things
Speaker 1: this organization. When they were like choosing to like look
Speaker 1: at a garment manufacturer to see what NAFTA was going
Speaker 1: to do in Mexico, they picked Niagard because he's it
Speaker 1: was a really big deal and he was a big
Speaker 1: part of it. Ums, just like the obvious where are
Speaker 1: we at? Timeline? Yeah, this is this is like the
Speaker 1: late eighties. I think when kind of this gets I
Speaker 1: can I can actually look this up? Um don't. I'm
Speaker 1: just trying to figure out why I've never heard of
Speaker 1: this brand before. Is it because I'm not Canadian or
Speaker 1: is it because I only became a middle aged lady
Speaker 1: more recently. Yeah, I think the second might be a
Speaker 1: bigger and you're you're not like a suburban like mother
Speaker 1: of three, which I think is primarily kind of who
Speaker 1: he was angled at UM. But yeah, so obviously mckiela
Speaker 1: is also a Canadian organization that may also be part
Speaker 1: of why they pick Niagard. But Niagard was one of
Speaker 1: the largest, I think at it for a time, the
Speaker 1: largest garment manufacturer to invest in Mexican factories and kind
Speaker 1: of the first days of nafta UM. The writers of
Speaker 1: that Makuela Solidarity Net Network paper did not consider this
Speaker 1: to have been a good thing, and they wrote quote
Speaker 1: from the research that has already been done on the ground. However,
Speaker 1: working conditions in areas where Niagard has produced and is
Speaker 1: currently producing in Mexico are less than ideal. While management
Speaker 1: at the Majelosa factory in Tahoakan, Mexico, insisted that they
Speaker 1: paid premium wages, workers disputed these statements. Low wages are
Speaker 1: a common complaint of garment workers into wak Been. Many
Speaker 1: are forced to work several jobs to meet their families
Speaker 1: basic needs. It is not uncommon for children to work
Speaker 1: in smaller makilas and workshops to complement the very low
Speaker 1: wages their parents are making. In Quahuila, where Niagard is
Speaker 1: currently contracting work there, are similar reports of low wages,
Speaker 1: long hours, and forced overtime. Since the signing of NAFTA,
Speaker 1: union representation has decreased significantly in this region. Force pregnancy
Speaker 1: testing and sexual harassment have also been reported. Further research
Speaker 1: needs to be done to document the working conditions at
Speaker 1: niagard owned factories in Guadalajara and Guernavaca, Mexico and Canada.
Speaker 1: Three of Niagard's Manitoba factories are certified by UNITE, the
Speaker 1: North American Garment and Textile Workers Union. During union drives
Speaker 1: in the nineteen eighties at his plants, Peter Niagard placed
Speaker 1: full page ads in Winnipeg newspapers stating his anti union position.
Speaker 1: At that time, the Manitoba Labor Board ruled that the
Speaker 1: company had committed unfair labor practices, including the refusal to
Speaker 1: deduct union dues to allow the union access to the
Speaker 1: plant and to pay into the union's retirement and health
Speaker 1: and welfare funds. Niagaret was ordered to pay the union
Speaker 1: and illegally laid off employees a hundred fifty dollars in
Speaker 1: money owed and fines um. So yeah, he's cool, Do
Speaker 1: you ever like? Is there ever a bastard who's like
Speaker 1: the shining prints of everything and then secretly has the
Speaker 1: like murder basement or always just these people where you're like,
Speaker 1: of course, this person doesn't respect fucking anybody except like,
Speaker 1: I mean, we didn't portray it this way, but a
Speaker 1: lot of people, Georgia Tan, the woman who invented adoption
Speaker 1: by kidnapping a lot of babies, a whole bunch of
Speaker 1: people thought she was wonderful because she's running these adoption
Speaker 1: centers and stuff, you know. Um, so I should probably
Speaker 1: say a little bit about naft to here as well.
Speaker 1: We're not gonna go a lot into nafty here, because
Speaker 1: that's a subject that deserves more than just casual coverage
Speaker 1: on a podcast. Um, but it's fair to say that
Speaker 1: rather than inspiring NAFTA, Nigaard's primary contribution was to be
Speaker 1: one of the first guys to use the trade agreement
Speaker 1: to escape unionized labor and forced workers to endure privation
Speaker 1: for the enhanced profit of his company. This pattern was
Speaker 1: repeated on a large scale al by other businesses. I
Speaker 1: want to quote now from a writ up by sociology
Speaker 1: professor Robert Ross from Clark University. Uh, it is a
Speaker 1: long quote, but I think that it's necessary to do
Speaker 1: that here. On August second, nineteen, labor officials in the
Speaker 1: state of California rated a garment manufacturing shop twelve miles
Speaker 1: east of Los Angeles and the town of El Monty.
Speaker 1: The shop was located in what had appeared to be
Speaker 1: a residential condominium complex, but this one was surrounded by
Speaker 1: a barbed wire fence and a six foot brick wall
Speaker 1: with metal spikes. Dangerous and unsanitary, the Carmit Factories was
Speaker 1: worse than substandard. Its workers were virtual slaves. Held in
Speaker 1: the condominium complex were seventy two laborers who were first
Speaker 1: to work as much as seventeen hours a day, seven
Speaker 1: days a week for one six In some cases, the
Speaker 1: sixty seven women and five men worked up to twenty
Speaker 1: two hours for as little as fifty cents an hour
Speaker 1: their which is varied therefore between about one third and
Speaker 1: one tenth of the U S legal minimum wage. The
Speaker 1: condominium was also a major fire hazard. There was no
Speaker 1: rear exit and only small windows with thick iron bars.
Speaker 1: A gain of eight smugglers had paid the workers air
Speaker 1: fair from Thailand, promising them a bright her future in America.
Speaker 1: Upon their arrival, However, the new immigrants were forced into
Speaker 1: slave labor, working day and night to pay off their
Speaker 1: passage fees. The fees ranged from forty eight hundred dollars
Speaker 1: to twenty five thousand dollars. They were also threatened with beatings, rape,
Speaker 1: and even death. Following the discovery, all seventy two workers
Speaker 1: were arrested as a legal alien held by federal immigration officers,
Speaker 1: but conditions had been so bad. One of the women said,
Speaker 1: the day I was arrested, I was very happy. Budparangmak,
Speaker 1: one of the people forced to stay at the compound,
Speaker 1: claimed that a year ago, two people who tried to
Speaker 1: escape were severely beaten and sent back to Thailand. He
Speaker 1: also stated that workers were frequently beaten in the compound
Speaker 1: to prevent escapes. Another worker from the al Monti sweatshop
Speaker 1: claimed that she was told it would take three years
Speaker 1: for her to pay off the forty eight hundred dollar
Speaker 1: traveling fee. She was forced to pay three hundred dollars
Speaker 1: a month. According to federal officials, threats against the workers
Speaker 1: children or family members in Thailand were used to make
Speaker 1: sure their parents continued sewing. Immigration officials had been aware
Speaker 1: of the al Monty operation for three years, but the
Speaker 1: local authorities acted only when they heard the testimony of
Speaker 1: a woman who escaped through a ventilation shaft just weeks
Speaker 1: before the raid. The eight time nationals who ran the
Speaker 1: ring and its businesses were convicted of harboring and transporting
Speaker 1: illegal immigrants, kidnapping, peonage, and other serious charges. A few
Speaker 1: weeks after the discovery, over a million dollars of their assets,
Speaker 1: including over eight hundred and sixty five thousand dollars in cash,
Speaker 1: were distributed to the seventy two workers found in al
Speaker 1: Monty and a thirty nine others who had worked in
Speaker 1: the Los Angeles installations controlled by the ring. The smuggler
Speaker 1: owners have been imprisoned the illegal immigrants, who do approximately
Speaker 1: three point five million in back pay in penalties, The
Speaker 1: Labor and Occupational Safety agencies of the State of California
Speaker 1: asked for five hundred and fifty thousand dollars in penalties
Speaker 1: from the sweatshop owners. Compensation has also been collected from
Speaker 1: the garment manufacturers who con commissioned work from the man
Speaker 1: from the contractor Major American Retails Change, which sold clothing
Speaker 1: made in the swaves. The slave sweatshop include and even
Speaker 1: Marcus Montgomery Ward and Sears. Stories such as these about
Speaker 1: the Thai slaves of El Monty, California, symbolically represent one
Speaker 1: of the main tendencies of contemporary global capitalism, the tendency
Speaker 1: to level workers conditions down to or below a global
Speaker 1: standard more like that of today's most vulnerable Third world
Speaker 1: workers and that of yesterday's organized workers and the developed
Speaker 1: industrial social order. This is the concrete meaning of the
Speaker 1: race to the bottom. While the Thai slaves represent the
Speaker 1: unusual worst case of the problems of labor in the
Speaker 1: apparel industry and in other low wage industries in North America,
Speaker 1: the rise of the new sweatshops is widespread. One responsible estimate,
Speaker 1: often used by former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich, is
Speaker 1: that up to half the entire apparel workforce of the
Speaker 1: United States, potentially half a million workers, labor it below
Speaker 1: the legal minimum wage or without legally entitled premium pay
Speaker 1: for overtime hours. These workers also suffer unsafe and unsanitary conditions.
Speaker 1: Such conditions include as many as fifty thousand workers in
Speaker 1: New York City and seventy to ninety thousand in Los Angeles,
Speaker 1: the two largest centers of garment production in the country.
Speaker 1: The North American Free Trade Agreement, dissolving barriers to the
Speaker 1: movement of goods and capital between the United States, Mexico
Speaker 1: and Canada, is like the European Union and the General
Speaker 1: Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, part of the project of
Speaker 1: global capital and a very successful one. In thirty years,
Speaker 1: a new form of capitalism has been borne out of
Speaker 1: the crisis of mid century capitalism. The mid century type
Speaker 1: of capitalism, known variously as monopoly capitalism or later ford
Speaker 1: is um, was characteristically associated with the Kingsian welfare state,
Speaker 1: but many of the characteristic forms and achievements of that
Speaker 1: variant of capitalism have been superseded by a new one,
Speaker 1: global capitalism. This, then, is the context of NAFTA, a
Speaker 1: world project of capitalism to dissolve barriers to investment and
Speaker 1: to lower cost of production in te lingibso facto a
Speaker 1: systemic attack upon and loss of working class power and
Speaker 1: social protections in the older industrial nations. Yet paradoxically, the
Speaker 1: same world context makes more concrete than ever the rewards
Speaker 1: of solidarity and the necessity of internationalism. Anyway, I mean
Speaker 1: was a long one and it talks about the necessity
Speaker 1: of something. Uh, like when I only a couple of things.
Speaker 1: When I think about the compensation as people are deserved, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mostly think about like I don't know, ears and
Speaker 1: pieces pieces of bodies, yes, um, but it is like
Speaker 1: this is this is the thing that igerd was was
Speaker 1: a huge part of. And we can tell from the
Speaker 1: way he treated his workers in Canada and the way
Speaker 1: he treated his workers in Mexico. This was exactly what
Speaker 1: he wanted to happen. Like he saw he was one
Speaker 1: of a number of people not to put too much
Speaker 1: credit on this guy, but he saw the people who
Speaker 1: made his products as a barrier to his profits. And
Speaker 1: before NAFTA happened, he was working to do what he
Speaker 1: could to ensure that they could not cut into his profits.
Speaker 1: And he backed NAFTA and took advantage of it as
Speaker 1: soon as it happened in order to cut the ability
Speaker 1: of other people to make money off of the company
Speaker 1: that he owned. Right, Like, that was the thing. The
Speaker 1: people who made the products he wanted he was willing to,
Speaker 1: you know, force him to take pregnancy tests, beat them, um,
Speaker 1: lock them up for dayson and take their fucking passports.
Speaker 1: Whatever it takes to make sure that like he gets
Speaker 1: every dime he possibly can that anyway, I'm sure he
Speaker 1: used for good and noble purpose, like I just I
Speaker 1: can't even Yeah, that's that's what we're about to talk about. Yeah,
Speaker 1: what he does with all the money he makes doing this?
Speaker 1: Um so uh. In nineteen eight seven, Peter purchased land
Speaker 1: in the Bahamas, where he soon began construction on a
Speaker 1: sprawling estate. We will discuss this later, um. But in
Speaker 1: two thousand three, an American couple sued him in Florida
Speaker 1: for allegedly tricking them into accepting jobs managing this estate.
Speaker 1: They further claimed that Niggard ignored Bahamanian immigration laws and
Speaker 1: failed to obtain work permits for employees, which you may
Speaker 1: notice is something of a pattern for him. You're gonna
Speaker 1: need to give me those. I'll make sure you don't
Speaker 1: lose them now. They also alleged that he find workers
Speaker 1: for petty infractions, which Nigard conceded to doing during a
Speaker 1: court case. He claimed this was done in cases of
Speaker 1: quote lateness and poor quality work. Such penalties under law
Speaker 1: are only allowed to be deducted from quarterly bonuses, but
Speaker 1: Nigard illegally deducted them from weekly pay Forbes rights. Twenty
Speaker 1: five dollar fines were common for such offenses as leaving
Speaker 1: a dirty glass on a beach cabana, not having Niggard's
Speaker 1: room enough when he arrived, and for the presence of
Speaker 1: house flies in the grand Hall. Executives at Niagard corporate
Speaker 1: offices lived under a similar threat of penalties. For example,
Speaker 1: the employment contract of Norman Neil, a former vice president,
Speaker 1: advised that after receiving full indoctrination, including so called basic
Speaker 1: policy framework training, you would be septed to a fine
Speaker 1: equal to five percent of his bonus for violations of
Speaker 1: company policies. Neil was fired and he later sued for
Speaker 1: breach of employment contract. Niagrid countersuit and the case was settled.
Speaker 1: So this is just kind of the way this guy rolls,
Speaker 1: and it is, I guess interesting that he treats his
Speaker 1: vps kind of the same way. Um that that's honestly
Speaker 1: the most house thing so far, like you'd think, I mean,
Speaker 1: maybe it's just like all of the Hollywood indoctrination about
Speaker 1: like even the evil capitalist rich people at their house
Speaker 1: on the beach are like really into like seeming really
Speaker 1: cool to the people who are around them, including like
Speaker 1: the higher up people who work for them or whatever, like, no,
Speaker 1: this guy is, it's amazing, it's it's yeah, he's comprehensively
Speaker 1: a piece of ship. Now there's more things we could
Speaker 1: say about Peter's treatment of his employees, but I think
Speaker 1: we have now covered the most consequential cruelties. So it's
Speaker 1: probably time to discuss the primary group of people outside
Speaker 1: of laborers that he targeted for horrific cruelty, which was
Speaker 1: any young woman who happened to be anywhere near his orbit.
Speaker 1: Often the employees he abused where were obviously, as this
Speaker 1: excerpt from The New York Times makes clear. A nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty news article described an area of his office in Winnipeg,
Speaker 1: the city in Manitoba where he built his company, as
Speaker 1: a passion pit, with a mirrored ceiling and a couch
Speaker 1: that transformed into a bed at the push of a button.
Speaker 1: This is his office in Winnipeg. Um, if anyone calls
Speaker 1: your boss's office a passion pit, it's time. That's not
Speaker 1: a place. That's not don't go don't go to that's
Speaker 1: not a good place. Don't go to the pack. Don't
Speaker 1: go to anything called the passion pit unless it's like
Speaker 1: a like a juice restaurant that that focuses on passion
Speaker 1: fruit and like peaches a lot, and I guess it
Speaker 1: might be okay, or like a kind of if you're
Speaker 1: into the kind of sleazy swinger club that we call
Speaker 1: itself the passion Pit. Obvious, no judgment. Look, if there's
Speaker 1: if there's like a dirty bar in an industrial part
Speaker 1: of Philly that promises key parties and like sixty five
Speaker 1: cent rum and cokes and it's called the Passion Pit,
Speaker 1: of course I'm going to go there totally. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: just a good time. Um, that's just a good time.
Speaker 1: And then a number of doctor visits afterwards, but most
Speaker 1: of that stuff anyway, whatever, Yeah, they got fucking things now,
Speaker 1: So uh boy, I shouldn't lead directly from that to
Speaker 1: this next paragraphs. You know we're gonna to Margarets Is,
Speaker 1: We're going to roll to ads and just try to
Speaker 1: let let a little bit of capitalism cleanse our palates.
Speaker 1: This is our palate cleanser, little little little bit of
Speaker 1: an ad break, dabble off down the shopping pause. Whoa,
Speaker 1: it's all bad except for these ads. Oh we're back
Speaker 1: over the years. Peter Nigard was repeatedly accused of demanding
Speaker 1: for that female employees satisfy him sexually. Uh. There were
Speaker 1: at least nine women in Winnipeg and Los Angeles who
Speaker 1: accused him of sexual harassment or assault. Um. The New
Speaker 1: York Times spoke to ten other women who said that
Speaker 1: he had proposed sex, touched them inappropriately, or raped them. Um.
Speaker 1: Since he sold fashion for women, Peter worked hard for
Speaker 1: decades to maintain the image of an eccentric playboy. But
Speaker 1: when it was basically good at heart, right, he would
Speaker 1: dress ostentatiously, he would have this. He was always photographed
Speaker 1: with models and stuff, and there's even photos of like
Speaker 1: his passion pit and his like living room and stuff
Speaker 1: and all of his fancy things. But his whole attitude
Speaker 1: was that like, well, yeah, I'm a little bit of
Speaker 1: a play with but look, you know, my mom and
Speaker 1: my sister helped me run the company. Like I'm a
Speaker 1: good guy at heart. I just like to um. Anyway,
Speaker 1: when he wrote about his one brief marriage to a
Speaker 1: model in the nineteen seventies, he refused to name her
Speaker 1: and claim that she had left him after three years
Speaker 1: because quote, I worked too hard, which is again you
Speaker 1: see what he's doing here is He's like, look, yeah,
Speaker 1: I had a marriage break up. It's because I worked
Speaker 1: too hard. But like, that's not done me. And I'm
Speaker 1: a bad guy, you know. I just that's what I do. Yeah, Um,
Speaker 1: it's it's it's it worked for a while. In other interviews,
Speaker 1: Niagret would bemoan that he had given up on the
Speaker 1: concept of marriage. He claimed that in his youth it
Speaker 1: had been about finding a partner you wanted to stay
Speaker 1: with for life. Quote. It doesn't mean that anymore, he said,
Speaker 1: claiming he was disillusioned about what marriage has turned out
Speaker 1: to be. People aren't necessarily happier when they get married.
Speaker 1: I think you can be a very good partner to
Speaker 1: someone if you have to earn that partnership every day
Speaker 1: rather than be legally bound to do it. Um. So
Speaker 1: another good. Yeah, that sounds that's like fine, Like, but
Speaker 1: that's not what he does. Um, that is very much
Speaker 1: not what he does. Um. It certainly does not jell
Speaker 1: with the picture of the man's relationship styles painted by
Speaker 1: this Forbes profile quote. Niagard went on to have seven
Speaker 1: children with four different women Karina Paca, and eventually gets
Speaker 1: up to ten kids. Karina Paca, a former steward, has
Speaker 1: fought him for years in Ontario courts for child support
Speaker 1: for their then teenage son, and I could argue the
Speaker 1: amount she saw it was excessive and would destroy the
Speaker 1: child's work ethic. Give him a case of affluenza. I know, right,
Speaker 1: what a what a cool guy? Um? Yeah, he's just
Speaker 1: such a slee's ball. Um. But it works really well.
Speaker 1: He's making fucking bank. He's like one of the biggest
Speaker 1: names in fashion. Allegations of sexual harassment in the workplace
Speaker 1: have flittered out around Peter for most of his career.
Speaker 1: We know that. In nineteen eighty, the Winnipeg Free Press
Speaker 1: reported that he'd been charged with the rape of an
Speaker 1: eighteen year old girl by local authorities. Those charges were
Speaker 1: dropped when the complainant refused to testify. I'll give you
Speaker 1: some guesses as to why. Niagard claimed the police had
Speaker 1: used poor judgment in investigating the case. He told the
Speaker 1: Free Press that he planned to finance the creation of
Speaker 1: a foundation to improve the Canadians audicial system. Never happened. Look,
Speaker 1: I want to fix this. We all want to get
Speaker 1: to the bottom of this problem, right, investigating us poor
Speaker 1: innocent men. Yeah, it's poor innocent multi millionaires with at
Speaker 1: this point twenty or thirty sexual assault and rape allegations
Speaker 1: against them. A CBC investigation in the late two thousand
Speaker 1: teens found Forbes says dredged up claims by former employees
Speaker 1: that he'd abused In the nineteen nineties, It's alleged Niagard
Speaker 1: paid to have three sexual harassment complaints settled through the
Speaker 1: Manitoba Human Rights Commission. Since the cases did not go
Speaker 1: to court, no records exist about what these cases were about,
Speaker 1: but the Winnipeg Free Press published articles about the complaints.
Speaker 1: One was from a twenty seven year old travel coordinator
Speaker 1: who claimed she repeatedly brushed off Niagard's touches and sexual advances.
Speaker 1: Another claims Niagard added skinny dipping to the agenda of
Speaker 1: a business meeting. Business events were often held on his
Speaker 1: Bahamanian compound, well Niagard would, according to one employee, frequently
Speaker 1: grabbed himself while wearing a small aithing shoot suit. She complained,
Speaker 1: I would find him in a state of undress, pants open,
Speaker 1: no shirt, or with his hand down the front of
Speaker 1: his pants fondling himself. Gus really subtle, Yeah he's you
Speaker 1: will see a picture. You know what, Sophie, it's time
Speaker 1: to show Margaret a picture of Peter Niard. This count
Speaker 1: time for Margaret to see this man. Yes, this this violates.
Speaker 1: Actually all of us have have have grounds to sue.
Speaker 1: Now sue him for his photo. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: trying to side which I'm gonna I'm just gonna go
Speaker 1: to Google images he's he looks, and then just share
Speaker 1: my screen because I can't. I can't pick one look
Speaker 1: like Ethically, I can't suggest that like people get charged
Speaker 1: with sexual harassment just based on their physical appearance. But
Speaker 1: if you were going to do it, Peter Niagard would
Speaker 1: be the guy. He looks like how Trump thinks he looks. Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: that's exactly how he looks. And he has his hair
Speaker 1: is sucking amazing. No, like um, he's got the like
Speaker 1: silver fox thing down, but in a like creep Yeah,
Speaker 1: like you could. Yeah, he wears. We'll talk about the
Speaker 1: v NEX in a little bit really deep. He he
Speaker 1: was jacked at one point, yeah, but he did. He was.
Speaker 1: He was muscular at c He does look like he
Speaker 1: looks like the bad guy from a Paul Verhoeven movie.
Speaker 1: Like he looks like someone RoboCop would shoot at like
Speaker 1: the like the hour and twenty five minute, or the
Speaker 1: androids will hold over and be like I want more life. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: the androids will accuse him of sexual assault. Incredibly, Um
Speaker 1: he's he's he does also look and this is bury
Speaker 1: inside Baseball for people who live in's name through the
Speaker 1: weather map, Dallas rains. I want that guy to be
Speaker 1: good in every way because if so, yeah, from a
Speaker 1: big dominative determinalists, so I can't imagine he's bad. But okay, okay, no,
Speaker 1: See he looks nice, Peter Niagard, Peter n he looks
Speaker 1: rich in all of his photos, but also like he
Speaker 1: would leave a film if he sat in your car,
Speaker 1: you would have to scrub it, and not just with
Speaker 1: like a spray bottle and a little bit of like
Speaker 1: like a paper towel, Like you need to actually get
Speaker 1: like one of those green scrubby things to really get
Speaker 1: in there, because it's going to get in the crevices.
Speaker 1: The Niagard goo. So when the Free Press reached out
Speaker 1: for comments on the case of him pulling down the
Speaker 1: pant fondling himself in front of an employee, Niagard threatened
Speaker 1: a defamation suit against the paper, the reporter and another employee.
Speaker 1: He was accused of rape again by a Los Angeles
Speaker 1: employee who he later fired. The case was eventually smissed.
Speaker 1: Now none of these all again, this is the eighties
Speaker 1: through the nineties, that none of these allegations do more
Speaker 1: than cause mild talk, right, like, this does not harm
Speaker 1: him in any way. There's not a lot of way
Speaker 1: to search things on the internet, so unless you're really
Speaker 1: paying attention to his life, it's not something you're gonna
Speaker 1: just like drum up the fact that there's these stories
Speaker 1: in fucking Canada about him. Um so now you've got
Speaker 1: to live a life of opulence and semi glamour. He
Speaker 1: co hosted an annual Oscar party in Los Angeles, which
Speaker 1: he build as the Night of a Thousand Stars, actual
Speaker 1: Hollywood in crowd, people knew it as the Night of
Speaker 1: a thousand has Beens because no one but B listers
Speaker 1: tended to show up. It was at one of these
Speaker 1: parties that he may yeah, yeah, yeah, that's a real
Speaker 1: Hollywood burn. And again, the people burning in here are
Speaker 1: probably the people using Epstein as like him, So let's
Speaker 1: not yeah anyway, it's at one of these parties that
Speaker 1: he met Anna Nicole Smith, who he dated from two
Speaker 1: thousand one. After she died of an overdose in two
Speaker 1: thousand seven, he went on Montell Williams to claim that
Speaker 1: he'd tried to get her off drugs, which based on
Speaker 1: some things we'll talk about in a bit, I don't
Speaker 1: think it's likely. Come on, it's very sad. It's a
Speaker 1: real bummer, real bummer. Uh. Now, he had a private
Speaker 1: plane where he did the normal rich guy stuff. They
Speaker 1: put a bar in there, he put stripper poles in
Speaker 1: a bed in there, and like, look, you've got a
Speaker 1: private jet, which you shouldn't, but of course you're gonna
Speaker 1: do some like wacky S seven ship like that. All
Speaker 1: that is worth noting. He's doing this in like the
Speaker 1: eighties and nineties. Um, this is all anyway. Whatever would
Speaker 1: be like it's like led Zeppelin ship. Um. And at
Speaker 1: least one instance, Nygard's seventeen year old girlfriend was filmed
Speaker 1: dancing on one of the poles. So again, Epstein E
Speaker 1: we're not yet getting into the stuff. That's yeah, but
Speaker 1: we're starting to get into the Epstein stuff. Right. Flying
Speaker 1: around children on your your sex plane, that's that's that's
Speaker 1: abstain territory. We're in there, you know, we're we're running deep.
Speaker 1: We've made a first down. That's a basketball term, right,
Speaker 1: So if he's moving right along, Um, I'm gonna quote
Speaker 1: from Forbes here. A former stewardess on his private plane
Speaker 1: told of one incident in which Niagard was accompanied by
Speaker 1: a bevy of topless women. At one point in midflight,
Speaker 1: she recalls Niagard, wild haired and with his bathrobe open,
Speaker 1: began berating her coworker, yelling, you are nothing, you are garbage.
Speaker 1: When the stewardess tried to calm him down, he screamed,
Speaker 1: I am God. Do you not understand. Even after the
Speaker 1: security director intervened, she claims, Niagard continued to rage, shouting,
Speaker 1: this is my plane. I could do whatever the hell
Speaker 1: I want. That's that's the way the rules work. Cool guy,
Speaker 1: Cool guy. I mean they do for him for like decades.
Speaker 1: So that's why he feels that way. He's not like
Speaker 1: making He hasn't like invented this out of peer like
Speaker 1: that would normally be evidence of delusion, but for decades,
Speaker 1: that's the way the world works for Peter. Like, not
Speaker 1: that that's good, but that is the way the world
Speaker 1: works for him because he gets away with all of
Speaker 1: this for an extremely long time. Also, I should note,
Speaker 1: for legal purposes, he denies that story above um, although
Speaker 1: I don't think he'll be suing us anytime soon because
Speaker 1: of where he's located. By far, Peter's most beloved possession. Yes, yeah, um,
Speaker 1: By far Peter's most beloved possession, and the center of
Speaker 1: his image is a care free playboy. Fuck Monster was
Speaker 1: nigred k a chunk of the coastline of New Providence,
Speaker 1: which is in the Bahamas, that he renamed after himself.
Speaker 1: The compound was Mayan themed and it had the look
Speaker 1: of a tropical temple city. I described the build no,
Speaker 1: just just that that way just I have nothing to
Speaker 1: add to that, but that stands for its own. It
Speaker 1: does say a lot, right when you have built your
Speaker 1: own Mayan temple city to yourself in the Bahamas, like
Speaker 1: sovereign country that you have just bought an ignored. Um.
Speaker 1: I would describe the build quality based on what I
Speaker 1: can see is like Disney World quality. Like it looks
Speaker 1: like it was. It looked pretty cool. I'm not gonna lie.
Speaker 1: The Mayan temples didn't look bad. The grand hall was
Speaker 1: thirty two thou square feet with a hundred thousand pound
Speaker 1: glass ceiling. Uh Nigred k was featured on Lifestyles of
Speaker 1: the Rich and the Famous. It hosted celebrities like Oprah,
Speaker 1: who claimed I'm not living large enough after seeing it
Speaker 1: for years. Yeah, yeah, there you go. Of course, Oprah constantly,
Speaker 1: like a little D level villain in like seven or
Speaker 1: eight of Art, moves through it. Yeah, just a little thread,
Speaker 1: just like what's going on with her? She kind of
Speaker 1: seems like she might be up to some evil stuff,
Speaker 1: but also everyone loves her um fun stuff. Anyway. For years,
Speaker 1: the compound was one of the most infamous examples of
Speaker 1: wealthy access on the planet. I want to play a
Speaker 1: clip for you, Margaret from a two thousand four show
Speaker 1: called Life of Luxury. Now. The woman you're gonna hear
Speaker 1: talking first is Bianca Nigred, who's his daughter and at
Speaker 1: this point is the chief of operations for his compound. Hi, welcome,
Speaker 1: nag Key. We have anything you could possibly imagine. Champoline
Speaker 1: out on the water, tennis courts, basketball court, beach, volleyball, pool, volleyballs.
Speaker 1: Every Sunday we have a paper party with nanicures and
Speaker 1: pedicures and massages for I guess this highway of Heathenism
Speaker 1: boast a hundred and fifty thousand square foot wonderlander of excess,
Speaker 1: the ocean, the water slide. There's even a human aquarium
Speaker 1: that's not crazy. I need to pack your back. Sorry.
Speaker 1: The slice of having anchor rent it's the private, utopian
Speaker 1: bachelor pet of this man Canada's clothing magnet. Peter and
Speaker 1: I guard and entry is by invitation only. Personally, I
Speaker 1: enjoyed the electric best when I have friends here with
Speaker 1: which you shareff. It certainly is bigger enough with its
Speaker 1: twenty two mem rooms built without walls, so that last
Speaker 1: bets a little creepy, right without walls, built without walls,
Speaker 1: and the human aquarium that does a shot. It's a
Speaker 1: gross tank in as with a person in a bikini
Speaker 1: in it. It is pretty fucking, pretty fucking Nardi and
Speaker 1: we have not really started into the gross stuff. We've
Speaker 1: started into the gross, but it gets a lot worse.
Speaker 1: For now. You're not going to be surprised to learn
Speaker 1: that a lot of those so called friends that he
Speaker 1: likes to share his compound with, the ones who are
Speaker 1: not celebrities, were extremely young women. Some of them were children.
Speaker 1: A lot of them were children who were trafficked, sometimes
Speaker 1: allegedly against their will, and systemically abused, systematically abused by
Speaker 1: Peter Niagard. We're going to tell that story, and we're
Speaker 1: gonna tell you a lot more in part two. But Margaret,
Speaker 1: if you had tens of millions of dollars compound based
Speaker 1: off of the stolen artistic style of a Central American
Speaker 1: civilization on a Bahamanian island, where you committed a raft
Speaker 1: of felonies, what would it be and what would the
Speaker 1: felonies be? Well, the felonies is that people like that
Speaker 1: would be in the aquarium and they would be in
Speaker 1: there for just long enough to before we lift them
Speaker 1: out again. It's just kind of a perpetual dunking tank
Speaker 1: and anyone who comes can can dunk them in. Um.
Speaker 1: That is that is what I would build. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think I would do like a Khokey amount, But
Speaker 1: the mound is just a mass grave of guys like
Speaker 1: that my throne of bastard spells. Yeah, I think the
Speaker 1: I think the people of the Cookey Amounts would be
Speaker 1: okay with that. Um anyway, Margaret, you got that's that's
Speaker 1: all for part one. You got anything to plug? Well
Speaker 1: after that? Enjoyable? Uh yeah. I have a book that
Speaker 1: is probably out by the time you hear this, called
Speaker 1: we Won't be Here Tomorrow, which includes such stories as
Speaker 1: people programming drones to murder people like we're discussing the
Speaker 1: show in a fictional s because it's fiction. Um. And
Speaker 1: that book is out. And I also a host of
Speaker 1: a podcast called Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff, where
Speaker 1: you can hear um ban things that are sort of
Speaker 1: like this, Um, Margaret Banger, we won't be here tomorrow,
Speaker 1: but we will be back on Thursday. Part two, well done.
Speaker 1: I just thought of that one. Also, I have a
Speaker 1: book called After the Revolution. Find a K Press or
Speaker 1: a K Press has a bunch of indie bookstores you
Speaker 1: can order from. You can also get it from all
Speaker 1: of the regular bookstores. It's it's all over the place.
Speaker 1: Just type the words in and you'll find it. All right, everybody,
Speaker 1: alright Margaret, alright, alright, Sophie, Off we go to Nigrid
Speaker 1: but like in an i R kind of way. Yeah, there,
Speaker 1: there we go. No. Behind the Bastards is a production
Speaker 1: of cool Zone Media. For more from cool Zone Media,
Speaker 1: visit our website cool zone media dot com, or check
Speaker 1: us out on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you get your podcasts.