Speaker 1: Hello the Internet, and welcome to this episode of The
Speaker 1: Weekly Zeitgeist. These are some of our favorite segments from
Speaker 1: this week, all edited together into one NonStop infotainment laugh stravaganza. Yeah, So,
Speaker 1: without further ado, here is the Weekly Zeitgeist.
Speaker 2: Miles. We are thrilled to be joined in our third
Speaker 2: seat by a senior reporter covering racial equity at the
Speaker 2: Center for Public Integrity. She's been a full Bright Fellow,
Speaker 2: a Fellow with the International Women's Media Foundation, and Innovations
Speaker 2: in Food and Agriculture Fellow with the National Press Foundation.
Speaker 2: And she's the host of the third season of The Heist,
Speaker 2: which is incredible focuses on the long documented history of
Speaker 2: government discrimination against black farmers. Please welcome to the show.
Speaker 2: April Simpson, April Welcome, April Welcome.
Speaker 3: I'm really glad to be here.
Speaker 2: Happy Halloween. Happy. Yeah do you celebrate?
Speaker 3: I don't, but I have a daughter now and he
Speaker 3: will be.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, okay, So hold thanks six months. Okay.
Speaker 4: So I'm a nine month old and we're doing the
Speaker 4: same thing, and part the whole time, I was really
Speaker 4: conflicted about costumes because I'm like, this child is not
Speaker 4: selecting this costume and we're now reducing it to a
Speaker 4: live action doll. But but I mean, if seeing him
Speaker 4: in a woody costume didn't bring a tear to my eye,
Speaker 4: you know, wow will Yeah, that was the one that
Speaker 4: was very flammable by the way that I was Okay, dude,
Speaker 4: this woody costume it was. That was the one that
Speaker 4: was like reeking of like petroleum. I'm pretty sure it's
Speaker 4: like the most synthetic fabrics that have ever been made.
Speaker 4: So yeah, so how is your daughter liking the first Halloween?
Speaker 3: Well, first, congrats to you too, Oh, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3: I think he's gonna love it. He's going to be
Speaker 3: a butterfly. Wow, it could be fun. Yeah, but I think,
Speaker 3: you know, babies bring so much joy to other people,
Speaker 3: so that yeah, kind of the fun of it too.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that is true, because there's no one sees a
Speaker 4: cute baby dressed up and goes like that's so trite,
Speaker 4: a nice try, Yeah, what a contrived outshit this is.
Speaker 2: It's just it's always like, oh.
Speaker 4: Like I remember I went somewhere else and someone was like,
Speaker 4: there's a baby here dressed like toy story.
Speaker 2: I guess, yeah, we'll take that. Oh, that's so cute, amazing,
Speaker 2: those sound amazing. Congratulations to you both, and congratulations to
Speaker 2: every living human with a beating heart that runs into
Speaker 2: you on Halloween and gets to see you children and
Speaker 2: they're amazing Halloween costumes. Absolutely? What is something from your
Speaker 2: search history?
Speaker 5: Math jokes?
Speaker 2: Math jokes?
Speaker 5: A math joke?
Speaker 2: What's a math like? Give me hit me with one?
Speaker 5: Okay, the I says to the pie, be irrational?
Speaker 2: Why says to the pie irrational?
Speaker 5: And the pie says BG. The pie says back, get real.
Speaker 2: This rational umber? Oh?
Speaker 5: Come on, you know the imaginary number?
Speaker 4: I Oh, okay, I'm a ha ha love that math joke.
Speaker 5: The uh one of the okay Samue Obayin has better
Speaker 5: math jokes than the ones I found on the internet.
Speaker 5: But math joke cartoons?
Speaker 2: Wait? Wait, what got you onto math jokes?
Speaker 5: Somebody told me that they don't like comedy, they just
Speaker 5: like math.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 6: It was like some guy was like nagging me in
Speaker 6: a in the grocery storeline.
Speaker 4: Why are you doing like a tight five about grocery
Speaker 4: lines or something?
Speaker 5: I mean, okay, let's be real.
Speaker 6: I'm a out of commission comedian right now, performing right now,
Speaker 6: which means that I'm performing.
Speaker 2: Everywhere, everywhere. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 6: Like I'm sorry, world, that's just what happens. Just trying
Speaker 6: jokes out on everybody.
Speaker 2: Wait, so you ask someone randomly and lie you like, hey,
Speaker 2: like you wanna hear a joke?
Speaker 6: Basically basically that's what I'm doing now. I just like
Speaker 6: I say a dumb, funny thing like, oh, I guess
Speaker 6: this line's gonna just keep going.
Speaker 2: And I don't feel that a geometry Is that a
Speaker 2: geometry joke?
Speaker 6: No, it gets there, you know, like I just like,
Speaker 6: keep at it, you know, just double down, like it's
Speaker 6: just a wrapping around corners, all the corners.
Speaker 5: I'm sure there's a math joke to plug in here.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well famously keep going. Yeah, and in geometry they
Speaker 2: just keep going.
Speaker 6: And going and pie goes and goes forever. And the
Speaker 6: guy was like, I like math, just not jokes, And
Speaker 6: I was like, what the what.
Speaker 2: The fuck are you talking about? Man? What the I
Speaker 2: don't know if that person, you know, they were just
Speaker 2: the person like.
Speaker 5: Yeah, is he telling me to stop making nice?
Speaker 2: I just don't.
Speaker 4: I love that binary though it's math or humor, pick one.
Speaker 4: It's like, I don't know, but I guess why wasn't
Speaker 4: the geometry teacher at school because she sprained her angle.
Speaker 2: You like that one. You like that guy and he's
Speaker 2: like crying. It's so like, oh fuck ah, you write that.
Speaker 5: This moment has changed me, right right right?
Speaker 2: I love it. I like math? Okay, like was he
Speaker 2: my seven year old son? Sort of thing. My seven
Speaker 2: year old son would say to me, like, I try
Speaker 2: and make him laugh and he's like, I like math, dad,
Speaker 2: Oh jokes. That's kind of fucked up.
Speaker 4: That's actually probably the most scathing response you could give,
Speaker 4: where you're like, honestly, I like math.
Speaker 2: Better than whatever the fuck this is.
Speaker 1: I know.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I was like, man, come on, man, I thought I've.
Speaker 2: Had a baby. I'm please, man, I haven't.
Speaker 4: I haven't gone up in like months a little.
Speaker 2: He just burst into tears and he's like, fuck, fuck,
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, Okay, I didn't know. I didn't fuck what
Speaker 2: the fuck?
Speaker 5: That's when I dropped the fork lift on him.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's exactly. Hey, Blake, why don't you tell us
Speaker 2: something that you think is overrated? Yeah? I had here.
Speaker 7: Written down the heat and I'm like, is are we
Speaker 7: talking about pat Riley? But of course not. I'm talking
Speaker 7: about the heat in your house where I for years
Speaker 7: thought that heat cost about four dollars and fifty cents
Speaker 7: per minute to run. So I was like, in gas
Speaker 7: money on your gas bill. So and I lived in
Speaker 7: la for forever, so I would never I would be like,
Speaker 7: let's just throw on sweatshirts or coat. And then I
Speaker 7: started living with my now wife and she was like,
Speaker 7: this isn't the right way to live, and so then
Speaker 7: I started turning it on. You're also living on the
Speaker 7: East coast in it was clear breeze this morning, different temperatures, yeah, correct,
Speaker 7: And when we turn it on, if you haven't used
Speaker 7: the heat and a while, there's generally a lot of
Speaker 7: like dust and I don't know, mouse bones and there,
Speaker 7: and I'm allergic to some of that.
Speaker 2: So allergic to mouse, like I don't.
Speaker 7: It's not mice is a full you know, out of
Speaker 7: the garage mouse. It's fine, but it's bone.
Speaker 2: Smoked a whole mouse this morning. I didn't. Yah, we
Speaker 2: is right off the bone.
Speaker 7: Had a full mouse and yeah, no, it generally gives
Speaker 7: me allergies. So I just think it's over. I like
Speaker 7: to bundle up. I prefer or a blanket and like
Speaker 7: a nice comfy hoodie in home. Yeah I do, and
Speaker 7: which yeah, and I'm right. I was about to say,
Speaker 7: I realized that's strange. It's not strange, it's blake.
Speaker 2: Will you do me a favor? Go ahead right now?
Speaker 2: Will you wait? Yeah? I'm right.
Speaker 4: Okay, is the heat on right now at your place?
Speaker 2: No? No, it can't be.
Speaker 4: And you said it was thirty degrees this morning.
Speaker 7: Yeah, but it's gone up to about forty nine.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 4: Will you touch the tip of your nose and tell
Speaker 4: me if that's warm or cold?
Speaker 2: Right now?
Speaker 7: I can't feel it. I can't even tell it. It
Speaker 7: just broke off. Oh yeah, fuck, that's like snowman.
Speaker 4: That's always when I know the house is too cold,
Speaker 4: is when the tip of my nose gets cold. I'm like, now,
Speaker 4: let me I don't need to have all this shit on.
Speaker 4: But yeah, it's funny.
Speaker 2: It is someone who loves to wear like warm, like
Speaker 2: cold weather clothing just for some reason.
Speaker 4: I get in my house, I'm like, do I need
Speaker 4: to wear a parka on my couch?
Speaker 2: I don't know, but hey, yeah, each their own.
Speaker 7: When I was a kid, we I but we grew
Speaker 7: up like, never want it for anything, you know, grew up.
Speaker 7: My my dad had a good job. And I'm saying
Speaker 7: this because of what I'm about to say. Take those
Speaker 7: silver spoons out of your mouth real quick.
Speaker 2: I can't hear you. I can't.
Speaker 7: They're actually welded to my teeth. My teeth instead of fillings,
Speaker 7: I'd have silver swimmings melted down. I've formed the bowlers
Speaker 7: and we just I slept like in the a converted
Speaker 7: attic which had air conditioning but no heat. So when
Speaker 7: I would come home from college, win or break, I
Speaker 7: would sleep in a coat.
Speaker 2: You know what.
Speaker 7: That's probably why I don't give a shit about heat,
Speaker 7: because I did it when I was young. I was
Speaker 7: able to sleep in a coat. Why can't the woman
Speaker 7: I love more than anything on earth suffer along with me?
Speaker 2: Yeah? No, she'll fingers and tell many people about you. Huh.
Speaker 2: It just kind of kept you up in that attic. No, no, And.
Speaker 7: It was they wouldn't come up until my plates started
Speaker 7: piling up outside the door and feed me, Yeah, the
Speaker 7: little sloths.
Speaker 4: Or if we had company over and they would blindfold
Speaker 4: me and give me my happy juice.
Speaker 7: Yes, yes, And I met the broom once, the broom
Speaker 7: that they used to hit the ceiling and say, sorry,
Speaker 7: we have rats. Every time i'd sneeze or something.
Speaker 2: We have rats, I said, The mice bones are rattling
Speaker 2: again up there. Hence who turned the heat? You got
Speaker 2: allergic to mice bones because they were your only friends
Speaker 2: for so long? But they were they were also they
Speaker 2: were also from a physiological No, it does that in
Speaker 2: the mental state.
Speaker 7: And also if i'd like break a bone trying to escape,
Speaker 7: I would make a splint out of their bones.
Speaker 2: Yeah, too weird, just bone supporting bones? Why not sometimes together?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 7: Thank you, m M exactly.
Speaker 2: What's uh? What's something you think is underrated? Okay? Two things.
Speaker 8: Stove top espresso, which I think is just like the percolators.
Speaker 8: They're just great.
Speaker 2: Oh that metal thing, right, yeah yeah, the metal thing,
Speaker 2: yeah yeah, yeah, I think there.
Speaker 8: I think there. I think it's better than French press.
Speaker 8: I think it's better than a pour over. You know,
Speaker 8: it might not be better than like one hundred year
Speaker 8: old French machine or something, but I think it's the
Speaker 8: best juga choo, you know. And then the other thing
Speaker 8: I like that I think is underrated are the cheapy
Speaker 8: headphones that you get from flight attendants on flights because
Speaker 8: they always come in handy at the exact time when
Speaker 8: you can't find your other shit.
Speaker 2: Oh, it's like you're like, wait.
Speaker 8: A minute, I have one of these in my purse,
Speaker 8: and then you need it and you have it and those.
Speaker 4: Are my Yeah, it's for I'm like such a headphone nerd.
Speaker 4: Like I'm like, I got my own cans, thank you
Speaker 4: so much because the fidelity is way too fucked up
Speaker 4: from my ears. But hey, maybe maybe my mother would
Speaker 4: like it because she doesn't care about how shit sounds.
Speaker 2: But yeah, it is.
Speaker 4: I never thought of it as like so of like
Speaker 4: having like a package of Kleenex or something too, where
Speaker 4: you're like headphones, Wait, I got I know.
Speaker 2: I have a pile of them from every flight I go.
Speaker 4: On exactly how I will be less stuck up and
Speaker 4: I will accept them gleefully.
Speaker 2: You just take them as your backup, right right. Some
Speaker 2: of them break like one and a half uses into
Speaker 2: a life cycle, but sometimes like that, that's not a rule,
Speaker 2: and sometimes they'll last you a year. You know, they'll
Speaker 2: just be you get the the real ones that are
Speaker 2: able to kind of stick together. I thought stuff Top
Speaker 2: Espresso was the stuff top stuff and brand expanding into
Speaker 2: the world espresso. So I'm very glad to hear that
Speaker 2: that's not what's happening. Just add water to like the powder.
Speaker 2: There it is and microwave it.
Speaker 8: Oh good god, you thought I mean Ethiopian. I would never.
Speaker 2: Serious about the coffee. That's that's where my American brain went.
Speaker 2: Of course, of course, of course, so it's probably in
Speaker 2: a box, the stuff top espresso. It's like, what aisle
Speaker 2: is that in? Where do I find that? All right, well,
Speaker 2: let's uh, let's take a quick break and we'll come
Speaker 2: back and talk about presidents creating foreign policy based on
Speaker 2: some movies they just saw. And we're back. We're back,
Speaker 2: and I guess to kick us off, i'd just be
Speaker 2: curious to hear a little bit more about your background, April.
Speaker 2: What kind of stories did you cover prior to this?
Speaker 2: How do you get to this story? Because I personally
Speaker 2: hear agriculture, and my brain it doesn't turn off, but
Speaker 2: it assumes that's somebody else's story to pay attention to.
Speaker 2: But then this one was so good, and it seems like,
Speaker 2: base on some of your credentials, that agriculture is kind
Speaker 2: of a sweet spot for you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I I'd say I almost fell into it because
Speaker 3: at my job prior to coming to Center for Public Integrity,
Speaker 3: I covered rural issues and really had the opportunity to
Speaker 3: shape that beat as I saw fit. And you know,
Speaker 3: at that time Trump was president, there were like subsidies
Speaker 3: basically that were given to farmers when there was a
Speaker 3: trade war with China, right to help keep them on
Speaker 3: their feed. And there was you know, investigative reporting that
Speaker 3: showed most of that money, nearly all of that money
Speaker 3: went to white farmers, and some of that just has
Speaker 3: to do with the way, like the structure of the system.
Speaker 3: So I got just into role issues reporting into agriculture
Speaker 3: as like a beat within my beat while I was
Speaker 3: at my previous job, and during that time also learned
Speaker 3: more about the history of discrimination at USDA. I learned
Speaker 3: against black farmers and other farmers of color as well,
Speaker 3: and you know, learn more about Pickford versus Clickman was,
Speaker 3: which was this big class action lawsuit black farmers were successful,
Speaker 3: and then the I guess the person installment in the
Speaker 3: late nineties, nineteen ninety nine, and doing that work, you know,
Speaker 3: led me to CPI and trying to like not sound
Speaker 3: super wonky about it, but not go Wonk and hearing
Speaker 3: a farmer who actually recently passed away. His names Eddie Slaughter. He's, oh, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: he passed away like end of September. It just happened.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm sad to hear that. Yeah that.
Speaker 4: I mean, like, this story is so it like it
Speaker 4: touches intersect it with so many issues that the United
Speaker 4: States has been the cause of and never the solution to.
Speaker 2: And it's the whole journey that.
Speaker 4: You sort of take listeners on is really fantastic because,
Speaker 4: like Jack said, like when I hear, like when I
Speaker 4: hear people talking about big agriculture, I hear about big
Speaker 4: agriculture and factory farming and farm subsidies. But I'm like, yeah,
Speaker 4: I don't know, it's just like that one industry, like
Speaker 4: the government is the one being like the money hose
Speaker 4: will never turn off for some of you, right, And
Speaker 4: then really beginning to zoom out to really understand the
Speaker 4: entirety of it, because in my mind, I'm like, it's
Speaker 4: probably like you just assume it's like it's probably like
Speaker 4: five companies doing everything. When you lose sight of sort
Speaker 4: of what these origin stories are and you go back to,
Speaker 4: you know, the early twentieth century in Oklahoma and how
Speaker 4: a lot of these farming, these black farming communities were thriving,
Speaker 4: you know, And we've talked about like Black Wall Street
Speaker 4: on this show and just sort of the whole history there,
Speaker 4: But can you kind of just like sort of paint
Speaker 4: this picture, because I think more than even talking about,
Speaker 4: like we're going to talk about what's happening now, but
Speaker 4: I think it's really important for people to understand how
Speaker 4: prosperous black farming was in the United States, to really
Speaker 4: get an understanding of like the tragedy that has been
Speaker 4: occurring ever since then.
Speaker 2: Just to refresh people, Black Wall Street was Tulsa, Oklahoma,
Speaker 2: like this boom time, like all black or you know,
Speaker 2: prominently black community where business was just thriving, families were
Speaker 2: getting rich. And because they're being left to operate a
Speaker 2: community on their own without a lot of white supremacy
Speaker 2: coming in and you know, using the tools of systemic
Speaker 2: oppression to crush them and then people Obviously this is
Speaker 2: a simplified way of saying it, but like the what
Speaker 2: white supremacy came in and burnt the town to the
Speaker 2: ground and like raised like literally raised the community in
Speaker 2: Oklahoma but yeah, totally a story that I didn't know
Speaker 2: was that not far away. Also in Oklahoma around the
Speaker 2: same time, there was a similarly thriving community that you
Speaker 2: talked about April.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we talked about Bowley, Oklahoma, which is where the
Speaker 3: main character of the podcast is from, Nate Bradford, and
Speaker 3: it was in some ways like a country version of
Speaker 3: that Tulsa. It was a thriving black community that was
Speaker 3: full of folks who came from the Deep South escaping
Speaker 3: Jim Crow around the turn of the century and trying
Speaker 3: to you know, get get a piece of land and
Speaker 3: be free. And a lot of those folks ended up
Speaker 3: settling in Bowley because there was a railroad that was
Speaker 3: being developed and going from Oklahoma to Arkansas, so it
Speaker 3: was just, you know, a good place to be and
Speaker 3: that brought a lot of folks through there. So they settled,
Speaker 3: you know, in and around Bowley. They were able to
Speaker 3: buy land be a part of this community that was
Speaker 3: for four black folks, by black folks, so you know,
Speaker 3: answering to local government leadership and everything that was done
Speaker 3: was in the interest of the people who were there,
Speaker 3: who were majority black, and a lot of those folks
Speaker 3: Cotton was huge. So a lot of them were cotton farmers.
Speaker 3: Some of them were also in cattle farming, and Bully
Speaker 3: ended up and they really paid for Bully, right, Their
Speaker 3: money was what was making the town prosperous, and Bowley
Speaker 3: ended up being hugely successful. It had colleges, it had
Speaker 3: grocery stores, it had banks, It had what is believed
Speaker 3: to be the first black nationally chartered bank in the country,
Speaker 3: which is huge. And yeah, I mean that ended up
Speaker 3: changing for a number of reasons, but Bully it was
Speaker 3: one of fifty black towns at the time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's just so so devastating to the central
Speaker 2: narrative of white supremacy, like the existence of this thriving
Speaker 2: town that like if white supremacists all how this town
Speaker 2: to exist, is able to thrive and have this amazing community,
Speaker 2: and also like kind of devastating to some of the
Speaker 2: central tenets of capitalists, like individualism and capitalism where there's
Speaker 2: this you know, we we've talked about community action and
Speaker 2: how you know, Black communities and you know, indigenous communities
Speaker 2: are some of the best models that we have of
Speaker 2: like how you know, communities that take care of themselves
Speaker 2: and start their own you know, circular communities and yeah,
Speaker 2: so it runs against the central coordinarrative of the American
Speaker 2: mainstream in a lot of ways that are probably scary
Speaker 2: to powerful people. Right.
Speaker 4: It's it's also like like hearing about that era too,
Speaker 4: where you know, these these communities are thriving and here
Speaker 4: like that the change came once you know, like once
Speaker 4: statehood occurred and now Oklahoma was going to be like
Speaker 4: basically get like the other states that were like enacting
Speaker 4: these Jim Crow laws. And now you had these communities
Speaker 4: that were for the most part able to do whatever
Speaker 4: they had to mostly free from any kind of like
Speaker 4: racial interference that suddenly now they're seeing segregation and they're
Speaker 4: seeing all these laws that are like are completely changing
Speaker 4: the way they live. What was like from that moment on,
Speaker 4: because I think this is this is what becomes really
Speaker 4: interesting too, is this is sort of like the that
Speaker 4: was sort of like the height of things and now
Speaker 4: we begin to see the deterioration of these communities and
Speaker 4: the dispossession of land. What was like can after these
Speaker 4: Jim Crow laws were enacted, what sort of like the
Speaker 4: kind of next sort of beats that happened that are
Speaker 4: kind of that begins sort of this momentum even further.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so Oklahoma became a state nineteen oh seven, it
Speaker 3: starts passing these Gym Crow laws. But Bully did thrive
Speaker 3: for a little bit longer. But then there were a
Speaker 3: lot of economic things that happened. Right There was the
Speaker 3: Great Depression, There was a bull evil that chewed up
Speaker 3: the cotton. There was the Agricultural Adjustment Act of in
Speaker 3: the thirties that limited the amount of cotton a farmer
Speaker 3: could produce those that were sharecropper, and folks farmers got
Speaker 3: money to help them through that, but folks that were
Speaker 3: sharecroppers may not have seen any of that money. And
Speaker 3: black folks were kind of limited in what they could grow.
Speaker 3: So all those things led to the decline of Bully.
Speaker 3: A lot of the folks there, and like the local
Speaker 3: historians say that even though there was this Jim Crow
Speaker 3: violence happening outside of Bowley, not even that far outside
Speaker 3: of Bully, because there were sundowntowns very close, it Bully felt,
Speaker 3: you know, kind of protected, but it's still that fear,
Speaker 3: that violence that's happening just outside. All these things came
Speaker 3: together and encouraged folks to move on to other places.
Speaker 4: And then like I guess you know, part of like
Speaker 4: the whole you know, the focus of this season is
Speaker 4: talking about just the decline and discrimination in black farming
Speaker 4: and black farmers have had to face. Can you like
Speaker 4: there's some pretty staggering statistics. I think people should kind
Speaker 4: of like hear first, like as we dive into this
Speaker 4: is what, like what was the state of black farmers
Speaker 4: like in its prime as opposed to right now, just
Speaker 4: so we can give ourselves an idea of like how
Speaker 4: aggressive this process has.
Speaker 3: Been so around the turn of the century when we know,
Speaker 3: you know, obviously coming out of slavery, there were a
Speaker 3: great number of black farmers and me we know, for example,
Speaker 3: there's a study that found black farmers lost three hundred
Speaker 3: and twenty six billion in land and wealth from nineteen
Speaker 3: twenty to nineteen ninety seven, which is a huge, huge number.
Speaker 3: And we know that the number of black farmers has
Speaker 3: dropped since nineteen hundred, so that's that's a pretty big
Speaker 3: one now as well, black farmers now are only about
Speaker 3: one point four percent of all farmers, suggest.
Speaker 2: A tiny number, and that that was not the case
Speaker 2: and like leading up to the nineteen twenties was not
Speaker 2: like one point four percent.
Speaker 3: No, it was black folks had you know, we're much
Speaker 3: greater in number, and we're also you know, significant landowners
Speaker 3: as well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and the way the government accomplished this is kind
Speaker 2: of a thing. We've you know, the systemic economic forces,
Speaker 2: economic racism, and it blends in more easily when they
Speaker 2: can just say, oh, well, you know, there was a
Speaker 2: bad run of bull weavils or something like that, and
Speaker 2: not focusing on well, in white communities, when there's a
Speaker 2: you know, bed string of crops because of all weevils,
Speaker 2: the government comes in and turns on the money hose, right,
Speaker 2: But in this case, there's just a different standard of
Speaker 2: one to intervene and how easy it is to get
Speaker 2: government assistants and then like what happens once you get
Speaker 2: that government assistance.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean obviously there's racial violence that had a
Speaker 3: pardon this, but also subsidies, for example, are more helpful
Speaker 3: to farmers that are larger landowners or farmers who are
Speaker 3: growing certain crops, and black farmers, you know, tend to
Speaker 3: be smaller guys, so they're not going to get as
Speaker 3: much money from those subsidy programs. The USDA, for example,
Speaker 3: is a lender of last resort, and that means you
Speaker 3: had to get rejected from other agencies, other banks in
Speaker 3: order to get a loan from them. And there's this
Speaker 3: long documented history showing that black farmers have had a
Speaker 3: tougher time getting those loans, and when they get those loans,
Speaker 3: they're not as much as they would have wanted them
Speaker 3: to be, or maybe they're delayed so that they don't
Speaker 3: come when the farmer might need it for planting, they
Speaker 3: come much later, and then that kind of has a
Speaker 3: chain reaction to it.
Speaker 4: Right, And yeah, like in this, like in this telling
Speaker 4: of it or just like this, you know, examination of
Speaker 4: the industry, you just realize that the USDA is doing
Speaker 4: some of the most vile shit, like in terms of
Speaker 4: disenfranchising these farmers or putting them essentially into like a
Speaker 4: debt trap.
Speaker 2: To dispossess their land.
Speaker 4: And I know, like it's like you'll never find a
Speaker 4: document that says this is our mandate as the USDA.
Speaker 4: But when you look at how the USDA was interacting
Speaker 4: with black farmers that were looking for loans and things
Speaker 4: like that, it's as wild how so many of the
Speaker 4: people that you spoke to were sort of saying like
Speaker 4: the second I took that loan was basically the end.
Speaker 4: Like when I began to rely on the USDA and
Speaker 4: the just the hoops and things that people have to
Speaker 4: jump through just for the simplest things is really like
Speaker 4: mind blowing, Like can you kind of just paint a
Speaker 4: picture for people of sort of how the U like
Speaker 4: how this game is set up with the USDA of
Speaker 4: how like, because I think normal people would be like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 4: what's the problem. You get your loan if you have
Speaker 4: an off year, you tell them, they understand and then
Speaker 4: maybe they work with you to make something happen. But
Speaker 4: that really wasn't the case for black farmers really ever.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So like in the past, USDA had a system
Speaker 3: where county committees, who are like local farmers, would have
Speaker 3: a lot of influence deciding who is credit worthy, and
Speaker 3: so you know, they could decide like that black farmer,
Speaker 3: for example, we don't want to give him a loan.
Speaker 3: Or one of the experts we talked to says how
Speaker 3: the county committee person could say, well, I have my
Speaker 3: eye on that piece of property that they have, and
Speaker 3: I know if this loan is delayed or denied that
Speaker 3: it's only a matter of time before that piece of
Speaker 3: property will be you know, out in the market. Right,
Speaker 3: So that was, you know, one way that affected black farmers.
Speaker 3: Another is loan officers have a lot of discretion and
Speaker 3: deciding who gets loans and who doesn't and how supportive
Speaker 3: they can be when that farmer's in trouble and they're farmers,
Speaker 3: older farmers and then younger farmers like me who tells
Speaker 3: us his story of how he felt he didn't get
Speaker 3: the flexibility that he needed from his loan officer.
Speaker 4: Right, it is like do you think you know, like
Speaker 4: in looking at it too, because you know, Nate, the
Speaker 4: one of the farmers that you speak with, talks about
Speaker 4: how when he's asking for his loan to be restructured
Speaker 4: or something, their solution is basically like, why don't you
Speaker 4: just sell your land then, and or like sell your cattle,
Speaker 4: And they're like, but that's how I make my living,
Speaker 4: So if I do that, that renders me like inert
Speaker 4: from a business standpoint.
Speaker 2: And like with that, like.
Speaker 4: Knowing that that you had these sort of credit bureaus
Speaker 4: of like local like landed farmers who are the ones
Speaker 4: determining who were like kind of behind the scenes or
Speaker 4: at least how to like a seat at the table
Speaker 4: to determine who got loans. It feels like that sort
Speaker 4: of I got my eye on that property sort of
Speaker 4: energy has just kind of persisted throughout like the like
Speaker 4: the decades following it.
Speaker 3: I mean, I think we know for sure through what
Speaker 3: mid nineties, because that's what Pickford was based on, Like,
Speaker 3: we know that. The trickier question is to what extent
Speaker 3: is this happening now? Like, to what extent has it continued?
Speaker 3: And people like me, obviously through his experience, feel like
Speaker 3: it has. You know, other folks would argue that USAA
Speaker 3: has done a number of things to try to rectify this,
Speaker 3: but I guess the we're still trying to figure it out, right.
Speaker 2: Can you talk about you did mention that there's racial
Speaker 2: violence that played a role in this over the course
Speaker 2: of like the transition from the from nineteen twenty to
Speaker 2: the late nineties. Can you just talk about what that was,
Speaker 2: what that looked like, because I think that's probably helpful
Speaker 2: when then coming into this and being like and then
Speaker 2: this is a world that was like self policing, where
Speaker 2: like the USDA just gets to use their own judgment
Speaker 2: to make financial decisions. But what was what was happening
Speaker 2: at that time.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean outside of the Deep South. I guess
Speaker 3: some would consider Oklahoma still part of that. But Oklahoma
Speaker 3: has like one of the highest documented things outside of
Speaker 3: the Deep South traditional Deep South, And you know there's
Speaker 3: stories Oklahoma elsewhere are folks kind of abandoning their property
Speaker 3: because of fear of racial violence from white farmers, white landowners.
Speaker 3: So I mean, that's that's kind of outside of USDA,
Speaker 3: but that's something that's functioned to dispossess black farmers as well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, USDA, I'm mainly knew prior to this for like
Speaker 2: grating my eggs and meats, like kind of my experience
Speaker 2: with the USDA. But truly like they've set up this
Speaker 2: kafka esque like just system like that. There's one scene
Speaker 2: where they discover like that this USDA Civil Rights Agency
Speaker 2: that they've been sending their complaints to the office just
Speaker 2: like doesn't exist. Their letters have been just like piling
Speaker 2: up in an office somewhere, and when it comes time
Speaker 2: to like actually look at their complaints and what the
Speaker 2: USDA was doing, the court is just like we can't
Speaker 2: use the letters as evidence because they never open, like
Speaker 2: basically the logic is like, they never opened them, so
Speaker 2: what are they supposed to do? But yeah, it's like
Speaker 2: the judicial historical equivalent of like plugging your ears and saying, yeah,
Speaker 2: I can't hear you, so like it doesn't count. But yeah,
Speaker 2: it's just a whole different level of like illogic and
Speaker 2: injustice that I don't know, like it was crazy to
Speaker 2: hear about. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah. During with the Oregan administration, that's when the Civil
Speaker 3: Rights Office was like pretty much closed. So you had
Speaker 3: farmers sending in their discrimination complaints and they weren't going
Speaker 3: anywhere right, Like nobody was reading them. They were were
Speaker 3: just kind of piling up in a room that and
Speaker 3: nobody was monitoring them. So that was one of the
Speaker 3: things that really fed into the Pickford suit that even
Speaker 3: when farmers filed complaints of discrimination there, they weren't being addressed.
Speaker 3: There was no one to address them, right.
Speaker 4: And it's again like it feels like the USDA is
Speaker 4: just like another example of many other agencies or institutions
Speaker 4: that like, after decades of discriminatory behavior, they'll be like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 4: it turns out we may have been doing some bad stuff.
Speaker 4: And then it just kind of feels like it sort
Speaker 4: of peters out there because it felt like, especially when
Speaker 4: discussing the Pickford for Verslickman, right, is the case that
Speaker 4: there was a moment for this to potentially create some
Speaker 4: kind of sea change, but it it just it just didn't.
Speaker 4: And a lot of that, I'm sure too, like as
Speaker 4: you ex like as the reporting shows, like the in
Speaker 4: the show, is that a lot of it too is
Speaker 4: also like by design, by like offering these farmers, like
Speaker 4: when the like in a settlement that it was just
Speaker 4: kind of like pick your poison here and neither are
Speaker 4: actually going to fully address all of the injustices that
Speaker 4: you had to suffer.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So there was a settlement agreement and so this
Speaker 3: case never went to trial, so farmers never had the
Speaker 3: opportunity to really like tell their case in court. But
Speaker 3: they decided on the settlement that didn't actually require USDA
Speaker 3: to come out and say, you know, we did wrong,
Speaker 3: We're going to change our ways, we're going to fire
Speaker 3: folks who were involved in this, Like none of that
Speaker 3: had to happen. And the settlement offered two tracks for
Speaker 3: folks to follow. One of those tracks basically they had
Speaker 3: to show some level of paperwork they had just proved
Speaker 3: some level of discrimination and they would get fifty thousand dollars.
Speaker 3: But they also had to show, like that there was
Speaker 3: a white farmer in a similarly situated position that they
Speaker 3: suffered an economic loss. That was supposedly the easy track.
Speaker 3: And then there was Track B, and that one they
Speaker 3: had to gather more paperwork, They had to present it
Speaker 3: at like a mini trial. They had to show that
Speaker 3: their damages were greater than fifty thousand dollars, and then
Speaker 3: they had to convince an arbitrator of all that and
Speaker 3: they could potentially get, you know, a substantial amount of money.
Speaker 3: The farmer that we talked to, Eddie, says that the
Speaker 3: lawyers really encouraged the farmers to go with Track A
Speaker 3: and not Track B, and part of that was because
Speaker 3: Track A offered the possibility of debt forgiveness if they
Speaker 3: could find discrimination attached to the loan in question. So
Speaker 3: he argues, that's why a bunch of us went with
Speaker 3: truck A, something like I think like two percent or
Speaker 3: less than two percent went with truck B. Wow, And
Speaker 3: in the end, a lot of folks didn't end up
Speaker 3: who went with TRACKA didn't end up getting that loan. Forgiveness.
Speaker 4: It's that's what's like really harrowing, especially that when you
Speaker 4: talk about Eddie and you know the never ending fight
Speaker 4: with the USDA, of how it's always him or the
Speaker 4: farmers trying to prove that they're worthy of these loans,
Speaker 4: that they're being left out all the while that the
Speaker 4: USDA uses things like offsets, which is like this practice
Speaker 4: to say like, well, if you can't pay some of
Speaker 4: this debt that you have, we'll just take this out
Speaker 4: of your fifty thousand dollars settlement from the USDA. Like that,
Speaker 4: the it just feels like never ending, and like the
Speaker 4: the frustration that comes out in some of these these
Speaker 4: people's voices, it's really really like it's heartbreaking because at
Speaker 4: the end of the day, they're trying to do something
Speaker 4: as simple as just like grow things on the land
Speaker 4: and have a very simple life. They're not saying like
Speaker 4: I'm trying to live outside of my means or do
Speaker 4: something extravagant. It's like I like to I like to farm,
Speaker 4: and we're not given this opportunity, and and every other turn,
Speaker 4: it feels like they have to constantly fight just to
Speaker 4: not have their their their their finances whittled away at
Speaker 4: to the point that they are so destitute that the
Speaker 4: only option is to give up everything and give up land.
Speaker 4: And they all talk about how important like the land is,
Speaker 4: Like it's sometimes it's not even about the money. It's
Speaker 4: the fact that especially for uh, for Black Americans, that
Speaker 4: owning that piece of land is such a vital part
Speaker 4: of your longevity, of you being able to have something
Speaker 4: to give to your descendants and things like that. And
Speaker 4: that must have been so difficult to like, I mean,
Speaker 4: did you have any I'm sure you had a sense
Speaker 4: of how like backwards this whole thing was, but like,
Speaker 4: did it just kind of make you more angry or
Speaker 4: what was that like? Because I like listening to it,
Speaker 4: I wanted to like scream half the time.
Speaker 3: I would say it made me angry necessarily. I think
Speaker 3: sometimes when you're like you're so seeped in it, it's
Speaker 3: like you lose a little bit of that. But I think,
Speaker 3: I mean, folks like Eddie are so passionate about this cause,
Speaker 3: and I think farmers in general, regardless of race, are
Speaker 3: really attached to the land. I mean, it's a multi
Speaker 3: generational life, right. They're not just thinking about themselves, They're
Speaker 3: thinking about who's coming up after them, because they want
Speaker 3: the name to be carried on, you know, well after them.
Speaker 3: And I think the stakes are obviously so much higher
Speaker 3: for black farmers. Is given everything that folks went through
Speaker 3: to desk to hold on to that land, with the
Speaker 3: violence and with the economic issues that they faced one
Speaker 3: hundred years ago, to have it now is like, it's
Speaker 3: it's huge. So yeah, it's I mean, it does. It
Speaker 3: is a sad story when we think about just everything
Speaker 3: that's involved.
Speaker 2: Let's take a quick break and we'll come back and
Speaker 2: talk about just where where you see things heading and
Speaker 2: where you kind of leave things at the end of
Speaker 2: the show.
Speaker 9: And we're back and has anyone So there's that one
Speaker 9: there's that one picture of him on the beach right
Speaker 9: with Casey and it's like clearly photoshopped and there are
Speaker 9: no footprints behind them?
Speaker 2: Is that because of something to do with like maybe
Speaker 2: his feet aren't even real?
Speaker 5: Vampire?
Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe he's a vampire, that's all.
Speaker 4: If you're footless, Yeah we can, we can, we can
Speaker 4: get right on them feet pictures. I feel so terrible
Speaker 4: that I didn't actually put this into the document for
Speaker 4: us to look at.
Speaker 2: But yeah, well you knew I would be described what.
Speaker 5: He's got fike feet, folks.
Speaker 2: Yeah, thick feet, thick foot king.
Speaker 5: Yeah, those look like the inflamed foot of a man
Speaker 5: who's been wearing lifts.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and one of his feet is propped up like
Speaker 2: a barbie foot.
Speaker 5: He can't stop propping it.
Speaker 4: His imagine that foot is stuck like that from overuse
Speaker 4: of the lifts.
Speaker 2: They it took three days to get the left foot
Speaker 2: like flattened out, but they yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5: He has extremely flat feet.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, well, hey, Ron, not anymore, not with the
Speaker 2: magic of these lifts. No, not at all. All right,
Speaker 2: we have an update on the story that we've been
Speaker 2: covered breathlessly. We're like, guys, stop stealing from Target. There's
Speaker 2: a string that is putting them out of business. And
Speaker 2: it turns out that is bullshit.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we've been covering, like I remember, the first one
Speaker 4: we were talking about is probably Walgreens in the Bay Area.
Speaker 2: They're like, oh god, it's so out of control.
Speaker 4: And then it's like, no, your rents too high, you're
Speaker 4: not doing enough business, and you've overexpanded too quickly, and
Speaker 4: you're using this as cover. And now the latest one
Speaker 4: was like about a month ago. Target is the latest
Speaker 4: company crying crime wave, and they.
Speaker 2: Said, we're gonna have to close nine stores because they're
Speaker 2: shoplifting so much. And again every fucking place. CNBC.
Speaker 4: Target says it will close nine stores in major city
Speaker 4: siting violence and theft. Wall Street Journal Target to closed
Speaker 4: stores in San Francisco other cities sighting theft. Bloomberg Target closes.
Speaker 10: Nine NYC West Coast stores to stop losses from rising theft.
Speaker 10: The New York Times Target sighting theft to close nine stores.
Speaker 10: Everybody just took this and ran with it. Okay, and
Speaker 10: sadly for sw York Times is the most liberal publication
Speaker 10: in the world.
Speaker 5: What obviously, Yeah, I'm so confused.
Speaker 4: I know their coverage is so to the left, its right,
Speaker 4: that's how wild it is.
Speaker 2: It's crazy.
Speaker 4: But like sadly for them. Jud Legum's Popular information team
Speaker 4: took a look at the numbers of the stores affected
Speaker 4: in San Francisco and New York and guess what, These
Speaker 4: stores that are being shuttered actually had lower instances of
Speaker 4: theft than the fucking stores that are remaining open.
Speaker 2: Wow does that work?
Speaker 4: And then but politicians, they only read the Wall Street Journal,
Speaker 4: so naturally a few senators have introduced a bill called
Speaker 4: the Combating Organized Retail Crime Act, and that's really just
Speaker 4: more cop shit, right obviously, And they point to this
Speaker 4: statistic in their press release about why they need to act. Quote,
Speaker 4: organized retail crime cost retailers seven hundred and twenty thousand
Speaker 4: dollars for every one billion dollar sales. That's up fifty
Speaker 4: percent since twenty fifteen.
Speaker 5: Damn, I'm in the wrong business.
Speaker 4: Hey wait, quick math those are you love math joke?
Speaker 4: And I know you're really good at math? What percentage
Speaker 4: of seven hundred and twenty thousand out of one billion?
Speaker 2: Three?
Speaker 4: There you go, it's actually zero point zero seven percent
Speaker 4: of sales. And like the group that they say they
Speaker 4: get the stats from, this lobbying group, the.
Speaker 2: National Retail Federation, is the one keeping the stats, and
Speaker 2: even they admit they stopped recording these specific stats like
Speaker 2: back in twenty twenty because the numbers are so minuscule.
Speaker 5: Oh my god.
Speaker 4: And really a lot of people are just like, just
Speaker 4: like the Walgreens thing, some people who are like savvy
Speaker 4: investors kind of looking into it and they're like, it
Speaker 4: looks like maybe a target is just trying to hide
Speaker 4: behind the theft. Argument to cover up the fact that
Speaker 4: their stores are just doing less business because they're poorly
Speaker 4: planned in the locations they're at, and maybe because the
Speaker 4: prices might still be too high.
Speaker 2: Maybe that could also be a thing.
Speaker 4: Too, But of course that couldn't be that what targeted
Speaker 4: be like we're losing business because our ship's overpriced.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Well, and also for them to have nine stores oh
Speaker 5: yeah closed down, Like and that's just the ones they close,
Speaker 5: Like there's more stores that they have. I mean it's
Speaker 5: poor planning yet, yeah, take down there.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: But I've seen a lot of people argue about this
Speaker 4: story too, where they're like.
Speaker 5: People really buy into it.
Speaker 2: They love to people love to cape for retail stores.
Speaker 2: It's fucking wild. Like there's like there's a Twitter thread
Speaker 2: going on. I was like looking at people saying like,
Speaker 2: if you knew anything about being in retail, you know that,
Speaker 2: like law enforcement is so underfunded that they can't even
Speaker 2: do anything about it. And other people were like, have
Speaker 2: you ever worked at a store and have someone steal something?
Speaker 2: You never call the cops, you know why, because they're
Speaker 2: gonna be like the fuck you want us to do? Yeah,
Speaker 2: like did you catch them? Their response to most things.
Speaker 2: It turns out, oh wait, hold on, there's someone having
Speaker 2: a fucking mental health crisis. We're right there, right there,
Speaker 2: guns thrown.
Speaker 4: But yeah, like it's yeah, so this fucking this like
Speaker 4: little dumb story keeps coming back.
Speaker 2: All the time. It'll never go away, but you cry
Speaker 2: out for that. Theft has gone up a little bit
Speaker 2: in the past ten years, and that is because of
Speaker 2: self checkouts. They introduced self checkouts because and it was
Speaker 2: a calculated risk that self checkout would save them enough
Speaker 2: money that it would offset the losses they would have
Speaker 2: from people just being like, oh miss missed that one.
Speaker 5: But okay, okay, everyone knows that self checkout is where
Speaker 5: you go when you want to steal shit.
Speaker 2: Yeah, of course, yeah, and they know that I do.
Speaker 2: I'm just saying, right, yeah.
Speaker 4: And also what you do is the person who's like
Speaker 4: the monitor, like the one human they have over there,
Speaker 4: you get good with them. You're like, hey, man, you
Speaker 4: want I'm about to come up on a London broil.
Speaker 4: If you want me, I'll split it with you.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 5: Listen, I'm gonna buy this boot lift. Yeah, don't tell
Speaker 5: anyone about it.
Speaker 6: That's how I that's how my sleep deprided brain.
Speaker 5: Things. Hey, I'm going to commit an.
Speaker 4: Act and you're like, uh, I think you're here for
Speaker 4: your child's three month checkup.
Speaker 2: Oh oh my bad. Okay, so I thought it wasn't
Speaker 2: target all right. There's a story from dentists where I
Speaker 2: appreciate the specificity of their vision. The they're really like
Speaker 2: just being like, we don't give a fuck about any
Speaker 2: other part of the body. We're good here. So an
Speaker 2: article this week, a dentist of Virginia implored kids to
Speaker 2: eat all their Halloween candy and one sitting because it's
Speaker 2: much better for your teeth.
Speaker 5: Oh hilarious.
Speaker 2: It might upset your belly a little bit. Yeah, might
Speaker 2: get all your candy in one sitting. It might like
Speaker 2: put you into a diabetic coma. Like literally, but I
Speaker 2: don't know everything. Yeah, but this isn't like one way
Speaker 2: silly Denis Like every single year Dennis give the same
Speaker 2: advice where they're like, I mean, if you're gonna eat candy,
Speaker 2: like a big bag full of candy, you might as
Speaker 2: well get it out of the way now and then
Speaker 2: just go brush your teeth immediately.
Speaker 4: Oh, rather than like a prolonged, a prolonged multi year's effort,
Speaker 4: like my weird bag candy vault would be.
Speaker 2: You get all your candy in one city. You're exposing
Speaker 2: your teeth to that frequency one time, But if you're
Speaker 2: sitting there and you're eating it every twenty thirty minutes
Speaker 2: for the next few days, over the next week, it's
Speaker 2: causing more damage to your teeth. Oh that's that's a
Speaker 2: quote from one dentist.
Speaker 5: I put it all in a bowl by my bed,
Speaker 5: and after I brush my teeth, I have one here
Speaker 5: you go.
Speaker 2: I do not use hands. I just go face first
Speaker 2: into a bowl of peeah of I called it peeled candy.
Speaker 2: That's how much. That's how much I use. I'm consuming
Speaker 2: vegetables and fruits. That the only thing I can say
Speaker 2: is peeled candy. Peel the wrap, peel the skin off
Speaker 2: my candy, and then just go at it. Yeah, you
Speaker 2: gotta do.
Speaker 4: You gotta do the thing where you know those flat
Speaker 4: jolly rancher candies.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, those are so good.
Speaker 4: You just put those on each side of your mouth
Speaker 4: before you take a little retainer.
Speaker 2: Yeah, wrap it around, soak on it for a little bit,
Speaker 2: and wrap it around both so you have one in
Speaker 2: your bottom jaw. Oh yeah, yeah, topjaw and then.
Speaker 4: Or like X rays and like that film, you have
Speaker 4: to bite down on just those flat pieces.
Speaker 2: I just love that. I just I don't know. I
Speaker 2: guess it could be argued that it's also not great
Speaker 2: for kids' teeth to have them bolt through a plate
Speaker 2: glass window and a sugar crazed frenzy after eating an
Speaker 2: entire pillowcase full of candy. But I'm with the dentists
Speaker 2: on this one.
Speaker 5: Hey, you know what, I watch a lot of true crime.
Speaker 5: You know what lives outlives you? Your teeth?
Speaker 2: Teeth, that's right.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you know, after you've been murdered and manslaughtered, massacred, whatever,
Speaker 5: tortured by a serial killer, how do you want your
Speaker 5: teeth to look to the whole rest of the world.
Speaker 2: That's what that's mainly. Yeah, when people are like, what
Speaker 2: am I going to leave behind when they're having existential crises? Teeth,
Speaker 2: Just your teeth, that's what you're going to leave behind.
Speaker 5: So you sit down, little Jimmy, and you eat that
Speaker 5: entire goddamn bag of candy.
Speaker 2: Yes, do you think I watch you? Do you think
Speaker 2: kids want to do that? Like?
Speaker 4: I know everyone's like, I'm going to eat it now,
Speaker 4: But like I feel like there's always that sort of
Speaker 4: deferred gratification thing.
Speaker 5: Like, yeah, no, he's taking to parents of kids with candy,
Speaker 5: like adults in charge of kids bags of candy, right right,
Speaker 5: I used to eat my knees is candy? They forget
Speaker 5: about it?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, they really do.
Speaker 5: They sit they forget about it. After like three days,
Speaker 5: they're like, yeah, whatever, Halloween, Oh.
Speaker 2: Jackie, do you dole it out? Do I dole it out? Yeah?
Speaker 4: No, I'm saying, are they in control of their their
Speaker 4: bag account?
Speaker 2: No? No, no, no. They got a couple of pieces on
Speaker 2: Halloween night and then like maybe one are too, in
Speaker 2: like a couple of nights after, and then they forget
Speaker 2: about it because they're also like they my wife raised
Speaker 2: them on the idea that fruit is dessert and fruit
Speaker 2: is the sweetest thing that you get, and so they
Speaker 2: are there they really prefer fruit to candy. And I'm
Speaker 2: just sitting there being like, you suckers. When I eat
Speaker 2: all of their candy and.
Speaker 4: Dad has all my Jolly Ranchers in his mouth again,
Speaker 4: I'm going to go for the rest of the night.
Speaker 2: Dad's teeth a rotting out of his head at such
Speaker 2: a rate that we can actually see it in real time.
Speaker 4: I think I saw a worm come out of his
Speaker 4: incisor too, how's a gummy worm?
Speaker 5: I think let's get a diagram on this.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and finally we've got a great trend, a thriving
Speaker 2: subculture in New Zealand. There's been a bunch of headlines
Speaker 2: of the past week about how a New Zealand town
Speaker 2: has been plagued by drivers blasting Selene Dion ballads, which
Speaker 2: has turned people's lives into chaos.
Speaker 6: It sounds to me like plagued is the wrong should
Speaker 6: be enhanced blest yeah, series blessed, thank you.
Speaker 2: But yeah, it makes it sound like it's a prank
Speaker 2: of some sort of some sort, but it's actually kind
Speaker 2: of nuanced and beautiful. So there's this, there's this elaborate
Speaker 2: New Zealand subculture in which siren clubs have quote siren
Speaker 2: battles where they blair music on speakers hooked up to
Speaker 2: modded cars or bikes to compete for the title of
Speaker 2: Siren King to win. So this is like this was
Speaker 2: happening with like bass when when I was growing up
Speaker 2: with like cars, with like war yeah, base wars. But
Speaker 2: the difference here is to win there, sounds can't just
Speaker 2: be the loudest, they also have to be the clearest,
Speaker 2: which is why competitors, many of them of the PACIFICA community,
Speaker 2: have been using Celine Dion because her music has high trouble,
Speaker 2: which it makes it very clear. You can play at
Speaker 2: a loud volume and three blocks away they just hear
Speaker 2: the voice of an angel sound out in the night,
Speaker 2: clear as a bell.
Speaker 6: As if I didn't already want to move to New
Speaker 6: Zealand enough, I know, right, that's their biggest problem, is
Speaker 6: people blasting Celine Dion.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Well, and it's wild too because it's not even like
Speaker 4: even when people are like it's a gang or whatever,
Speaker 4: they're like, no, it's actually like a really positive thing
Speaker 4: for like young people.
Speaker 2: It's not even like they're doing instead of a gang.
Speaker 2: They say, like the kids are like actually, like this
Speaker 2: keeps me pretty like it's like a fun, productive thing
Speaker 2: that we do together, right.
Speaker 4: It like it reminds me of like how like in
Speaker 4: some cities on the East Coast, like they're they're like
Speaker 4: angry when they see like groups of kids and this
Speaker 4: like city on bikes and stuff. Yeah, and they're like
Speaker 4: it's a nuisance you're like, honestly, some of these kids
Speaker 4: like this is this is healthier for them to have
Speaker 4: fun together doing something like on a bike then you know,
Speaker 4: getting into some fucking nonsense or get in trouble. So
Speaker 4: it's it's it's always interesting to see how these subcultures
Speaker 4: pop up. And then like I love that it's such
Speaker 4: a respect for the fidelity that they've had to dial in.
Speaker 4: And it's like Selene Dion is actually like it's not
Speaker 4: even about the style, it's about this is the music
Speaker 4: that helps us really determine who the siren king is.
Speaker 2: I'm just picturing like a bunch of teenagers. It's like
Speaker 2: that scene in Shawshank when like the voice comes over
Speaker 2: and like all these teenagers just like look up in
Speaker 2: a single tier like runs down their eye, you know.
Speaker 5: Right, Okay, what's your favorite Selene Dion ballad?
Speaker 2: I mean the power of Lirve. Yeah, it feely has
Speaker 2: to be right power. I'm blasting that shit. If you're
Speaker 2: not by heart well going, that.
Speaker 11: Feels I'm sorry, it feels a little kind of yeah,
Speaker 11: little played all those I'm not saying the power of
Speaker 11: Lorve is the you know, like an original banger either,
Speaker 11: but I just feel like that would if I'm trying
Speaker 11: to be a Siren King, I'll probably try and win
Speaker 11: with that one.
Speaker 5: I think you would win, Siron King, Miles.
Speaker 4: And you know, thank you so much. I'm you know,
Speaker 4: I am planning to just maybe make my way to
Speaker 4: Auckland to see how I can you imagine that fucking
Speaker 4: comedy movie about some dude in like America. I'll been like,
Speaker 4: I just want to be a Siren King dad and
Speaker 4: making the journey to New Zealand.
Speaker 2: Do live your dream, Live your dream boy. But he's
Speaker 2: trying to like bring bass music to the Siren battles
Speaker 2: and they're like, everyone's like this fucking sucks man. It's
Speaker 2: just it's all muddled. Man, I can't this is not
Speaker 2: Siren King material. If you kiss me like this, oh
Speaker 2: like that, it's all coming all coming back. I'll come
Speaker 2: into back to I mean, now, wow, when it gets
Speaker 2: to bab.
Speaker 4: That's when you're fucking That's when you just put your
Speaker 4: Siren King crown on. You're like, yep, any other questions.
Speaker 5: That that ship's hot.
Speaker 2: I feel like I will always love you. It would
Speaker 2: be a fun one to just like hear again ring
Speaker 2: out because it opens with that long a cappella just
Speaker 2: just her, just Whitney, you know.
Speaker 5: I mean, she's got lines like the flesh and the fantasy.
Speaker 2: Folks, it's all coming back when you when you said
Speaker 2: that line, it's all coming back to me. But it's
Speaker 2: all coming back to me. I just could smell the
Speaker 2: back seat of my parents car that song was playing,
Speaker 2: and I was nine years old.
Speaker 4: Oh, I thought this was you like making like making
Speaker 4: out in the back of your parents caring and like.
Speaker 2: Should I put the celine beyond on? Shall we? Uh?
Speaker 2: Shall we smooch to some celine?
Speaker 5: Damn Jack?
Speaker 2: Shall we bless the back seat with some celine? Like
Speaker 2: can you take me home? Yeah?
Speaker 4: Yeah, Sorry, that was a big swing on my part.
Speaker 4: I didn't.
Speaker 2: Sorry, why do you have goosebumps? All? Listen? Drop me off,
Speaker 2: drop me off up here?
Speaker 1: All right, that's gonna do it for this week's weekly Zeitgeist.
Speaker 1: Please like and review the show if you like. The
Speaker 1: show means the world to Miles. He he needs your validation.
Speaker 2: Folks. I hope you're having a great weekend and I
Speaker 2: will talk to you Monday.
Speaker 12: Bye.
Speaker 1: Ba