WEBVTT - It Could Happen Here Weekly 18 0:00:00.120 --> 0:00:03.239 Raffi is the voice of some of the happiest songs 0:00:03.279 --> 0:00:09.040 of our generation, Babyga so who is the man behind 0:00:09.080 --> 0:00:14.000 Baby Bluga. Every human beings wants to feel respected. When 0:00:14.040 --> 0:00:18.439 we start with all good things can grow from there. 0:00:18.640 --> 0:00:22.279 I'm Chris Garcia, comedian, new Dad and host of Finding Raffie, 0:00:22.440 --> 0:00:25.680 a new podcast from My Heart Radio and Fatherly. Listen 0:00:25.720 --> 0:00:28.400 every Tuesday on the I Heart Radio app or wherever 0:00:28.440 --> 0:00:32.680 you get your podcasts. I'm John Gonzalez, the host of 0:00:32.880 --> 0:00:36.680 s i s new podcast, Sports Illustrated Weekly. Sports Illustrated 0:00:36.720 --> 0:00:39.760 has delivered some of the best storytelling in sports for 0:00:39.880 --> 0:00:43.680 seventy years and now that continues. On our show. Each 0:00:43.760 --> 0:00:46.160 week will dive deep into the best stories from around 0:00:46.200 --> 0:00:50.199 the sports world. Sports Illustrated Weekly is available every Wednesday 0:00:50.280 --> 0:00:53.800 on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever 0:00:53.880 --> 0:01:02.400 you get your podcasts. Subscribe now. NFL fans, nothing compares 0:01:02.480 --> 0:01:07.319 to being their Live is a lie and the NFL's 0:01:07.360 --> 0:01:11.400 biggest season ever is now ready for the postseason playoff time. 0:01:11.560 --> 0:01:14.840 We Gotta Win. NFL Playoff tickets are on sale now. 0:01:15.080 --> 0:01:16.840 Don't miss your chance to be a part of the 0:01:16.880 --> 0:01:21.480 post season action on the road to Super Bowl visit 0:01:21.600 --> 0:01:25.200 NFL dot com slash tickets for a complete listing of games. 0:01:25.800 --> 0:01:31.600 That's NFL dot com slash tickets. Hey, everybody, Robert Evans here, 0:01:31.600 --> 0:01:33.399 and I wanted to let you know. This is a 0:01:33.480 --> 0:01:37.080 compiletion episode. So every episode of the week that just 0:01:37.240 --> 0:01:41.280 happened is here in one convenient and with somewhat less 0:01:41.319 --> 0:01:43.960 ads package for you to listen to in a long 0:01:44.000 --> 0:01:46.319 stretch if you want. If you've been listening to the 0:01:46.319 --> 0:01:48.520 episodes every day this week, there's gotta be nothing new 0:01:48.560 --> 0:01:57.200 here for you, but you can make your own decisions. Hey, 0:01:57.200 --> 0:02:01.600 welcome to it could happen here. I'm Garrison, and today 0:02:01.760 --> 0:02:06.040 I'm gonna be talking about some really big things and ideas, 0:02:06.840 --> 0:02:09.360 but hopefully I'll be talking with them in a way 0:02:09.400 --> 0:02:14.480 that contextualizes them and makes you remember that despite their magnitude, 0:02:14.560 --> 0:02:19.200 there's still very real things that you can interact with. Anyway, 0:02:19.280 --> 0:02:22.240 I'll get started and eventually it will kind of make sense. 0:02:23.120 --> 0:02:27.200 So right now we are all living in one massive 0:02:27.320 --> 0:02:31.560 liminal space. For those less online than I am, i'll 0:02:31.560 --> 0:02:35.280 explain what I mean. Liminal spaces became an online meme 0:02:35.360 --> 0:02:38.760 around late twenty nineteen as a term to describe a 0:02:38.760 --> 0:02:42.160 certain type of picture that features architecture, or like just 0:02:42.240 --> 0:02:50.560 a place that looks off familiar, eerie, lonely, yet mesmerizing 0:02:50.639 --> 0:02:54.840 and beautiful. I've been an avid lurker on the liminal 0:02:54.919 --> 0:02:58.679 space subredit for a while now, and there's an undeniable 0:02:58.720 --> 0:03:03.280 allure to these dreamlike photos of buildings and rooms and 0:03:03.440 --> 0:03:07.640 the effect that they have on me. Describing what makes 0:03:07.680 --> 0:03:11.440 a liminal space photo a liminal space photo as opposed 0:03:11.440 --> 0:03:13.960 to just any other regular photo of a building or 0:03:14.040 --> 0:03:18.080 a room can be tricky because, in part the point 0:03:18.160 --> 0:03:21.120 is to elicit a certain feeling without thinking too much 0:03:21.160 --> 0:03:25.880 about the why they're not spooky or scary in the 0:03:25.880 --> 0:03:29.720 traditional sense. The gist of a liminal space photo and 0:03:29.760 --> 0:03:32.680 where it gets its name liminality, is a good place 0:03:32.680 --> 0:03:36.800 to begin to understand what type of feelings these pictures 0:03:36.800 --> 0:03:41.800 are supposed to produce. Liminal refers to a transitional phase 0:03:42.280 --> 0:03:47.000 and the ambiguity and disorientation associated with being inside of 0:03:47.000 --> 0:03:50.880 a threshold, not on either one side, per se, but 0:03:51.200 --> 0:03:55.880 somewhere in between. Now, that threshold can be many things. 0:03:56.400 --> 0:04:00.720 A literal transitionary threshold between certain places is a common one. 0:04:01.080 --> 0:04:05.600 This can include stuff like hallways, and airports. One of 0:04:05.600 --> 0:04:10.360 my favorites, though, is a threshold between time, an ambiguous, 0:04:10.440 --> 0:04:15.320 unspecific nostalgia you can't quite place, but it feels awfully familiar, 0:04:15.560 --> 0:04:20.640 like a dream from childhood. Pictures of weird, indoor, squishy 0:04:20.720 --> 0:04:24.800 playgrounds do this for me. The other threshold is a 0:04:24.839 --> 0:04:28.760 threshold between purpose and use, like a building or room 0:04:28.920 --> 0:04:34.040 designed for a very specific special purpose but now no longer, 0:04:34.120 --> 0:04:37.880 serving that it's empty and out of date, an abandoned mall, 0:04:38.000 --> 0:04:42.599 or cheery birthday party room at an arcade photographed desolate 0:04:42.839 --> 0:04:46.320 and in the dark. There's two other aspects of liminal 0:04:46.360 --> 0:04:51.239 space photos that complement the various thresholds we've mentioned. Usually 0:04:51.320 --> 0:04:55.360 they have no visible people, and there's a sense of artificiality, 0:04:55.880 --> 0:04:59.320 like a lot of fluorescent and artificial lighting, and even 0:04:59.320 --> 0:05:02.960 when there is a sunny outside, it looks fake, like 0:05:03.000 --> 0:05:07.240 a Windows computer screen saver. One of the most popular 0:05:07.279 --> 0:05:10.680 liminal space photos is of an underground bunker in Las 0:05:10.800 --> 0:05:14.240 Vegas that was painted and decorated to look like it's 0:05:14.279 --> 0:05:18.840 outside despite being buried deep within the ground. It's such 0:05:18.839 --> 0:05:21.719 a great example of liminal spaces because it elicits a 0:05:21.760 --> 0:05:25.200 certain type of cognitive dissonance and a distinct lack of 0:05:25.200 --> 0:05:30.240 synchronicity that is difficult to describe. Otherwise. Almost never is 0:05:30.320 --> 0:05:34.960 quote unquote nature the subject of these photos. They nearly 0:05:35.000 --> 0:05:39.760 exclusively focus on very human constructs, particularly ones that no 0:05:39.839 --> 0:05:43.719 longer serve their intended use or maybe never did in 0:05:43.720 --> 0:05:47.599 the first place. So what do I mean by we're 0:05:47.640 --> 0:05:52.039 all in one huge liminal space right now? Well, we 0:05:52.120 --> 0:05:56.280 are in between an historic economic and technological boom, one 0:05:56.320 --> 0:05:59.719 that's produced machines that resemble the magic of old. But 0:06:00.000 --> 0:06:03.200 on the other side of this valley is global climate 0:06:03.240 --> 0:06:07.040 catastrophe and destruction and change, the likes of which humans 0:06:07.080 --> 0:06:10.880 have possibly never seen or at least remembered. We're in 0:06:11.080 --> 0:06:15.560 the transitionary period between these two states, and that disassociation 0:06:15.600 --> 0:06:18.600 of not being fully in either one, that that cognitive 0:06:18.640 --> 0:06:21.960 dissonance can be kind of mind boggling. It's like the 0:06:22.040 --> 0:06:25.880 nervous anticipation right before the roller coaster goes over the peak, 0:06:26.400 --> 0:06:29.480 or that weird feeling of being alone in an empty 0:06:29.560 --> 0:06:36.000 church nursery at night. Similar to liminal space photos, climate 0:06:36.080 --> 0:06:40.520 change transcends a regular perception of time space, and with 0:06:40.600 --> 0:06:46.120 that cause and effect, it's more than just a regular thing, phenomenon, 0:06:46.320 --> 0:06:51.640 or object. While specifically thinking about climate change, philosopher Timothy 0:06:51.680 --> 0:06:58.600 Morton dubbed these massive space time altering objects as hyper objects. Now, 0:06:58.800 --> 0:07:02.599 Morton often writes about things that can't be talked about directly, 0:07:02.800 --> 0:07:04.720 so really the only way to discuss it or get 0:07:04.760 --> 0:07:08.440 into the topic is to orbit around it, associating with 0:07:08.480 --> 0:07:12.000 adjacent ideas or words to get close enough to the 0:07:12.040 --> 0:07:14.880 topic to partially understand it, even if you can't get 0:07:14.960 --> 0:07:19.600 quite there. Other possible examples of hyper objects besides climate 0:07:19.640 --> 0:07:23.760 change can include stuff like black holes, the biosphere, or 0:07:23.840 --> 0:07:27.640 the solar system. But hyper objects don't need to be 0:07:27.840 --> 0:07:31.320 just massive celestial things. They can also be the sum 0:07:31.360 --> 0:07:34.640 total of all nuclear materials on Earth, or the very 0:07:34.840 --> 0:07:38.680 long lasting product of direct human manufacture, such as all 0:07:38.720 --> 0:07:41.960 of the styroform of plastic bags in the world. It 0:07:42.000 --> 0:07:44.880 can also be the sum of all the worlding machinery 0:07:44.960 --> 0:07:49.920 of capitalism or the state. Hyper objects, then, are hyper 0:07:50.280 --> 0:07:53.600 just in relation to some other entity, whether they're directly 0:07:53.640 --> 0:08:00.160 manufactured by humans or not, And hyper objects aren't just collections, systems, 0:08:00.320 --> 0:08:04.760 or assemblages of other objects. They are things in their 0:08:04.800 --> 0:08:08.560 own right, and they affect more than just humans. They 0:08:08.600 --> 0:08:11.960 don't come into being just because humans notice them. They 0:08:12.000 --> 0:08:14.800 will have effects on the world whether or not they 0:08:14.800 --> 0:08:20.000 are observed. One of the more obvious differences between hyper 0:08:20.040 --> 0:08:24.520 objects and ordinary objects that you can't ever actually see 0:08:24.600 --> 0:08:27.960 a hyper object in its totality. You can only ever 0:08:28.040 --> 0:08:32.360 witness a small extension or piece of a hyper object. Now, 0:08:32.480 --> 0:08:35.679 this makes thinking about them kind of intrinsically tricky. It's 0:08:35.720 --> 0:08:39.160 like only seeing a fragmented shadow of a thing and 0:08:39.200 --> 0:08:43.520 the effects that that thing has on all other things. Now, 0:08:43.679 --> 0:08:47.520 the more contrarian listeners might protest that we never see 0:08:47.559 --> 0:08:51.439 all of any object, even ordinary ones. Now, it's obviously 0:08:51.480 --> 0:08:54.840 true that everything we see has a negative side, the 0:08:54.920 --> 0:08:58.240 part behind that we can't actually always look at, but 0:08:58.400 --> 0:09:03.000 can reasonably assume there. Now, the difference is that hyper 0:09:03.040 --> 0:09:07.839 objects transcend not only a regular conception of physical reality, 0:09:07.880 --> 0:09:11.800 but more so our temporal reality. You can hold a 0:09:11.840 --> 0:09:14.600 coffee monk and rotate it around in a pretty short 0:09:14.600 --> 0:09:18.679 amount of time and witnessed each side and angle, Or 0:09:18.720 --> 0:09:20.760 if you want to get really fancy, you could make 0:09:20.800 --> 0:09:23.760 a three sixty scan so you can see a projected 0:09:23.880 --> 0:09:27.160 version of the entire object, Or you know, more simply 0:09:27.280 --> 0:09:29.959 just get three people in a room to all look 0:09:30.000 --> 0:09:32.880 at different sides of the mug, thus forming a consensual 0:09:33.000 --> 0:09:38.000 reality based understanding of the whole object. Now, not only 0:09:38.120 --> 0:09:41.959 can you not hold a hyper object, but even if 0:09:42.000 --> 0:09:44.960 you could, the temporal effects would make it impossible to 0:09:45.160 --> 0:09:49.000 rotate it around to witness the totality of what's being held, 0:09:49.720 --> 0:09:52.560 and it would be way too big for multiple people 0:09:52.559 --> 0:09:57.000 to ever witness all sides of the thing. Quoting from 0:09:57.120 --> 0:10:01.480 Morton's book hyper Objects, The Philosophy and Ecology after the 0:10:01.559 --> 0:10:06.760 End of the World. Quote, consider raindrops. You can feel 0:10:06.800 --> 0:10:09.679 them on your head, but you can't perceive the actual 0:10:09.840 --> 0:10:14.040 raindrop in itself. You can only ever perceive your particular 0:10:14.160 --> 0:10:18.760 anthropomorphic translation of the raindrops. Isn't this similar to the 0:10:18.800 --> 0:10:21.440 rift between weather, which I can feel falling on my head, 0:10:21.679 --> 0:10:26.560 and global climate, not the older idea of local patterns 0:10:26.559 --> 0:10:30.200 of weather, but the entire system. I can think of 0:10:30.280 --> 0:10:33.960 an compute climate in this sense, but I can't directly 0:10:34.120 --> 0:10:37.760 see or touch it. The gap between the phenomenon and 0:10:37.840 --> 0:10:42.120 the thing yawns wide open, disturbing my sense of presence 0:10:42.200 --> 0:10:45.600 and being in the world. Humans have been aware of 0:10:45.880 --> 0:10:49.360 enormous entities, some realism imagined for as long as we 0:10:49.400 --> 0:10:52.160 have existed. But this book is arguing that there is 0:10:52.200 --> 0:10:56.640 something quite special about the recently discovered entities such as climate. 0:10:57.280 --> 0:11:00.400 These entities directly cause us to reflect on our very 0:11:00.440 --> 0:11:04.120 place on Earth and in the cosmos. Perhaps this is 0:11:04.120 --> 0:11:08.080 the most fundamental issue. Hyper objects seem to force something 0:11:08.120 --> 0:11:11.440 on us, something that affects some core idea of what 0:11:11.480 --> 0:11:15.760 it means to exist, what Earth is, what society is. 0:11:16.800 --> 0:11:20.240 There's no doubt that cosmic phenomenon such as meteors and 0:11:20.320 --> 0:11:25.400 blood red moons, tsunami's, tornadoes, and earthquakes have terrified humans. 0:11:25.440 --> 0:11:31.400 In the past, meteors and comets were known as disasters. Literally, 0:11:31.440 --> 0:11:35.880 a disaster is a fallen, dysfunctional, or dangerous or evil 0:11:36.000 --> 0:11:41.599 star disaster. But such disasters take place against a stable backdrop. 0:11:42.320 --> 0:11:47.240 There is the Ptolemaic Aristolian machinery of the stars, which 0:11:47.440 --> 0:11:51.800 hold fixed stars in place. It seems as if there's 0:11:51.800 --> 0:11:55.840 something about hyper objects that is more deeply challenging than 0:11:55.880 --> 0:12:01.720 these disasters. The worries not whether the world will end 0:12:02.040 --> 0:12:05.160 as in the old models of the disaster, but whether 0:12:05.200 --> 0:12:09.079 the end of the world is already happening, or whether 0:12:09.160 --> 0:12:13.600 perhaps it might have already taken place. A deep shuttering 0:12:13.679 --> 0:12:18.599 of temporality then occurs. For one thing, we are inside 0:12:18.679 --> 0:12:21.720 hyper objects, like Jonah in the whale. This means that 0:12:21.800 --> 0:12:24.960 every decision we make is in some sense related to 0:12:25.200 --> 0:12:29.440 hyper objects. These decisions are not merely limited to sentences 0:12:29.480 --> 0:12:32.840 in texts about hyper objects. When I turned the key 0:12:32.920 --> 0:12:35.280 in the ignition of my car, I am relating to 0:12:35.400 --> 0:12:39.360 global warming. When a novelist writes about the immigration to Mars, 0:12:39.880 --> 0:12:44.080 they are relating to global warming. I am one of 0:12:44.080 --> 0:12:47.440 the entities caught in the hyper object that I hear 0:12:47.559 --> 0:12:54.720 call global warming. Different hyper objects have numerous properties in common, 0:12:55.400 --> 0:12:57.800 but for our purposes we're going to discuss the five 0:12:58.040 --> 0:13:02.720 main points of similarity. Hyper Objects are viscous, meaning they 0:13:02.760 --> 0:13:06.360 stick to beings that are involved with them. They are nonlocal, 0:13:06.520 --> 0:13:09.199 in other words, and any local manifestation of the hyper 0:13:09.280 --> 0:13:14.200 object is not directly the hyper object. They involve very 0:13:14.360 --> 0:13:17.880 different temporalities than the human scale ones that were used 0:13:17.920 --> 0:13:21.720 to In particular, some very very large hyper objects have 0:13:21.960 --> 0:13:26.880 a genuine Gaussian temporality. They generate space time vortexes due 0:13:26.920 --> 0:13:31.560 to general relativity, and hyper objects occupy a higher dimensional 0:13:31.640 --> 0:13:36.160 phase space that results in their being invisible to humans 0:13:36.240 --> 0:13:40.480 for stretches of time, and they exhibit their effects inter objectively. 0:13:40.880 --> 0:13:43.160 That is, they can be detected in a space that 0:13:43.240 --> 0:13:48.480 consists of inter relationships between ascetic properties of objects. The 0:13:48.559 --> 0:13:51.520 hyper object is not just a function of our knowledge. 0:13:51.920 --> 0:13:56.000 It is also hyper relative to worms, lemons, and ultra 0:13:56.120 --> 0:14:00.480 violet rays as well as humans. Now, I'm gonna go 0:14:00.520 --> 0:14:04.400 into the five different points of similarity in more detail 0:14:04.480 --> 0:14:08.480 to kind of help flesh out what these things hyper objects, 0:14:08.880 --> 0:14:11.400 what they are, and how they might actually be a 0:14:11.480 --> 0:14:15.800 useful way to think about really big stuff. So, first off, 0:14:16.040 --> 0:14:20.520 viscous hyper objects adhere to any object they touch, no 0:14:20.520 --> 0:14:24.320 matter how hard the objects tries to resist. In this way, 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:28.240 hyper objects overrule ironic distance, meaning that the more an 0:14:28.240 --> 0:14:31.880 object tries to resist a hyper object, the more glued 0:14:31.960 --> 0:14:35.360 to the hyper object it becomes. Now, the more you 0:14:35.440 --> 0:14:38.120 learn about any big topic, the more you'll end up 0:14:38.160 --> 0:14:41.640 noticing it in the world. This is the law of synchronicity. 0:14:41.680 --> 0:14:44.360 But the more you know about climate change, the more 0:14:44.400 --> 0:14:48.440 you realize how perversive it is. The more you discover 0:14:48.520 --> 0:14:51.760 about evolution, the more you realize how much our entire 0:14:51.960 --> 0:14:56.560 physical being is caught in its mesh work. Immediate intimate 0:14:56.560 --> 0:15:00.800 symptoms of hyper objects are very real, vivid, and often painful, 0:15:01.680 --> 0:15:06.640 yet they carry with them this trace of unreality. A 0:15:06.680 --> 0:15:11.840 good example of hyper object viscosity would be radioactive materials. 0:15:12.440 --> 0:15:14.280 The more you try to get rid of them, the 0:15:14.320 --> 0:15:19.200 more you realize you can't. They seriously undermine the notion 0:15:19.480 --> 0:15:24.800 of a way there is no away. Flushing vomit down 0:15:24.840 --> 0:15:27.320 the toilet doesn't make it disappear. It makes its way 0:15:27.360 --> 0:15:30.400 to the ocean or the water treatment facility, and and 0:15:30.440 --> 0:15:34.040 eventually just back to us again. I'll quote from the 0:15:34.040 --> 0:15:38.520 book hyper Objects quote late itself is the most viscous 0:15:38.560 --> 0:15:42.880 thing of all, since nothing can surpass its speed. Radiation 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:47.200 is Sartra's jar of honey par excellence, a luminous honey 0:15:47.280 --> 0:15:51.920 that reveals our bone structure as it seeps around us. Again, 0:15:52.000 --> 0:15:54.880 it's not a matter of making some suicidal leap into 0:15:54.880 --> 0:15:58.520 the honey, but discovering that we are already inside it. 0:16:00.200 --> 0:16:03.880 This is it, folks, This is the ecological interconnectedness. Come 0:16:03.920 --> 0:16:06.320 in and join the fun. But I see that you're 0:16:06.360 --> 0:16:13.400 already here unquote. Yeah, that is a that's fun. The 0:16:13.440 --> 0:16:16.080 next point of similarity, we're to discuss is the molten 0:16:16.400 --> 0:16:21.560 or Gaussian quality. Hyper Objects are time stretched to such 0:16:21.560 --> 0:16:25.320 an extent that they become impossible to hold in the mind. 0:16:26.080 --> 0:16:29.000 Hyper objects are so massive that they refute the idea 0:16:29.040 --> 0:16:33.360 that spacetime is fixed, concrete, and consistent. The size of 0:16:33.440 --> 0:16:36.560 hyper objects can make them basically invisible just because they're 0:16:36.800 --> 0:16:40.560 so big. It's like swimming in Crater Lake in southern Oregon, 0:16:40.680 --> 0:16:43.280 one of the deepest lakes in the world. But it's 0:16:43.280 --> 0:16:47.680 not just deep, it's also very very clear. So the 0:16:47.720 --> 0:16:51.280 water is so deep yet so clear. It's like you're 0:16:51.320 --> 0:16:54.040 swimming in the sky. It's like you're swimming in nothing. 0:16:54.800 --> 0:16:56.680 It would be like if you approach an object and 0:16:56.840 --> 0:17:00.960 more and more objects emerge because we can't see the 0:17:01.120 --> 0:17:05.040 end of them. Hyper objects are necessarily uncanny. They have 0:17:05.160 --> 0:17:09.480 to be. Just like my favorite liminal space photos. Hyper 0:17:09.560 --> 0:17:13.800 objects seem to beckon us further into themselves, making us 0:17:13.880 --> 0:17:17.959 realize that we're already lost inside them. The recognition of 0:17:18.000 --> 0:17:21.679 being caught in hyper objects is precisely a feeling of 0:17:21.840 --> 0:17:29.520 strange familiarity and a familiar strangeness. Next up is nonlocality. 0:17:30.760 --> 0:17:33.800 Hyper Objects are massively distributed in time and space, such 0:17:33.840 --> 0:17:39.160 as any particular local manifestation never actually reveals the totality 0:17:39.200 --> 0:17:42.720 of the hyper object. For example, climate change is a 0:17:42.800 --> 0:17:47.200 hyper object that impacts meteorological conditions such as tornado formations. 0:17:48.119 --> 0:17:54.000 Objects don't feel climate change, but instead experience tornadoes as 0:17:54.040 --> 0:17:58.920 they cause damage in specific places. Thus, nonlocality describes the 0:17:58.960 --> 0:18:02.120 manner in which a hyper object becomes more substantial than 0:18:02.359 --> 0:18:07.840 the local manifestations that they produce, putting moreton again. For 0:18:08.040 --> 0:18:12.159 a flower, nuclear radiation turns its leaves a strange shade 0:18:12.160 --> 0:18:16.320 of red. Global warming for the tomato farmer rots the tomatoes. 0:18:16.840 --> 0:18:20.159 Plastic for the bird, strangles it as it becomes entangled 0:18:20.200 --> 0:18:23.320 in a set of six pack rings. What we are 0:18:23.359 --> 0:18:26.199 really dealing with here are just the aesthetic effects that 0:18:26.240 --> 0:18:30.600 are directly causal. The octopus of the hyper object amits 0:18:30.680 --> 0:18:34.439 a cloud of ink as it withdrawals from access. Yet 0:18:34.440 --> 0:18:37.320 this cloud of ink is a cloud of its effects 0:18:37.359 --> 0:18:43.040 and effects these phenomenon themselves are not global warming or radiation. 0:18:43.520 --> 0:18:47.359 Action at a distance is involved. It's like confusing the 0:18:47.440 --> 0:18:52.920 map with the territory. Hyper Objects cannot be thought up 0:18:52.960 --> 0:18:57.600 as occupying a series of now points in time or space. 0:18:58.320 --> 0:19:01.600 They confound the social and psycho instruments we use to 0:19:01.640 --> 0:19:06.199 measure them. Even digital devices have trouble. Global warming is 0:19:06.240 --> 0:19:09.720 not just a function of our measuring devices yet, because 0:19:09.720 --> 0:19:13.560 it's distributed across the biosphere and beyond, it's hard to 0:19:13.600 --> 0:19:16.800 see it as a unique entity. And yet there it 0:19:16.960 --> 0:19:20.119 is raining down on us, burning down on us, quaking 0:19:20.160 --> 0:19:25.040 the earth, spawning giant hurricanes. Global warming is an object 0:19:25.359 --> 0:19:29.480 of which many things are distributed pieces the rain drops 0:19:29.480 --> 0:19:32.240 falling on my head in northern California, the tsunami that 0:19:32.280 --> 0:19:36.560 pours through the streets of Japanese towns, the increasing earthquake 0:19:36.600 --> 0:19:40.359 activity based on changing pressure on the ocean floor like 0:19:40.440 --> 0:19:43.919 a moving illusion picture. Global warming is real, but it 0:19:43.960 --> 0:19:48.560 involves a massive, counterintuitive perspective shift for us to see it. 0:19:49.760 --> 0:19:53.080 Convincing some people of its existence is like convincing some 0:19:53.480 --> 0:19:57.760 two dimensional flatland people of the existence of apples based 0:19:57.800 --> 0:20:00.800 on the appearance of a morphing circle oular shape in 0:20:00.840 --> 0:20:07.320 their world. Next point of similarity is phasing. So our 0:20:07.400 --> 0:20:11.600 sense of being in a time and inhabiting a place 0:20:12.200 --> 0:20:16.720 depends on forms of regularity, the periodic rhythms of day 0:20:16.720 --> 0:20:20.440 and night, the sun coming up. Only now we know 0:20:20.560 --> 0:20:24.720 that it doesn't really come up. It's now common knowledge 0:20:24.720 --> 0:20:28.280 that the Moon's phases are just the relationship between the 0:20:28.280 --> 0:20:31.160 Earth and the Moon as they circumnavigate to the Sun. 0:20:32.480 --> 0:20:35.000 Hyper objects seem to phase in and out of the 0:20:35.119 --> 0:20:39.320 human world. They occupy a higher dimensional phase space that 0:20:39.440 --> 0:20:42.320 makes them impossible to see as a whole on our 0:20:42.520 --> 0:20:47.199 regular three dimensional human scale basis, but they might appear 0:20:47.240 --> 0:20:51.800 differently to an observer with a higher dimensional view. We 0:20:51.840 --> 0:20:54.600 can only see pieces of a hyper object at a time. 0:20:55.320 --> 0:20:57.840 The reason why they appear non local and temporarily for 0:20:57.960 --> 0:21:03.000 shortened is precisely because of this trans dimensional quality. We 0:21:03.040 --> 0:21:05.919 can only see pieces of them at once, like a 0:21:05.960 --> 0:21:10.080 tsunami or a taste of radiation sickness. If an apple 0:21:10.200 --> 0:21:13.560 were to invade a two dimensional world, first the stick 0:21:13.600 --> 0:21:16.040 people would see some dots as the bottom of the 0:21:16.040 --> 0:21:19.840 apple touched their universe, and then a rapid succession of 0:21:20.040 --> 0:21:24.000 shapes that would appear like an expanding and contracting circular blob, 0:21:24.280 --> 0:21:27.560 diminishing into a tiny circle, possibly a point, and then disappearing. 0:21:28.680 --> 0:21:32.600 That's why you can't directly see climate change. You would 0:21:32.600 --> 0:21:35.440 need to occupy some higher dimensional space to see the 0:21:35.520 --> 0:21:40.320 hyper object unfolding explicitly. Like the people in the two 0:21:40.320 --> 0:21:43.560 dimensional flat land. We can only see brief patches of 0:21:43.600 --> 0:21:47.800 this gigantic object as it intersects with our world. The 0:21:47.840 --> 0:21:52.000 brief patch called hurricane destroys the infrastructure of New Orleans. 0:21:52.760 --> 0:21:55.760 The brief patch called drought burns the planes of Russia 0:21:55.800 --> 0:21:59.320 and the midwestern United States to a crisp our bodies 0:21:59.400 --> 0:22:05.119 itch we yesterday's sunburn, But don't relegate hyper objects as 0:22:05.119 --> 0:22:10.320 a simple abstract notion. Thinking hyper objects as transdimensional real 0:22:10.560 --> 0:22:14.760 things is valuable. Global warming is not simply a mathematical 0:22:14.800 --> 0:22:19.200 abstraction that doesn't really pertain to this world. Hyper Objects 0:22:19.359 --> 0:22:23.119 don't just inhabit some conceptual beyond in our heads or 0:22:23.320 --> 0:22:27.560 out there. They are real objects that affect other objects. 0:22:28.200 --> 0:22:30.760 We tend to only think about hyper objects as they 0:22:30.840 --> 0:22:35.440 phase in and connect to other, more static objects. This 0:22:35.520 --> 0:22:38.960 is a mistake and contributes to non action. Whether or 0:22:39.000 --> 0:22:43.280 not we perceive objects and hyper objects connecting doesn't affect 0:22:43.359 --> 0:22:47.120 the existence and the inevitable effects of the hyper object. 0:22:47.960 --> 0:22:52.080 What we experience as the slow periodic re occurrence of 0:22:52.119 --> 0:22:55.119 a celestial event such as an eclipse or a comet, 0:22:56.080 --> 0:22:59.760 is a continuous entity whose imprint simply shows up on 0:22:59.760 --> 0:23:04.000 our social and cognitive space for a while. The gaps 0:23:04.040 --> 0:23:07.520 I perceive between moments at which my mind is aware 0:23:07.520 --> 0:23:10.240 of the hyper object and moments at which it isn't 0:23:10.800 --> 0:23:15.399 do not matter in relation to the hyper object itself. Okay, 0:23:15.520 --> 0:23:19.679 and now onto our final point of similarity. Inter Objective 0:23:20.359 --> 0:23:25.920 hyper objects are formed by relations between more than one object. Consequently, 0:23:25.960 --> 0:23:30.080 objects are only able to perceive the imprint or footprint 0:23:30.280 --> 0:23:35.040 of a hyper object upon other objects revealed as information. 0:23:36.200 --> 0:23:40.879 It's all an ecological mesh of interconnectedness and inter objectivity. 0:23:41.520 --> 0:23:45.840 For example, climate change is formed by interactions between the sun, 0:23:45.960 --> 0:23:52.120 fossil fuels, carbon dioxide, economic growth, among other things. Yet 0:23:52.400 --> 0:23:56.720 climate change is made apparent through emissions levels, temperature changes, 0:23:56.920 --> 0:24:00.640 and the sea level rising, making it see as if 0:24:00.640 --> 0:24:04.000 global warming is a product of scientific models rather than 0:24:04.080 --> 0:24:09.240 connected to an object that predates its own measurement. Hyper 0:24:09.280 --> 0:24:13.600 objects exist in and between objects and things we deal 0:24:13.640 --> 0:24:18.240 with every day, but it's not simply those objects. Plastic 0:24:18.280 --> 0:24:23.040 bags are not climate change, but those things are both intertwined. 0:24:23.560 --> 0:24:27.320 Hurricanes are not climate change, but they can be a 0:24:27.400 --> 0:24:33.080 shadow like local manifestation of it. A mesh consists of 0:24:33.160 --> 0:24:37.960 relationships between criss crossing strands and the gaps between strands. 0:24:38.600 --> 0:24:42.199 Meshes are a potent metaphor for the strange interconnectedness of 0:24:42.359 --> 0:24:47.280 things and interconnectedness that does not allow for perfect, lossless 0:24:47.280 --> 0:24:52.359 transmission of information, but is instead full of gaps and absences. 0:24:53.080 --> 0:24:56.280 When an object is born, it is instantly a meshed 0:24:56.480 --> 0:25:00.960 into a relationship with other objects in the mesh. The 0:25:01.040 --> 0:25:04.879 mesh isn't inside of all things, but it's on the 0:25:05.119 --> 0:25:09.720 edge or floats on top of all things. Inter objective 0:25:09.880 --> 0:25:14.239 mesh is the extra connecting layer between the mass and 0:25:14.280 --> 0:25:19.800 the mask of all objects, almost like a universal skin fascia. 0:25:21.080 --> 0:25:25.040 Inter objectivity provides a space that is ontologically in front 0:25:25.160 --> 0:25:30.800 of objects in which relational phenomenon can emerge. The massiveness 0:25:30.800 --> 0:25:34.360 and distribution of hyper objects simply force us to take 0:25:34.440 --> 0:25:38.479 note of this fact. Hyper objects provide great examples of 0:25:38.640 --> 0:25:42.280 inter objectivity, namely the way in which nothing has ever 0:25:42.359 --> 0:25:47.199 experienced directly, but only as mediated through other entities in 0:25:47.320 --> 0:25:52.920 some shared consensual space. We never hear the wind in itself, 0:25:53.320 --> 0:25:56.560 only the wind in the door, the wind in the trees. 0:25:57.520 --> 0:26:00.600 This means that for every objective system, there is at 0:26:00.680 --> 0:26:05.040 least one entity that is withdrawn from the relationship. We 0:26:05.160 --> 0:26:08.400 see the footprint of a dinosaur left in some ancient 0:26:08.520 --> 0:26:12.040 rock that was once a pool of mud. The dinosaur's 0:26:12.080 --> 0:26:16.720 reality exists inter objectively. There is some form of shared 0:26:16.800 --> 0:26:21.800 space between the rock, ourselves, and the dinosaur, even though 0:26:21.960 --> 0:26:27.160 the dinosaur isn't there directly. The print of a dinosaur's 0:26:27.200 --> 0:26:30.320 foot in the mud is seen as a foot shaped 0:26:30.440 --> 0:26:34.920 hole in a rock by humans sixty five million years later. 0:26:35.640 --> 0:26:39.880 There is some sensuous connection then, between the dinosaur, the rock, 0:26:40.400 --> 0:26:45.800 and the human, despite their vastly differing time scales. The 0:26:45.880 --> 0:26:51.040 dinosaur footprint in fossilized mud is not a dinosaur. Rather, 0:26:51.200 --> 0:26:54.960 the footprint is a trace of the hyper object evolution 0:26:55.320 --> 0:26:59.840 that joins me, the dinosaur, and the mud together, along 0:27:00.040 --> 0:27:03.359 with the intentional act of holding them in the mind. 0:27:08.960 --> 0:27:12.280 I found the hyper object banner as a useful tool 0:27:12.440 --> 0:27:14.560 to help my brain think about things that are just 0:27:14.840 --> 0:27:18.159 too big, things that have effects so spaced out in 0:27:18.240 --> 0:27:21.239 time that using in our ordinary models of thought are 0:27:21.320 --> 0:27:25.359 just inadequate. You can also reconcile the opposing views that 0:27:25.440 --> 0:27:28.919 cast climate change as the very real series of disasters 0:27:29.680 --> 0:27:32.640 or a complicated, interlocking mess of systems that can feel 0:27:32.720 --> 0:27:37.280 very unreal and overwhelming. Just thinking of big things as 0:27:37.359 --> 0:27:41.320 abstract systems has the habit of divorcing you from the 0:27:41.359 --> 0:27:45.640 real world impacts things like hyper objects can cause. Sometimes 0:27:45.640 --> 0:27:48.680 we forget that climate change is a thing we interact 0:27:48.720 --> 0:27:54.400 with every day and can inform choices we make. Now 0:27:54.480 --> 0:28:00.200 the almost impossible to comprehend totality of our situation. It's 0:28:00.240 --> 0:28:02.879 not great for mental well being. You can end up 0:28:03.080 --> 0:28:07.960 tail spinning down a black hole of fate, conspiracy, coping, denial, 0:28:08.080 --> 0:28:11.320 and doom. It's very easy to trip and fall into 0:28:11.359 --> 0:28:15.080 a void of negation. Things that are hyper objects fundamentally 0:28:15.119 --> 0:28:18.600 break our conception of reality temporality and cause an effect. 0:28:19.200 --> 0:28:22.199 And it's already a really weird time to try to 0:28:22.320 --> 0:28:26.199 suss out reality. We're constantly being bombarded with products and 0:28:26.280 --> 0:28:30.479 services trying to usurp the real That's what marketing is. 0:28:31.080 --> 0:28:34.240 You know. First we had the Internet with its limitless 0:28:34.280 --> 0:28:37.720 possibilities as a digital universe. Then we got the world 0:28:37.800 --> 0:28:42.520 of social media with all of its fractured and fractal realities. 0:28:43.440 --> 0:28:46.240 There's a massive gaming and the allure of getting lost 0:28:46.320 --> 0:28:50.160 within thousands of unique worlds. And now we have VR 0:28:50.520 --> 0:28:55.160 a r and the metaverse, more layers of digital fabrication 0:28:55.280 --> 0:28:59.040 trying to be passed off as an almost hyper reality, 0:28:59.560 --> 0:29:02.400 a prom us to make a reality even more real 0:29:02.480 --> 0:29:07.640 and immersive than our status quo. The Internet itself is 0:29:07.680 --> 0:29:12.440 another hyper object, and all this extra reality can take 0:29:12.480 --> 0:29:16.920 a strain on the human mind. De realization, the perception 0:29:17.000 --> 0:29:21.280 that actual waking reality is an artificial construct. The feeling 0:29:21.280 --> 0:29:24.840 of being de attached from your surroundings, like the world's 0:29:24.840 --> 0:29:28.200 made of cardboard, or you're looking at everything through a 0:29:28.240 --> 0:29:32.360 cloud of fog, is becoming more and more common, especially 0:29:32.400 --> 0:29:36.080 among so called Gen Z, the generation that drew up 0:29:36.080 --> 0:29:40.320 with the Internet being a staple of life. Now. How 0:29:40.360 --> 0:29:43.520 we got here is a disassociation between humans and what 0:29:43.560 --> 0:29:48.000 we call nature or the environment. The problems are getting 0:29:48.000 --> 0:29:51.640 fixed because we're so disassociated from the effects, just as 0:29:51.680 --> 0:29:55.920 the effects are from the cause. That resulting alienation of 0:29:55.960 --> 0:29:59.840 all things makes this worse. All of the worst effects 0:29:59.840 --> 0:30:03.360 that timate change aren't going to be felt for hundreds 0:30:03.360 --> 0:30:06.600 of years. And that is a weird feeling, that is 0:30:06.640 --> 0:30:10.320 cognitive dissonance that I don't know how to understand that, 0:30:10.400 --> 0:30:14.120 and that makes making decisions about our situation now feel 0:30:14.200 --> 0:30:17.320 distant yet also urgent. It's both and it's neither, and 0:30:17.400 --> 0:30:22.440 it's confusing. The resulting alienation of all things makes this worse. 0:30:22.800 --> 0:30:26.600 It produces this lack of immediate and close and proximity consequences. 0:30:27.120 --> 0:30:31.560 We must purposely remove these layers of separation and abandoned 0:30:31.560 --> 0:30:37.400 our anthropocentric thinking. Nature isn't other from us. We are nature, 0:30:37.480 --> 0:30:40.160 It's the same thing. We are all part of this 0:30:40.280 --> 0:30:45.000 big mesh. This, this sacred idea of nature isn't natural 0:30:45.120 --> 0:30:48.000 and can never be naturalized. We have to learn how 0:30:48.040 --> 0:30:52.440 to have an ecology without nature, with without nature as 0:30:52.440 --> 0:30:56.880 a separate thing. To have a genuine ecological view, we 0:30:57.000 --> 0:31:01.680 must relinquish this idea that nature being separate from us, 0:31:01.840 --> 0:31:04.680 once and for all. We have to kill the anthroprasyne 0:31:04.880 --> 0:31:08.760 in our own head. A quote from one of Morton's 0:31:08.800 --> 0:31:14.080 other books titled Ecology Without Nature. Putting something called nature 0:31:14.200 --> 0:31:17.600 on a pedestal and admiring it from afar does for 0:31:17.640 --> 0:31:21.120 the environment what patriarchy does for the figure of a woman. 0:31:21.840 --> 0:31:28.200 It's a paradoxical act of sadistic, possessive admiration. Unquote. So 0:31:28.840 --> 0:31:33.080 within Morton's branch of philosophy, reification, the making of a 0:31:33.120 --> 0:31:36.640 thing into a thing, is precisely the reduction of a 0:31:36.800 --> 0:31:41.800 real object to its sensual appearance. For another object, reification 0:31:42.000 --> 0:31:46.720 is reduction of one's entity to another's fantasy about it. 0:31:47.560 --> 0:31:51.520 Nature is a realification in this sense, and that's why 0:31:51.560 --> 0:31:55.200 we need an ecology without nature. Maybe if we turn 0:31:55.320 --> 0:32:00.000 nature into something more fluid, it might work. Now most 0:32:00.000 --> 0:32:03.640 most of our modern political discourse can be boiled down 0:32:04.440 --> 0:32:07.480 to what things are real and what things are not. 0:32:08.240 --> 0:32:11.360 Hyper objects and climate change don't just play into this debate, 0:32:11.520 --> 0:32:14.880 but crash into it, decimating all the other toys in 0:32:14.960 --> 0:32:19.080 this sandbox. As Morton says, the threat of global warming 0:32:19.160 --> 0:32:23.479 is not only political but also ontological. The threat of 0:32:24.000 --> 0:32:28.920 unreality is the very sign of reality itself. And oh boy, 0:32:29.040 --> 0:32:33.720 do we be experiencing this simultaneous disillusionment of reality and 0:32:33.760 --> 0:32:37.920 the overwhelmingly real presence of hyper objects which stick to us, 0:32:38.000 --> 0:32:42.040 which are us. The worry is not whether the world 0:32:42.080 --> 0:32:45.560 will end, but whether the end of the world is 0:32:45.600 --> 0:32:49.880 already happening, or whether perhaps they might have already taken place. 0:32:51.240 --> 0:32:53.400 The idea of the end of the world is very 0:32:53.440 --> 0:32:57.720 active in environmentalism, but the way it's usually framed kind 0:32:57.760 --> 0:33:01.120 of fosters its own negation. The end of the world 0:33:01.200 --> 0:33:05.160 is coming idea is not really effective, since to all 0:33:05.200 --> 0:33:08.560 types of purposes, the being that we are supposed to 0:33:08.680 --> 0:33:12.720 feel anxiety about and care for is actually already gone. 0:33:13.600 --> 0:33:16.480 This does not mean that there's no hope for ecological 0:33:16.520 --> 0:33:20.240 politics and ethics and a better future. Far from it. 0:33:20.560 --> 0:33:23.560 In fact, Morton and I would argue that the strongly 0:33:23.600 --> 0:33:26.040 held belief that the world's about to end unless we 0:33:26.080 --> 0:33:29.680 act now is paradoxically one of the most powerful factors 0:33:29.720 --> 0:33:34.960 that inhibit a full engagement with our ecological coexistence here 0:33:35.000 --> 0:33:38.760 on Earth. The strategy of the ecological hyper object concept 0:33:39.080 --> 0:33:41.960 is to then awaken us from this dream that the 0:33:41.960 --> 0:33:45.160 world's about to end, because action on Earth, like the 0:33:45.240 --> 0:33:48.120 real Earth, depends on it, the end of the world 0:33:48.200 --> 0:33:53.520 has already happened. Using the hyper object idea helps sort 0:33:53.560 --> 0:33:56.640 out these overly systematic things into a package that I 0:33:56.680 --> 0:34:00.720 can actually think about. There's something about discovering the language 0:34:00.800 --> 0:34:03.680 for a feeling, being able to name it that is 0:34:03.840 --> 0:34:08.600 empowering a way of finding handhold in the dim light 0:34:08.880 --> 0:34:13.400 of confusion, rather than scrambling around in the dark. So 0:34:14.120 --> 0:34:17.719 how would you convince two dimensional flatland people of the 0:34:17.760 --> 0:34:21.279 existence of apples based on the occasional phasing appearance of 0:34:21.320 --> 0:34:25.960 a morphing circular shape in their world. Now, hyper objects 0:34:26.000 --> 0:34:29.319 can really assist in understanding the cognitive dissonance around to 0:34:29.360 --> 0:34:33.120 climate denial. You can't point to something like rising sea 0:34:33.160 --> 0:34:36.480 levels and say that is climate change, because yeah, that 0:34:37.200 --> 0:34:41.319 isn't climate change. The hyper object rising sea levels are 0:34:41.480 --> 0:34:45.160 just an environmental effect, and since the effects are so 0:34:45.280 --> 0:34:48.480 disattached from the cause, that fosters a lot of room 0:34:48.520 --> 0:34:51.960 for cognitive dissonance. When people point at extreme weather and 0:34:52.120 --> 0:34:56.400 call it something else. It's our lack of ecology. Are 0:34:56.400 --> 0:35:01.400 seeing of interconnected things as separate problems or manifestation, missing 0:35:01.480 --> 0:35:04.239 the fact that almost all of our problems don't have 0:35:04.320 --> 0:35:07.600 a shared root cause, but instead are just part of 0:35:07.640 --> 0:35:12.920 a massive, shared bungee cord like mesh network. When so 0:35:13.040 --> 0:35:16.680 many local manifesting problems and actual disasters are blamed on 0:35:16.840 --> 0:35:19.680 climate change, even if you believe climate change is the cause, 0:35:20.400 --> 0:35:23.960 which you know it is, it still feels weird because 0:35:24.000 --> 0:35:27.960 climate change isn't just a simple thing. It's such an 0:35:27.960 --> 0:35:32.400 amorphous shape shifting time traveling idea that for the climate 0:35:32.400 --> 0:35:36.719 denier or climate skeptic, seeing very real physical effects be 0:35:36.840 --> 0:35:40.479 blamed on such an abstract thing is hard for them 0:35:40.560 --> 0:35:45.680 and their understanding of reality. For many people, rejecting hyper 0:35:45.760 --> 0:35:49.600 objects is a lot easier than thinking about them, because 0:35:49.680 --> 0:35:53.000 once you start thinking about them, finding solutions to problems 0:35:53.120 --> 0:35:58.600 so displaced in time it's not only difficult but encourages procrastination. 0:35:59.800 --> 0:36:02.719 The greenhouse gas emissions up there in the air right 0:36:02.760 --> 0:36:06.440 now won't reach their full effects for decades and centuries. 0:36:07.120 --> 0:36:10.640 That's not downplaying the urgency of the problem. In fact, 0:36:10.719 --> 0:36:14.640 that should make the problem more urgent. The cause is 0:36:14.680 --> 0:36:19.240 our brief luxury, and the effect is terror forming the world. 0:36:20.239 --> 0:36:24.759 And we are right now caught in between the uncanny 0:36:24.840 --> 0:36:29.319 hyper object of all liminal spaces. The end of the 0:36:29.320 --> 0:36:32.520 world has already happened. We are on the path and 0:36:32.600 --> 0:36:35.880 about to enter a new world. We are in the 0:36:36.000 --> 0:36:40.120 liminal space hallway of all liminal space hallways. The door 0:36:40.160 --> 0:36:42.799 behind us is closed, and at the other end of 0:36:42.840 --> 0:36:46.279 the hallway is a black hole. We cannot backtrack and 0:36:46.320 --> 0:36:49.400 re enter the door behind us. Already are we getting 0:36:49.400 --> 0:36:52.920 sucked forward into the hallway, But there are many doors 0:36:52.920 --> 0:36:55.520 ahead of us, and we get to choose which one 0:36:55.600 --> 0:36:59.360 to open. At this point, we have passed some of 0:36:59.400 --> 0:37:02.759 the pretty doors, but don't be tricked into thinking that 0:37:02.800 --> 0:37:06.120 there are none left. We must not focus on preserving 0:37:06.200 --> 0:37:08.960 an old way of life, but instead need to carefully 0:37:09.040 --> 0:37:12.919 carve out our new reality. We need to pick our 0:37:13.040 --> 0:37:20.520 new door. Well. That is my essay. Read thing episode 0:37:21.000 --> 0:37:26.000 amalgamation about hyper objects, liminal spaces, and our new reality. 0:37:26.400 --> 0:37:31.520 I hope you found some of the ideas useful um 0:37:31.560 --> 0:37:36.400 despite their kind of abstract and anti abstract nature. If 0:37:36.440 --> 0:37:38.600 you want to learn more about this, I would recommend 0:37:38.680 --> 0:37:43.480 reading Timothy Morton's book hyper Objects Um. It is an 0:37:43.480 --> 0:37:46.279 academic read, but it's not that bad. I would I 0:37:46.280 --> 0:37:48.399 would recommend picking up if you want to learn more 0:37:48.400 --> 0:37:51.399 about these things. I'm sure I'll talk about them more 0:37:51.440 --> 0:37:54.839 in the future. Thank you for listening. Everybody see you 0:37:54.840 --> 0:38:05.000 on the other side. Raffie is the voice of some 0:38:05.160 --> 0:38:11.200 of the happiest songs of our generation. Baby So who 0:38:11.320 --> 0:38:15.200 is the man behind Baby Bluga? Every human being wants 0:38:15.400 --> 0:38:20.120 to feel respected. When we start with young, all good 0:38:20.160 --> 0:38:23.640 things can grow from there. I'm Chris Garcia, comedian, new 0:38:23.719 --> 0:38:26.640 Dad and host of Finding Raffie, a new podcast from 0:38:26.640 --> 0:38:29.880 my Heart Radio and Fatherly Listen every Tuesday on the 0:38:29.920 --> 0:38:32.719 I Heart Radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. 0:38:33.239 --> 0:38:36.160 Look at your children's eyes to see the true magic 0:38:36.280 --> 0:38:39.680 of a forest. It's a storybook world for them. You 0:38:39.840 --> 0:38:42.840 look and see a tree. They see the wrinkled face 0:38:42.880 --> 0:38:46.239 of a wizard with arms outstretched to the sky. They 0:38:46.280 --> 0:38:49.480 see treasure and pebbles. They see a windy path that 0:38:49.520 --> 0:38:53.440 could lead to adventure, and they see you. They're fearless 0:38:53.480 --> 0:38:57.040 guide to this fascinating world. Find a forest near you 0:38:57.200 --> 0:39:00.319 and start exploring it. Discover the Forest dot Org. Brought 0:39:00.360 --> 0:39:02.279 to you by the United States Force Service and the 0:39:02.320 --> 0:39:07.640 AD Council. I'm Jake Halbern, host of deep Cover. Our 0:39:07.680 --> 0:39:10.280 new season is about a lawyer who helped the mob 0:39:10.480 --> 0:39:14.960 run Chicago. We controlled the courts, we controlled absolutely everything. 0:39:15.760 --> 0:39:18.960 He broughbed judges and even helped a hit man walk free, 0:39:19.480 --> 0:39:22.680 until one day when he started talking with the FBI 0:39:22.760 --> 0:39:26.080 and promised that he could take the mob down. I've 0:39:26.120 --> 0:39:28.160 spent the past year trying to figure out why he 0:39:28.200 --> 0:39:31.440 flipped and what he was really after. From my perspective, 0:39:31.600 --> 0:39:33.719 Bob was too good to be true. There's got to 0:39:33.760 --> 0:39:36.479 be something wrong with this I wouldn't trust the guy. 0:39:36.800 --> 0:39:39.720 He looks like a little scum, big lawyer, stool pidgeon. 0:39:39.760 --> 0:39:42.040 He looked like what he was or at. I can 0:39:42.080 --> 0:39:44.640 say with all certainty I think he's a hero because 0:39:44.680 --> 0:39:46.239 he didn't have to do what he did, and he 0:39:46.280 --> 0:39:48.760 did it anyway. The moment I put the wire around 0:39:48.760 --> 0:39:51.960 the first time, my life was over. If it ever 0:39:52.040 --> 0:39:55.360 got out, they would kill me in a heartbeat. Listen 0:39:55.400 --> 0:39:57.600 to deep Cover on the I Heart radio app, Apple 0:39:57.640 --> 0:40:14.120 Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. Welcome to it 0:40:14.160 --> 0:40:21.960 could happen here podcast. I'm Robert Evans. So is that it? 0:40:23.120 --> 0:40:27.840 I'm fortunately, I'm so sorry. All right, well I just 0:40:27.920 --> 0:40:31.560 apologize really quick. If that's a lot to take in. No, 0:40:31.719 --> 0:40:33.880 that was a good introduction. That was a good introduction. 0:40:33.920 --> 0:40:37.000 We got across the gist. Who else is here with you? Robert, 0:40:37.520 --> 0:40:40.600 that's a great question. Is Garrison here? Yeah? I think 0:40:40.640 --> 0:40:46.880 they're here? Is Chris here? Is st Andrew here? I 0:40:47.040 --> 0:40:50.960 am indeed excellent. Um, why don't you take over and 0:40:51.000 --> 0:40:54.800 do and do my job for me? That sounds actually 0:40:54.920 --> 0:40:59.120 good idea, fantastic. It was hopping and everybody, I M say, 0:40:59.200 --> 0:41:03.640 I'm true. Back to guest host yet again. Um. Last 0:41:03.680 --> 0:41:08.839 time we spoke about you know, soft climate change Nile 0:41:09.640 --> 0:41:14.719 and continue the theme of me talking about whatever I 0:41:14.760 --> 0:41:19.160 want to talk about. As for contractual obbligation, UM, today, 0:41:19.200 --> 0:41:21.840 I wanted to explore a concept that I brought up 0:41:21.880 --> 0:41:26.680 one of my recent videos, UM, self and community actualization. 0:41:27.520 --> 0:41:31.440 Yeah right, So first we need to get in some context, 0:41:31.480 --> 0:41:35.360 of course. UM. I mean when most people hear self actualization, 0:41:35.560 --> 0:41:40.120 they probably think of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, right, the 0:41:40.120 --> 0:41:46.759 famous permit that management uh staff tend to use up 0:41:46.760 --> 0:41:53.319 in their offices and such Los Angeles yoga ladies. Uh. 0:41:53.520 --> 0:41:58.160 The context in which I've heard self actualization the most. Yeah, yeah, 0:41:58.200 --> 0:42:03.719 that whole group kind of you know yea. Um. But yeah, 0:42:03.880 --> 0:42:07.839 so self actualization mass' hierarchy of needs, the old psych 0:42:07.960 --> 0:42:10.360 one on one stuff, you know. I mean, it's traditionally 0:42:10.400 --> 0:42:14.360 represented as a pyramid, but it was never how Maslow 0:42:14.480 --> 0:42:18.080 himself actually depicted it. Um. It was actually something that 0:42:19.239 --> 0:42:25.120 later in two preters of his work ran with and popularized. UM. 0:42:25.160 --> 0:42:27.200 And so that as a result of that pyramid, there 0:42:27.200 --> 0:42:30.680 are a lot of you know, critiques of Master's theory 0:42:30.800 --> 0:42:34.560 that don't quite engage with his theory. Would rather engage 0:42:34.560 --> 0:42:40.200 with like interpretations of his theory by other people. But um, 0:42:40.239 --> 0:42:42.759 you know, I think it's still an interesting way to 0:42:42.800 --> 0:42:47.680 depict human needs, and I think it's a good launching 0:42:48.040 --> 0:42:52.080 point to start thinking about and start discussing, you know, 0:42:52.160 --> 0:42:56.560 human needs. Um, what do you'll think you'll are on 0:42:56.600 --> 0:43:01.399 the pyramid right now? Just for posterity sake, Oh, right 0:43:01.480 --> 0:43:06.279 up on the tippy top. I mean, I'm like I've been. 0:43:06.320 --> 0:43:08.480 I've been. I've been very lucky to do exactly like 0:43:08.520 --> 0:43:10.920 what I want to do for a living most of 0:43:10.960 --> 0:43:14.279 my life and and now I own goats, So it 0:43:14.320 --> 0:43:17.520 doesn't get any better than that, including one absolute unit. 0:43:18.120 --> 0:43:26.239 He's fucking massive. He's a chunky buddy. What about Karen? Yes, 0:43:27.680 --> 0:43:30.480 I really don't know. I don't. I don't spend too 0:43:30.520 --> 0:43:33.640 much time thinking about models like this, especially around kind 0:43:33.680 --> 0:43:37.719 of my own my own goals, um and like where 0:43:37.760 --> 0:43:41.120 I see myself. Um, but I don't know. I mean, 0:43:41.160 --> 0:43:45.360 I'm I'm I'm doing like him. I'm I'm relatively stable 0:43:45.400 --> 0:43:49.440 with my like actual physical needs. Um, so I guess yeah, 0:43:49.440 --> 0:43:52.600 I'm just trying to figure out what I actually want 0:43:52.600 --> 0:43:55.239 out of life. Like a lot of younger people, do. 0:43:55.320 --> 0:43:58.480 I guess right, right, So I guess that's more on 0:43:58.600 --> 0:44:06.319 the um esteem, yes, autization side of things. Yeah, And 0:44:06.480 --> 0:44:09.080 it's harder because you can say, like, well, within the 0:44:09.120 --> 0:44:12.200 context of like what is possible, I'm I'm I'm aware, 0:44:12.520 --> 0:44:14.840 I want to be and I'm doing stuff that I 0:44:15.680 --> 0:44:18.840 want to be doing, but also everything feels like a 0:44:18.880 --> 0:44:23.000 disaster around me all the time because the time simon, 0:44:23.080 --> 0:44:25.799 which makes it difficult to be is right. I was 0:44:25.800 --> 0:44:29.320 about to say, is anybody really on the safety needs 0:44:29.480 --> 0:44:35.000 category of of the pyramid? I mean some people like absolutely, yeah, 0:44:35.239 --> 0:44:39.719 but this group, I mean yeah, like we we we are, right, 0:44:40.160 --> 0:44:43.960 there's like a weird there's like a weird disassociation between 0:44:44.840 --> 0:44:49.080 what's actually going on and what we know could be 0:44:49.120 --> 0:44:55.200 going around on in like the larger sphere. That's fair. Yeah, yeah, 0:44:55.400 --> 0:44:57.440 that's that's a very good way of thinking about it. 0:44:57.520 --> 0:45:00.680 Is like, yeah, my immediate needs are met. Am I 0:45:00.920 --> 0:45:04.520 very concerned that large chunks of the places I love 0:45:04.560 --> 0:45:08.920 will be unlivable and you know, there will be that 0:45:09.000 --> 0:45:11.000 we're kind of staring in the face of a variety 0:45:11.000 --> 0:45:15.480 of calamities that that could uh make everything worse for 0:45:15.520 --> 0:45:18.160 me and everybody I care about. Absolutely, but I can't 0:45:18.160 --> 0:45:20.080 do anything about that, right. The other thing I was 0:45:20.120 --> 0:45:23.279 going to point out is that with like with like, 0:45:23.360 --> 0:45:32.440 the physio needs is that includes sleep. Yeah, this is 0:45:32.480 --> 0:45:35.120 who you're talking about, being the sun shining down on 0:45:35.160 --> 0:45:38.000 the pyramid and he gets up there, you know, the sleep. 0:45:38.120 --> 0:45:41.279 The sleep scientists have had their pockets in big bed 0:45:41.360 --> 0:45:49.719 for far too long, the cozy industrial complex problem. It's fine. 0:45:49.800 --> 0:45:51.360 I was just gonna say something relatively. I was going 0:45:51.440 --> 0:45:54.000 to see that, Um, you know, the pyramid, as we 0:45:54.040 --> 0:45:58.520 are discovering in this conversation doesn't really accurately map out, 0:45:59.040 --> 0:46:03.839 you know, me and human psychology really because I mean 0:46:04.080 --> 0:46:07.080 not just because our brains aren't shaped like pyramids, but 0:46:07.120 --> 0:46:11.120 also because at any point in time we can be 0:46:11.239 --> 0:46:16.160 struggling multiple um sections and parts of the needs. So 0:46:16.239 --> 0:46:20.640 for example, we could all be breathing air and drinking 0:46:20.719 --> 0:46:24.759 water and having our food and stuff met right now. Um. 0:46:24.840 --> 0:46:28.799 And you know, you might be like really respected and 0:46:28.840 --> 0:46:31.960 stuff in your field. Um, and you might have a 0:46:32.000 --> 0:46:35.920 certain could sense of self esteem and stuff. But then 0:46:35.960 --> 0:46:39.960 at the same time, you know you're not in a 0:46:40.000 --> 0:46:44.040 safe place, or you may be dealing with like a 0:46:44.080 --> 0:46:49.080 debilitating health condition, or you maybe lack in certain resources 0:46:49.120 --> 0:46:53.759 that you need to like thrive, right, So and then 0:46:54.000 --> 0:46:58.040 or maybe you know you have here food, water, shelter, sleep, 0:46:58.080 --> 0:47:01.880 all that, and you know you're secure and you have 0:47:01.920 --> 0:47:04.840 what you need and whatever, but you have no friends. 0:47:05.160 --> 0:47:09.960 You know, you have no intimacy, no family sense, a 0:47:10.000 --> 0:47:13.479 connection with other people. So you're kind of like living 0:47:13.480 --> 0:47:17.239 in this bubble, just floating through life, you know. I 0:47:17.239 --> 0:47:19.799 mean your bubble is say, if it has what you need, 0:47:19.880 --> 0:47:28.080 but there's not that social aspect. And I think what's 0:47:28.120 --> 0:47:31.399 interesting about this is because as we start to talk 0:47:31.440 --> 0:47:35.239 about massive hierarchy of needs, we start to see the 0:47:35.680 --> 0:47:42.080 structural and societal um impact on you know, our psychology 0:47:42.120 --> 0:47:43.960 and on our needs. Right, Because if you want to 0:47:43.960 --> 0:47:47.319 talk about our safety needs, for example, well let's get 0:47:47.320 --> 0:47:49.480 to stay to the to the bottom, to the basic. 0:47:50.000 --> 0:47:54.040 If you wanna talk about physiological needs, what is now 0:47:54.040 --> 0:47:58.440 a package and commodified product. Right. Food is something that 0:47:58.520 --> 0:48:01.560 is inaccessible to many, not because we don't have enough food, 0:48:01.880 --> 0:48:07.120 but because the distribution of it to meet the needs 0:48:07.120 --> 0:48:10.560 of all. It's not what's prioritized on the capitalism, right, 0:48:11.080 --> 0:48:13.400 there are people who are lacking in shelter, you know, 0:48:13.680 --> 0:48:17.520 um and a lot of people are sleep deprived by 0:48:17.760 --> 0:48:21.759 the systems we're living in. Yeah, m hmm. And the 0:48:21.760 --> 0:48:24.840 same thing with safety. You know, we have based literally 0:48:24.880 --> 0:48:30.480 threatened by climate change, and you know, we are atomized 0:48:30.520 --> 0:48:33.480 from our relationships and stuff because so much of so 0:48:33.560 --> 0:48:36.480 many of us have to work so hard, you know, 0:48:36.680 --> 0:48:40.560 every day, five days a week or more, eight hours 0:48:40.640 --> 0:48:43.080 or more, pretty and it really just strips us of 0:48:43.160 --> 0:48:46.560 our social connections. And there's our esteem needs were sort 0:48:46.560 --> 0:48:50.000 of stripped of that by you know, these commercial messages 0:48:50.000 --> 0:48:53.239 that we get about, like you're not this unless you 0:48:53.320 --> 0:48:57.040 have this, and bye bye bye kind of thing, right, 0:48:57.560 --> 0:49:00.400 And in self actualization isn't even really what's for a 0:49:00.440 --> 0:49:02.760 lot of people because they're still busy trying to reach 0:49:02.800 --> 0:49:06.239 all those other things um or don't even have the 0:49:06.320 --> 0:49:09.440 time to think about or they can become who they 0:49:09.480 --> 0:49:13.279 are um and we get intoide a bit more later 0:49:13.360 --> 0:49:16.160 on in this discussion, But they don't really have the 0:49:16.200 --> 0:49:18.759 time of the sense to think about that because they've 0:49:18.800 --> 0:49:23.480 been so restricted by their circumstances, right, and on top 0:49:23.520 --> 0:49:27.960 of that, restricted by like the messages that they would 0:49:27.960 --> 0:49:29.960 have gotten, you know, whether it be in the school 0:49:30.000 --> 0:49:32.839 system or through ads or whatever. The case may be, 0:49:33.560 --> 0:49:36.799 so I think looking at the pyramid, of course it's 0:49:36.800 --> 0:49:39.800 incomplete and the issues with it, but it does illuminate 0:49:39.840 --> 0:49:43.160 some interesting things that you know we're dealing with right now. 0:49:44.680 --> 0:49:47.560 I mean, yeah, I definitely it's easier to self actualize 0:49:47.560 --> 0:49:50.880 and have esteem once your needs are met. But I 0:49:50.920 --> 0:49:54.359 think definitely there's an ability to jump around, especially when 0:49:54.400 --> 0:49:56.799 you know you have like a large scale depression and 0:49:56.840 --> 0:50:01.960 alienation and disassociation. It is to weird since where you 0:50:02.040 --> 0:50:04.640 can kind of hop around the pyramid quite quite often. 0:50:04.719 --> 0:50:07.560 Even if you have certain things met, this doesn't necessarily 0:50:07.560 --> 0:50:11.239 mean you have something you know above or below. Yeah, 0:50:11.280 --> 0:50:14.800 like I I I when it comes to like actual 0:50:15.320 --> 0:50:18.680 people that I associate with, you know, all of whom 0:50:18.719 --> 0:50:21.680 are folks who have to, like I have to work 0:50:21.880 --> 0:50:25.439 in order to live. I don't think I've ever heard 0:50:25.440 --> 0:50:29.480 anyone talk about happiness in terms of like self actualization. 0:50:29.560 --> 0:50:31.840 It's always in terms of like when I get my 0:50:31.880 --> 0:50:34.120 student loans paid off, you know, when I get my 0:50:34.360 --> 0:50:36.400 when I'm able to take care of this health problem 0:50:36.440 --> 0:50:38.239 that I have, Like when I have enough money. It's 0:50:38.280 --> 0:50:41.360 basically everything boils down to for most people, when I 0:50:41.400 --> 0:50:45.279 have enough money to not be as suffering as much 0:50:45.320 --> 0:50:48.320 from this specific thing, or to not be scared about 0:50:48.360 --> 0:50:52.879 not having enough money, um, which is I think more 0:50:52.920 --> 0:50:55.160 would I get from people when they're talking about like 0:50:55.239 --> 0:50:59.040 aspirational goals than I would like to do this thing 0:50:59.400 --> 0:51:04.520 that that fulfills me as a person. Um. Yeah. Yeah, yes, 0:51:04.640 --> 0:51:07.719 It's like like any any kind of actual self actualization 0:51:07.800 --> 0:51:10.799 becomes this not just a luxury, but a luxury that's 0:51:10.960 --> 0:51:17.440 just unimaginable. Yeah, exactly, exactly. Some people can't even imagine. 0:51:17.680 --> 0:51:19.840 I know people who have just basically given up on 0:51:20.000 --> 0:51:23.319 like ever being able to repay their loans, right Like 0:51:23.400 --> 0:51:26.319 they've just resigned themselves like this is my life now, 0:51:26.520 --> 0:51:30.080 all the tunity, this is this is it, you know, 0:51:30.400 --> 0:51:32.759 and I can't blame them. Who can really blame them? 0:51:32.760 --> 0:51:35.560 When that is the reality, you know for a lot 0:51:35.560 --> 0:51:38.400 of people, taking themselves out to debt is not possible 0:51:38.880 --> 0:51:40.239 even if they did get a whole bunch of the 0:51:40.280 --> 0:51:42.319 money or able to like pay off a bit more 0:51:42.400 --> 0:51:44.680 PU month. You know this love interest rates that're just 0:51:44.800 --> 0:51:50.239 like so badly exploitative that they're basically suits for the 0:51:50.239 --> 0:51:53.560 rest of lives. Of course, we had to have that 0:51:54.080 --> 0:51:58.560 brief moment of Damn the system sucks. As is typical 0:51:58.719 --> 0:52:03.160 on it could happen here. But I want to switch 0:52:03.160 --> 0:52:08.359 shift attention now to another society and another culture that 0:52:08.640 --> 0:52:15.680 has approached this human needs and human psychology and human 0:52:15.719 --> 0:52:20.440 society thing differently. Right. Um, what's been coming to a 0:52:20.440 --> 0:52:25.440 lot more people's attention lateally is that Abraham Maslow, Um 0:52:25.480 --> 0:52:29.640 he was actually partially inspired to develop his theory by 0:52:29.719 --> 0:52:32.600 his stay with the Six Seek of Blackfoot. And I 0:52:32.640 --> 0:52:35.520 went into some of the details on the video on 0:52:35.560 --> 0:52:39.640 my channel, um rethinking Maslow's hierarchy of needs psycho bit 0:52:39.640 --> 0:52:45.640 more in there, but basically, um, what he discovers what 0:52:45.800 --> 0:52:49.360 I get to in that video is that, well, firstly, 0:52:49.840 --> 0:52:53.400 some cultures us as being one self actualized, right like 0:52:53.480 --> 0:52:57.640 the Six Seek of Blackfoot, meaning that's the Blackfoot just 0:52:57.719 --> 0:53:00.040 for a little bit of context, or and indid in 0:53:00.160 --> 0:53:04.279 this people, I think confederation is how they tend to 0:53:04.920 --> 0:53:14.239 refer to themselves in like Montana, I think Idaho, Um yeah, 0:53:14.480 --> 0:53:17.719 up in Canada, Yeah, I kind of like Idaho, Montana 0:53:17.800 --> 0:53:21.560 and parts of Canada, Um, like that's that's Blackfoot territory. 0:53:21.560 --> 0:53:25.120 They were also Maslow spent time with them. L Run 0:53:25.200 --> 0:53:27.400 Hubbard lied about having spent a lot of time with 0:53:27.440 --> 0:53:33.160 the Blackfoot. So I didn't know that. I don't know. Yes, 0:53:34.080 --> 0:53:36.319 there's a lot of scientology law if you have to 0:53:36.320 --> 0:53:40.840 catch up one yeah, but um yeah, so you know, 0:53:40.880 --> 0:53:45.520 with Maslow's model, self auctionalization is essentially, you know, self fulfillment, right, 0:53:45.800 --> 0:53:49.040 the tendency for the individual to become more and more 0:53:49.080 --> 0:53:52.120 what one is and to become everything that one is 0:53:52.120 --> 0:53:56.399 capable of becoming. So us like fulfilling your potential as 0:53:56.880 --> 0:54:00.760 a person, as a partner, as a parent, I talent, 0:54:01.000 --> 0:54:05.080 as a artists, as a whatever, just fulfilling your potential 0:54:05.160 --> 0:54:08.200 as a person. Right. But to say that we are 0:54:08.400 --> 0:54:13.360 born self actualized, um, that framing will looks too seeing 0:54:13.440 --> 0:54:15.680 us each as born in the world with a spark 0:54:15.760 --> 0:54:20.360 of divinity, because of course this is tied into their spirituality. Um, 0:54:20.520 --> 0:54:23.160 born for the spark of divinity and with a great 0:54:23.360 --> 0:54:28.840 purpose embedded in us. And what self actualization is linked 0:54:28.840 --> 0:54:32.759 to in these cultures inextricably linked to that is is 0:54:32.920 --> 0:54:37.960 community actualization. Right. So community actualization is a concept that 0:54:38.040 --> 0:54:42.800 places the actualized individual in the context of community. So 0:54:42.840 --> 0:54:46.200 instead of just upholding the individual alone, which Maslow's hierarchy 0:54:46.200 --> 0:54:51.160 has been critiqued for sort of doing. Community actualization incorporates 0:54:51.160 --> 0:54:55.400 the web of relationships that supports each of us as individuals. Basically, 0:54:55.480 --> 0:55:01.200 it recognizes that we cannot be self actualized solely as 0:55:01.239 --> 0:55:04.960 individuals if there's not like a broader network over at, 0:55:04.960 --> 0:55:07.520 a web that is supports us. You know, we're not 0:55:08.440 --> 0:55:13.319 islands standing, you know. Yeah, yeah, we were, we were. 0:55:13.360 --> 0:55:15.600 We were touching on on on that point a bit, 0:55:15.640 --> 0:55:19.560 a bit previous, but less eloquently. Um, how yeah, it is, 0:55:19.600 --> 0:55:22.600 it is. It's it's it's much easier to have the 0:55:22.640 --> 0:55:27.799 ability to actualize your goals into into actions when you 0:55:27.840 --> 0:55:30.279 are less alienated and you have and you have all 0:55:30.280 --> 0:55:35.319 these other things around around a community. Yeah exactly. Is that. 0:55:35.560 --> 0:55:39.080 I think like the lack of community self actualization is 0:55:39.520 --> 0:55:42.919 kind of what we were talking about in terms of like, yeah, 0:55:42.960 --> 0:55:45.960 things are seeing things are great for me inasmuch as 0:55:46.000 --> 0:55:49.400 things are great, you know, in the system we live in, 0:55:49.480 --> 0:55:52.640 But I I don't feel that, you know, Yeah, you 0:55:52.640 --> 0:55:55.439 can look outside and you're like everything is actually really bad. 0:55:55.480 --> 0:55:57.520 I'm just kind of in my little bubble and I'm 0:55:57.560 --> 0:56:00.319 trying to expand my bubble to be around you know, 0:56:00.520 --> 0:56:04.439 and to help more people, but it can be overwhelming sometimes. Yeah, 0:56:04.440 --> 0:56:06.319 I mean it's only so much one person could do. 0:56:08.040 --> 0:56:10.520 And that's kind of the whole point of community, right. 0:56:10.640 --> 0:56:14.640 Our community supports our basic needs and basically equips us 0:56:14.680 --> 0:56:19.840 to manifest our purpose. So it's a community would be 0:56:19.880 --> 0:56:22.719 there too, for example, and we can get into this 0:56:22.760 --> 0:56:27.359 a bit more designer model of education that supports us 0:56:27.520 --> 0:56:31.239 in expressing our unique gifts. Right. Another part of the 0:56:31.280 --> 0:56:35.719 Six Secret Black philosophy involves cultural perpetuity, where there's an 0:56:35.719 --> 0:56:39.160 important consideration of those who came before and those who 0:56:39.160 --> 0:56:42.640 are coming after, seven generations forward and seven generations backward, 0:56:42.680 --> 0:56:46.759 as I had it explained to me. So that is 0:56:47.080 --> 0:56:50.560 something that I think it would have been useful when 0:56:50.560 --> 0:56:54.720 it came to discussions of um, you know, climate change. 0:56:55.400 --> 0:57:00.239 And it's very relevant now because we are seeing the 0:57:00.280 --> 0:57:04.040 older generations basically struggling and being like, you know, um, 0:57:04.120 --> 0:57:07.040 well it's ends problem now you could take care of it. 0:57:07.200 --> 0:57:10.600 You're in the future kids, all right? Well that yeah, 0:57:11.080 --> 0:57:14.160 when they're basically on the download saying fuck them kids, 0:57:14.200 --> 0:57:18.960 you know, yeah, but can I say that or yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, 0:57:18.920 --> 0:57:20.720 you know, you can always say them kids, I say 0:57:20.760 --> 0:57:27.040 that to Garrison all the time. All right, yeah, yeah, 0:57:27.120 --> 0:57:31.400 But speaking of kids, UM, I think we could compare 0:57:31.400 --> 0:57:36.760 and contrast basically how childhood is approached in our society 0:57:37.440 --> 0:57:40.320 versus how it would be approached in society that values 0:57:40.880 --> 0:57:46.040 community actualization. UM. I mean, and I'm just speaking from 0:57:46.040 --> 0:57:48.720 my experience here. Of course, you're a free talk about 0:57:48.760 --> 0:57:53.600 your own. UM. I from like primary school and stuff. 0:57:54.520 --> 0:57:59.320 I remember it's constantly feeling like I had to compete 0:57:59.440 --> 0:58:03.080 with my fellow um classmates. I mean, you know, I 0:58:03.160 --> 0:58:06.880 was friendly and stuff with everybody and stuff, but since 0:58:06.920 --> 0:58:10.600 I was like usually at or close to the top 0:58:10.640 --> 0:58:13.920 of my class, I always felt this kind of pressure 0:58:14.000 --> 0:58:18.080 to just beat them out and continue to be the 0:58:18.120 --> 0:58:21.040 best gifted kid ever. You know. So there was a 0:58:21.080 --> 0:58:27.640 sense of like constant competition with others that wasn't really 0:58:27.680 --> 0:58:32.800 balanced out with a kind of, um collaborative sort of 0:58:32.840 --> 0:58:38.560 approach to like basically trading us from like an early 0:58:38.600 --> 0:58:41.760 age to learn to cooperate and work with people as 0:58:43.520 --> 0:58:47.840 people and as comrades, you know, although comrade is a 0:58:47.840 --> 0:58:51.360 way way to put it. But yeah, I just remember 0:58:51.400 --> 0:58:53.520 there was a sort of sense of sort of atomization 0:58:53.840 --> 0:59:02.280 that undercuted that sort of educational approach. I I feel 0:59:02.280 --> 0:59:06.600 like that's pretty yuh universal and a lot of a 0:59:06.600 --> 0:59:10.920 lot of parts of our modern world. We definitely really 0:59:11.880 --> 0:59:17.400 embed that sense of competition into very young kids that 0:59:17.520 --> 0:59:20.440 being in school or like wherever. Because yeah, that was 0:59:20.520 --> 0:59:24.320 that was definitely my experience, even even like in private 0:59:24.360 --> 0:59:27.480 school in Canada a long time ago. And I know 0:59:27.600 --> 0:59:31.120 that's that's the thing across you know, across the ocean 0:59:31.160 --> 0:59:34.760 as well, on on the other side of the pond. Yeah, 0:59:35.120 --> 0:59:42.680 we are back. That doesn't sound like us, are we are? 0:59:42.680 --> 0:59:49.680 We really back? Sorry, it's ten am um all right. 0:59:49.840 --> 0:59:55.640 So when we look at like childhood and education and 0:59:55.680 --> 1:00:01.160 stuff in society there would value community actualization. Um, what 1:00:01.240 --> 1:00:03.640 sort of things do you guys think we would be 1:00:03.680 --> 1:00:07.880 seeing in that sort of society? What sort of approaches 1:00:07.960 --> 1:00:10.840 do you think would be embedded from an early age. 1:00:11.960 --> 1:00:14.240 I'm trying to put it into words, so kind of 1:00:14.280 --> 1:00:17.720 one of the things I'm I'm currently in a living 1:00:17.760 --> 1:00:22.080 situation right where I have. I'm working with a group 1:00:22.080 --> 1:00:24.360 of people on a chunk of land, and so every 1:00:24.360 --> 1:00:27.800 week we do projects on it to make it better, um, 1:00:27.840 --> 1:00:32.200 which is tremendously satisfying. And I think in a in 1:00:32.280 --> 1:00:35.960 a society where that kind of self actualization like you've 1:00:35.960 --> 1:00:38.400 been talking about was more common, kids would feel that 1:00:38.480 --> 1:00:43.400 way about doing things, um that improve their community like 1:00:43.520 --> 1:00:46.200 that that that that take care of the people around them, 1:00:46.240 --> 1:00:50.080 that make you know, wherever they live a better place 1:00:50.160 --> 1:00:52.880 to live, Like that would be. That would be in 1:00:52.920 --> 1:00:54.960 the same way that, like I go out each weekend 1:00:55.000 --> 1:00:57.240 thinking that will be a fun thing to do to 1:00:57.360 --> 1:00:59.800 like to improve the place that I'm living. I think 1:00:59.800 --> 1:01:05.160 that would be kind of, um a common feeling like 1:01:05.200 --> 1:01:06.920 that would be a common activity as a kid to 1:01:06.960 --> 1:01:09.840 go engage in projects like that. Yeah, and I mean 1:01:09.880 --> 1:01:12.960 we already see children doing that, right except they do 1:01:13.000 --> 1:01:15.920 it in minecraft. Yes, you know what I mean, Like 1:01:15.960 --> 1:01:19.320 the implix is being directed somewhere currently. This isn't a 1:01:19.360 --> 1:01:21.320 thing you have to This isn't a thing you have 1:01:21.360 --> 1:01:23.960 to like splice in the kids little brains to make 1:01:24.000 --> 1:01:27.000 them want to do it. Kids love making ship exactly. 1:01:27.240 --> 1:01:29.600 Like if you give a child an opportunity and sort 1:01:29.600 --> 1:01:33.480 of facility that like, they a very a lot of them. 1:01:33.600 --> 1:01:36.400 I can't really generalize because I know some kids were 1:01:36.480 --> 1:01:38.200 like you do what you had to do. I want 1:01:38.240 --> 1:01:40.400 to stay in my corner but there a lot of 1:01:40.480 --> 1:01:43.200 kids as well who would be like very very willing 1:01:43.240 --> 1:01:47.680 to be helpful, you know, they really like they just 1:01:48.000 --> 1:01:52.280 a door being a helper and being someone who can support, 1:01:52.280 --> 1:01:54.240 whether it be in the kitchen, you know, with like 1:01:54.280 --> 1:01:57.160 a little broom or whatever, sweeping, whatever the case may be. 1:01:57.160 --> 1:01:59.280 There some my kids don't want to be part of 1:01:59.280 --> 1:02:02.080 a community, you know, because we are social atomos um. 1:02:02.120 --> 1:02:07.080 It's just that right now it's directed at like minecraft, 1:02:07.120 --> 1:02:11.200 supers or whatever. Yeah, I think one of the things 1:02:11.200 --> 1:02:13.320 that I would really focus on, because this is just 1:02:13.400 --> 1:02:17.120 kind of in my experience, is teaching young kids how 1:02:17.280 --> 1:02:21.280 to cook, um and then having them cook or at 1:02:21.360 --> 1:02:24.320 least help cook food for other people. I think it's 1:02:24.320 --> 1:02:27.760 a really great kind of skill to learn. But also 1:02:27.840 --> 1:02:30.360 it it does this weird thing to your brain when 1:02:30.400 --> 1:02:32.920 you do. That's like you you get very happy when 1:02:32.960 --> 1:02:35.720 you cook food for for other people. And I think 1:02:35.720 --> 1:02:39.560 it's it's a really good kind of emotional impulse to 1:02:39.760 --> 1:02:42.000 give kids. It's like, hey, this is you can make 1:02:42.000 --> 1:02:45.880 people feel good by doing things for them, um, And 1:02:46.000 --> 1:02:48.080 because that makes you feel good and it makes them 1:02:48.120 --> 1:02:50.520 feel good, and then that really builds that whole sense 1:02:50.560 --> 1:02:57.120 of community. So yeah, I see. Yeah, yeah, some kids 1:02:57.160 --> 1:03:00.720 could be like but like both self lessness, but it 1:03:00.760 --> 1:03:05.800 also teaches you to like do stuff for yourself as well. Right, 1:03:05.840 --> 1:03:09.600 it's a good skill to be self also be self sustaining. 1:03:09.920 --> 1:03:12.160 So I think that's that's why I really enjoy teaching 1:03:12.240 --> 1:03:14.760 kids cooking. Um. I used to I I used to 1:03:14.760 --> 1:03:17.640 be a culinary instructor because I'm really just passionate about 1:03:18.280 --> 1:03:23.080 that specific thing. Yeah, I mean for me personally, UM, 1:03:23.240 --> 1:03:27.800 I develop an aneurism whenever anyone's in the kitchen with me. Yes, 1:03:29.040 --> 1:03:31.200 I there is definitely moments where if there's too many 1:03:31.200 --> 1:03:34.840 people in a kitchen, that is frustrating. But if if 1:03:34.880 --> 1:03:36.480 you do it right, you can get you can get 1:03:36.480 --> 1:03:40.040 a thirteen year old cooking you an entire like really 1:03:40.280 --> 1:03:43.800 really nice holiday dinner. Um, which is which is what 1:03:43.840 --> 1:03:45.400 I was doing when I was thirteen. I was cooking 1:03:45.680 --> 1:03:48.520 all of the holiday dinners for my entire family, um, 1:03:48.560 --> 1:03:51.760 because I just I wanted to learn cooking. So it's 1:03:51.800 --> 1:03:54.280 it's definitely possible if you're a parent and you want 1:03:54.360 --> 1:03:56.960 less time in the kitchen, uh, teach your kid how 1:03:57.000 --> 1:03:59.880 to cook. I mean I come from a family of 1:04:00.040 --> 1:04:03.480 child cooks, right, I remember um, this one time, I 1:04:03.480 --> 1:04:05.640 think I was making like a cart cake with my 1:04:05.760 --> 1:04:10.440 mom um. But I was used to like licking my 1:04:10.520 --> 1:04:14.120 fingers when you know, you make that cookie cookie dough 1:04:14.200 --> 1:04:19.680 and stuff. But I licked my fingers when the when 1:04:19.680 --> 1:04:24.040 I cracked the egg, she was like, stuff, you can't 1:04:24.040 --> 1:04:26.480 do that, you know, So I just remember that was 1:04:26.480 --> 1:04:28.640 one of the experiences in the kitchen ready stood out 1:04:28.680 --> 1:04:35.120 to me. Lessons lessons will be learned about, like bacteria, yeah, 1:04:35.160 --> 1:04:40.280 you know, it'sience, knives you get get to learn how 1:04:40.280 --> 1:04:42.520 to use knives, get to learn about heat. You know, 1:04:42.600 --> 1:04:44.640 there's a lot of a lot of good lessons you 1:04:44.640 --> 1:04:48.560 can learn inside. I can get firing safety, chemistry, you know, 1:04:49.320 --> 1:04:52.360 of stuff all mixed in there, you know, even math, 1:04:53.160 --> 1:04:56.200 even absolutely fractions. It's one of the only times I 1:04:56.280 --> 1:04:59.880 use fractions is in cooking and baking. Yeah, I mean, 1:05:01.000 --> 1:05:03.520 as embarrassing as it is, I use Google when I 1:05:03.520 --> 1:05:06.800 want to confute measurements still, but I mean it's just there. 1:05:06.840 --> 1:05:10.080 It's more convenient. But yeah, I absolutely agree that example, 1:05:10.160 --> 1:05:12.920 you know, like the use of like cooking lessons and 1:05:12.960 --> 1:05:18.960 that sort of thing to support um, to support like 1:05:19.280 --> 1:05:24.720 kids self actualization. At also the community actualization because of 1:05:24.760 --> 1:05:28.360 my experience, and the thing I default to is different 1:05:28.440 --> 1:05:32.080 versions of like the youth liberation argument. But because of 1:05:32.080 --> 1:05:34.600 how people have been using that term on Twitter right now, 1:05:34.680 --> 1:05:36.720 I don't want to talk about it because it's been 1:05:36.800 --> 1:05:39.560 causing a lot of like really dumb fighting about what 1:05:39.600 --> 1:05:41.880 that term actually means and who coined it and like 1:05:41.960 --> 1:05:44.000 that kind of stuff. But that's kind of where I 1:05:44.160 --> 1:05:48.520 default to in terms of like what self actualization could 1:05:48.560 --> 1:05:51.440 be in a community setting. Youth liberation is one of 1:05:51.520 --> 1:05:56.880 those things that I'm really passionate about UM, and I 1:05:56.880 --> 1:06:00.000 honestly don't know who coined it or what discourse stopped 1:06:00.000 --> 1:06:03.600 and about it right now, but it definitely UM informs 1:06:03.600 --> 1:06:06.640 my approach and ends up influence and like a lot 1:06:06.720 --> 1:06:10.040 of the things that I discuss, Like when if I 1:06:10.160 --> 1:06:14.120 talk about like an issue or whatever UM in society, 1:06:14.520 --> 1:06:17.920 a lot of times it really boils down or starts 1:06:18.560 --> 1:06:21.920 from an early age, it starts through the education system, 1:06:22.080 --> 1:06:26.720 or it's foster there or incubated there. So I think UM, 1:06:27.440 --> 1:06:30.080 a lot more discussion should be happening about, you know, 1:06:30.920 --> 1:06:35.960 the place of young people and the education system and 1:06:36.000 --> 1:06:40.240 stuff UM, alongside, of course all the other struggles and 1:06:40.400 --> 1:06:43.880 discussions and discourses about struggles we've been happen. Yeah, I'm 1:06:43.920 --> 1:06:50.120 trying to view like anarchistic like liberatory frameworks. It's like 1:06:50.200 --> 1:06:54.560 trying to achieve that self actualization and to some degree 1:06:54.600 --> 1:06:56.520 like the the like a steam level, and then also 1:06:56.600 --> 1:06:59.400 like the community and belonging level. Um, even if you 1:06:59.440 --> 1:07:02.320 don't have all of your physical needs met all the time, 1:07:03.000 --> 1:07:06.560 is how these types of frameworks can be can almost 1:07:06.560 --> 1:07:09.800 just like jump around that and be like, despite me 1:07:09.920 --> 1:07:14.240 not having all of these base needs met, if I 1:07:14.240 --> 1:07:17.360 if I have like a radical model of the world, 1:07:17.800 --> 1:07:21.240 I can still try to achieve that type of freedom 1:07:21.280 --> 1:07:24.920 because I can work outside the box to get it. Um. Yeah, 1:07:25.240 --> 1:07:27.120 and I think that that that's kind of what I 1:07:27.160 --> 1:07:29.440 was I was trying to get at, is at least 1:07:29.480 --> 1:07:31.920 on you know, like a like a like whether it 1:07:31.960 --> 1:07:34.160 be like a youth lib framework or just like general 1:07:34.200 --> 1:07:38.680 like radical anarchism in general. Yeah, And I mean parts 1:07:38.680 --> 1:07:42.880 of thinking outside the box involves, you know, looking at 1:07:43.120 --> 1:07:45.919 other people who have thought outside of the box, who 1:07:45.960 --> 1:07:52.600 have reinvented and reconsidered and sort of transformed their approach 1:07:52.680 --> 1:07:58.720 to things like education, child care and really all the 1:07:58.720 --> 1:08:01.480 aspects of society that we take for granted as you know, 1:08:01.600 --> 1:08:05.240 just being a certain way. You know, Um, when we 1:08:05.280 --> 1:08:09.080 talk about things like education and childhood in the place 1:08:09.120 --> 1:08:12.840 that plays and community actualization, I send to think a 1:08:12.920 --> 1:08:14.720 lot about, you know, all the things we can do 1:08:14.760 --> 1:08:17.479 to not fit into into capitalist smooths. You know, it's 1:08:17.520 --> 1:08:21.320 really facilitate folks potential, not just really cooking classes for example, 1:08:21.760 --> 1:08:25.640 but even through you know, workshops and field trips. I 1:08:25.640 --> 1:08:27.599 mean field trips. Now, we're just kind of like this 1:08:28.880 --> 1:08:31.080 saying that you know, kids go to from time to 1:08:31.120 --> 1:08:33.640 time and they after walking a single fire line and 1:08:34.760 --> 1:08:38.120 all these different things. But what I envision when I 1:08:38.200 --> 1:08:41.720 think of you know, learning is something walk into, Like 1:08:43.479 --> 1:08:47.080 less restriction to just the four walls of a classroom 1:08:47.680 --> 1:08:51.120 and more the whole world is your classroom. You know, 1:08:51.200 --> 1:08:54.120 the whole world is a place where you know, you 1:08:54.200 --> 1:08:58.600 can explore, and you can room and you can develop yourself. 1:08:59.080 --> 1:09:05.200 You know, with out all these barriers and controls replace on, 1:09:05.439 --> 1:09:12.160 kids end up suffocating their imagination of what things can be. 1:09:12.520 --> 1:09:15.000 And I mean when you have that sort of educational 1:09:15.120 --> 1:09:18.280 model where you know, the youth are able to explore 1:09:18.320 --> 1:09:22.600 different avenues and direct their own education, routes. You know, 1:09:22.760 --> 1:09:25.880 you also end up, which is what has happened in 1:09:26.840 --> 1:09:31.160 education models that we've seen throughout many different cultures of 1:09:31.160 --> 1:09:35.720 the world. You see that it facilitates relationships with the 1:09:35.760 --> 1:09:39.639 community members, right, and everybody benefits because you have, for example, 1:09:40.280 --> 1:09:46.280 becausn't exactly something like apprenticeships, and you have you know, 1:09:46.439 --> 1:09:49.479 for example, people getting support from the kids in the 1:09:49.600 --> 1:09:55.879 kitchen or you know, in the workshop or in library 1:09:56.040 --> 1:09:58.080 or whatever the case may be. And not only the 1:09:58.160 --> 1:10:02.040 kids about paying their skills, but they're also developing relationships 1:10:02.120 --> 1:10:05.120 with different members of the community with different backgrounds, with 1:10:05.160 --> 1:10:10.080 different experiences. And it released serves almost as I see 1:10:10.120 --> 1:10:13.960 it as a way to God against um, this sort 1:10:14.000 --> 1:10:17.280 of style of parenting where that we just kind of 1:10:17.320 --> 1:10:21.600 seeing popularized lately, where like the child is basically the 1:10:21.680 --> 1:10:26.439 exclusive property of the parents and you can't tell anybody 1:10:26.560 --> 1:10:29.840 how to raise their child and the parent always knows best, 1:10:29.880 --> 1:10:32.360 and that kind of approach. I think it's a good 1:10:32.920 --> 1:10:35.639 and to do to that because the child being exposed 1:10:35.640 --> 1:10:39.320 to a lot more of life and of people. UM. 1:10:40.040 --> 1:10:44.160 I think that to me, UM is the sort of 1:10:44.360 --> 1:10:49.439 youth liberation route that I see developing. It requires of 1:10:49.560 --> 1:10:56.840 course a total transmission. But you know, no proposal could 1:10:56.840 --> 1:11:01.679 really be approach and isolation. Yeah, and it's it's easier 1:11:01.760 --> 1:11:04.639 to achieve when you around other right, It's it's easier 1:11:04.640 --> 1:11:06.799 to once if if you are already in a community 1:11:06.840 --> 1:11:09.720 where these things can be fostered, then it's a lot 1:11:10.040 --> 1:11:13.960 you know, it's a lot less of a lofty goal. Yeah. 1:11:14.640 --> 1:11:17.400 I think that there's a kind of interesting I don't 1:11:17.439 --> 1:11:19.559 know if case studies the right word, but there's part 1:11:19.600 --> 1:11:24.120 of Italy that had a really really long running like 1:11:24.280 --> 1:11:27.680 anarchist education experiments, and so they're basically able to sort 1:11:27.680 --> 1:11:32.360 of refund local school systems and it worked. But you know, 1:11:32.400 --> 1:11:34.640 and they produced a bunch of really good schools, and 1:11:34.880 --> 1:11:36.240 you know, the schools are based in sort of like 1:11:36.600 --> 1:11:38.920 cooperative learning etcetera, etcetera, And you know, I mean the 1:11:38.960 --> 1:11:41.800 model still exists today. But and you know, it's like, yeah, 1:11:41.800 --> 1:11:43.680 they made some of the best schools in Europe, but 1:11:44.840 --> 1:11:48.880 the society around them didn't change, and so sort of bizarrely, 1:11:49.000 --> 1:11:53.320 they ended up making these schools that like produced you know, 1:11:53.479 --> 1:11:55.880 they're they're very good schools. They produced extremely good students, 1:11:55.920 --> 1:11:59.600 but then they also like produced an extremely you know, 1:12:00.040 --> 1:12:04.519 well educated and good like capitalist candre basically. And so 1:12:04.680 --> 1:12:06.560 I think I think there's a sort of you know, 1:12:06.640 --> 1:12:09.040 if if we go back to sort of the community 1:12:09.080 --> 1:12:11.920 aspect of this is like, yeah, there's there's a sense 1:12:11.960 --> 1:12:17.400 to which even even if you have you know, you 1:12:17.479 --> 1:12:19.760 get some form of self actualization, you get some form 1:12:19.800 --> 1:12:22.920 of sort of you know, community and cooperative like education 1:12:22.960 --> 1:12:26.280 for children and stuff like that, the whole society has 1:12:26.360 --> 1:12:28.479 to move with it or otherwise you just wind up 1:12:28.520 --> 1:12:33.360 sort of feeding the beast more effectively. Yeah, yeah, I 1:12:33.400 --> 1:12:35.679 mean that is that you you also see that kind 1:12:35.720 --> 1:12:38.240 of problem with like the we wred guys, right, the 1:12:39.000 --> 1:12:43.200 Adam Newman and and and h the two co founders 1:12:43.240 --> 1:12:45.559 of that came out of an Adam's case at kibbutz 1:12:45.720 --> 1:12:48.040 in Israel, which you know started with from kind of 1:12:48.120 --> 1:12:51.479 socialist foundations, and the other founder had grown up in 1:12:51.560 --> 1:12:54.240 like a commune in rural or again. Uh, and they 1:12:54.320 --> 1:12:57.960 both wound up making like this ultra capitalist real estate company. 1:12:58.080 --> 1:13:01.680 So yeah, if you it's it's you know, there's a 1:13:01.760 --> 1:13:04.320 lot that's said, and there's there's a lot of value 1:13:04.360 --> 1:13:08.760 and kind of like carving out sections of culture for 1:13:09.080 --> 1:13:11.960 the things you believe in to try to um get 1:13:12.080 --> 1:13:14.439 shelter from the storm. But yeah, as you were kind 1:13:14.439 --> 1:13:18.160 of noting, Chris, UM, it does. It does also just 1:13:18.320 --> 1:13:22.760 wind up kind of reinforcing the dominant social system. UM. 1:13:22.920 --> 1:13:27.000 If there's not a kind of more basic upheaval of 1:13:27.439 --> 1:13:30.760 the way things work. Yeah, if there's no you know, 1:13:30.960 --> 1:13:35.040 political philosophy and your goodness and there's no connection with 1:13:35.200 --> 1:13:38.920 you know, broader social movements and sort of confederation with 1:13:39.280 --> 1:13:43.000 other projects, you know, it could very easily be coopted, 1:13:43.200 --> 1:13:46.680 you know, in isolation. And I guess I guess that's 1:13:46.800 --> 1:13:49.160 you know, like that that's what happened to self actualization 1:13:49.320 --> 1:13:51.760 is a concept for the most part, is that it 1:13:51.840 --> 1:13:57.479 got taken over by kind of weird grifters and yeah, 1:13:58.680 --> 1:14:04.640 like self care. Yeah yeah, and take these concepts and 1:14:04.800 --> 1:14:09.400 there's sort of twisted and transformed into um, you know, 1:14:09.520 --> 1:14:16.479 capitalists hands it's even something like um like with there's 1:14:16.680 --> 1:14:21.400 been some interesting discussions happening surrounding like luxury and what 1:14:21.720 --> 1:14:26.760 luxury means around certain within certain circles on Twitter UM 1:14:27.760 --> 1:14:34.519 and Kim Kimberly Foster from for Harriet Excellent YouTube channel UM. 1:14:34.840 --> 1:14:38.920 She mentioned that to her at least is long but 1:14:39.120 --> 1:14:41.760 really good video. She spoke about how lux read to 1:14:41.800 --> 1:14:46.040 who is basically, um, you know, finding the ability to 1:14:46.200 --> 1:14:48.840 rest where you need to rest and to be able 1:14:48.880 --> 1:14:55.960 to be supported. Um, whereas luxury now, but luxury has 1:14:56.160 --> 1:15:02.240 quite popular understanding, it is more so about consumption and consumerism. 1:15:02.760 --> 1:15:06.720 So even when you have something where like and this 1:15:06.920 --> 1:15:10.719 is specific to um, the black experience of course, because 1:15:10.760 --> 1:15:13.280 for a long time, you know, black women have been 1:15:13.360 --> 1:15:19.160 expected to, like um, toil and labor and support not 1:15:19.240 --> 1:15:23.040 only the communities but also engineer as slavery also you know, 1:15:23.120 --> 1:15:26.800 their white masters and that kind of thing. Um, there's 1:15:26.880 --> 1:15:29.719 there was a push for the Black women Luxury movement 1:15:29.960 --> 1:15:35.840 to sort of reclaim you know, a space for black 1:15:35.920 --> 1:15:38.880 women to just be able to enjoy themselves and you know, 1:15:39.000 --> 1:15:44.240 be themselves. But that quickly became something that it's just like, 1:15:44.760 --> 1:15:48.439 you know, just get the bag. Um, just the sort 1:15:48.479 --> 1:15:54.799 of hyper capitalists, hyper consumerist, bougie kind of approach to luxury, 1:15:55.400 --> 1:15:57.840 where the original route to the movement, which was about 1:15:58.760 --> 1:16:01.960 finding rest, sort of lost. And I mean that's a 1:16:02.000 --> 1:16:03.920 bit of a tangent. So I'll try to connect that 1:16:04.040 --> 1:16:06.360 back to what we're saying. Um. I think when it 1:16:06.439 --> 1:16:10.680 comes to things like rest and the ability to rest. UM, 1:16:11.840 --> 1:16:18.960 I think that that's can only really be found in community, 1:16:20.160 --> 1:16:23.960 and if there's a lack of communit community support to 1:16:24.360 --> 1:16:26.519 you know, pick up the slack when you need to 1:16:26.600 --> 1:16:28.519 rest and you need to revive yourself and you just 1:16:28.680 --> 1:16:34.519 need to recharge UM. Barring that, of course, resheople can 1:16:34.680 --> 1:16:37.560 pay for a sort of a full community in a 1:16:37.680 --> 1:16:40.799 sense of having you know, nannies and maids and butlers 1:16:40.920 --> 1:16:43.880 and tutors and all these people to basically support their 1:16:43.920 --> 1:16:49.040 lifestyles and support their freedom. But most people lack that. 1:16:49.600 --> 1:16:53.599 And so I think part of stypt of actualization, as 1:16:54.280 --> 1:17:01.160 you're mentioning earlier, UM, it's ability to rest, and I 1:17:01.240 --> 1:17:06.600 see that as linked with community. Yeah, I think I 1:17:06.600 --> 1:17:10.559 think that definitely ties into our recent discussions on anti 1:17:10.640 --> 1:17:14.680 work and how anti work is a lot more feasible 1:17:14.880 --> 1:17:18.519 if you are in a community support like network and 1:17:18.640 --> 1:17:21.960 right and you have people to rely on. UM and 1:17:22.080 --> 1:17:25.280 definitely like you know, self actualization as the ability to 1:17:26.920 --> 1:17:29.800 like to just rest when you want to, it's a 1:17:29.960 --> 1:17:35.320 very uh, it's very powerful thing and very enticing, and 1:17:35.439 --> 1:17:38.720 that definitely plays into the whole like anti work like 1:17:40.240 --> 1:17:44.519 idea I guess yeah. I mean to connect the anti 1:17:44.840 --> 1:17:49.879 thing to just general you know, unonization and striking efforts. 1:17:50.040 --> 1:17:52.719 Right Like, I was seeing people calling for a general 1:17:52.840 --> 1:17:56.840 strike the other day, um, as if we haven't been 1:17:56.920 --> 1:18:00.400 a lesson, but um they were calling for that, But 1:18:00.960 --> 1:18:05.040 what they were not realizing was that without these structures 1:18:05.080 --> 1:18:08.800 in place to support striking efforts, it's not gonna be enough. 1:18:08.880 --> 1:18:13.400 You know, if people cannot support themselves and their families, 1:18:14.640 --> 1:18:17.200 the strike cannot last. You know, it's only with this 1:18:17.439 --> 1:18:21.439 community and the community coming together to support people can 1:18:21.560 --> 1:18:23.960 they you know, not just fight for the rights in 1:18:24.080 --> 1:18:28.320 the striking and unization context, but also you know, to 1:18:28.439 --> 1:18:32.000 be able to find leisure, to find rest, as with 1:18:32.120 --> 1:18:35.760 the anti work discussion, and so sort of turn this 1:18:36.000 --> 1:18:41.800 to a discussion on organizing more generally. Um. You know, 1:18:41.960 --> 1:18:45.200 we are, at the end of the day, a very 1:18:45.360 --> 1:18:51.400 communal ape and if we were to just focus on 1:18:51.439 --> 1:18:57.800 ourselves as individuals, um, I think as capitalism, in its 1:18:57.960 --> 1:19:01.840 anti social nature exp access to I think we would 1:19:01.840 --> 1:19:06.439 all suffer as a result. You know, our goal as people, 1:19:06.520 --> 1:19:09.800 as any one person, should be not just to you 1:19:09.880 --> 1:19:14.960 knowles ourselves, but also to enrich the worlds of those 1:19:15.040 --> 1:19:21.800 around us, and to cultivate the community that as we 1:19:22.000 --> 1:19:26.439 support they you know, will support us. And I mean 1:19:27.040 --> 1:19:33.719 as we prefigure this sort of you know culture of support, 1:19:34.080 --> 1:19:40.240 of you know, care and of empathy and that sort 1:19:40.280 --> 1:19:45.640 of thing. Um, I think our organizing efforts would as 1:19:45.680 --> 1:19:48.800 a results be a lot more powerful, be a lot 1:19:48.840 --> 1:19:52.960 more potent, um, be a lot more enriching, and a 1:19:53.040 --> 1:20:00.680 lot more imaginative. So and I sending any of you 1:20:00.760 --> 1:20:03.599 have anything else to see, um to sort of bring 1:20:03.640 --> 1:20:12.559 this to a close. Um, I just want to leave, um, 1:20:13.000 --> 1:20:15.400 leave us with some food for thought in terms of 1:20:15.479 --> 1:20:20.320 how we can incorporate community actualization in action, right, Because 1:20:20.320 --> 1:20:22.400 it's one thing to say it will be wonderful to 1:20:22.520 --> 1:20:24.559 have a community to support you in that kind of thing. 1:20:24.680 --> 1:20:29.880 But you know, um, how do people pretty isolated and stuff? 1:20:29.960 --> 1:20:34.680 Right now? Um? So I guess I actually put it 1:20:34.760 --> 1:20:41.760 into sort of five stage kind of approach, starting with 1:20:42.080 --> 1:20:48.400 firstly facilitating collective belonging among diverse groups. Right, So we 1:20:48.479 --> 1:20:53.400 want to look at bringing people together. Obviously they would 1:20:53.400 --> 1:20:58.360 have different backgrounds and different needs, different ones, different personalities, 1:20:59.000 --> 1:21:04.160 but bring people together, um, whether it be at work 1:21:04.520 --> 1:21:09.960 or on the block, or at school or whatever. The 1:21:10.040 --> 1:21:13.519 case we just for a cook cote or for align 1:21:13.920 --> 1:21:18.519 or any kind of party or interaction. Obviously, depending on 1:21:18.600 --> 1:21:21.040 where you are that that may not be the safest 1:21:21.080 --> 1:21:27.479 thing to do, um, considering COVID and everything. But just 1:21:28.600 --> 1:21:31.720 bring people together, not even necessary to proselytize to them 1:21:31.920 --> 1:21:35.680 about anarchism or socialism or whatever, but at the very 1:21:35.800 --> 1:21:41.960 least start connecting the nodes and start connecting the different 1:21:42.040 --> 1:21:45.559 parts that can eventually come together to become something greater, 1:21:45.840 --> 1:21:47.320 you know. I mean, you don't need to wait for 1:21:48.040 --> 1:21:51.280 a calamity. That's onything to happen. But of course we 1:21:51.360 --> 1:21:55.080 have seen as well where natural disasters have broad communities 1:21:55.600 --> 1:22:00.240 together that wouldn't together before. Um. I think, however, it 1:22:00.240 --> 1:22:02.000 would be better to like not wait for that kind 1:22:02.000 --> 1:22:04.840 of thing to happen and to just you know, bring 1:22:04.880 --> 1:22:09.320 people together from now, start some conversations, get things going right, 1:22:09.439 --> 1:22:13.280 and then from there you want to be facilitating solidarity 1:22:13.680 --> 1:22:17.519 in struggle. Right. So whether it be in the solidarity 1:22:17.560 --> 1:22:19.760 is a bit of a buzz would now or at 1:22:19.840 --> 1:22:24.800 least it become a buzz world. But I think whether 1:22:24.840 --> 1:22:30.240 it be with disasterly funds or solarity strikes and protests, 1:22:30.600 --> 1:22:33.960 or you know with basic mutually support you know, whether 1:22:34.040 --> 1:22:40.040 it's material or emotional solidarity in struggle. I think that 1:22:40.200 --> 1:22:44.400 is another crucial part in you know, building community and 1:22:44.640 --> 1:22:49.360 incorporating eventually community actualization, because what that does is it 1:22:49.800 --> 1:22:53.280 shows others that I have your back and you know, 1:22:54.080 --> 1:22:56.479 others able to see that, you know, they can have 1:22:56.640 --> 1:23:00.639 mine as well. UM. It have to build that sense 1:23:00.680 --> 1:23:04.200 of trust. You also want to sort of cultivated probably 1:23:04.240 --> 1:23:06.439 a sense of community pride and a sense of being 1:23:06.439 --> 1:23:09.519 able to rely on community networks. You know, we spoke 1:23:09.520 --> 1:23:14.799 about mutulate networks, but also things like UM skill shares 1:23:15.040 --> 1:23:20.040 or workshops, so UM material support. You know, if somebody 1:23:20.320 --> 1:23:23.120 needs food, being able to support for them to know 1:23:23.720 --> 1:23:27.080 that they have people they can go to to support 1:23:27.080 --> 1:23:29.880 them in their time of need, that is powerful. You know, 1:23:30.000 --> 1:23:33.080 not maing people forget that, Not maning people forget the 1:23:33.240 --> 1:23:37.360 time that they were at their most dire point and 1:23:37.960 --> 1:23:41.160 you know the community stepped up to support them. You know, 1:23:41.720 --> 1:23:46.840 if you want to see UH insurrection in our lifetimes, UM, 1:23:47.479 --> 1:23:51.040 you don't start guns blazing, you know, you start with 1:23:52.439 --> 1:23:56.840 a creative food, you start with a helping hand. You 1:23:56.920 --> 1:24:02.120 start with money if people need it, UM, and then 1:24:02.200 --> 1:24:05.200 from there, you know, you get into the realm of 1:24:05.560 --> 1:24:11.040 community achievements, where your community is collectively able to celebrate 1:24:11.120 --> 1:24:14.639 the things that we have accomplished together, you know, whether 1:24:14.720 --> 1:24:20.679 it be establishing community garden that is able to supplement 1:24:20.960 --> 1:24:25.800 people's um fresh produce supply, or whether it be that 1:24:26.520 --> 1:24:31.400 you know, community has come together and they've fixed something 1:24:31.479 --> 1:24:34.760 that was broken on the street, or even that they've 1:24:34.800 --> 1:24:38.040 come together and we're able to train people with like 1:24:38.280 --> 1:24:42.639 some really helpful skills where they're now able to support 1:24:42.800 --> 1:24:46.160 themselves and bring other things to the table as well. 1:24:46.840 --> 1:24:51.160 And then from there, I think that sort of approach 1:24:51.439 --> 1:25:00.280 would foster fulfillment in community and the figures community actualization. Yeah, 1:25:00.320 --> 1:25:02.800 I mean, and this is this is all. It's a 1:25:02.840 --> 1:25:05.720 big topic. Um. And it's a much bigger topic than 1:25:05.840 --> 1:25:08.760 just like what a what do you what changes do 1:25:08.840 --> 1:25:10.760 you want to make around the edges, like what things 1:25:10.800 --> 1:25:13.600 should people advocate for or even just like advocating that 1:25:13.880 --> 1:25:17.120 that the system be torn down, like as as was 1:25:17.240 --> 1:25:19.679 kind of evident when you asked, how could we build 1:25:22.240 --> 1:25:27.680 a community in which like kids feel more self actualization 1:25:27.800 --> 1:25:30.920 from engaging in the community. Um, And there was that 1:25:31.040 --> 1:25:34.240 kind of blank moment the when you actually talking talk 1:25:34.320 --> 1:25:41.000 about like reconfiguring society at such a fundamental level. Um. 1:25:41.320 --> 1:25:45.200 It's it's a big topic. UM. And it's it's one 1:25:45.280 --> 1:25:48.560 that I think it's important to introduce to people the 1:25:48.680 --> 1:25:52.040 idea like and we really have to be we really 1:25:52.080 --> 1:25:54.200 got to figure this this out. This is this is 1:25:54.320 --> 1:25:58.160 important to like everything we we say we believe. UM. 1:25:58.680 --> 1:26:02.519 Answering this question is going to be key. Uh and 1:26:03.360 --> 1:26:06.560 it's it's it's a tough one. UM. So I don't know. 1:26:06.640 --> 1:26:11.120 I think sometimes uh, people come into episodes we do 1:26:11.240 --> 1:26:13.519 on stuff like this like looking for Okay, well, how 1:26:13.680 --> 1:26:16.120 how are you what's your suggestion for how to do that? 1:26:17.000 --> 1:26:21.160 And at the moment, like I agree with the how 1:26:21.240 --> 1:26:26.479 imperative this is, um, But in terms of actionable stuff, it's, um, 1:26:26.920 --> 1:26:30.400 this is a big open ended question in my head. 1:26:34.120 --> 1:26:35.920 I mean, I think I think Andrew laid out a 1:26:35.960 --> 1:26:38.439 lot of the stuff that we've we've talked about both 1:26:38.520 --> 1:26:41.719 like you know, with within our kind of own community groups, 1:26:42.240 --> 1:26:44.320 in terms of the things in terms of like like 1:26:44.400 --> 1:26:46.879 you know, like connecting nodes and all like the steps 1:26:46.960 --> 1:26:50.479 that we can do to have there be like more 1:26:51.080 --> 1:26:53.840 like more connecting branches of the tree and how to 1:26:54.120 --> 1:26:57.040 strengthen those I think that it's it's a good Yeah, 1:26:57.080 --> 1:26:59.240 it's like we can't We don't know what your community 1:26:59.320 --> 1:27:02.000 is like, or what your what your situation is. All 1:27:02.080 --> 1:27:04.560 we can really say is here's the broad things that 1:27:05.560 --> 1:27:08.080 that you can try or have worked for other people 1:27:08.160 --> 1:27:10.439 in the past, and then based on what your situation is, 1:27:10.520 --> 1:27:18.920 you can apply those plugables. Yeah, pab St Andrew Yes, 1:27:19.040 --> 1:27:21.439 of course. Um, well, you can follow me on Twitter 1:27:21.800 --> 1:27:26.360 at underscore Scene true and of course on YouTube seeing andreids. 1:27:26.439 --> 1:27:29.800 Um check my stuff. You know, I have the video 1:27:30.320 --> 1:27:34.760 on rethinking masters, hierarchy of needs um and some other 1:27:35.720 --> 1:27:40.439 fun practice see things as well. Check it out. Check 1:27:40.479 --> 1:27:45.839 it out, um, and uh uh, stay thinking about stuff. 1:27:47.320 --> 1:27:59.120 Thinking is good. Thinking is good. The Gangster Chronicles podcast 1:27:59.240 --> 1:28:01.960 is a weekly conver station that revolves around the underworld 1:28:02.400 --> 1:28:05.879 and criminals and entertainers to victims, crime and law enforcement. 1:28:05.960 --> 1:28:08.919 We cover all facets of the game against. The Chronicles 1:28:09.000 --> 1:28:12.799 podcast doesn't glorify pro motilicit of activities. We just discussed 1:28:12.840 --> 1:28:16.040 the ramifications and repercussions of these activities, because, after all, 1:28:16.400 --> 1:28:18.760 she played gainst the games you are ultimately rewarded with 1:28:18.840 --> 1:28:22.440 Gainster Prizes. Our Heart Radio is number one for podcasts, 1:28:22.640 --> 1:28:25.040 but don't take our award for it. Find against the 1:28:25.120 --> 1:28:27.800 Chronicles podcast and I Heart Radio app or wherever you 1:28:27.880 --> 1:28:34.000 get your podcasts. I called the Union Hall. I said 1:28:34.000 --> 1:28:36.360 it's a matter of life and death. I think these 1:28:36.400 --> 1:28:39.639 people are planning to kill Dr King. On April four, 1:28:41.120 --> 1:28:43.479 Dr Martin Luther King was shot and killed in Memphis. 1:28:43.880 --> 1:28:47.160 A petty criminal named James Earl Ray was arrested. He 1:28:47.320 --> 1:28:49.479 played guilty to the crime and spent the rest of 1:28:49.520 --> 1:28:54.439 his life in prison. Case closed right, James L. Ray 1:28:55.040 --> 1:28:59.759 was upon for the official story. The authorities would parade 1:29:00.160 --> 1:29:03.600 we found a gun, the James old Raybard in Birmingham 1:29:03.800 --> 1:29:07.120 that killed Dr King. Except it wasn't the gun that 1:29:07.200 --> 1:29:10.479 killed Dr King. One of the problems that came out 1:29:10.640 --> 1:29:14.040 when I got the Ray case was that some of 1:29:14.120 --> 1:29:17.160 the evidence, as far as I was concerned, did not 1:29:17.439 --> 1:29:21.719 match the circumstances. This is the MLK tapes. The first 1:29:21.800 --> 1:29:25.280 episodes are available now. Listen on the I Heart Radio app, 1:29:25.360 --> 1:29:31.200 Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Make sure 1:29:31.240 --> 1:29:33.879 to check out Drink Champs, your number one music podcast 1:29:33.960 --> 1:29:36.680 on the Black Effect podcast Network. Hosts n O r 1:29:36.720 --> 1:29:38.479 E and d J E f N sat down with 1:29:38.640 --> 1:29:42.479 artists and icon Yea, which Vulture called one of most 1:29:42.520 --> 1:29:46.479 significant interviews. I literally had to go like Danos and 1:29:46.520 --> 1:29:48.200 I don't want to have to be the villain. But 1:29:48.320 --> 1:29:51.719 when I went and did the Donda thing, he returns 1:29:52.280 --> 1:29:55.280 and anybody had to sit back and watch the real leader. 1:29:55.640 --> 1:29:58.280 Check out Drink Champs conversation with Yea and many more 1:29:58.439 --> 1:30:01.679 legendary artists each and every on the I Heart Radio app, 1:30:01.720 --> 1:30:04.639 Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. 1:30:13.400 --> 1:30:17.320 Welcome that Could Happen Here a podcast about things falling 1:30:17.360 --> 1:30:19.599 apart and sort of how you can put them back together. 1:30:19.720 --> 1:30:23.080 This is again another mostly things fall Apart episode. UM 1:30:23.160 --> 1:30:26.920 Here with Me is Garrison. Hello, hello, and joining us 1:30:26.960 --> 1:30:31.080 today to talk about well a pretty wide range of things, 1:30:31.240 --> 1:30:34.960 but about the drug war in Mexico, about primorialitaries, and 1:30:35.960 --> 1:30:37.840 I guess also I guess about the Narco State. Is 1:30:37.920 --> 1:30:40.400 Alex Vinia, who is an a socially professor of history 1:30:40.520 --> 1:30:43.720 at Arizona stat University and has written several very very 1:30:43.760 --> 1:30:46.360 good articles that I've read recently. Um Alex, how are 1:30:46.360 --> 1:30:49.439 you doing doing great? Thank you so much for having 1:30:49.520 --> 1:30:51.760 me on. Yeah, thank you, thank you for joining us. 1:30:52.680 --> 1:30:57.640 Um So, I wanted to start by talking about an 1:30:57.760 --> 1:31:02.519 article that you has come fairly recently. Uh, that is 1:31:02.640 --> 1:31:10.080 about essentially the transition, particularly in Guerrero from I guess 1:31:10.240 --> 1:31:15.320 the sort of sixties seventies dirty war in Mexico two 1:31:16.240 --> 1:31:18.839 the drug war, and I guess I wanted to start 1:31:19.080 --> 1:31:22.040 from because I don't I don't think it's a issue 1:31:22.040 --> 1:31:25.360 that's particularly well known. Um. I want to, I guess, 1:31:25.920 --> 1:31:29.679 start with sort of an overview of how we got 1:31:29.760 --> 1:31:32.040 into the sort of dirty war in Mexico in the sixties, 1:31:32.120 --> 1:31:34.360 because I think I don't know, like I think if anyone, 1:31:34.479 --> 1:31:36.840 if people know stuff about this, it tends to be 1:31:37.000 --> 1:31:41.120 the very dramatic sort of like massacre in eight but 1:31:41.479 --> 1:31:44.479 it's been it went on for longer than that, and 1:31:44.640 --> 1:31:46.479 as a sort of deeper history. So can you bring 1:31:46.600 --> 1:31:51.840 us into that, Yeah, for sure. So I'll start off 1:31:51.880 --> 1:31:54.599 by saying that generally, if when most people think about 1:31:54.720 --> 1:31:58.080 dirty wars and and and Cold War Latin America, Mexico 1:31:58.200 --> 1:32:00.760 is probably the last country that they think be one, right, Like, 1:32:00.880 --> 1:32:05.200 there's a certain exceptionalism that Mexico has enjoyed until relatively 1:32:05.280 --> 1:32:11.919 recent and relatively recently UM amongst academics and especially historians 1:32:12.000 --> 1:32:15.080 right where we're in the last ten twenty years, we 1:32:15.120 --> 1:32:18.320 started to uncover Mexico's own version of a dirty war 1:32:18.439 --> 1:32:23.960 that we are more familiar with in other places like Chile, Argentina, Brazil, etcetera. 1:32:24.560 --> 1:32:27.600 UM Mexico's dirty war though, and if people know a 1:32:27.680 --> 1:32:29.640 little bit about this period, like as you mentioned right, 1:32:29.680 --> 1:32:32.360 they know about the infamous student massacre that the local 1:32:32.400 --> 1:32:36.160 in October two ninety eight. But you know, my my 1:32:36.280 --> 1:32:39.160 research focuses on on this the southern state of Guerrero. 1:32:39.240 --> 1:32:41.720 It's on the Pacific coast. It's made famous by the 1:32:41.840 --> 1:32:45.519 resort city of Akapunco. And I wrote a book in 1:32:45.560 --> 1:32:47.840 twenty four published a book in twenty fourteen that really 1:32:47.880 --> 1:32:50.920 traced the emergence of armed resistance in the state of 1:32:50.960 --> 1:32:54.160 Guerrero during the nineteen sixties and seventies. And that was 1:32:54.280 --> 1:32:57.599 my entrance into this idea of of a Mexican dirty war, 1:32:57.800 --> 1:33:02.679 of the Mexican state practice seeing systematic state terrorism against 1:33:02.720 --> 1:33:07.680 political dissidents and in my case, armed guerilla dissidents who 1:33:07.840 --> 1:33:11.240 enjoyed the backing of dozens of rural communities. UM and 1:33:11.520 --> 1:33:15.280 even urban poor working class neighborhoods in places that in 1:33:15.360 --> 1:33:18.760 the late sixties and in early nineteen seventies. That's a 1:33:18.840 --> 1:33:21.240 very regional story, right. That's another thing that kind of 1:33:21.280 --> 1:33:24.160 distinguishes the Mexican Dirty War from from other Latin American 1:33:24.240 --> 1:33:29.000 cases is that the Dirty War was localized to a 1:33:29.120 --> 1:33:32.479 few major cities and then to two very specific locales 1:33:32.520 --> 1:33:36.880 in the countryside, Garretro being the most bloody theater. Um. 1:33:37.320 --> 1:33:40.519 The way that these girla movements emerged, they really began 1:33:40.640 --> 1:33:44.840 as these popular, civic minded social movements in the late fifties, 1:33:44.880 --> 1:33:48.879 early nineteen sixties, and and they protested things like political 1:33:48.920 --> 1:33:53.479 authoritarianism and economic injustice. But they did so essentially within 1:33:53.640 --> 1:33:57.200 the confines of the Mexican constitution. They followed the law. Um, 1:33:57.280 --> 1:34:00.720 you know, Mexico has the the you know that that 1:34:00.880 --> 1:34:03.080 the characteristic in Latin America of having the first great 1:34:03.160 --> 1:34:06.600 social revolution of the twentieth century. Um, you do have 1:34:06.720 --> 1:34:09.839 a post revolutionary government that emerges from the nineteen nineteeent 1:34:09.880 --> 1:34:13.439 revolution that has to pay list service to the radical traditions, 1:34:13.439 --> 1:34:15.720 to the revolutionary traditions that came out of that that 1:34:16.400 --> 1:34:19.439 that movement, and for that reason the Mexican constitution that 1:34:19.880 --> 1:34:22.439 was passed in nineteen seventeen in its time was the 1:34:22.520 --> 1:34:26.400 most radical social democratic even constitution in the Western hemisphere. 1:34:26.920 --> 1:34:30.519 UM and you know, peasant communities compassing the communities in 1:34:30.520 --> 1:34:33.200 the state of believed the letter of the law. So 1:34:33.280 --> 1:34:36.360 when they started to protest, you know, an authoritarian state 1:34:36.479 --> 1:34:40.640 governors um a police violence, army violence, economic injustice. In 1:34:40.680 --> 1:34:43.800 the sixties, they followed the rules and they followed the laws, 1:34:43.960 --> 1:34:46.639 and each time that they did so, they experienced pretty 1:34:46.680 --> 1:34:49.920 horrific instances of both state violence exercised by the military 1:34:49.960 --> 1:34:52.839 and the police, but also everyday forms of violence practiced 1:34:52.920 --> 1:34:55.360 by you know, gun slingers who were working for landed elites. 1:34:55.800 --> 1:34:59.040 And that then radicalized some of these social movements into 1:34:59.080 --> 1:35:01.839 two separate guerrilla movements that were led by rural communist 1:35:01.880 --> 1:35:07.760 school teachers and not ask and movement in particular the 1:35:07.840 --> 1:35:10.320 Party of the Poor. They ended up creating a guerilla 1:35:10.360 --> 1:35:13.280 force of about the high estimates about three hundred fighters. 1:35:13.640 --> 1:35:16.800 A more realistic estimate is somewhere from one fifty to 1:35:16.880 --> 1:35:20.200 two hundred. But the key is that in coastal Guerrero 1:35:20.320 --> 1:35:22.599 and then some of the mountains mountain communities of the Garto. 1:35:23.040 --> 1:35:26.400 They obtain a lot, a pretty substantial amount of popular support, 1:35:26.600 --> 1:35:28.720 which then leads the Mexican government that had been you know, 1:35:28.840 --> 1:35:31.000 ruled by the p r I and it was ruled 1:35:31.040 --> 1:35:32.680 in Mexico, was ruled by the p r I for 1:35:32.760 --> 1:35:35.439 like eight years. Uh, they sent in the military and 1:35:35.520 --> 1:35:38.960 they waged this pretty horrific counter insurgency that that did 1:35:39.040 --> 1:35:43.200 things like disappear people, torture, rape, um. You know, they 1:35:43.320 --> 1:35:47.000 raised entire communities, um. And that's generally what's known as 1:35:47.040 --> 1:35:49.760 the Dirty War in Mexico. It's rural theater. Its main 1:35:49.960 --> 1:35:51.920 rural theater was in a place like Garrido where you 1:35:52.040 --> 1:35:56.360 we think there was almost a thousand disappearances from nineteen 1:35:56.400 --> 1:35:59.640 sixty nine up until the early nineteen eighties. Yeah, what 1:35:59.880 --> 1:36:02.599 are the things that they interested me a lot sort 1:36:02.640 --> 1:36:05.479 of reading through this was that it's sort of weird 1:36:05.560 --> 1:36:07.840 for an insurgency, and that you get aspects of both 1:36:08.080 --> 1:36:11.599 kind of the kind of like classical seventies urban Gurilla movement, 1:36:11.640 --> 1:36:14.040 but it's also it's very much a real movement you have, 1:36:14.920 --> 1:36:15.800 you know, I mean, like one of one of the 1:36:15.840 --> 1:36:18.479 stories you're telling this is about like a group of 1:36:18.479 --> 1:36:20.200 a group of people who did one of the you know, 1:36:20.320 --> 1:36:23.160 like the classic urban seventies thing, which is that you 1:36:23.200 --> 1:36:25.880 know they did they did a bank robbery, and then 1:36:25.960 --> 1:36:28.160 two the people get tortured and the rural guerrilla sort 1:36:28.160 --> 1:36:29.519 of get hunted down. And I was I was wondering 1:36:30.400 --> 1:36:34.240 about the dynamics of this because it seems like like 1:36:34.360 --> 1:36:36.840 there there's it seems like you have these groups that 1:36:36.880 --> 1:36:41.280 are kind of unusually moving back and forward between like 1:36:41.439 --> 1:36:45.559 having bases and cities and having bases in these rural areas. Yeah, 1:36:45.640 --> 1:36:48.800 that's one of the So usually when when when folks 1:36:48.880 --> 1:36:51.559 think about these these guerrilla movements, and in the sixies 1:36:51.600 --> 1:36:53.519 and seventies, they think of them primarily as as a 1:36:53.560 --> 1:36:57.040 as a you know, very fairly typical rural guerrilla movements 1:36:57.120 --> 1:37:01.000 as you just described. But these two movements, one led 1:37:01.000 --> 1:37:03.120 by as the Party of the Poor, the other one 1:37:03.160 --> 1:37:09.439 by Hanada Baska is the a CNRC. From the very onset, 1:37:09.520 --> 1:37:12.920 they tried to connect the rule to the city UM, 1:37:13.000 --> 1:37:16.040 whether it was cities in in Guerrero like UM the 1:37:16.120 --> 1:37:19.040 resort city of Acapulco, particularly working class neighborhoods on the 1:37:19.080 --> 1:37:21.839 outside of the city, or the state capital in Chilpan 1:37:21.920 --> 1:37:25.080 Single which housed the state university. Right, So both of 1:37:25.120 --> 1:37:28.280 these movements made pretty substantial inroads into that community and 1:37:28.360 --> 1:37:31.880 then also into Mexico City. So they tried. Their idea 1:37:32.040 --> 1:37:35.560 was not necessarily to start as a strictly as a 1:37:35.640 --> 1:37:38.640 strictly rural movement, but their idea was always to expand 1:37:39.160 --> 1:37:41.880 because I think to the cities, and I think quite 1:37:42.280 --> 1:37:45.720 rightly they they perceived that what the Mexican state was 1:37:45.760 --> 1:37:47.599 going to do to them was trying to corral them 1:37:47.680 --> 1:37:50.720 in the state of Guerrero and prevent them from logistically 1:37:50.760 --> 1:37:54.040 and politically expanding beyond that. And in the end they 1:37:54.080 --> 1:37:56.360 were That's exactly what happened, um. And that's how these 1:37:56.400 --> 1:37:59.080 movements were ruthlessly crushed. That and it took a lot 1:37:59.120 --> 1:38:02.559 of terror to to separate these armed movements from their 1:38:02.600 --> 1:38:05.080 popular base of support. But a lot of this has 1:38:05.080 --> 1:38:07.000 to do with the fact that both Vaskis and Colonias 1:38:07.000 --> 1:38:10.160 were school teachers and they were involved in union movements 1:38:10.240 --> 1:38:12.840 that were national in scope. Um, they were in moved, 1:38:12.920 --> 1:38:14.880 they were in you know, Luss was in the next 1:38:15.040 --> 1:38:18.400 Communist Party, right, so he had extensive urban experiences and 1:38:18.720 --> 1:38:22.120 networks throughout the country. So their perspective was always to 1:38:22.200 --> 1:38:25.200 connect the rule to the urban particularly because Mexico by 1:38:25.240 --> 1:38:28.000 the seventies was a rapidly urbanizing country, right it was 1:38:28.040 --> 1:38:30.840 going it becomes for the first time and assist well 1:38:31.320 --> 1:38:33.799 first time as his post colonial history, it becomes primarily 1:38:33.920 --> 1:38:38.400 an urban country. So um, So they tried these really 1:38:38.439 --> 1:38:42.560 interesting experiments to try to connect the two theaters. But 1:38:42.720 --> 1:38:44.439 as you as you mentioned, right, they did that typical 1:38:44.520 --> 1:38:49.960 nineteen seventies thing of robbing banks, and their terminology was expropriation, right, um. 1:38:50.200 --> 1:38:53.160 But that that then exposed them to police actions and 1:38:53.360 --> 1:38:55.840 and any time any of their militants were captured, they 1:38:55.880 --> 1:38:59.760 were immediately tortured information you know, that they were interrogated horrifically, 1:39:00.320 --> 1:39:02.400 and that and from intel was used to to hunt 1:39:02.439 --> 1:39:04.960 down their their their their comrades up in the mountains. 1:39:04.960 --> 1:39:07.880 And I think that that's a good place to move 1:39:08.040 --> 1:39:10.800 towards sort of the other side of this, which is 1:39:11.240 --> 1:39:14.680 partially the Mexican state response. But the part, the part 1:39:14.720 --> 1:39:16.719 of it that was really interesting to me was about 1:39:16.880 --> 1:39:20.000 how you know, so so part part part part of 1:39:20.040 --> 1:39:22.040 what these groups are fighting are these sort of very 1:39:22.160 --> 1:39:27.920 very local like to landed elites, and I wonder if 1:39:27.960 --> 1:39:30.920 you could talk a little bit about how these sort 1:39:30.960 --> 1:39:33.560 of local elites merger, are able to merge with and 1:39:33.640 --> 1:39:35.719 sort of like co opt in a lot of ways 1:39:35.840 --> 1:39:40.600 that the military units that are deployed. Yeah, that's one 1:39:40.640 --> 1:39:43.800 of the biggest So let me see how I can 1:39:43.800 --> 1:39:47.000 answer this question, because there's there's so what I what 1:39:47.080 --> 1:39:48.559 I tried to do in this article, and it's part 1:39:48.600 --> 1:39:51.559 of my broader ongoing research, is to kind of connect 1:39:52.439 --> 1:39:54.680 the violence, the state violence of the Mexican Dirty War 1:39:54.760 --> 1:39:56.920 as it as as it happens and get around the 1:39:56.960 --> 1:40:00.400 seventies with with with something else that's happening simuel taneously, 1:40:00.479 --> 1:40:03.240 which is like the so called drug war and the 1:40:03.400 --> 1:40:06.920 exponentially increasing cultivation of drugs in a place like Gereto, 1:40:06.960 --> 1:40:10.000 particularly marijuana and then opium poppies that are used to 1:40:10.160 --> 1:40:13.320 produce heroin. UM. So what I try to do in 1:40:13.360 --> 1:40:15.639 the article that that you're referencing is kind of the show. 1:40:16.040 --> 1:40:19.920 There's a longer history and Guerrero of of how power 1:40:20.400 --> 1:40:23.040 is exercise at the local level and how some of 1:40:23.120 --> 1:40:25.719 these local landed elites are able to weather the nineteen 1:40:25.720 --> 1:40:29.200 ten Mexican Revolution. They're able to weather, the agrarian reform 1:40:29.280 --> 1:40:33.559 efforts that that occurred in the nineteen thirties and forties UM. 1:40:33.800 --> 1:40:36.680 And and really these these families. One of the things 1:40:36.760 --> 1:40:39.920 that that captures my attention of of Guerrero is that, uh, 1:40:40.240 --> 1:40:42.320 how you can tell who's in power by just by 1:40:42.360 --> 1:40:44.720 almost by looking at their last name. Because there's this 1:40:44.840 --> 1:40:48.600 remarkable continuity in the state of who has managed to 1:40:48.720 --> 1:40:51.880 exercise power at the local level political, social, economic power 1:40:52.439 --> 1:40:55.880 um for decades now for generations UM. And you can 1:40:56.000 --> 1:40:59.280 track how power works by looking at families. And in 1:40:59.680 --> 1:41:01.120 what I do in this article is to look at 1:41:01.120 --> 1:41:03.360 a couple of landed elite families that had managed to 1:41:03.360 --> 1:41:07.000 stay in power for decades UM. So there's certain at Landed. 1:41:07.400 --> 1:41:11.200 In this article, I focus on one municipality called which 1:41:11.280 --> 1:41:14.080 is in the hot Lands region of Guerrero. UM. During 1:41:14.600 --> 1:41:16.160 you know, probably from about two thousand and eight to 1:41:16.240 --> 1:41:19.920 two thou fifteen, it was in the top three in 1:41:20.040 --> 1:41:22.920 Mexico for opium and heroin production. So it becomes this 1:41:23.120 --> 1:41:26.840 massive drug producing region. So I go back in time 1:41:27.200 --> 1:41:29.479 and I kind of trace like who was in power 1:41:29.600 --> 1:41:32.360 in this region, who owned land, who owned the resources. 1:41:32.400 --> 1:41:35.800 Throughout the twentieth century and how they were responsible for 1:41:35.920 --> 1:41:39.599 essentially creating this little narco fiefdom as it currently exists, 1:41:40.040 --> 1:41:42.640 and trying to figure out which families were involved. So 1:41:42.720 --> 1:41:44.120 on the one hand, you have these families that have 1:41:44.200 --> 1:41:46.439 been in power from like the nineteen twenties and thirties 1:41:46.479 --> 1:41:48.960 and are still exercising power. And then when we get 1:41:49.000 --> 1:41:51.559 to the nineteen seventies and you have this this horrific 1:41:51.640 --> 1:41:54.280 dirty war, this counterinsurgency that the state in the military 1:41:54.400 --> 1:41:58.480 waging against communities and guerrero that opens up new possibilities 1:41:58.520 --> 1:42:01.240 for new families to come in and to ally themselves 1:42:01.280 --> 1:42:05.160 with locally stationed UH military units, and they work together 1:42:05.320 --> 1:42:08.439 to wipe out guerillas and guerilla supporters at the and 1:42:08.640 --> 1:42:10.439 at the same time they start to you know, kind 1:42:10.439 --> 1:42:13.639 of dip their toe into this this world of narcotics production. 1:42:13.880 --> 1:42:16.479 Because really in Mexico in the nineteen seven especially by 1:42:16.479 --> 1:42:19.120 the night mid nineteen seventies, it becomes a number one 1:42:19.280 --> 1:42:23.000 prior of of marijuana and heroin to the United States um. 1:42:23.040 --> 1:42:25.160 And this is part of just a broader global history 1:42:25.200 --> 1:42:29.040 of narcotics. Right there's US lad drug interdiction efforts in 1:42:29.080 --> 1:42:33.799 places like Turkey, Afghanistan and in the in Southeast Asia, 1:42:34.200 --> 1:42:37.639 and efforts to suppress the drug drug production there creates 1:42:37.720 --> 1:42:39.519 this you know what what what people usually refer to 1:42:39.560 --> 1:42:42.320 as a balloon effect. Uh, it just displaces the drug 1:42:42.400 --> 1:42:44.680 production somewhere else because the demand in the US is 1:42:44.720 --> 1:42:47.879 still there. And that because in that creates in Mexico 1:42:48.320 --> 1:42:51.080 the number one provider of narcotics by the mid nineteen seventies, 1:42:51.120 --> 1:42:52.840 and that then has an impact locally in the place 1:42:52.880 --> 1:42:56.760 of Guerrero, which is again simultaneously experiencing a grill insurgency, 1:42:56.840 --> 1:42:59.400 a dirty war, and then also the ramping up of 1:42:59.439 --> 1:43:02.720 drug product shoot. One of the most interesting parts of 1:43:02.800 --> 1:43:06.000 this that I didn't know about was about how, I 1:43:06.040 --> 1:43:10.080 mean they're like how how explicitly because I've read a 1:43:10.160 --> 1:43:11.880 lot of while not a lot, but I've read about 1:43:12.680 --> 1:43:17.080 a lot of how, particularly like after like when when 1:43:17.200 --> 1:43:20.479 the sort of after sort of the various up people 1:43:20.520 --> 1:43:23.559 in two thousands six in Mexico with the Wahaka uprising 1:43:23.680 --> 1:43:25.400 with the Zapatuita is making a bunch of moves and 1:43:25.840 --> 1:43:29.040 the CPO presidential election, about how you get the drug 1:43:29.120 --> 1:43:31.840 war is this sort of like military solution to these 1:43:31.840 --> 1:43:34.720 electist movements, But I was interested in how I mean, 1:43:34.800 --> 1:43:39.080 incredibly explicit they are about this, Like the anti guerrilla 1:43:39.120 --> 1:43:41.719 operations are, like they don't call them mentic thriller operations. 1:43:41.760 --> 1:43:45.439 They talk about like bandits and like they they they're 1:43:45.479 --> 1:43:47.080 they're explicitly like no, no, no, this is an anti 1:43:47.120 --> 1:43:50.480 narco operation, even though you know they're going and massacurring 1:43:50.760 --> 1:43:55.160 like essentially peasants and occasionally guerillas, but just a bunch 1:43:55.200 --> 1:44:01.000 of just random like campusinos. Yeah. Yeah, there's a there's 1:44:01.600 --> 1:44:05.240 a great quote that I got from for in this article. Um, 1:44:06.040 --> 1:44:08.760 you know, this is wonderful researcher in Mexico, Carlos Flordesho, 1:44:08.800 --> 1:44:10.920 was a really good book on kind of like the 1:44:11.520 --> 1:44:14.240 failed state in Mexico and drugs and military and in 1:44:14.320 --> 1:44:18.920 that steady he managed to interview a military participant in 1:44:19.000 --> 1:44:21.599 the Dirty War in the nineteen seventies and he has 1:44:21.640 --> 1:44:23.679 this great quote that I included in this essay which 1:44:23.680 --> 1:44:26.920 he says, this military guy says basically, look, with the 1:44:27.000 --> 1:44:30.040 marijuana growers, we had no problem, we had no beef. 1:44:31.000 --> 1:44:32.559 But with the guerrillas, we had to fuck them up. 1:44:33.400 --> 1:44:35.920 And for me, like that, that direct quote kind of 1:44:36.040 --> 1:44:39.479 encapsulates like what the drug war in Mexico has been 1:44:39.600 --> 1:44:42.519 historically and in this current form. Like and this is 1:44:42.560 --> 1:44:45.240 something that I learned from people like sociologists and journalists 1:44:45.240 --> 1:44:47.080 Don Paley, right, like the war on drugs, the war 1:44:47.120 --> 1:44:50.960 on poor people, um. And and it it becomes in 1:44:50.960 --> 1:44:53.800 the nineteen seventies, it becomes a really useful cover for 1:44:53.960 --> 1:44:56.280 the type of horrific violence that the state is practicing 1:44:56.360 --> 1:45:01.360 in a place like against these popularly supported insurgencies so 1:45:01.560 --> 1:45:04.400 publicly and to the international audience and to its own 1:45:04.439 --> 1:45:07.080 domestic national audience. And the Mexican state is saying, look, 1:45:07.120 --> 1:45:09.439 we're not waging a dirty war, We're not waging a 1:45:09.520 --> 1:45:12.599 counter insurgency. We're fighting a war against cattle wrestlers, against 1:45:12.600 --> 1:45:16.720 cattle thieves, and against criminals, against drug dealers, um. When 1:45:16.760 --> 1:45:19.000 in reality they're waging a war against poor people who 1:45:19.040 --> 1:45:21.800 are supporting these different guerrilla insurgencies led by these rural 1:45:21.840 --> 1:45:25.360 communist school teachers. Um. So that's and that's in the 1:45:25.439 --> 1:45:27.680 rural theater, right. It's it's really interesting when you think 1:45:27.720 --> 1:45:30.920 about how the Mexican state in the seventies will criminalize 1:45:31.439 --> 1:45:34.000 urban guerrilla movements. You know, Mexico had like thirty eight 1:45:34.040 --> 1:45:36.120 guerilla movements in the nineties, sixies and seventies. That's just 1:45:36.240 --> 1:45:39.080 like people don't really recognize that, right, like thirty eight 1:45:39.160 --> 1:45:42.360 to forty different rural and urban guerilla organizations. The big 1:45:42.520 --> 1:45:45.439 urban one that managed to create i don't know, ten 1:45:45.520 --> 1:45:49.400 to twelve different uh focals or folks uh pols i 1:45:49.960 --> 1:45:55.639 Um was the LEA, the Communist League of the September Um. 1:45:55.800 --> 1:45:58.400 They became such a big threat in the urban theater 1:45:58.640 --> 1:46:01.040 that the Mexican president, and we said Cheveria devoted his 1:46:01.120 --> 1:46:03.960 nineteen seventy four State of the Union, basically the Mexican 1:46:04.280 --> 1:46:06.400 version of the State of Union, he devoted a pretty 1:46:06.400 --> 1:46:08.920 good chunk of it to these quote unquote terrorists, right, 1:46:08.960 --> 1:46:11.320 So for the urban guerrillas, he referred to them as terrorists, 1:46:11.800 --> 1:46:13.800 and then he does this thing where he says, you know, 1:46:13.920 --> 1:46:17.920 most of these terrorists are unpatriotic. They and I'm gonna 1:46:17.920 --> 1:46:23.280 paraphrase some of his language, they reveal high indices of homosexuality, 1:46:24.000 --> 1:46:26.920 of like just basically mothering them to the point that 1:46:26.960 --> 1:46:29.559 they're seen as like the most despicable other in Mexico, 1:46:29.680 --> 1:46:32.360 in Mexican society. And that then opens them up to 1:46:32.400 --> 1:46:36.320 getting wiped out, um, which is fulfills a similar function 1:46:36.360 --> 1:46:39.879 as calling the rural guerillas nothing more than cattle wrestlers, 1:46:39.920 --> 1:46:43.080 cattle thieves, and narcos. Right, So it's all this counterinsurgency 1:46:43.160 --> 1:46:47.240 like discursive strategy that that justifies the elimination of these people. 1:46:48.160 --> 1:46:50.200 But at bottom, these are just wars against the drug 1:46:50.240 --> 1:46:52.960 wars a war against poor people. And and you see 1:46:53.040 --> 1:46:54.719 that to this day, you see that, you know most 1:46:54.800 --> 1:46:56.960 one of the things that really animates my research about 1:46:57.280 --> 1:47:00.200 the history of drug wars in Mexico is that I 1:47:00.280 --> 1:47:04.080 really want to push back against you know, journalistic treatments 1:47:04.120 --> 1:47:06.320 that that will say, look, Mexico's war on drugs began 1:47:06.400 --> 1:47:09.960 in two thousand and six when President Felipe Leon wait, 1:47:10.080 --> 1:47:13.120 you know, launched the military against the different drug trafficking organizations. 1:47:13.160 --> 1:47:16.080 And you know, historians, um, like like myself will work 1:47:16.120 --> 1:47:17.640 on this. We're like, wait, no, Mexico has had a 1:47:17.800 --> 1:47:21.439 series of drug wars right that. There's a historian Alec 1:47:21.479 --> 1:47:24.599 Dawson who talks about has a really excellent book on Payote, 1:47:25.160 --> 1:47:27.000 and he talks about how the war on drugs begins 1:47:27.040 --> 1:47:28.720 in like the colonial era, right in terms of how 1:47:28.760 --> 1:47:33.840 the Spanish colonial state criminalized uh indigenous consumption of drugs 1:47:33.920 --> 1:47:38.080 like payote for for their own ritualistic cultural practices. Um. 1:47:38.160 --> 1:47:40.880 The nineteen seventies is another moment where you have a 1:47:41.040 --> 1:47:44.680 form of drug war that the Mexican state exercises. But 1:47:44.880 --> 1:47:47.360 from my perspective, it's just it's almost like a cover 1:47:47.800 --> 1:47:50.439 as a way to wage war against political dissidents and 1:47:50.600 --> 1:47:54.040 an armed guerrilla challenges to its rule in Mexico. Yeah, 1:47:54.040 --> 1:47:56.639 and I think that's a that's a iportant of looking 1:47:56.680 --> 1:48:01.519 at it also as just a way to understand stand why, 1:48:03.120 --> 1:48:04.519 you know, like if if you're looking at it from 1:48:04.520 --> 1:48:06.360 the inspective of like a policy makers like oh, well, 1:48:06.360 --> 1:48:07.840 we spent all the time during the War on drugs, 1:48:07.880 --> 1:48:10.519 like why are there more drugs? And it's like, well yeah, 1:48:10.520 --> 1:48:15.640 because I mean, the point isn't really about like I mean, 1:48:16.439 --> 1:48:18.400 I think, okay, I want to make a caveat here, 1:48:18.439 --> 1:48:20.760 which is like it's not like there's such a thing 1:48:20.800 --> 1:48:22.920 as like a quote unquote good war on drugs that 1:48:22.960 --> 1:48:24.960 you could wage like there there's no there isn't a 1:48:25.040 --> 1:48:27.120 version of this that's like oh no, if if if 1:48:27.160 --> 1:48:29.599 we actually just try to like focusing on stopping these people, 1:48:29.640 --> 1:48:32.360 it would work, but it's like no, But simultaneously, yeah, 1:48:32.400 --> 1:48:38.840 it's that the goal isn't really about like it's not 1:48:38.880 --> 1:48:41.240 about drugs, it's just about killing poor people. And I said, yeah, 1:48:41.240 --> 1:48:42.880 I think that that's that's a good way of framing it. 1:48:42.920 --> 1:48:48.160 And I think also it's an interesting way of looking 1:48:49.320 --> 1:48:55.200 at why you start to see these sort of supposedly 1:48:55.240 --> 1:48:59.840 like anti narco units just immediately start doing like getting 1:48:59.880 --> 1:49:04.680 to the trade. Yeah. Well, I mean because they're like 1:49:05.080 --> 1:49:07.599 their position to make a ton of money off of it. Yeah, 1:49:07.760 --> 1:49:10.080 like it's yeah, they're not dumb. Yeah, yeah, And I 1:49:10.160 --> 1:49:12.000 think I don't know, this is an interesting question about 1:49:12.000 --> 1:49:13.920 like the structure of the state here too, because you know, 1:49:14.000 --> 1:49:15.720 look like in Chicago, this is another like this is 1:49:15.760 --> 1:49:17.200 the thing that happens all the time, is yeah, you 1:49:17.240 --> 1:49:19.320 get these you get these antidrug units that are you know, 1:49:19.320 --> 1:49:21.080 incredibly specialized, They get a bunch of money, and then 1:49:21.160 --> 1:49:23.479 they immediately trying to round start and start like just 1:49:23.720 --> 1:49:26.320 do like just enter into the drug trade. And so 1:49:27.240 --> 1:49:28.519 I was one of the other things, Yeah, I was 1:49:28.680 --> 1:49:34.719 just been interested in this just about there's there's seems 1:49:34.760 --> 1:49:40.240 to be these these very these these very interesting sort 1:49:40.280 --> 1:49:46.960 of alliances between paramilitaries, cartels, the police in the military 1:49:47.320 --> 1:49:49.920 that open up and this is this I know this 1:49:50.040 --> 1:49:53.720 is an incredibly broad like it's a question you can like, 1:49:54.320 --> 1:49:56.479 you know, devote academic disciplines too, But I was wondering 1:49:57.160 --> 1:50:00.120 how you look at the states in the context in 1:50:00.200 --> 1:50:03.120 a context like this, because yeah, I mean in a 1:50:03.160 --> 1:50:06.639 context where you know, it's not the state doesn't really 1:50:06.720 --> 1:50:10.840 have monopoly on violence, right, Yeah, No, that's a that's 1:50:10.880 --> 1:50:13.840 a huge question. And there's how you I mean, essentially, 1:50:13.880 --> 1:50:16.000 the question is like what is the state? Which is yeah, 1:50:16.040 --> 1:50:20.360 that question always terrorizes me. And how you answer that 1:50:20.560 --> 1:50:24.479 question then leads has consequences to how we think about 1:50:24.720 --> 1:50:27.800 things like the drug war or you know, violence in 1:50:27.920 --> 1:50:30.960 Mexico or a variety of different things. Right. But so 1:50:31.280 --> 1:50:33.920 what I what I do in this article is uncle 1:50:35.240 --> 1:50:37.360 is to just simply look at what the state looks 1:50:37.400 --> 1:50:40.360 like at the local level, right, um, particularly like it's 1:50:40.400 --> 1:50:43.240 repressive apparatus is and what you see in a place 1:50:43.360 --> 1:50:49.040 like because yeah, you see kind of like it's a 1:50:49.160 --> 1:50:53.840 multi scale er issue, right where you have generations of 1:50:54.240 --> 1:50:57.400 conflicts over land and land tenure and who gets to 1:50:57.439 --> 1:51:00.920 control rural markets. Who gets to control access to rural 1:51:01.000 --> 1:51:03.280 markets and rural production. Right, So there's already like a 1:51:03.360 --> 1:51:07.000 built in structure that's exploitative, that has somehow managed to 1:51:07.040 --> 1:51:10.920 weather a big social revolution and a grand reform effort. 1:51:11.439 --> 1:51:13.679 And on top of that, then in the sixties and seventies, 1:51:13.720 --> 1:51:18.280 you get uh, you know, industrialized narcotics production placed on 1:51:18.400 --> 1:51:21.080 top of this pre existing structure. Right, so it's should 1:51:21.120 --> 1:51:24.360 be no, it's almost like no surprise then that you know, 1:51:24.439 --> 1:51:26.639 the gun slingers that used to work for landed elagues 1:51:27.040 --> 1:51:29.640 will now serves not just gun slingers for land of 1:51:29.680 --> 1:51:32.840 elages who are terrorizing campesinos, but now they're also gonna 1:51:32.840 --> 1:51:35.960 work with like local narcotic uh, you know, narco farmers, 1:51:36.080 --> 1:51:40.240 drug farmers and and traffickers. And then at the same 1:51:40.280 --> 1:51:43.080 time they're going to do their best to co opt 1:51:43.200 --> 1:51:46.280 to buy off you know, military units that are stationed 1:51:46.320 --> 1:51:48.320 at the local level, police units that are stationed at 1:51:48.360 --> 1:51:51.719 the local level, local judges, local magistrates, local political officials, 1:51:52.280 --> 1:51:56.280 and and it it creates a very um dense network 1:51:56.479 --> 1:51:59.439 at the local level of people who are working together, 1:52:00.200 --> 1:52:04.439 uh to maintain power, but at the same time make 1:52:04.479 --> 1:52:08.040 sure that this really profitable political economy of narcotics is 1:52:08.080 --> 1:52:11.160 going to thrive. And this is at the very local level, right, 1:52:11.200 --> 1:52:14.960 So in some in some ways those local interests of 1:52:15.000 --> 1:52:17.680 the quote unquote the state are will conflict with the 1:52:17.760 --> 1:52:21.160 state in Mexico City and how to resolve those tensions 1:52:21.200 --> 1:52:23.519 and becomes a big deal. So the the guy that 1:52:23.600 --> 1:52:26.720 the military participant that I referenced earlier, he was he 1:52:26.920 --> 1:52:30.200 was actually sent in from outside of Garredo into Geo 1:52:30.280 --> 1:52:34.120 to wage counterinsurgency. And you know, he talks in this 1:52:34.280 --> 1:52:36.599 book about how they didn't know what to do when 1:52:36.640 --> 1:52:41.560 they see their soldier comrades, uh, you know, obviously collaborating 1:52:41.600 --> 1:52:44.640 with local narticles even though the over this guy in 1:52:44.760 --> 1:52:46.960 his unit have been sent in to wipe out the naticles. 1:52:47.320 --> 1:52:50.439 So what ends up happening is that the goal is 1:52:50.479 --> 1:52:54.400 never to eradicate the from a national level. From a 1:52:54.479 --> 1:52:56.640 state national level, the goal is never to eradicate the 1:52:56.680 --> 1:52:58.759 drug trade in Mexico in the sixties, seventies, and eighties. 1:52:59.080 --> 1:53:00.800 The goal is to rash realize that the goal is 1:53:00.880 --> 1:53:04.240 to control it and and the goal is for the 1:53:04.439 --> 1:53:08.400 state to be able to maintain power over it. And 1:53:08.479 --> 1:53:10.559 this is leads us to what you know, some scholars 1:53:10.600 --> 1:53:12.960 were referred to as a plasa system, right, that that 1:53:13.479 --> 1:53:17.080 that different narcotic organ traffic organizations will control different parts 1:53:17.120 --> 1:53:20.320 of Mexico, but the overall power, you know, they have 1:53:20.439 --> 1:53:24.920 to kick back to is our different state officials. Um. 1:53:25.280 --> 1:53:29.760 And that there's a recent book, really great book by 1:53:29.840 --> 1:53:31.960 Ben Smith called The Dope that just came out, really 1:53:32.000 --> 1:53:35.240 like the first really good English language big history of 1:53:35.360 --> 1:53:38.680 of the Mexican drug trade. And and he essentially he 1:53:38.760 --> 1:53:42.760 says that like, the Mexican state is a racket. It's 1:53:42.800 --> 1:53:46.879 a racket, and it's ensuring that this drug trade exists, 1:53:47.080 --> 1:53:49.880 and it's centralized and it's rationalized in the sixties, seventies 1:53:49.920 --> 1:53:52.519 and eighties, um. But by the nineties it starts to 1:53:52.600 --> 1:53:55.439 lose control as the state itself is neoliberalized and becomes 1:53:55.479 --> 1:53:59.759 smaller and its capacity to control these different groups becomes 1:54:00.160 --> 1:54:04.760 uh weekend. So so that's like the big national level, right, 1:54:04.760 --> 1:54:06.160 and then we think that takes us to the scale 1:54:06.160 --> 1:54:08.240 of the international which is a whole another thing. But 1:54:08.360 --> 1:54:10.200 at the very local level, what does this look like. 1:54:10.360 --> 1:54:13.080 It looks like if you're a drug farmer, right, because 1:54:13.080 --> 1:54:15.160 another thing in Garreto is that these drug farmers are 1:54:15.680 --> 1:54:18.320 like small scale right there. They're small scale, they have 1:54:18.400 --> 1:54:21.960 a little bit of autonomy, but they're small scale. But 1:54:22.040 --> 1:54:24.760 they're selling their product to these traffickers. And these are 1:54:24.800 --> 1:54:28.639 the traffickers usually that will have connections to local landed families, 1:54:28.680 --> 1:54:32.360 who have connections to military, to police, to politicians, um. 1:54:32.560 --> 1:54:34.960 That will ensure that this economy will will have will 1:54:35.000 --> 1:54:37.760 continue to thrive in a in a profitable way by 1:54:37.800 --> 1:54:39.760 the late seventies. And this is something else I think 1:54:39.800 --> 1:54:42.400 that I need a little bit more research on. But 1:54:42.960 --> 1:54:45.280 you see it happened elsewhere in Mexico, and especially in 1:54:45.280 --> 1:54:47.560 the northwest, in a place like Sinaroa, which is usually 1:54:47.560 --> 1:54:50.000 seen as the cradle of the Mexican drug trade. But 1:54:50.080 --> 1:54:51.880 I think in the late seventies, both in sin and 1:54:52.840 --> 1:54:55.200 the Dirty War and and the and the sending of 1:54:55.240 --> 1:54:58.080 the military and mass in a place like Garreto, it 1:54:58.200 --> 1:55:00.960 not only takes out armed resil into the Mexican state, 1:55:01.000 --> 1:55:04.080 but it will also take out small scale narco traffickers 1:55:04.080 --> 1:55:07.000 who don't want to play. They don't like the rules 1:55:07.040 --> 1:55:09.280 that the Mexican state is imposing upon them in order 1:55:09.360 --> 1:55:12.320 to make money and traffic drugs. Um. So I've seen 1:55:12.320 --> 1:55:15.720 a couple of documents where, um, you know, secret police, 1:55:16.040 --> 1:55:19.520 spy agent documents where they say, Okay, yes, you know 1:55:19.600 --> 1:55:22.320 these these campesinos who are accused of being guerillas. Yes 1:55:22.400 --> 1:55:27.560 we are disappearing them. But apparently some small scale drug 1:55:27.600 --> 1:55:30.360 traffickers are also being disappeared because they're not they don't 1:55:30.400 --> 1:55:32.240 want to go along with the rules being imposed by 1:55:32.240 --> 1:55:35.680 the Mexican military. And that's something that you see inca 1:55:35.880 --> 1:55:38.760 in the late seventies when something called Operation Condor gets 1:55:38.840 --> 1:55:41.520 launched and you get thousands of troops and federal police 1:55:41.560 --> 1:55:44.120 who go up there, and instead of eradicating the drug 1:55:44.160 --> 1:55:47.560 trade and getting rid of these different traffickers, what they 1:55:47.600 --> 1:55:50.400 do is they centralize it, they rationalize it, um, they 1:55:50.480 --> 1:55:53.080 make it more efficient, um. And that actually it's so 1:55:53.160 --> 1:55:57.600 it's in in a counterintuitive way, it's state violence that 1:55:57.960 --> 1:56:00.440 actually leads to the formation of things that we think 1:56:00.480 --> 1:56:03.040 about as cartels and not the other way around, right, 1:56:03.040 --> 1:56:07.160 because the very trade begins within the confines of the 1:56:07.240 --> 1:56:10.360 Mexican state. And in part two of this interview, we're 1:56:10.360 --> 1:56:13.000 gonna drill deeper into that question and look at how 1:56:13.040 --> 1:56:14.760 the state's attempt to get in on the drug trade, 1:56:14.800 --> 1:56:16.840 created the cartels and how they sort of lost control 1:56:16.920 --> 1:56:19.320 of them, leading to an incredible increase in pera military 1:56:19.440 --> 1:56:22.400 violence and death and destruction. And on that happy note 1:56:22.440 --> 1:56:25.120 that this has been it could happen here join us 1:56:25.120 --> 1:56:29.600 again tomorrow for that and in the meantime, stay safe 1:56:29.640 --> 1:56:32.280 and don't die. If you want to find us, we're 1:56:32.440 --> 1:56:36.280 at happen Here pot on Twitter, Instagram. You can also 1:56:36.360 --> 1:56:38.880 find other work that we do at cools on media 1:56:39.000 --> 1:56:41.880 on Twitter if for some reason you can. You want 1:56:41.920 --> 1:56:45.000 to continue venturing out of the house sides good bye. 1:56:53.200 --> 1:56:55.920 After thirty years, it's time to return to the halls 1:56:55.960 --> 1:56:58.360 of West Beverly High and hang out at the peach pit. 1:56:58.640 --> 1:57:01.440 On the podcast nine O It's You one, OMG joined 1:57:01.520 --> 1:57:04.080 Jenny Garth and Tori Spelling for a rewatch of the 1:57:04.200 --> 1:57:06.800 hit series Beverly Hills nine O two one oh. From 1:57:06.840 --> 1:57:10.160 the very beginning, we get to tell the fans all 1:57:10.320 --> 1:57:12.800 of the behind the scenes stories to actually happen, so 1:57:13.240 --> 1:57:15.720 they know what happened on camera obviously, but we can 1:57:15.760 --> 1:57:18.160 tell them all the good stuff that happened off camera. 1:57:18.280 --> 1:57:21.080 Get all the juicy details of every episode that you've 1:57:21.120 --> 1:57:23.720 been wondering about for decades. As nine O two one oh, 1:57:23.880 --> 1:57:27.120 super fan and radio host Sissany sits in with Jenny 1:57:27.160 --> 1:57:30.640 and Tory Too reminisce, reflect and relive each moment, from 1:57:30.720 --> 1:57:34.440 Brandon and Kelly's first kiss to shouting, Donna Martin graduates, 1:57:34.760 --> 1:57:38.560 you have an amazing memory. You remember everything about the 1:57:38.760 --> 1:57:41.240 entire ten years that we filmed that show, and you 1:57:41.600 --> 1:57:44.760 remember absolutely nothing of the ten years that we filmed 1:57:45.120 --> 1:57:48.240 that show. Listen to nine O two one OMG on 1:57:48.320 --> 1:57:50.920 the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you 1:57:51.040 --> 1:57:55.520 get your podcasts. I'm Colleen what joined me, the host 1:57:55.600 --> 1:57:58.280 of Eating Wall Broke podcast, While I eat a meal 1:57:58.400 --> 1:58:02.480 created by self made entre breneurs, influencers and celebrities over 1:58:02.520 --> 1:58:04.760 a meal they once eight when they were broke. Today 1:58:04.800 --> 1:58:07.840 I have the lovely aj Crimson, the official Princess of 1:58:08.000 --> 1:58:12.320 comfin Asia, Kidding and Assia. This is the professor. We're 1:58:12.360 --> 1:58:14.800 here on Eating While Broke and today I'm gonna break 1:58:14.880 --> 1:58:17.480 down my meal that got me through a time when 1:58:17.520 --> 1:58:20.080 I was broken. Listen to Eating While Broke on the 1:58:20.160 --> 1:58:23.120 I Heart Radio app, on Apple podcast or wherever you 1:58:23.200 --> 1:58:31.880 get your podcasts. This is it could Happen Here, a 1:58:31.920 --> 1:58:35.400 podcast that is often in today about state and paramilitary violence. 1:58:35.560 --> 1:58:38.240 And we're back with part two of her interview with 1:58:38.240 --> 1:58:42.920 Alexander Vina about the state and paramilitary violence in the 1:58:43.000 --> 1:58:45.960 cartels in Mexico. The immediate thing I was thinking about 1:58:45.960 --> 1:58:49.560 this was it reminds me a lot of uh, some 1:58:49.640 --> 1:58:54.560 stuff I've read a while back about like smuggling people 1:58:54.600 --> 1:58:58.120 over the border and about how the American militarization of 1:58:58.280 --> 1:59:02.440 that like destroyed because it used to like as as 1:59:02.480 --> 1:59:04.480 the US tries to like make the border more and 1:59:04.560 --> 1:59:06.400 more unsafe, if it becomes harder and harder, and it 1:59:06.480 --> 1:59:08.000 means that like the people who can actually do it, 1:59:08.400 --> 1:59:10.440 like you know, you need to have access to more 1:59:10.480 --> 1:59:14.680 resources and more like technical capability. And that's sort of 1:59:14.800 --> 1:59:17.040 like and that that also in a lot of ways 1:59:17.080 --> 1:59:20.120 help the cartels because you know it, well, it's like, okay, 1:59:20.160 --> 1:59:22.840 so who actually has a bunch of organizational expertise with 1:59:22.880 --> 1:59:25.560 smuggling routes and a lot of money And it's it's 1:59:25.600 --> 1:59:27.360 and I think that's like it is it's an interesting 1:59:29.040 --> 1:59:32.520 way of looking at what the national application of state 1:59:32.560 --> 1:59:35.640 power in these like it does, which is that like 1:59:37.480 --> 1:59:40.760 it's it seems almost like what's happening is that so 1:59:41.120 --> 1:59:43.520 when when you get these massive exertion to state power, 1:59:43.640 --> 1:59:46.480 it's not that they like flatten like you know, it's 1:59:46.480 --> 1:59:48.000 not that they just sort of wipe out out resistance. 1:59:48.040 --> 1:59:52.120 What they do is they yeah, it's what you were saying, 1:59:52.160 --> 1:59:53.920 is like they centralize the drug trip, but they also 1:59:54.040 --> 1:59:56.280 they centralize the sort of violent apparatus. And it means 1:59:56.320 --> 1:59:58.400 that like yeah, if if, if you're going to survive 1:59:58.520 --> 2:00:02.960 that you have to be like incredibly efficient, incredibly violent. 2:00:03.040 --> 2:00:07.280 You have to also sort of start like you you 2:00:07.440 --> 2:00:09.640 have to start playing with it, like playing by the 2:00:09.760 --> 2:00:12.800 rules at the state of exception, which is you know, 2:00:12.920 --> 2:00:16.640 and that's that's like how I guess the violence level 2:00:16.680 --> 2:00:21.920 and the organizational centralization happens. Yeah, I think it's yeah, No, 2:00:22.160 --> 2:00:23.760 I think you're I think you're right. And I think 2:00:23.920 --> 2:00:27.760 it's also becomes part of the to add I mean, 2:00:27.880 --> 2:00:30.400 so to add you know, fuel to the fire. Even 2:00:30.440 --> 2:00:33.040 more so, it's become a strategy of like the d 2:00:33.120 --> 2:00:36.280 e A and and and counter our catics forces in 2:00:36.360 --> 2:00:39.240 Mexico to to do what you just describe, but then 2:00:39.320 --> 2:00:42.960 also to sow dissension amongst the different drug trafficking organizations. Right. 2:00:43.040 --> 2:00:46.520 So um, that then also increases the violence. Right. So 2:00:46.760 --> 2:00:48.960 if you can get you know it was it was 2:00:48.960 --> 2:00:52.160 pretty well none that the chapel, for instance, the leader 2:00:52.200 --> 2:00:54.800 of the Senetta cartel until well, let's not say leader 2:00:54.840 --> 2:00:57.480 one of the most prominent traffickers of the Senato cartelntil recently, 2:00:57.920 --> 2:01:00.520 like he was giving up people. He was giving information 2:01:00.640 --> 2:01:03.360 on rivals to the d A and to other other 2:01:04.240 --> 2:01:07.160 counting arcotics forces, right, And that's part of the strategy. 2:01:07.200 --> 2:01:10.560 The strategy is to fragment these groups. Um. And that 2:01:10.720 --> 2:01:13.520 only concreases the violence. And and you see that violence 2:01:13.560 --> 2:01:16.920 at the very localized level. Um. And this is what 2:01:17.000 --> 2:01:19.600 Geretto suffering from right now. Right, Gretto for a long 2:01:19.680 --> 2:01:24.280 time under the control of one single drug trafficking organization, 2:01:24.320 --> 2:01:28.560 slash family from the state of sinaloas right, they used 2:01:28.640 --> 2:01:31.800 they were originally aligned with their actually cousins with the 2:01:31.920 --> 2:01:34.480 Chapabuzman's family. They had a falling out and they made 2:01:34.520 --> 2:01:36.640 two thousands and they and they went to war. And 2:01:36.720 --> 2:01:39.680 I had disastrous consequences for the people of Guereto because 2:01:39.680 --> 2:01:43.800 it fragmented the drug trafficking organizations and it forced different 2:01:43.840 --> 2:01:46.960 local groups to take sides, um. And And that's kind 2:01:46.960 --> 2:01:49.520 of how I am the article that that you're referencing, right, um, 2:01:49.960 --> 2:01:52.240 where different local groups start to take sides, and that 2:01:52.320 --> 2:01:55.760 increases the level of violence at the local level and 2:01:55.880 --> 2:01:59.440 and and communities suffer greatly. Um. And that's also a 2:01:59.480 --> 2:02:02.120 consequence of like the kingpin strategy, right, Like this idea 2:02:02.160 --> 2:02:04.640 that if you take down the perceived leader of a 2:02:04.680 --> 2:02:08.040 drug trafficing organization, that's somehow going to have an impact 2:02:08.160 --> 2:02:10.720 on drug production. You know, what actually happens that it 2:02:10.800 --> 2:02:13.840 fragments the organization and it creates more violence at the 2:02:13.880 --> 2:02:15.920 local level. Well, at the same time, it gives a 2:02:16.000 --> 2:02:18.720 chance to like xd agents to go on like you know, 2:02:19.000 --> 2:02:20.720 national media and be like, oh, yes, the capture of 2:02:20.760 --> 2:02:23.280 the chapel is gonna have a great impact the drug trade. No, 2:02:23.440 --> 2:02:26.400 well not like it increases the violence. And I think 2:02:26.400 --> 2:02:28.560 that the thing that that that's very clear from this article. 2:02:28.560 --> 2:02:30.080 And I think it's clear if you you know, if 2:02:30.120 --> 2:02:32.000 you look at the drug trade, is it's like, no, 2:02:32.600 --> 2:02:34.760 it's it's it's it's largely economic stuff. And like one 2:02:34.760 --> 2:02:37.080 of the thinks you're talking about is is you know 2:02:37.280 --> 2:02:39.160 it is that these peasants who are the people who 2:02:39.200 --> 2:02:41.000 have been able to hold onto the collective land basically 2:02:41.640 --> 2:02:44.240 get forced by the lamb bankes to like produce sesame 2:02:44.320 --> 2:02:45.720 and it's like they can't make any money off of 2:02:45.760 --> 2:02:50.200 it and don't I don't know how directly it looked 2:02:50.240 --> 2:02:51.920 to me a lot like like that was directly one 2:02:51.960 --> 2:02:55.440 of the things that starts to lead to the shift 2:02:55.480 --> 2:02:56.920 to the drug trade there, because you have all these 2:02:56.960 --> 2:03:03.280 people locked into this crop that like just can't support them. Yeah, yeah, 2:03:03.360 --> 2:03:06.360 And it's it's just the bigger story there is is 2:03:06.400 --> 2:03:09.480 really the failure of the post revolutionary Mexican state too 2:03:10.520 --> 2:03:14.720 UM to really help spur agricultural production at the level 2:03:14.840 --> 2:03:17.720 of of these small holding peasants and and these rural 2:03:17.760 --> 2:03:20.920 communities that are these ahelos who have received land from 2:03:20.960 --> 2:03:24.120 the Mexican state. UM. If anything, most of the state 2:03:24.200 --> 2:03:28.760 subsidies in the state structure, state support for agriculture from 2:03:28.840 --> 2:03:31.720 the forties, you know, up until the eighties, that was 2:03:31.800 --> 2:03:35.200 all directed to big agro businesses that were producing export 2:03:35.240 --> 2:03:37.480 crops in places like sea at all, Right, they're producing 2:03:37.520 --> 2:03:39.960 winter crops for the American market or winter fruit for 2:03:40.000 --> 2:03:42.680 the American market. Right, So in the absence of like 2:03:42.800 --> 2:03:46.360 meaningful state support for small holding agriculture, that small holding 2:03:46.360 --> 2:03:50.880 agricultural sector that is meant to feed Mexico. Um. You know, 2:03:51.080 --> 2:03:53.040 some of these these farmers in a place like call 2:03:53.040 --> 2:03:55.600 you and they'll say, Okay, well, we were growing this 2:03:55.760 --> 2:03:58.480 thing that the the Agricultural Bank is telling us to 2:03:58.520 --> 2:04:00.640 grow sesame, but we're not making lot of money off 2:04:00.680 --> 2:04:02.400 of it. But on the other hand, by the late sixties, 2:04:02.440 --> 2:04:05.640 they see that marijuana production is is really increasing due 2:04:05.680 --> 2:04:09.600 to American demand. If I can do both things, you know, 2:04:09.640 --> 2:04:11.320 I'm gonna make a lot of money, and I'm gonna 2:04:11.320 --> 2:04:14.400 allow my family to make a pretty good living while 2:04:14.480 --> 2:04:16.800 staying in the countryside, while not having to migrate to 2:04:16.880 --> 2:04:19.920 Mexico City, or while not having to migrate to these 2:04:19.960 --> 2:04:23.000 agricultural fields in northern Mexico or even into the United States. 2:04:23.400 --> 2:04:26.760 So because it's a really rational economic response to to 2:04:27.160 --> 2:04:29.960 to a broader macroeconomic situation that has put them in 2:04:30.040 --> 2:04:33.360 that position. The and and you still see this to 2:04:33.440 --> 2:04:36.960 this day. Right, these these small farmers, they still own 2:04:37.000 --> 2:04:40.040 their land, they'll grow certain crops on it, and it's 2:04:40.040 --> 2:04:42.760 almost serves as a shield for um. You know, the 2:04:42.840 --> 2:04:45.200 opium poppies that they're growing on the same plot of land, 2:04:45.240 --> 2:04:47.440 but in a part that's a little you know, harder 2:04:47.480 --> 2:04:50.160 to access and it's a little bit more hidden, right, Um. 2:04:50.520 --> 2:04:53.000 But it's it's it's trying to find a way at 2:04:53.080 --> 2:04:55.920 a bottom to make a dignifity, you know, how to 2:04:56.000 --> 2:04:58.080 make a life of dignity for your family when you're 2:04:58.120 --> 2:05:00.280 living in the in the countryside, when you're living in 2:05:00.320 --> 2:05:04.200 a place like and then you see that, you know, 2:05:04.240 --> 2:05:07.080 the Getingos are going crazy over a cap gold in 2:05:07.160 --> 2:05:10.120 the late sixties. Um, and you have uh, you know 2:05:10.400 --> 2:05:14.360 North Gengo traffickers coming into get Ready with new seeds. Um. 2:05:14.600 --> 2:05:16.720 Or you have set a lewnce is coming into your 2:05:16.720 --> 2:05:18.960 state saying, you know, grow these here are some marijuana 2:05:19.000 --> 2:05:22.640 sees grow that strain um, you know, and they can 2:05:22.680 --> 2:05:26.000 buy off you know, local politicians and soldiers and police. 2:05:26.080 --> 2:05:28.800 That's that's one of the ways that you get the 2:05:28.880 --> 2:05:33.839 emergence of industrial proportion production of marijuana and and opium 2:05:33.840 --> 2:05:36.560 poppies and garred in the sixties and seventies and again 2:05:37.120 --> 2:05:39.320 at the same time that this massive dirty war is 2:05:39.360 --> 2:05:42.520 being waged against two different peasant guerrilla movements. Right, So 2:05:42.560 --> 2:05:46.120 it's like a really messy like social matrix that's occurring 2:05:46.160 --> 2:05:48.880 at the same time. I guess one everything I wanted 2:05:48.880 --> 2:05:54.200 to talk about was about how the political parties sort 2:05:54.240 --> 2:05:58.520 of work into this, because I guess, like my experience 2:05:58.560 --> 2:06:01.000 with this sort of like the the kind of like 2:06:01.120 --> 2:06:04.400 narco state fusions with like twenties and thirties China and there, 2:06:04.480 --> 2:06:08.720 it's like like you're you're I don't know. I mean, 2:06:08.800 --> 2:06:12.640 the Communists have an actual independent political base outside of 2:06:12.760 --> 2:06:14.920 like like the Green Gang, but like the k MT, 2:06:15.240 --> 2:06:19.520 it's like like this is basically just a like like 2:06:19.640 --> 2:06:21.520 this like this is this is just like an arco 2:06:21.920 --> 2:06:25.160 organization with like a flag planted on it. And I'm 2:06:25.280 --> 2:06:30.000 I'm wondering how like on what end of the scale 2:06:30.480 --> 2:06:32.880 we're working with with the p R and also also 2:06:33.120 --> 2:06:35.240 like with with the other Mexican parties, because it seems 2:06:35.280 --> 2:06:38.800 like there are like parts of like a functional state 2:06:38.840 --> 2:06:41.520 app like a party state appartus or like a party apparatus, 2:06:41.560 --> 2:06:43.840 and then parts of it that are just like this 2:06:44.000 --> 2:06:47.760 is a cartel. Yeah, it's it's that's a huge question. 2:06:47.840 --> 2:06:51.680 It's it's um yes, I resistant no, no, no, it's 2:06:51.680 --> 2:06:56.360 all good. I've I've stopped understanding this within the framework 2:06:56.400 --> 2:06:58.400 of like an ARCO state, right, because to think about 2:06:58.400 --> 2:07:01.880 an ARCO state, you really have to think about how 2:07:02.040 --> 2:07:05.200 a state was captured by these drug trafficking organizations. And 2:07:05.440 --> 2:07:08.400 and I historically and currently I don't think that describes 2:07:08.440 --> 2:07:11.440 what's what's happening in Mexico. Um, I think what you would. 2:07:11.520 --> 2:07:12.920 And again it goes back to the question of what 2:07:13.080 --> 2:07:15.880 is the state, right, Like the questions drive like just 2:07:17.040 --> 2:07:20.680 I'm gonna be thinking about this decade, right, But because 2:07:20.720 --> 2:07:23.280 you have, you know you have. It depends on what 2:07:23.480 --> 2:07:25.560 part of the Mexican state you're also referring to. Right. 2:07:25.600 --> 2:07:27.560 So if we're talking about the military, the military has 2:07:27.640 --> 2:07:29.640 all segments of the military. I have always had an 2:07:29.640 --> 2:07:32.720 important role to play in the production and trafficking of 2:07:33.320 --> 2:07:36.600 narcotics from Mexico into the US from the from like 2:07:36.680 --> 2:07:40.400 the nineteen tens, right, the military governor of Baja California, 2:07:40.760 --> 2:07:44.320 this guy by the name of Colonel Estevan Kantu. He 2:07:44.560 --> 2:07:48.720 was helping traffic opium um into the United States during 2:07:48.760 --> 2:07:51.839 the Mexican Revolution, Right, And this has been a constant rum. 2:07:52.240 --> 2:07:54.720 The guys that I talked about in my article this 2:07:54.840 --> 2:07:58.680 guy Um who ends up he he's a general by 2:07:58.720 --> 2:08:01.400 the time he's he's arrested in two two. But this guy, 2:08:01.840 --> 2:08:06.320 Mario Costao, he was like the main counterinsurgent, theorist and 2:08:06.480 --> 2:08:10.080 and and and bright mind of the Mexican military that 2:08:10.120 --> 2:08:12.040 gets sent to get right on the seventies to wipe 2:08:12.080 --> 2:08:14.840 out these different guerrilla movements. But he's after they wipe 2:08:14.840 --> 2:08:17.520 out the gerrilla movements, he stays on. He serves as 2:08:17.960 --> 2:08:19.600 as a kind of like the leader of the state 2:08:19.640 --> 2:08:21.120 police forces. And what do he starts to do. He 2:08:21.160 --> 2:08:24.839 starts to buy up land allegedly that will start producing 2:08:24.920 --> 2:08:28.040 opium poppies and marijuana. And this guy from the late 2:08:28.120 --> 2:08:31.200 seventies up until he's arrested in two thousand, it's pretty 2:08:31.240 --> 2:08:33.560 clear that had he had been collaborating with different narco 2:08:33.600 --> 2:08:38.360 trafficking organizations. He gets arrested by his own military um 2:08:38.480 --> 2:08:41.120 in two thousand because he it was pretty clear that 2:08:41.320 --> 2:08:43.920 he had been protecting and collaborating with this You have 2:08:44.040 --> 2:08:48.960 Guada's cartel and I'm a Lookio fuentis Um, so you 2:08:49.040 --> 2:08:52.000 know one of these like anti anti guerrilla, anti nautical 2:08:52.320 --> 2:08:56.000 nauticles that will you know, actually get go to jail 2:08:56.280 --> 2:08:59.000 for about six years, UM, because it was pretty apparent 2:08:59.120 --> 2:09:01.560 that he had been for long time collaborating and protecting 2:09:01.720 --> 2:09:04.760 the different narco trafficking organizations. Right. So that's the military. 2:09:05.120 --> 2:09:07.880 Then you have like the secret police that gets formed 2:09:07.880 --> 2:09:12.280 in Mexico, the DFS, and with the help of the FBI, UM, 2:09:12.560 --> 2:09:15.280 the DFS becomes like this political police that the Mexican 2:09:15.320 --> 2:09:18.160 president can use to tamp down on political descent. They're 2:09:18.200 --> 2:09:22.160 the ones, you know spine surveillance by the sixties and seventies, 2:09:22.160 --> 2:09:25.600 are also torturing, disappearing, and with that level of impunity 2:09:25.600 --> 2:09:27.360 and power, they also get into the drug game. By 2:09:27.360 --> 2:09:30.680 the seventies and eighties. Um, you have the federal judicial Police. 2:09:30.800 --> 2:09:33.480 They're the ones who control for this during the fifties, sixties, 2:09:33.480 --> 2:09:36.440 and seventies. Really they're the ones who are controlling, um, 2:09:36.720 --> 2:09:39.640 the kickbacks that they're receiving from narco traffickers until the 2:09:39.720 --> 2:09:42.720 military moves in the seventies and takes over for them. Right. 2:09:42.760 --> 2:09:45.840 So the repressive apparatus is within the Mexican state of 2:09:45.880 --> 2:09:48.040 the twentie century play a really key role, if not 2:09:48.200 --> 2:09:52.280 the role and helping foster create this this political economy 2:09:52.280 --> 2:09:55.600 of narcotics. Now, how do how do we view that 2:09:55.680 --> 2:09:58.800 in relation to the p r I right, the party 2:09:58.840 --> 2:10:01.040 that emerges from the Mexican Revolution, the party that will 2:10:01.120 --> 2:10:04.000 rule Mexico generally will say, from the late twenties up 2:10:04.040 --> 2:10:06.400 until the year two thousand, Well, you have pretty important, 2:10:06.600 --> 2:10:09.640 you know, political officials within the party throughout the twinute 2:10:09.680 --> 2:10:12.640 century that are directly linked to narco traffickers and directly 2:10:12.680 --> 2:10:15.160 linked to military officials who are obviously involved in the 2:10:15.240 --> 2:10:17.560 game as well. But at no level can we say 2:10:17.600 --> 2:10:20.040 it's a narco state because the n arcos having captured 2:10:20.080 --> 2:10:22.320 the state. It's actually the other way around. It's the 2:10:22.400 --> 2:10:25.680 Mexican post revolutionary state that's trying to get its hands 2:10:25.720 --> 2:10:30.000 around this thing that's growing within its own confines, and 2:10:30.240 --> 2:10:32.080 and and by and they lose control of it. Like 2:10:32.200 --> 2:10:35.440 by the late eighties and nineties, they've effectively lost control 2:10:35.520 --> 2:10:37.440 of this thing. And that's when you see the rise 2:10:37.520 --> 2:10:41.400 of these um highly centralized drug trafficking organizations like this. 2:10:41.480 --> 2:10:43.880 You have uttest cartel that's making a ton of money 2:10:43.920 --> 2:10:48.280 off the cocaine. So I guess it seems like it's 2:10:48.280 --> 2:10:51.560 almost like you're dealing with from from from the very 2:10:51.720 --> 2:10:54.080 very local level where you have these sort of landed 2:10:54.120 --> 2:10:58.400 elites and their gun slingers. It's like it's this almost 2:10:58.440 --> 2:11:02.400 sort of like like miniaturized, fractal version of the state 2:11:02.440 --> 2:11:05.040 where's like you're getting these like very very small sort 2:11:05.080 --> 2:11:08.680 of like uh you know, like almost like fetal domains 2:11:08.680 --> 2:11:10.680 and that they sort of expand upwards and stand upwards. 2:11:10.960 --> 2:11:13.640 But yeah, and I guess the interesting part to me 2:11:13.800 --> 2:11:16.680 is is how like the paramilitary dynamics of that, and 2:11:16.800 --> 2:11:19.440 how how the power of these sort of land at 2:11:19.480 --> 2:11:23.160 least into power, Like how how it's like like the power, 2:11:23.320 --> 2:11:25.680 like the the use of power from the top seems 2:11:25.720 --> 2:11:28.840 to strengthen them. Where you know, if if you're looking 2:11:28.880 --> 2:11:34.000 at this from like like how how this is supposed 2:11:34.040 --> 2:11:36.240 to work in theory, if you're someone who actually like 2:11:36.240 --> 2:11:37.880 trying to eliminate the drug trade, you think would be 2:11:37.960 --> 2:11:39.760 the way around that, like the application of power would 2:11:39.800 --> 2:11:43.160 shatter but it sort of doesn't. It causes these like 2:11:43.360 --> 2:11:46.560 these these build ups, these apparatus is and then they 2:11:46.640 --> 2:11:49.200 fragment and they rebuild again. But it's you're not ever 2:11:51.520 --> 2:11:58.840 actually dealing with these sort of like micro state like yeah, yeah, no, 2:11:58.960 --> 2:12:03.680 I think that's exactly where and if anything, the paramilitarization 2:12:03.760 --> 2:12:06.560 is also like a like a long it's a process, right, 2:12:06.640 --> 2:12:09.520 So like the first if we can use this term, 2:12:09.560 --> 2:12:13.080 the first paramilitaries were used to wipe out a gray 2:12:13.120 --> 2:12:16.320 and reform minded Campasinos in the thirties and forties. Um, 2:12:17.080 --> 2:12:19.720 but you don't really have like a paramilitarization of of 2:12:20.200 --> 2:12:24.080 of the drug trade in Mexico to a certain extent, 2:12:24.160 --> 2:12:25.920 because you have the military and the police to do 2:12:26.040 --> 2:12:29.120 your dirty work. Right if you're a nautical UM. That's 2:12:29.120 --> 2:12:31.080 a more recent phenomenon that you start to see in 2:12:31.120 --> 2:12:33.400 the nineties and especially in the two thousand's. So right 2:12:33.480 --> 2:12:36.960 that the case that everyone points to are these the 2:12:37.040 --> 2:12:39.560 elite of the elite in the Mexican military. The gossis 2:12:39.720 --> 2:12:43.040 these guys are like the Navy seals of the Special Force, 2:12:43.200 --> 2:12:46.520 you know, the Army rangers the Mexican military. A bunch 2:12:46.560 --> 2:12:48.640 of these guys in the mid to late nineties decide, 2:12:48.720 --> 2:12:50.720 you know what, we don't want to work for the 2:12:50.800 --> 2:12:53.800 Mexican military. We're just gonna We're gonna dessert and we're 2:12:53.800 --> 2:12:56.760 gonna go hire ourselves out to the Gulf cartel. And 2:12:57.040 --> 2:13:00.080 they become really the first like paramilitary wing of a 2:13:00.200 --> 2:13:03.480 major drug trafficking organization. And these are guys, some of 2:13:03.560 --> 2:13:06.760 which probably most likely were trained at school the Americas 2:13:06.840 --> 2:13:11.000 or received American specialized training, now switching sides and and 2:13:11.120 --> 2:13:15.040 and protecting a pretty powerful drug trafficking organization, like at 2:13:15.080 --> 2:13:17.480 the time in the nineties that was the Gulf Cartel. 2:13:18.240 --> 2:13:20.040 And these are the infamous set Us, right, these are 2:13:20.080 --> 2:13:22.640 the zs um. They're called the set Us because that 2:13:22.760 --> 2:13:24.480 was like their military code. There was always a Z 2:13:24.680 --> 2:13:27.400 in front of a number. UM, so Z one was 2:13:27.480 --> 2:13:29.400 kind of like the leader, the first guy who took 2:13:29.560 --> 2:13:32.320 twelve or thirteen guys with him to desert and they 2:13:32.400 --> 2:13:35.680 hired themselves out to this drug trafficking organization and they 2:13:35.800 --> 2:13:38.840 become like the paramilitary unit. The rest of the group 2:13:38.920 --> 2:13:40.440 see that and they're like, oh ship, Like we gotta 2:13:40.480 --> 2:13:43.560 catch up, right because these like and these guys the 2:13:43.640 --> 2:13:47.320 god is you know, they have counter andsurgency experience. You know, 2:13:47.360 --> 2:13:49.520 they were the ones who were fighting against US and 2:13:49.560 --> 2:13:52.000 chiapas in the early nineties, right, they were the ones 2:13:52.040 --> 2:13:55.000 that they were sending to ye. They were the ones 2:13:55.080 --> 2:13:58.200 who were fighting against the new cycle of guerrillas that 2:13:58.280 --> 2:14:00.440 emerging get in the mid nineties that e p R. 2:14:01.520 --> 2:14:03.879 And then when they're used for counting our context operations, 2:14:04.000 --> 2:14:05.800 they look at the situation they say, you know what, 2:14:06.480 --> 2:14:07.960 we're not going to fight on the side of the military. 2:14:08.000 --> 2:14:10.240 We're gonna hire ourselves out to these this golf cartel. 2:14:10.240 --> 2:14:12.840 We're gonna make a ton of money. Um. But they 2:14:12.920 --> 2:14:15.000 have a lot of skills, right. So the rest of 2:14:15.040 --> 2:14:17.120 the so the rest of the drug traffic organizations see that, 2:14:17.160 --> 2:14:19.600 and they're like, we gotta play catch up, and and 2:14:19.840 --> 2:14:22.440 and and you see the paramilitarization of this conflict, and 2:14:22.520 --> 2:14:25.800 and in certain parts that's what's driving UM. I think 2:14:25.840 --> 2:14:27.960 has has played a really big role in driving some 2:14:28.080 --> 2:14:30.240 of the bloodshed and violence that we've seen in Mexico, 2:14:30.240 --> 2:14:33.320 particularly since two thousand six. But we can speak of 2:14:34.440 --> 2:14:38.200 probably four hundred thousand homicides since two thousand six, at 2:14:38.320 --> 2:14:41.360 least a hundred thousand disappearances. UM. A lot of that 2:14:41.440 --> 2:14:43.240 has to do with, you know, the people who are 2:14:43.320 --> 2:14:47.760 fighting our our paramilitaries, right they're receiving training from Colombian 2:14:47.800 --> 2:14:52.120 military advisors, They're receiving training from Israeli military officials, they're 2:14:52.120 --> 2:14:56.880 receiving training from UM Guatemalan special forces. These guys called 2:14:56.920 --> 2:14:59.880 the Kails who committed some of the worst atrocities during 2:15:00.000 --> 2:15:03.320 Guatemalan conflict of the of the of the seventies and eighties. Um, 2:15:03.680 --> 2:15:07.480 My families from Meat, which is a state north of Gerrito. 2:15:07.680 --> 2:15:11.680 And I remember when probably two thousand five, six or seven, 2:15:11.760 --> 2:15:14.320 I was down there doing research and Disney family, and 2:15:14.560 --> 2:15:17.760 they reported on the arrest of to Guatemalans and two 2:15:17.920 --> 2:15:22.240 Colombians in this random of far off part of Meat. 2:15:22.640 --> 2:15:24.360 And You're like, what were these two Colombians and two 2:15:24.400 --> 2:15:27.680 Guatemalans doing there? While they were most likely like special 2:15:27.920 --> 2:15:30.800 X special forces in those countries, militaries who had been 2:15:30.880 --> 2:15:35.240 hired by local organizations to train their their their soldiers, 2:15:35.320 --> 2:15:38.720 to train their their paramilitaries. Um. So that that's I 2:15:38.800 --> 2:15:41.280 think that has driven a lot of the violence, right, 2:15:41.320 --> 2:15:43.960 And you see it's in terms of techniques they use, 2:15:44.040 --> 2:15:47.800 the weapons, the armament, the logics of of how to 2:15:47.960 --> 2:15:51.480 take down their enemies. Yeah. I remember I read an 2:15:51.640 --> 2:15:55.480 article like, okay, I've literally lost all at the time, 2:15:55.920 --> 2:15:58.200 I think it was like mid last year about a 2:15:58.280 --> 2:16:02.760 cartelogist basically running a military operation just shutting like shutting 2:16:02.840 --> 2:16:09.280 down the city. Um. Yeah, that was pre pandemic. That 2:16:09.400 --> 2:16:12.320 was when it was a pre pandemic. Oh my god, yeah, 2:16:12.360 --> 2:16:14.680 I remember, because that was on the day and the 2:16:14.840 --> 2:16:16.800 day after it happened. I think I spent way too 2:16:16.880 --> 2:16:19.640 much time on Twitter talking to people. Um. That was 2:16:19.720 --> 2:16:24.480 when I think you're referring to when the UH detachment 2:16:24.520 --> 2:16:28.520 from the Mexican military um in the city of Koya Khan, 2:16:28.600 --> 2:16:31.280 which is the capital of Sinaloa. Kulakhan is seen as 2:16:31.320 --> 2:16:34.440 like sina is the cradle of the Mexican drug trade, 2:16:34.480 --> 2:16:37.520 then like Kodiakan is the capital of it, right, Um, 2:16:37.680 --> 2:16:39.840 I think I think you're referring to when the Mexican 2:16:39.879 --> 2:16:43.600 military detachment tried to arrest one of the chapel, right, 2:16:43.640 --> 2:16:46.360 and they actually found him, they localized it, they located him, 2:16:46.360 --> 2:16:48.960 and they tried to arrest him, and like the hills 2:16:49.040 --> 2:16:51.800 just came down on the city of Koyakan, and you 2:16:51.879 --> 2:16:56.160 had hundreds of of nauticles or paramilitaries who came down 2:16:56.360 --> 2:17:00.400 and essentially forced, um forced the military area in the 2:17:00.480 --> 2:17:02.840 state to hand over at the chapel's son to them 2:17:03.720 --> 2:17:06.920 and and for and the reason why I was like, uh, 2:17:07.360 --> 2:17:09.040 you know, spent way too much time on social media 2:17:09.080 --> 2:17:10.800 going after people because people said, oh, this is an 2:17:10.800 --> 2:17:13.160 example of a failed state. Oh, look at the new 2:17:13.200 --> 2:17:17.400 president of Mexico and he's lost control of the of 2:17:17.480 --> 2:17:21.200 the state, like he's taw tawing too nauticles And it 2:17:21.320 --> 2:17:23.520 was much more complicated than that, And something similar had 2:17:23.560 --> 2:17:27.520 already happened um in the previous administration where these different 2:17:27.640 --> 2:17:30.280 like particularly in the city of of Gadajada, where they 2:17:30.360 --> 2:17:33.080 even shot down a military helicopter or police helicopter and 2:17:33.160 --> 2:17:36.920 they and they essentially um shut down the entire city 2:17:37.040 --> 2:17:40.560 because one of their leaders have been captured. Okay, so 2:17:40.680 --> 2:17:42.880 what are what are the things the things you talked 2:17:42.879 --> 2:17:45.040 about the end of the article was about these this 2:17:45.120 --> 2:17:50.640 environmentalist group that gets like they all get arrested while 2:17:50.720 --> 2:17:52.959 like their their lawyer gets killed. After we starts talking 2:17:52.959 --> 2:17:56.600 about like connections between business owners and the party and 2:17:56.640 --> 2:18:00.720 the archo trades, I guess what do you how do 2:18:00.840 --> 2:18:03.840 you sort of like like how how do you left 2:18:04.720 --> 2:18:07.360 movements sort of navigate this space because you have it 2:18:07.400 --> 2:18:10.480 seems like you have on the one hand, you know, 2:18:10.560 --> 2:18:13.280 you have all these paramilitaries and then you also have 2:18:13.400 --> 2:18:18.120 a state that is like incredibly violently hostile to you 2:18:18.520 --> 2:18:22.760 and I guess I don't know, Like I guess you 2:18:22.840 --> 2:18:26.480 sort of have the Zapatista model of this combination of 2:18:26.560 --> 2:18:29.480 sort of like arm struggle and social pressure. But I guess, like, 2:18:29.640 --> 2:18:33.200 how how how do people navigate this sort of like 2:18:33.560 --> 2:18:36.840 it seems like like a really disastrous like a place 2:18:36.920 --> 2:18:40.600 to be trying to do leftist politics, And yeah, it's 2:18:40.680 --> 2:18:43.480 it's really difficult, right, And I think that's again going 2:18:43.520 --> 2:18:45.720 back to the thesis that the war on drugs is 2:18:45.720 --> 2:18:50.320 actually war on poor people. It's, um, you know, leftist movements, 2:18:50.360 --> 2:18:53.240 dissident movements in Mexico have to well, for while I'll 2:18:53.240 --> 2:18:56.000 say this in a place, it's these movements that have 2:18:56.760 --> 2:19:02.720 provided I think the the most accurate like X ray 2:19:02.760 --> 2:19:06.200 analysis of what the state is at the local level. Right. So, um, 2:19:06.680 --> 2:19:09.160 this this guerrilla leader that I talked about in the article, 2:19:09.240 --> 2:19:12.800 Commandant Ramido, who who was around in the late two thousand, seven, 2:19:12.920 --> 2:19:15.560 dozen eight, does nine like based on his travels in 2:19:15.600 --> 2:19:17.720 the mountains of Guerrero and kind of like the actions 2:19:17.760 --> 2:19:19.400 that he was engaged in. For him, it was very 2:19:19.440 --> 2:19:22.320 clear that the military was collaborating with all a narco 2:19:22.400 --> 2:19:25.200 trafficking organizations, not just the one, not just like the 2:19:25.280 --> 2:19:27.920 most powerful one, right. So at the national level, there 2:19:27.959 --> 2:19:29.800 was a lot of discourse of well, this start drug 2:19:29.840 --> 2:19:32.640 trafficking organization is going at it with this one in 2:19:32.680 --> 2:19:35.000 a place that Garrido, this guerrilla leader, looks at the situation. 2:19:35.040 --> 2:19:37.640 He's like, actually, they're all working together. And not only that, 2:19:37.760 --> 2:19:39.440 but they have the police in the military, and what 2:19:39.520 --> 2:19:43.800 are they doing. They are um going after poor communities 2:19:43.879 --> 2:19:46.080 up in the mountains who don't want to grow opium 2:19:46.120 --> 2:19:50.000 poppies or who want to organize a different way, an 2:19:50.000 --> 2:19:53.680 alternative model of of of living, of social reproduction. Um. 2:19:53.840 --> 2:19:56.960 What they'll say is, you know, uh, the what the 2:19:57.000 --> 2:19:59.240 military is doing in terms of drug interdiction is the 2:19:59.440 --> 2:20:04.480 only and and and burn some opium poppy fields and 2:20:04.640 --> 2:20:06.720 not others. And that's because the owner of that walled 2:20:06.720 --> 2:20:09.640 popium poppy feel that they burn didn't pay up um. 2:20:10.400 --> 2:20:13.000 So you know, now, current movements in Gueretro particing the 2:20:13.040 --> 2:20:15.840 indigenous moves and there's a recent report that that an 2:20:15.840 --> 2:20:18.280 indigenous group just put out and they're linked to the 2:20:18.959 --> 2:20:23.800 Congress Congress the c and I can remember the acronym 2:20:24.680 --> 2:20:29.320 um where they talk about a criminal state existing in 2:20:29.640 --> 2:20:33.119 in the in the part of Guerrero as Montana, which 2:20:33.160 --> 2:20:35.720 is a heavily indigenous area on the border on the 2:20:35.760 --> 2:20:37.960 eastern part of the state. And what they say is 2:20:38.040 --> 2:20:42.960 what we see here is uh an alliance between nauticles UM, 2:20:43.080 --> 2:20:49.200 political parties, military detachments and transnational corporations UM and so 2:20:49.400 --> 2:20:52.240 and and in Gerello, those transnational corporations are usually have 2:20:52.360 --> 2:20:56.200 something to do with mining and they're usually Canadian UM. 2:20:56.560 --> 2:21:00.440 So how do you navigate that? Like that is like 2:21:00.640 --> 2:21:02.880 like the correlation of forces, if we want to use 2:21:02.920 --> 2:21:05.120 that kind of terminology, like from a perspective of a 2:21:05.280 --> 2:21:08.600 of a group that that wants to resist this, it's 2:21:08.680 --> 2:21:12.000 it's it's damn near impossible, right, Like you have everything 2:21:12.080 --> 2:21:15.640 going against you, and yet people are still resisting. Right. 2:21:15.680 --> 2:21:18.720 You have the students of ayot Napa, They're still protesting, 2:21:18.760 --> 2:21:22.280 they're still organizing, even after the disappearance of their forty 2:21:22.320 --> 2:21:25.280 three comrades back in September, and we still don't have 2:21:25.360 --> 2:21:27.680 a clear answer as to what happened. Um, you still 2:21:27.760 --> 2:21:30.920 have you know, you have the model of of a 2:21:31.040 --> 2:21:33.960 timy that like that that certain indigenous communities, like the 2:21:34.160 --> 2:21:36.880 community in Chadan and ch have have practice which is 2:21:37.400 --> 2:21:39.840 essentially they kick out all political parties, they kick out 2:21:39.879 --> 2:21:43.640 all police officers, and they self organized at the communal level, 2:21:44.360 --> 2:21:46.440 almost like a community police force. And you see that 2:21:46.520 --> 2:21:49.480 in Guerrero as well. There's all you know, there's there's 2:21:49.560 --> 2:21:51.840 challenges with that. There's a that usually brings on a 2:21:51.920 --> 2:21:54.280 lot of violence. And the people of Chadan have really 2:21:54.320 --> 2:21:57.800 suffered for for trying to go this, for trying to 2:21:57.920 --> 2:22:01.080 protect themselves, right, they've they've suffered a lot of casualties. Um. 2:22:01.240 --> 2:22:04.160 And there you have a uh, this combination of like 2:22:04.280 --> 2:22:08.680 nauticals and illegal logging, right and and so the community 2:22:08.720 --> 2:22:10.760 there on the one hand is trying to protect their ecology, 2:22:11.080 --> 2:22:13.480 but they're also trying to defend themselves from nauticles who 2:22:13.480 --> 2:22:15.800 have taken over local political parties and they don't want 2:22:15.879 --> 2:22:18.280 them in their in their town. In Guereto, you have 2:22:18.440 --> 2:22:21.560 community police forces and you've had them since the nineteen 2:22:21.560 --> 2:22:27.160 eighties and nineteen nineties, um. But that's raised a lot 2:22:27.240 --> 2:22:29.800 of issues in terms of you know, what happens when 2:22:29.879 --> 2:22:33.760 one community police force gets cooputi or or co oputive 2:22:33.800 --> 2:22:36.120 or corrupted by a political party or by even a 2:22:36.200 --> 2:22:39.360 nautical and then that that group is used to hit 2:22:39.480 --> 2:22:42.360 against other community groups who are who are still trying 2:22:42.400 --> 2:22:46.000 to organize for for for a radical alternative. So it's 2:22:46.080 --> 2:22:49.240 it's it's on one level, it's really depressing, right, because 2:22:49.440 --> 2:22:53.200 everything is stacked against groups and communities and organizations in 2:22:53.240 --> 2:22:55.080 a place like Gueretta who want a better world, who 2:22:55.120 --> 2:22:57.800 want to create a better world. But in the longer 2:22:57.840 --> 2:23:02.240 scope of Guerretto's history, they still resist. They still resist. 2:23:02.360 --> 2:23:04.400 And to me, that's one of the things that fascinates 2:23:04.440 --> 2:23:07.360 me about this place and about its people, about its communities, 2:23:07.879 --> 2:23:10.040 that the odds have always been stacked against them, and 2:23:10.120 --> 2:23:15.560 nonetheless they still resist, they still try to um against 2:23:15.600 --> 2:23:18.840 overwhelming odds. They still try to carve out a better, 2:23:19.959 --> 2:23:23.439 more just more dignified existence for them and for their communities, 2:23:23.600 --> 2:23:27.080 even at great risk, you know, for their well being, 2:23:27.560 --> 2:23:31.280 and they're willing to risk everything. So they're still there. 2:23:31.959 --> 2:23:34.800 They're still there, even though the forces that they're facing 2:23:34.840 --> 2:23:42.840 are are extremely powerful. Yeah. I think that's a surprisingly 2:23:42.920 --> 2:23:46.160 hopeful note to end on, which is that, Yeah, it's 2:23:46.280 --> 2:23:50.040 even like, you know, places with just incredible concentrations of 2:23:50.120 --> 2:23:53.199 violence and different kinds of power against you, that people, 2:23:54.720 --> 2:23:59.040 people are people continue to fight. Yeah, Yeah, I think 2:23:59.120 --> 2:24:00.920 that's I think that is one of the lessons that 2:24:01.000 --> 2:24:04.720 we definitely get from a place like um or a 2:24:04.760 --> 2:24:07.160 place like Chiapa's right with the with the Sabasas who 2:24:07.200 --> 2:24:09.840 are still there, who have still managed to read I mean, 2:24:09.879 --> 2:24:12.960 they've managed to reproduce themselves generationally, which is really difficult 2:24:13.000 --> 2:24:18.440 for an armed um Uh insurrectionary group. Right, Like, they've 2:24:18.480 --> 2:24:21.600 managed to do that, and and and and to carve 2:24:21.680 --> 2:24:24.360 out at great costs as well. Right they're currently right 2:24:24.400 --> 2:24:27.320 now suffering. They've been suffering for for more than a 2:24:27.400 --> 2:24:29.600 decade of low intensity warfare that's been waged by the 2:24:29.680 --> 2:24:34.000 military and their paramilitaries. But they're still there with their example, right, 2:24:34.080 --> 2:24:36.600 And I think part of the power of them and 2:24:36.720 --> 2:24:40.080 the people in gro is their example alone is threatening 2:24:40.680 --> 2:24:42.800 to power to the powers that be, and and that's 2:24:42.840 --> 2:24:45.760 why that there's always an effort to exterminate them. So 2:24:45.959 --> 2:24:49.760 just by virtue of surviving and and and defending themselves, Um, 2:24:50.040 --> 2:24:52.280 that's like a small it seems like a small thing, 2:24:52.440 --> 2:24:54.959 but but they're providing an alternative. And I think that's 2:24:55.000 --> 2:24:58.600 where there their example is really important. And I think 2:24:58.640 --> 2:25:00.560 I think there is I think there's a real argument 2:25:00.720 --> 2:25:04.320 that the whole sort of the whole sort of anti globalization, 2:25:04.600 --> 2:25:06.920 like that wave of struggle like is something that was 2:25:07.000 --> 2:25:08.800 kicked off by the Deputistas and like and not just 2:25:08.879 --> 2:25:10.800 on the sort of like they were the first people 2:25:10.840 --> 2:25:12.720 to go into revolt, but it's like I mean explicitly 2:25:13.000 --> 2:25:17.000 like the way they brought you know, like social movements 2:25:17.040 --> 2:25:19.000 from across the world together and the way they you know, 2:25:19.120 --> 2:25:21.680 the way that they like had they got, the way 2:25:21.680 --> 2:25:23.240 they got people talking, the way they have people training 2:25:23.280 --> 2:25:25.000 each other, the techniques and the sort of ideas that 2:25:25.000 --> 2:25:28.200 they're exchanging that they like. Like they they set off 2:25:28.600 --> 2:25:32.640 like a wave of revolt that lasted for like I 2:25:32.720 --> 2:25:35.560 don't know if you started in like like the end 2:25:35.600 --> 2:25:41.240 of it's like six yes, yeah it was. It was incredible. Yeah, 2:25:41.360 --> 2:25:43.920 no they I think they there and even if you 2:25:43.959 --> 2:25:46.320 want to go this might take us off topic a 2:25:46.360 --> 2:25:49.280 little bit, right, but like scholars who focus on like 2:25:49.360 --> 2:25:51.640 Venezuela would say, actually, the first one was the Cata 2:25:51.680 --> 2:25:53.640 Castle right in the late eighties, when you have a 2:25:53.720 --> 2:25:57.680 popular rebellion in Catas, Venezuela against neoliberalism, against the liberal 2:25:57.720 --> 2:26:01.039 starity measures, right, and then so I've had that, I've 2:26:01.120 --> 2:26:04.080 had a you know talk to friends, I'll be like, yeah, 2:26:04.840 --> 2:26:06.640 were the first ones. They're like no, no, no, no no. 2:26:07.040 --> 2:26:09.920 It started in Karakas eight nine I think is the 2:26:09.959 --> 2:26:12.800 ka Castle. But yeah, no, I think they're their global example. 2:26:12.840 --> 2:26:15.480 It continues to be a really powerful one for me personally. 2:26:15.560 --> 2:26:18.440 It's like I still remember my parents had My parents 2:26:18.520 --> 2:26:21.040 are are migrants from Mexico. They had this this big 2:26:21.200 --> 2:26:24.640 satellite dish in our backyard so we can beam in, uh, 2:26:25.040 --> 2:26:27.880 you know, TV stations from Mexico. And I remember January one, 2:26:28.760 --> 2:26:32.560 we woke up right grogg y, uh celebrate New Year's 2:26:32.640 --> 2:26:34.760 and my parents turned on the TV to see Mexico 2:26:34.800 --> 2:26:38.160 City news, and there was moracles right, and there were 2:26:38.240 --> 2:26:42.760 the Sapatista's um and there were then the Mexican politicians saying, no, 2:26:42.879 --> 2:26:45.880 don't believe what, don't believe your eyes? This isn't you 2:26:46.000 --> 2:26:47.640 had a guy, I remember you had a guy go 2:26:47.800 --> 2:26:51.560 on TV. I think saying something like this is not 2:26:51.680 --> 2:26:54.120 an indigenous movement, because if it was an indigenous movement, 2:26:54.160 --> 2:26:57.720 they would be using machete is not rifles. Something really condescending, 2:26:58.000 --> 2:27:01.000 like the level of racist condescension came out of Mexican 2:27:01.080 --> 2:27:06.160 politicians in in response to this movement. Yum was was 2:27:06.200 --> 2:27:08.560 super high, right, but I remember I wasn't doing your 2:27:08.640 --> 2:27:10.080 high and I remember seeing it and I'm just like, 2:27:11.600 --> 2:27:13.480 there has to be something wrong for these people to 2:27:13.560 --> 2:27:15.520 do this right. And that just led me to what 2:27:15.680 --> 2:27:17.880 to do more research and to do more reading, and 2:27:18.200 --> 2:27:20.280 that I think is really powerful. I think I still 2:27:20.320 --> 2:27:22.680 think it's really powerful. So the more we can get 2:27:22.720 --> 2:27:26.000 the word out about these movements and in other parts 2:27:26.040 --> 2:27:28.440 of Latin America, I think, I think it's still really important. 2:27:28.520 --> 2:27:30.720 And I think, especially today, we really we do need 2:27:30.959 --> 2:27:37.800 a bit more hope in these dark pandemic times. I 2:27:37.879 --> 2:27:40.640 was trying to figure out a speaking of hope segue 2:27:40.720 --> 2:27:44.000 and I couldn't. I couldn't quite get it. Do you 2:27:44.080 --> 2:27:45.840 do you have anything that you want to plug? Where 2:27:45.879 --> 2:27:50.080 can people find you? Yeah? Well, thank you so much 2:27:50.120 --> 2:27:51.680 for having me on this was This is a lot 2:27:51.720 --> 2:27:55.320 of fun. Um. You can find me on God like 2:27:55.440 --> 2:27:57.120 you can find me on Twitter. I think the pandemic 2:27:57.320 --> 2:27:59.840 my Twitter consumption has really gone up. It's been powerful. 2:27:59.840 --> 2:28:04.760 But you can find me at Alexander Underscore Avena. Yeah. Um, 2:28:05.879 --> 2:28:07.960 then I want to plug. No. I think if you 2:28:08.040 --> 2:28:11.240 go on my Twitter page you'll see you'll be able 2:28:11.240 --> 2:28:12.800 to get the link to the to the article that 2:28:12.879 --> 2:28:17.160 we've been talking today UM about about the drug from 2:28:17.200 --> 2:28:20.800 dirty war to drug war into UM. I recently published 2:28:20.800 --> 2:28:24.360 a book review of this really fascinating book on the 2:28:24.560 --> 2:28:27.480 connection between the Israeli arms industry and like Cold War 2:28:27.600 --> 2:28:29.440 Latin America, so you can find that on my page. 2:28:30.360 --> 2:28:33.000 But yeah, it's I don't really have anything else to plug. 2:28:34.760 --> 2:28:37.440 Whenever I finish this damn book on the drug wars, 2:28:38.200 --> 2:28:41.160 have me back on And yeah, definitely thin tangible to 2:28:41.520 --> 2:28:45.360 the plug right now. It's just short little articles. Oh, 2:28:45.480 --> 2:28:48.440 thank thank you again for coming on the show. Um. Yeah, 2:28:48.520 --> 2:28:50.120 this this is this has when they could happen here. 2:28:50.280 --> 2:28:53.200 You can find us in the usual places. If do 2:28:53.280 --> 2:28:55.200 you want to venture on social media for some reason, 2:28:55.280 --> 2:29:00.680 please don't. It's it's a bad place. But yeah, thank 2:29:00.720 --> 2:29:16.040 you and goodbye everyone. Hey, we'll be back Monday with 2:29:16.280 --> 2:29:19.119 more episodes every week from now until the heat death 2:29:19.160 --> 2:29:21.880 of the universe. It could happen here is a production 2:29:21.920 --> 2:29:24.959 of cool Zone Media. Or more podcasts from cool Zone Media, 2:29:25.040 --> 2:29:27.520 visit our website cool zone media dot com, or check 2:29:27.600 --> 2:29:29.840 us out on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, 2:29:29.959 --> 2:29:32.960 or wherever you listen to podcasts, you can find sources 2:29:33.000 --> 2:29:35.560 for It could happen here, updated monthly at cool zone 2:29:35.560 --> 2:29:39.840 media dot com slash sources. Thanks for listening. I'm Tanya Sam, 2:29:40.000 --> 2:29:42.880 host of the Money Moves podcast powered by Greenwood. This 2:29:43.120 --> 2:29:45.440 daily podcast will help give you the keys to the 2:29:45.520 --> 2:29:49.360 Kingdom of financial stability, wealth and abundance with celebrity guests 2:29:49.400 --> 2:29:53.360 like Rick Ross, Amanda Sells, Angela Ye, Roland, Martin, JB. Smooth, 2:29:53.400 --> 2:29:55.560 and Terrell Owens. Tune in to learn how to turn 2:29:55.680 --> 2:30:02.000 liabilities into assets and make your money moves. 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