Speaker 1: Fellow Ridiculous Historians, thank you for joining us in this
Speaker 1: week's classic episode. We're gonna be honest. We take a
Speaker 1: lot of license with the word ridiculous. Sometimes evil things
Speaker 1: are ridiculous as well, and this episode is about a
Speaker 1: very ridiculously evil policy in our good state of Kansas.
Speaker 2: That's true. Why might you ask, did Kansas decide to
Speaker 2: imprison women for having sexually transmitted diseases? How long did
Speaker 2: this last? And why have so few people heard about
Speaker 2: this in the modern day? Let's roll it.
Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome, Welcome, Welcome,
Speaker 1: Thank you for tuning in. We would like to begin
Speaker 1: today's show with an acknowledgment of something that may have
Speaker 1: be fuddled some of you, our fellow ridiculous historians.
Speaker 2: Hi, I'm Ben, Hey, I'm no What are you talking about, Ben?
Speaker 1: I'm talking Noel about the fact that we double Oregoned.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's true.
Speaker 1: On our quest to do one episode for every state
Speaker 1: in the US.
Speaker 2: It's almost like we haven't been really thinking this through.
Speaker 1: It's almost as if we were winging that one.
Speaker 2: It's true. Well, we thought both.
Speaker 1: Stories regarding Oregon were interesting and important, so much so
Speaker 1: that we didn't really decide which one was our official
Speaker 1: Oregon episode.
Speaker 2: So we have two. Should we address right up front
Speaker 2: our double mispronunciation of the Malleury Wildlife Preservation, Casey, apparently
Speaker 2: you really peed the bed on that one. My man.
Speaker 3: Well, I'm unclear on this because the comment, Okay, so
Speaker 3: there's the way they say it there, which is the
Speaker 3: American way of saying it, which is quote unquote wrong
Speaker 3: if you're going by the French standard. I don't know
Speaker 3: if people are saying my French pronunciation was also.
Speaker 2: Oh no, I don't know what. No, I don't think
Speaker 2: they're saying that at all. Yeah, and I'm giving you
Speaker 2: a hard time, Casey.
Speaker 3: So but yes bye. By sort of saying that's how
Speaker 3: French people would say it, then you guys started saying
Speaker 3: it that way, and of course that's never how it
Speaker 3: works out when an American city is named for some other.
Speaker 2: So what's what's the real way, What's what's the real
Speaker 2: Oregonian way?
Speaker 3: It's like mal here or something. I think the h
Speaker 3: is silent, right, I don't know, you know, I withdraw
Speaker 3: from this discussion entirely. Those folks can pronounce it, how
Speaker 3: are they.
Speaker 1: Like okay, Well, just to verify we did find it, Noel,
Speaker 1: do you want to give it a shot?
Speaker 2: Yeah, hang on here, mal here, that's doesn't that isn't
Speaker 2: that is that? Yeah, mal here.
Speaker 1: Well, it's just it's just a different way of approaching it.
Speaker 1: And as we know, with proper nouns, pronunciation can be
Speaker 1: you know, very much on a case by case basis,
Speaker 1: and obey the rules of grammar and phonetics in absolutely
Speaker 1: no shape fashion reform.
Speaker 2: See fourvo says it's mallur ma Oregon see three different ways,
Speaker 2: three different ways. So I don't know not to get
Speaker 2: a b in our bonnet right up at the top
Speaker 2: of the show. Don't let it get to you. I'm
Speaker 2: not gonna let it get to you. But this, this
Speaker 2: episode today is about a state that's not Oregon. That's
Speaker 2: sort of the whole point of this way right right right.
Speaker 1: Also, we would be criminally remiss if we didn't do
Speaker 1: one of my favorite things to do on this show,
Speaker 1: Friends and Neighbors. Super producer Casey Pegram I just love
Speaker 1: the sound cute.
Speaker 2: I love it too, But I've noticed we've drifted into
Speaker 2: a thing where we will Casey will be on mic
Speaker 2: and it's not necessarily Casey on the case, so it
Speaker 2: doesn't have to be. It's a brave new world. It's
Speaker 2: a brave new world.
Speaker 1: It's just like English is a living language that continually evolves.
Speaker 1: This show and the country in which we record it
Speaker 1: are continually evolving.
Speaker 2: Well, hey, I see where you're going.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because today our journey takes us to Kansas in
Speaker 1: the nineteen twenties, and we want to warn everybody this
Speaker 1: is not a super happy, fun, feel good.
Speaker 2: Story now, No, it's really not. Really. Nothing good comes
Speaker 2: of this other than the fact that it stopped happening eventually, right,
Speaker 2: That is the happy ending. The it in question, Ben, The.
Speaker 1: It in questionable is the imprisonment of thousands of innocent people. Well,
Speaker 1: they were innocent by what we would consider criminal standards today,
Speaker 1: but morally they were considered quite guilty.
Speaker 2: But not just people, Ben, women specifically and poor women.
Speaker 2: So what's the scoop?
Speaker 1: So the nineteen twenties in the US sees the influx
Speaker 1: of many international influences because of people returning from World
Speaker 1: War One, which started in July of nineteen fourteen and
Speaker 1: went to November of nineteen eighteen, and not to cast
Speaker 1: aspersion on these returning soldiers. But a lot of them
Speaker 1: didn't just bring an appreciation for foreign food or new
Speaker 1: sorts of architecture music back home with them. They also
Speaker 1: brought some diseases. That's right, because they couldn't keep their
Speaker 1: d's in their peace right where.
Speaker 2: A family show.
Speaker 1: So what ended up happening is they returned home to
Speaker 1: their significant others, or they met people in the States
Speaker 1: and they transmitted some of these diseases they had picked up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, things like syphilis, gonorrhea, things that genuinely posed not
Speaker 2: only a national health risk, but also a national security risk.
Speaker 2: I read this the idea of it potentially preventing soldiers
Speaker 2: from being effective in battle. Right. Some of these diseases
Speaker 2: are no joke.
Speaker 1: They debilitate you severely, especially as they progress, things like syphilis.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: And then you know, as we mentioned, there were a
Speaker 1: couple of other diseases in the mixed chlamydia, the clap
Speaker 1: as well. And when this spike happened, it was noticeable.
Speaker 1: It was an outbreak. It wasn't just like two people
Speaker 1: in a town all of a sudden showed symptoms of
Speaker 1: god rhea when they were tested, and States started to
Speaker 1: panic and usually, unfortunately, when human communities panic, we often
Speaker 1: tend to target the people with the least agency or
Speaker 1: the least power in a community or that.
Speaker 2: And when we panic, we tend to screw up and
Speaker 2: overshoot the mark a little bit, right, So, in an
Speaker 2: effort to quash these potential outbreaks, in Kansas in particular,
Speaker 2: it was in nineteen seventeen that there was a law
Speaker 2: pass called Chapter two five, known as the State of
Speaker 2: Kansas Quarantine Law. And what this essentially meant was anyone
Speaker 2: suspected of having a sexually transmitted disease. It basically gave
Speaker 2: public health officials an insane amount of leeway in terms of, Hey,
Speaker 2: you there, Ben, you're looking a little peaked today. I
Speaker 2: think you probably have gone rhea into the cells with you.
Speaker 1: So before we go any further, let's clarify here. STDs
Speaker 1: transmit across the entirety of the gender spectrum's right, So
Speaker 1: this means that if Kansas and other states are so
Speaker 1: very concerned about the threat posed by STDs, they should
Speaker 1: be locking up everyone who has one.
Speaker 2: Right. Yeah, that's right, except we were just desperate for
Speaker 2: able bodied men to fight in this you know, horrific conflict,
Speaker 2: So it would be kind of counterproductive to lock up
Speaker 2: every man suspected of having one of these diseases, especially
Speaker 2: since the testing at the time right very inaccurate.
Speaker 1: The testing was nowhere near sophisticated as testing methods today. Additionally,
Speaker 1: there was this huge sexual double standard, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, talk about victim blaming this. We shall also
Speaker 1: say a lot of this information is coming from Nicole Perry,
Speaker 1: a University of Kansas researcher who dug into the story
Speaker 1: behind chapter two five. So we've established the gist right
Speaker 1: the general way in which this occurred. But we should
Speaker 1: probably also mention that when they were taking women to
Speaker 1: court for these situations, they would find excuses to intervene
Speaker 1: in and then find out that they had STDs and
Speaker 1: then punish them like they would They would use charges
Speaker 1: like vagrancy.
Speaker 2: That's right, no for sure. And the thing about this
Speaker 2: too is these women didn't go to the state penitentiary
Speaker 2: because the idea was that they would be abused by
Speaker 2: the male inmates. So nearby there was actually another facility
Speaker 2: called the Kansas State Industrial Farm, which was in fact
Speaker 2: a farm but is officially a working farm, but it
Speaker 2: was officially listed as a prison. That's right, exactly. And
Speaker 2: the notion was that social reformers, as is discussed in
Speaker 2: this article from caseu R The Faces of Long Gone
Speaker 2: Women tell a New story of the Kansas State Prison,
Speaker 2: social reformers believe that women that went there had the
Speaker 2: potential to be rehabilitated. But here's the thing. In this article,
Speaker 2: there's a woman named Jennifer Moyer who got a grant
Speaker 2: from the state to set up a exhibit at the
Speaker 2: Lansing Historical Museum, which is a very small place in
Speaker 2: a former train depot, all in the actual prison grounds.
Speaker 2: And she got ahold of all these amazing intake photographs
Speaker 2: of inmates when they you know, when they were admitted,
Speaker 2: I guess, and they're incarcerated booked exactly. And she noticed
Speaker 2: that following the opening of this separate women's prison in
Speaker 2: the spring of nineteen seventeen, it only had about seventeen
Speaker 2: inmates total, and that was pretty common in Kansas. But
Speaker 2: when Chapter two of five kicked in, it rose significantly
Speaker 2: to almost four hundred women in the facility by the
Speaker 2: end of that year. The end of that year, and
Speaker 2: that continued to grow because you see, after the war ended,
Speaker 2: this statute stayed on the books, and they kept using
Speaker 2: it to persecute women. Right.
Speaker 1: And in her research, Jennifer Meyer finds short write ups
Speaker 1: of interviews that the inmates, that the inmates had with
Speaker 1: the authorities, and this is how she learned that several
Speaker 1: things were happening as a result of this moral panic,
Speaker 1: one of those being that women were being rounded up
Speaker 1: in raids, and then some had been turned in by
Speaker 1: jilted lovers, right.
Speaker 2: And just in general, they were profiled because, like we
Speaker 2: said earlier, because those tests for these diseases were so inaccurate.
Speaker 2: Sometimes you might have a public health official who says, oh,
Speaker 2: you're sexually active, therefore you must have an stdre to
Speaker 2: the prison farm with you.
Speaker 1: And then also this magnifies the tragedy. Some women turned
Speaker 1: themselves in of their own accord because they had been
Speaker 1: exposed to an STD and treatment at the time was
Speaker 1: very expensive, not to mention often not safe.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think the term toxic came up a few times.
Speaker 2: What are we talking.
Speaker 1: Here, Well, we have to remember this is the age
Speaker 1: before the widespread use of penicillin, right, So there are
Speaker 1: treatments of things like sulfonylamide on gonorrhea, and these things
Speaker 1: could work, but they could also be dangerous. You know,
Speaker 1: you're poisoning your body in some cases.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I saw another one too, for pre penicillin treatment
Speaker 2: of gnohea. That was something called cubebs, which is an
Speaker 2: Indonesian pepper that was turned into a powder and applied
Speaker 2: to the affected area. And if you can imagine rubbing
Speaker 2: a hot pepper on your genitals, that's not a fun
Speaker 2: sounding experience at all.
Speaker 1: I mean to each their own, but yeah, I would
Speaker 1: say in general, that's not for me at least. So
Speaker 1: these people, if they were not well off financially, had
Speaker 1: no place to go to get treatment. Not to mention
Speaker 1: the shame that could spread around town, right, your reputation
Speaker 1: being key, especially in small town and the state of
Speaker 1: Kansas itself did not invest in free public health clinics
Speaker 1: at this time, So the closest many people could get
Speaker 1: to a free public health clinic is the farm.
Speaker 2: That's right. Yeah, No, I mean, it really is a
Speaker 2: pretty dire situation when you have someone in genuine need
Speaker 2: who has done nothing wrong and potentially, you know what,
Speaker 2: had intercourse with someone who may have even known they
Speaker 2: had the disease and decided to keep that from the partner.
Speaker 2: You know, this happens all the time, right, So you're
Speaker 2: literally victimized people who are already victims.
Speaker 1: Exactly exactly, and not only victimizing them in this legal sense,
Speaker 1: but also in this again this moral sense that you
Speaker 1: are a woman of ill repute and so on. And
Speaker 1: as you said, and I think this is important point,
Speaker 1: they were not held there for the rest of their lives.
Speaker 1: They were typically in for a matter of several months, right,
Speaker 1: two or three months. We don't know what happens to
Speaker 1: a lot of them after they leave, because there's no
Speaker 1: there's just no paper trail, right, except for in a
Speaker 1: few very isolated cases. And these are young kids too,
Speaker 1: like sixteen to twenty two, I think.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And if you want to see some of these women,
Speaker 2: you know, and you're in the area, I highly recommend
Speaker 2: that you check out this exhibit at the Lansing Historical
Speaker 2: Museum because these images are incredibly stark. They're captured using
Speaker 2: very high quality glass plate negatives, which I believe is
Speaker 2: still like a fine art photography method that's used today,
Speaker 2: and they yield these very stark black and white images.
Speaker 2: And in the article, the curator of this Museum. This
Speaker 2: exhibit talks about how surprising it is that these images
Speaker 2: are so old, and that it's very easy to look
Speaker 2: at these faces and kind of identify and see yourself
Speaker 2: in them because they really, you know, other than the dress,
Speaker 2: these are humans and it's very striking to kind of
Speaker 2: see them because they I'm looking at this one of
Speaker 2: a woman and she's in her profile shot, she's kind
Speaker 2: of like looks a little timid and looking away, but
Speaker 2: in her head on shot, she almost has like kind
Speaker 2: of a grin on her face. Yeah, and you know,
Speaker 2: and really some of these the clothes aren't even that
Speaker 2: dated looking other than just the little you know, what
Speaker 2: do you call it, the prison number and the you know,
Speaker 2: the little tag that you hold up look very much
Speaker 2: like a mugshot you might see today, only black and white. So, yeah,
Speaker 2: the slate.
Speaker 1: There's a there's a very emotionally charged human element to this,
Speaker 1: and it's tough. Two, it's tough to overestimate the importance
Speaker 1: of these photographs in history, right because I don't know
Speaker 1: about you, Noel, but I'm pretty sure neither of us
Speaker 1: knew about this practice before we started examining it for
Speaker 1: this episode.
Speaker 2: No, absolutely not and we met. We mentioned at the
Speaker 2: top of the show, and I think it goes without
Speaker 2: saying because of the military situation, but Meyer was asked
Speaker 2: how many men she found that had been incarcerated because
Speaker 2: of chapter two of five, and she says she couldn't
Speaker 2: find any. So I think that kind of goes without
Speaker 2: saying that that men were kind of able to just
Speaker 2: get away with murder. There's even a story about, you know, oh,
Speaker 2: I got a disease from my husband and he reported
Speaker 2: me just to like get rid of me. It's just
Speaker 2: this kind of witch hunt kind of situation.
Speaker 1: And the question that many of us are probably wondering
Speaker 1: at this point is how far did this go? How
Speaker 1: many people did Chapter two five affect? Well, we can
Speaker 1: say that number of people the penitentiary rose from seventeen
Speaker 1: to four hundred and this of the year. Eventually it
Speaker 1: led to around five thousand women being imprisoned at the
Speaker 1: farm while the law was on the books between nineteen seventeen.
Speaker 2: And nineteen forty two. Insane. Yeah, that's wild, because you know,
Speaker 2: if it was designed to or at least intended to,
Speaker 2: you know, help with this war situation, it's interesting that
Speaker 2: it stayed on the books for so long after as
Speaker 2: a means of kind of rounding up what might be
Speaker 2: considered as sinful women in the eyes of like a
Speaker 2: possibly puritanical rule of law.
Speaker 1: And you can read some great articles about this, particularly
Speaker 1: on the University of Kansas website. There's a great article
Speaker 1: titled Researcher Documents Gender class bias in Quarantine law Measures.
Speaker 1: And one thing that was pretty important to us in
Speaker 1: our research and with our research team looking at this
Speaker 1: was to note that the US does have a history
Speaker 1: of quarantining, detaining, or in turning citizens on its own soil.
Speaker 2: Right exactly. The Justice Department actually oversaw the internment of
Speaker 2: more than what was it been, thirty thirty thousand, more
Speaker 2: than thirty thousand American civilians during World War Two.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and this included more than eleven thousand people of
Speaker 1: German descents, Yeah, just just because of their ancestry, the
Speaker 1: three thousand due to their Italian ancestry. And then of
Speaker 1: course there were the US citizens who were in Japanese
Speaker 1: internment camps as well.
Speaker 2: And not to mention the fact that in the eighties
Speaker 2: and nineties during the HIV AIDS epidemic or when it
Speaker 2: first kind of came into the public consciousness. There was
Speaker 2: actually suggestion consideration of rounding up those affected by that
Speaker 2: into some kind of quarantine situation.
Speaker 1: And we know that ultimately that did not occur. But
Speaker 1: the scary number for that is, in nineteen ninety one,
Speaker 1: thirty four percent of the US public supported the idea
Speaker 1: of quarantining people who add HIV.
Speaker 2: It's a similar situation to you know, with the STD
Speaker 2: panic that we're talking about in the twenties, where it
Speaker 2: is seen as it's something new that they haven't experienced before,
Speaker 2: and it's seen as a potential public health crisis. So
Speaker 2: you know, people do stupid stuff when they panic.
Speaker 1: But we do have a I guess a little bit
Speaker 1: of let's say, light at the end of the tunnel
Speaker 1: of moral panic here, because that nineteen ninety one stat
Speaker 1: we just mentioned changes over time, and.
Speaker 2: These stats are from a report from the Psychology Department
Speaker 2: of UC Davis. There was another stat from ninety one
Speaker 2: saying that as many as twenty nine percent of the
Speaker 2: population believe that names should be named. So I talk
Speaker 2: about a witch hunt for those suffering from AIDS and
Speaker 2: they should be made public. But in the Spanish, just
Speaker 2: a handful of years. By ninety seven, only one in
Speaker 2: six endorsed these kinds of policies, and fewer than one
Speaker 2: in five supported doxing these people for lack of a
Speaker 2: better expression, putting out these names. So you know, and
Speaker 2: certainly the stigma surrounding STDs has similarly changed in this
Speaker 2: country from the way it may have been in World
Speaker 2: War One.
Speaker 1: Yeah, one would hope that we are making progress not
Speaker 1: just as a society but as a species today. As
Speaker 1: we said, this law is no longer on the books
Speaker 1: in Kansas, but it is important to remember that things
Speaker 1: like this, crazy as they sound, really did occur.
Speaker 2: It's true. And if we're doing a few stats, I
Speaker 2: think we should wrap with with a pretty interesting one today.
Speaker 2: According to the American Sexual Health Association, one and two
Speaker 2: sexually active people will contract STD or STI infection by
Speaker 2: the age of twenty five of some sort of some
Speaker 2: sort exactly, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Speaker 2: estimate that in someone in the neighborhood of twenty million,
Speaker 2: new in and says of STDs occur every single year.
Speaker 1: The good news is, however, that there are multitudes of
Speaker 1: resources that can help you if you have any concerns.
Speaker 1: You can go get free tests right in a city
Speaker 1: near you to steal a line from that men's warehouse guy.
Speaker 1: I guarantee it, And of course you hear it all
Speaker 1: the time. Just practice safe sex and just be smart
Speaker 1: about it. There's all kinds of resources, like Ben said,
Speaker 1: and there's all kinds.
Speaker 2: Of ways to protect yourself from getting one of these things.
Speaker 2: So you know, there you go.
Speaker 1: No, it occurs to me that we have completed our
Speaker 1: Kansas episode, but there's so many other interesting stories about Kansas.
Speaker 1: Are we going to end up doing a thing where
Speaker 1: we have like four episodes about one state and one
Speaker 1: episode for other states?
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, we don't want to hurt anybody's feelings,
Speaker 2: but you know, some states are greater than others in
Speaker 2: terms of the stories, but we're trying to dig for
Speaker 2: all of them. Man, we're not We're not gonna discriminate
Speaker 2: right against the states upfront, but the scrimmas state. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's good, Ben, that's not that's I like it. I
Speaker 2: liked it. It was worth it, as you would say, And.
Speaker 1: So we need your help. Let us know about the strange,
Speaker 1: little known historical oddities you have discovered researching a particular
Speaker 1: state in the US. You can tell us about it
Speaker 1: on Instagram, you can tell us about it on Twitter.
Speaker 1: We would love if you tell us, along with your
Speaker 1: fellow Ridiculous Historians about your research on our community page,
Speaker 1: Ridiculous Historians. And before we go, you know what, No,
Speaker 1: we've been on a kick about this lately. I say
Speaker 1: we double down and do some more listener mail.
Speaker 2: Is it because the episodes has been running short?
Speaker 1: It's because this episode is shorter, Yes, that's true.
Speaker 2: But it's a good one. You know, it's absolutely worthwhile,
Speaker 2: very important, and it certainly was a darker time in
Speaker 2: this country. But you know less, history repeat itself always
Speaker 2: a good idea to kind of keep on top of
Speaker 2: the trends of the past.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and now, without further delay, Casey, could you set
Speaker 1: us up for listener mail. So this is not our
Speaker 1: usual listener mail kind of thing, but I thought this
Speaker 1: was hilarious and if you haven't seen it on Ridiculous Historians,
Speaker 1: we wanted to share this with you.
Speaker 2: First, Welcome to Nicole p. Nicole.
Speaker 1: You are a new member on the group, and you
Speaker 1: recently said, does anyone hate these Starbucks ads as much
Speaker 1: as I do? I feel like they're on every podcast
Speaker 1: and they make me want to flip over tables and
Speaker 1: burn down as Starbucks.
Speaker 2: Well, the joke's on you, because the tables at Starbucks
Speaker 2: are bolted down, my friend.
Speaker 1: They thought about it, and just reading the descriptions of
Speaker 1: this opprobrium is so amazing.
Speaker 2: Melissa E.
Speaker 1: F responds, not just you, I hate them with the
Speaker 1: fiery passion of a thousand suns.
Speaker 2: Here's the thing, folks, we don't always have control over
Speaker 2: which ads get in our show, especially when they're ones
Speaker 2: we don't ourselves read or endorse. But you know what,
Speaker 2: they keep the lights on, and they keep our mouths
Speaker 2: talking into these here microphone, Thank yous.
Speaker 1: Just the one war though, this is I'm reading these
Speaker 1: because I you know, as a lover of language, I
Speaker 1: really respect a good turn of phrase. So Jerry m
Speaker 1: agrees and says, yes, annoying and somehow semi inappropriate, to
Speaker 1: which Nicole p says, right, it's like being told to
Speaker 1: have to pee by someone trying to seduce me.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, oh wow, Oh my good gracious, that's that's
Speaker 2: the closest we can get as a family show. I
Speaker 2: really hope Starbucks isn't listening today. I hope they make
Speaker 2: an out about it. Hey, you know what, it's fun.
Speaker 2: We love Starbucks. Actually, I go, I go, I get
Speaker 2: my Starbucks. I get my Bucks on on the.
Speaker 1: Rag and your point you're pointing by ads is right.
Speaker 1: We just we want to thank everyone listening for being
Speaker 1: so supportive of our show and also being so consistently hilarious.
Speaker 2: Agreed. Okay, the next one is uh. I don't know.
Speaker 2: I'm not walking it back, but it's a little mea
Speaker 2: culp for me. We've got one from Cameron. A. Hi,
Speaker 2: my name is Cameron. Let me just say I love
Speaker 2: your show. I wait every episode you guys put out.
Speaker 2: If I use social media, I would join your groups,
Speaker 2: but I'm too busy for social media at the moment. However,
Speaker 2: regarding your latest episode at the time, this was the
Speaker 2: British soccer game where the Brits gave the Nazi salute.
Speaker 2: I was a little sad to hear you guys compare
Speaker 2: the United States to Nazi Germany. I do respect that
Speaker 2: you first began with not to get political, but it
Speaker 2: still made me feel a bit unwelcome as a listener
Speaker 2: to the podcast. Not a huge Trump fan, a conservative libertarian,
Speaker 2: but he is still our commander in chief, and I
Speaker 2: wish him the best I can in his term as president.
Speaker 2: So I do just want to say that my statement
Speaker 2: there in our statement, I mean it was I'm the
Speaker 2: one who said it and then backed me up. It
Speaker 2: was mainly just the idea of watching history repeat itself
Speaker 2: in terms of appeasement. I was not comparing America to
Speaker 2: Nazi Germany. I was more saying the pieces that were
Speaker 2: laid that led to something like the Nazis being able
Speaker 2: to take power are strangely similar to what we're seeing
Speaker 2: with our administration right now in terms of letting things slide.
Speaker 2: That there's like sort of an escalating effect that you
Speaker 2: can kind of get a sense of and maybe compare
Speaker 2: the two historical circumstances. I am in no way implying
Speaker 2: that Donald Trump is one to one with Adolf Hitler
Speaker 2: at all, and we are not a political show. But
Speaker 2: it was a parallel that I could not help but
Speaker 2: notice and felt compelled to comment on.
Speaker 1: I see also also this was interesting to me. First, Cameron,
Speaker 1: thank you for your well worded and pretty respectful email,
Speaker 1: But this reminded me of Godwin's law.
Speaker 2: Do you know what that is? Gladwin's law, no Godwin,
Speaker 2: no relationship. Okay, god wy In.
Speaker 1: It's a weird thing that you may have heard if
Speaker 1: you're familiar with the internet. Godwin's Law, also called Godwin's
Speaker 1: rule of Hitler analogies, is this Internet adage that says,
Speaker 1: as no online discussion grows longer, the probability of a
Speaker 1: comparison involving Hitler approaches one, which this guy's argument is,
Speaker 1: no matter who who you talk about, no matter what
Speaker 1: you talk about, if it's online, you talk about it
Speaker 1: long enough. At some point, Nazis are gonna come up.
Speaker 1: Have you seen this Teddy rouxspin, this new online Teddy ruxspin.
Speaker 1: It's just like Nazi Germany.
Speaker 2: It's pretty the pieces are there. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So okay, if you're cool with it, maybe we end
Speaker 1: with with a funny email.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that smart. We go funny, heavy, funny.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like m PR, which is true, that's their formula.
Speaker 1: We are also big m PR fit.
Speaker 2: It's true.
Speaker 1: So this email, everybody, get your ears ready for this.
Speaker 1: This email is called.
Speaker 2: How could you do It? That should be a segment
Speaker 2: from from Noel l oh cool namesake in Oe l
Speaker 2: l e Ah whatever. Forget her. I'm sure you'll be famous. Friends.
Speaker 1: So, Noel, you wrote in to say, I want to
Speaker 1: know how you could do a show on the epic
Speaker 1: song Louie Louie and speak of its supposed to batchry
Speaker 1: impact on America's youth and not even mentioned one of
Speaker 1: the greatest covers of it, John Belushi and Animal House.
Speaker 1: That one scene defines everything that the mothers and fathers
Speaker 1: were worried. The song was encouraging. Guys, it was a
Speaker 1: great show, But I kept waiting for you to at
Speaker 1: least mention this piece of American film history in connection
Speaker 1: with the song. You blew it, guys. Double Secret Probation
Speaker 1: for you, Noel, Ell, I.
Speaker 2: Don't get the reference. I haven't seen Animal House. Animal
Speaker 2: House is great, Casey, have you seen Animal House?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 3: I haven't, But I do know the double Secret Probation thing,
Speaker 3: because that was also like on the special edition when
Speaker 3: it came out, it was the Double Secret Probation Edition.
Speaker 1: So so I've got to get you, guys. We've got
Speaker 1: to have a pizza party and watch Animal House.
Speaker 2: I've never seen The Blues Brothers either, so I've got
Speaker 2: some real holes in my comedy film history, you know.
Speaker 1: I watched The Blues Brothers when I was a kid
Speaker 1: with I guess some relatives.
Speaker 2: And I think I just didn't get it, you know
Speaker 2: what I mean. I think a lot of it went
Speaker 2: over my head.
Speaker 1: But thank you so much for writing in Noel and
Speaker 1: everyone else.
Speaker 2: Let us know.
Speaker 1: If I've got to take Casey and Noll to a
Speaker 1: movie night sometime soon, should we go for Animal House
Speaker 1: or should we go for Blues Brothers.
Speaker 2: Or what about Blues Brothers two thousand?
Speaker 3: I saw that one in the theater. Yeah, I heard
Speaker 3: it was quite bad, And yeah, you guys don't need
Speaker 3: to catch up on those.
Speaker 2: Cool There's actually an episode of How Did This Get Made?
Speaker 2: About it if you want to check that show out
Speaker 2: with Paul Sheer and June, Diane Raphael and Jason man Zucaus.
Speaker 2: Paul Sheer, who has actually been a guest on our
Speaker 2: Sister Brother Peer Peer podcast movie crush.
Speaker 1: YEP, and uh, Blues Brothers two thousand is ridiculously cameo heavy.
Speaker 1: So uh so, I guess it depends on how you
Speaker 1: feel about cameos.
Speaker 2: But or what about the band cameo ward app Yeah,
Speaker 2: the band cameo themselves.
Speaker 1: They don't get enough mentions and that's why you tuned
Speaker 1: into Ridiculous History so you can hear Cameo get the
Speaker 1: passing they deserve.
Speaker 2: Okay, I know we're in Tangent City right now when
Speaker 2: need to have this up. But I have to say
Speaker 2: this because I was standing around at the airport. I'm
Speaker 2: listening a comedy Bang Bang, which I love, and there
Speaker 2: is a character, you know the show. They have different
Speaker 2: improv actors playing characters coming on the show talking to
Speaker 2: Scott Ackerman, and one of them was his character was
Speaker 2: it's the guy from Cameo and every he just speaks
Speaker 2: like Hello Scott, Hello, Bam wired app and it's like
Speaker 2: that's how he speaks, and I'm like, I recognize that voice.
Speaker 2: And it was Carl Tart, who used to be one
Speaker 2: of the co hosts of our other cohort podcasts, Culture Kings. Oh,
Speaker 2: he's the.
Speaker 1: Guy that Got Away Comedy's.
Speaker 2: He also plays the chief on Comedy Bang Bank, the
Speaker 2: Carmen san Diego character. I had no idea.
Speaker 1: Yeah, pretty awesome, congratulations Carl. Maybe we could have him
Speaker 1: come on our show at some point.
Speaker 2: Who knows.
Speaker 1: I mean, we are pretty friendly with each other and.
Speaker 2: We do seem to be check out the recent episode
Speaker 2: with Robert Evans. I actually listened to it myself in
Speaker 2: the wild. That was a fun little discussion about the
Speaker 2: racist origins of Oregon.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Robert Van's the mastermind behind the new podcast Behind.
Speaker 2: The Bastard's True. Check it out, Check it out.
Speaker 1: And let us know what you think, and tune in
Speaker 1: for our next episode, when we explore Oscar Wilde, the
Speaker 1: morals of Victorian England, the incredibly complicated fashion required of the.
Speaker 2: Time, and an infamous pair of cross dressers who set
Speaker 2: the hoity toity world of late Victorian England ablaze.
Speaker 1: Thanks to our super producer, Casey Pegram, thanks to Christopher Hasiotis,
Speaker 1: our research assistant, thanks to.
Speaker 2: Alex Williams who composed our theme, and most importantly, thanks
Speaker 2: to you for putting up with us to knuckleheads and
Speaker 2: digging the show. We'll see you next time. For more
Speaker 2: podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
Speaker 2: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.