It Could Happen Here Weekly 142

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Also media.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
Hey everybody, Robert Evans here, and I wanted to let
you know this is a compilation episode. So every episode
of the week that just happened is here in one
convenient and with somewhat less ads package for you to
listen to in a long stretch if you want. If
you've been listening to the episodes every day this week,
there's going to be nothing new here for you, but
you can make your own decisions.

Speaker 3 (00:28):
Trudio Muski to a noise to intro.

Speaker 4 (00:29):
How do we do that? That's why you get bad?

Speaker 1 (00:34):
Can hear them?

Speaker 3 (00:35):
Okay? Okay, yeah, yeah, here we are. That's that's the introduction.
That's all you're getting, and you will be grateful for it.
It's it's me. It's Cherine Hi, Serene Hi, James Hi, Tarina.
What are we Are we doing vegetables today? Are we
doing genocide? Which part of the vegetable genoside spectrum wheel.

Speaker 4 (00:55):
I feel like we're closer to vegetable than genocide, but
you can argue the opposite as well, because I get
eat it alive by these things.

Speaker 3 (01:03):
So I don't know.

Speaker 4 (01:05):
I think we're kind of in the middle here. I
think it's a good even middle.

Speaker 3 (01:10):
Yeah. Yeah, we've really split the difference. Look at us go. Yeah, yeah,
it's right. It's things to eat. Shrene live today is
flesh eating bacteria day. It's not does not have a
flesh eating bacteria of the episode I thought we were doing. Yeah, yeah,
I'd like to surprise you sometimes, just see how you act.
We're doing mosquitos, actually, shreen mosquitos yep, yep. Little guys,

(01:32):
little friendly guys.

Speaker 4 (01:33):
Who they're not friendly and they're always little, but.

Speaker 3 (01:38):
Yeah, some of them are absolute chunks. Yeah, I've seen
some big dogs recently. Did you know the mosquito shreene
is the most deadly animal in the world.

Speaker 4 (01:45):
Really?

Speaker 3 (01:46):
Yeah, it's an animal. Yeah, I mean it's in the
animal kingdom, right, I suppose it's insect nuisance.

Speaker 4 (01:52):
No, it's not insect on animals and nuisance. I guess
I couldn't realize it was considered the most deadly animal.
Why is that just from like valeria?

Speaker 3 (02:00):
Yeah, and all the other diseases at vectors. Right, it
can do parasites, bacteria, and viruses. So it's really like
a triple threat when you can get like chicken gun. Yeah,
Dane gay, I've got a whole list of them.

Speaker 4 (02:10):
Why are they still around?

Speaker 3 (02:12):
That is an interesting question, Shereed.

Speaker 4 (02:13):
I've always wondered that, like bees have benefits, like they
make they're cute little guys, and they make honey, and
they just want to pollinate around.

Speaker 3 (02:21):
Lots of mosquitoes do too. Lots of them also, or
they don't make honey. Lots of species of mosquito just
feed of flowers. They're not out there to get you.
It is just the lady mosquitoes of certain species. What
was the lady insects man? The queen bee?

Speaker 4 (02:37):
Yeah, it's the black widow.

Speaker 3 (02:40):
I don't know, Yeah, it's it's true. Yeah, it's I
guess maybe they're a matriarchal society, you know, and.

Speaker 4 (02:44):
They're like, yeah, I guess technically a spider is not insect, right,
it's like a rat.

Speaker 3 (02:50):
Yeah, I wants to correct me on the reddits. Yeah,
please please post your genus and species stuff on the
on the reddit. I would love that. So, yeah, mosquito
say they stacking some bondies about three quarters of a
million people a year in fact, which is quite a
lot of people for then if you, yeah.

Speaker 4 (03:07):
I guess we're closure to the genocide in on the spectrum.

Speaker 3 (03:10):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, Sadly, I know the mosquitoes don't
have so much agency, so I don't feel like they're
quite as like evil. You know, the word of course
a moscow no moscuite is a fly in Spanish.

Speaker 4 (03:22):
And then of course, like why I don't know that, Yeah,
might know that, you know, I don't know that.

Speaker 3 (03:29):
I'm just gonna look this up. Mosquitoes or origin word. Well, now,
moscuite is a fly. Ito is a diminutive ending, so
it means like a little fly, oh, little fly, yeah,
a fly lit.

Speaker 4 (03:41):
And there's also a Spanish word that means long legged.

Speaker 3 (03:45):
Hold on from mosquito.

Speaker 4 (03:46):
The Spanish called the mosquitoes mosquetos, and the Native Hispanic
Americans call them zenkudos. Mosquito is Spanish or Portuguese, and
it means a little fly, while zen kudos is a
Spanish word that means long legged.

Speaker 3 (04:00):
Ah, okay, there we go and learning the etymology today
here and then I didn't have that. I just had
a little fly based on it being a little fly
in Spanish. Yeah, I like the long legged. Well we
have daddy long legs, I guess, but he's a mosquito. Yeah,
So technically, mosquitoes are actually micro predators, which is kind
of a fun word. I feel like I've met some

(04:20):
micro predators in my time that they were not mosquitoes,
and that is because some of them thrive by drinking
human blood. Tell me about it. Yeah, that is the reason,
sharing that you have encountered mosquito, So I want to
I want to talk first about their life cycle and
then about their their predation on charene So mosquito. Say,
the eggs in stagnant water. That's water that's not moving, right,

(04:44):
I know some things, Jane. Okay, okay, not everyone knows
about stagnant water, Charine. There are listeners too. They might
not know. So their eggs hatch into lava, and the
lava become puber These stages are all aquatic, right, They
all happen in the stagnant water, right, And then the

(05:05):
adult mosquito hatches from the pupa and it hatches on
the surface and then it flies off and it sucks
up your evening.

Speaker 4 (05:11):
I don't realize that you had anything to do with water.

Speaker 3 (05:13):
Yeah, that's why, like, did this not happen in La
a few years ago? They this council was like sending
people around San Diego to like scope out your garden
to see if you had standing water. Right, if that
did happen, I have no memory during arden peak. Yeah,
let's see. Uh maybe that's why, like it was peaked
like Zeka panic.

Speaker 4 (05:33):
Oh that makes sense that that would happen.

Speaker 3 (05:36):
Yeah, yeah, it does. And we definitely get them, like
I have to put a little over side like a
thing that kills the eggs into my chicken water. If
I'm having a big standing thing of chicken water, Yeah,
I try and have smaller and refresh it more frequently now.
But yeah, you definitely have to be careful of stagnant water.
And as we'll see, like one of the main ways
to control them is like limiting the amount of stagnant

(05:58):
water for some species only the females that a species
are the bloodsuckers, and in some cases they don't need
the blood and in other cases to lay their eggs
they need to have a blood meal as it's called,
which is which is a nice words unsettling. Okay. Yeah,
So the mosquitoes that are vectors for human diseases, so

(06:21):
they're like the transportation vector vehicle for the disease between
one person and another those are the guys who often
need a little blood meal to lay their eggs. They
don't only attack people, actually, they sort of have a
preferred species, but in a pinch, they'll go after anything
with blood. And I've seen them get really thick on
cattle and stuff in the summer, or horses.

Speaker 4 (06:43):
Yeah, I can imagine that, yeah, because cows just sit there.

Speaker 3 (06:46):
I mean, if they're being mosquito attacked, they get pissed off,
but there's only so much they can do. In some cases,
I think it's horses. Equinumcephalitis is spread by mosquitos, so
they can actually get it. They can get diseases from
terrible little guys, and they can like literally die from
being overbitten. And if they get like completely swarmed on wow, yeah,

(07:09):
that's like if they're unable to get away from them.
Because if you have a water tank, right, and then
mosquitos are breeding in the tank, it's where you want
to keep that tank moving like right.

Speaker 4 (07:16):
So it's not stagnant water, because stagnant water means it's
not moving.

Speaker 3 (07:19):
There. You go look at that actually and putting knowledge
into action. Let that be like one of those Guo
linga things. Where you learn a word then use it
in a sentence exactly. Yeah, all I do is use
that word.

Speaker 5 (07:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (07:32):
Yeah, So yeah, musket has come out adorn or dusk,
which is to say they are crepuscular, another word that
everyone already knows.

Speaker 4 (07:39):
I mean, I did learn that word. I did like
an audiobook and I had to look this word up,
and so I know what it means only because of that.
But it's a very interesting word. I will say it is,
isn't It sounds like creepy, Like I would have no
idea what it meant if I didn't look it up,
Like there's nothing that clues me in.

Speaker 3 (07:56):
Yeah, pusculate. It sounds like yeah, because like diurnal nocturnal,
you can kind of if you know one, you can
work out. But crepusculos coming out of fucking left field.

Speaker 4 (08:06):
That's creps.

Speaker 3 (08:07):
Does that mean?

Speaker 6 (08:08):
Which?

Speaker 3 (08:08):
Remind me?

Speaker 4 (08:08):
It means that they're active don and dust or that
they're eating it.

Speaker 3 (08:12):
I think it means they, Yeah, they are. I'm not
actually sure if it means it active or they're eating
That's a good question.

Speaker 4 (08:17):
Because I feel like I've heard cats are also described
as that.

Speaker 3 (08:20):
Yeah, cats are definitely that way. Animal appearing active in
Twilight active.

Speaker 4 (08:25):
Wow, that's very poetic. The first animal I see here
as a cat, Yeah, lion, American woodcock, firefly, short eared owl.

Speaker 3 (08:33):
Cool. Yeah, they real the pantheon and animals, So they
do the feeding at doorn a dusk and they actually
use compounds in your exhale breast to sniff you out,
so they are they are hunting for people. They specifically
prefer to feed on people who have type O blood,

(08:54):
an abundance of skin bacteria, high body heat, and pregnant women. Hmm,
if you fit one or all of those criteria, I
guess there's that because people like Definitely, I feel like
I have type of blood. Yeah, me too. I feel
like I'm victimized like more than most people by the
mosquito and they choose me. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (09:13):
I feel like me and my mom are both typo
and we get you know, live, So that makes sense.

Speaker 3 (09:18):
Yeah, they somehow they can smell that on you.

Speaker 4 (09:21):
I'm always cold, though, so I don't think I have
high body heat. Not always cold, but I can. I
don't know I have better circulation, not pregnant. I guess
I must have an abundance of skin bay.

Speaker 3 (09:31):
Yeah, it's got to be a skin bacteria and ensuring
by process of deduction.

Speaker 4 (09:35):
No, but typo makes sense. I think like that is enough.

Speaker 3 (09:39):
I suppose. Yeah, they because when it's a lot of them,
you know, and when one of them starts feeding on you,
that's going to trigger more of them to come feeding
on you.

Speaker 4 (09:48):
How because they're like, look at this, this idiot, let's
go feed off.

Speaker 3 (09:51):
Yeah, yeah, look at this. It is delicious blood that
is TYPEO. Yeah got it? Yeah, yum yum. And then
they're giving off their little feeding sort of vibes. And
then i'll mosquitoes come, which can be useful to trap them.
But that's a fair point. The trapping of mosquitoes, as
I learned when I was doing this, very fucking interesting.

Speaker 4 (10:08):
Actually, ooh, okay, tell me more. Actually maybe not now,
but whenever you get to it.

Speaker 3 (10:13):
Yeah, well we'll get to it, tune. They have a
very interesting set of mouth parts and including the labium,
which is like a gutter shaped tube mouth tube, I guess,
and it's super sharp and they can use it to
saw through your skin painlessly, so you never that's why
you don't feel.

Speaker 4 (10:30):
So that's that's the needle looking thing. Yeah, it's like
the little thing they poke you with.

Speaker 3 (10:34):
Then well they do that, then they have little needle
looking things that kind of that it contained within the
gutter shape that they used to suck out your blood. Gross.
Their saliva stops your blood from clotting, and it prevents
vascular constriction in the area where they're biting, so they
can get a little bit extra blood before it clots.
I guess some people can become desensitized to their bites
over time. If you're getting bit and all the time,

(10:55):
others can become more sensitive and then increased sensitivity is
known as Sketos syndrome Skeeter syndrome. Look up and what
it looks like. Because I'm very sensitive to them. Okay,
maybe we've got two diagnosed es in one episode. We've
got skin bacteria and Sketa syndrome.

Speaker 4 (11:11):
I don't know what I need to have to have
Skeeter syndrome, but I will say I'm extreme insensitive to
mosquito bites. When I get bitten, they become gigantic.

Speaker 3 (11:22):
I won't even know.

Speaker 4 (11:23):
I'll won't itch them because I know not to at
this point, but I'll get these like gigantic welts essentially
and they're bright pink, and then over the course of
like a week or something, and they become bright red
and they look like someone put paint on my leg.
It's like it's a crazy color of red. And then
when they eventually do stop itching, I'll have that welt

(11:43):
there in that red mark for like.

Speaker 3 (11:45):
Months, damn months. It's like it becomes like this weird scar. Yeah,
you could be a syndrome, I guess so.

Speaker 4 (11:53):
I will say when I was a kid in Syria,
when we would go visit there, they have so many
mesquita I got you alive because we'd go there in
the summer too. But there was one time I got
bit in on my eyelid like this, that sucks, and
so I genuinely couldn't open my eye for like a
week and a half.

Speaker 3 (12:12):
That was the worst one. I think I'm like that
with bee stings, like they they swell up like crazy.
Like I don't think I'm like anaphylactic, but a couple
of times. One time I was racing in Laguna Seca,
which is like a car racing track in Monterey, and
I'm racing along, and I guess I'm riding along with
my mouth open. It's just just like you know, thriving

(12:37):
and a mosquito flew in and bit me. I do
a mosquito a bee, and my whole face just was
like in your mouth. Yeah, it was crazy. It was bad, Shane, Yeah,
it was fucked. One had just stung me before, like
the extent which I swell at when beasting me. I
got stung in the leg on a training ride and

(12:58):
I had to upgrade to like exit shorts because like
my thigh just become like yeah, and then one got
me in the mouth.

Speaker 5 (13:08):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (13:08):
Shit, it was a bad day. I had epipain, I
had I think I had some ivy bedded drill at
some point. Oh yeah, it was fucking well.

Speaker 4 (13:15):
I mean, I'm glad you're not in a phylactic, but
it's pretty close, I guess.

Speaker 3 (13:19):
Yeah. Yeah, it's better you can get one time I got.
I got stung in a face when I was trying
to go to lecture as well, and like walked in
with like elephant man face and my stream Well we're
just like, dude, it's.

Speaker 4 (13:30):
Like those photos or videos you see of like animals
like a dog at a to b and their faces
like gigantic.

Speaker 3 (13:36):
Yeah, yeah, it is uh it's dogs. Do you love
to eat peas?

Speaker 4 (13:39):
I will say, I don't know if you've ever done
twenty three and me, but I did it years and
years ago for another show I was on and on
twenty three and meters. You can select if you want,
like health traits as well as like ancestral traits or
whatever like yeah, and on that it said I am
more likely to get a bitten by mosquitoes they gay.
Maybe it just need your blood type. But I didn't
give them my blood and even my spit.

Speaker 3 (14:00):
Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, that's crazy. Maybe that's something
in your book time. I don't know. We've just discovered
that Shream is on a eugenics podcast.

Speaker 4 (14:08):
No, it was as for my podcast that was about
this is tea?

Speaker 3 (14:12):
Okay, Yeah, some real problematic folks do love twenty three
in me. It's very funny when the white nationalists gone
twenty three in me and find out how they get upsets. Yeah,
I love that and it is always fun to see.
So the real problem with mosquitos is not just that
they make you a trip, but they're vectors for disease.
They infect seven hundred million people a year with their
little bitey mouths. They can spread all kinds of diseases,

(14:35):
including viruses, parasites, and bacteria. Some of their greatest hits
include yellow fever, Dangay malaria, Tuderimia zeka, chicken gunya, and
West Nile virus. Speaking from experience, some of those are
really shit and you are best avoiding all of those.
That's going to be my advice to you as a doctor.
In one European history, it really fucking sucks to get

(14:57):
some of these. I've had some diseases from some mosquitos,
and I would not recommend. The mosquitoes don't actually get
sick themselves, and it's like it's immune system can destroy
the virus, but if it bites someone else and then
bites you before it's immune system destroys the virus' genetic code,
you can get sick and at some parasites. Apparently malaria

(15:19):
can make mosquitoes more apt to go biting. It's interesting.
It kind of turns them into zombie brain mosquitos. That's
how I like to think about it. With malaria, which
is kind of the main mosquito vector disease. I guess
that we think about the parasite replicates in the liver
cells and then moves about by the bloodstream. If you
get bitten again, the blood could then pass that malaria

(15:40):
to the next victim of the mosquito. I'm going on
a trip soon for work. I'll probably be on it
when you will hear this, And like, because people are
traveling more, all these different diseases are becoming more common. Right,
They're endemic in one area, and then people come from
that area to another area, and then mosquitos are hopping
around when they're in a new area. That then thats
rereading in that area. So I was talking to some folks,

(16:03):
like on the areas where migrants travel north, all the
types of malaria are now currently present, which is great
because you've got people from all over the world, right,
and then the mosquitoes are hopping from someone from China
to someone who's come from Mauritania and spreading their little
mosquito vector diseases around. So that is bad treating. Do

(16:26):
you know what else is bad?

Speaker 4 (16:29):
I'm sorry my mind was so blank. But ads are
They're not bad. Ads are great. As are so.

Speaker 3 (16:35):
Good that we love them. Yay, ads, Okay, we're back,
and I want to talk about how we stop the
mosquito menace, please help. So I'm going to talk about

(16:55):
eliminating them, and then I'm going to talk about some
products and services actually that you can avail yourself off.
I've been thinking about this a lot recently for work reasons, right, Yeah,
doing some jungle travel in the next few months. So
how do we prevent them from biting us? First of all,
we can stop them having little useful pools of stagnant
water to replicate in right Like, this means like, if

(17:17):
you're like me, One of my friends referred to my
my garden as a quote Alaska yard, which I think
is a is a way of saying that it's a
mess and there are lots of like car parts and
like little little things that I am fixing soon, you know.
And I guess having an Alaska yard is bad for
the mosquitos, like especially things like tires, right Like, you know,

(17:39):
if you have a big car tire, water pools in there,
and they can have a little breed in there, same
as buckets in marshy areas, what people do is they
dig ditches that allows water to move so that water
doesn't sit completely still, and then introducing certain fish. It
can also help. Certain fish will eat, including the mosquito
fish will eat the lava of the mosquito tilapia. Also

(18:00):
this so like you can have a nice little if
you're a person who eats fish, a nice still situation
where you're reducing the disease burden. And also like providing
a food source, which is something they're working on, that
you can drain swamps. Of course, Donald Trump famously has
drained the swamp right, yeah, I hear no malaria do
you see anymore because of Donald Trump? But doing so
obviously destroys an important habitat. Certainly you don't want to

(18:22):
just be draining swamps. I was reading about something in
Florida they do called rotational impound management, where they kind
of allow water levels to fluctuate and then they have
these clever little gates that mean that that other species
like the fish and the crustaceans can move about that
they're keeping them water moving to stop the little mosquito eggs.
For me, the other way to do it is to
try and kill them, right, So, there are various ways

(18:43):
of doing that. One of them is to create an
environment where they would want to lay their eggs, but
then have that environment kill their eggs. So there are
various at home ways of doing this, so like you
could make a stagnant water thing and then blitz up
the eggs or filter them out, or you can put
things with oversides in there which to kill the eggs.

(19:05):
Some of them also kill the mosquitos when they come
and lay their eggs. You can also use their little
hunting senses against them, right, so you can create an
environment that attracts them either by seeming like a person
or by seeming like a good place for them to breed,
and then you can filter out the eggs from where
they lay them right, or you can kill them when
they come on in. There are things called lava sides.

(19:27):
Maybe that's what I'm using with my chicken thing actually
that destroy the lava. There are little bricks that you
dissolve in your water. And there are some pretty low
risk insecticides that you can use, and there are also
higher risk in sexicides, or at least underpopular intexticides. And
this is where a friend of the Cauzone media network
DDT comes in. Are you familiar with DDT Treed?

Speaker 7 (19:50):
No?

Speaker 3 (19:50):
There are friends, Yeah, there are friends. We love DDT
Big Appetize on pod We love them because until about
sixty years ago, the US government love to DDT. Right
it's an insecticide. They would put it in walls, in mattresses,
people rubbed their pets with it. For a while, people
thought they treated polio. They would even go through towns

(20:12):
spraying down whole neighborhoods with DDT. Right, and people kind
of became aware the DDT actually isn't a great idea
both pre ecological and health reasons about sixty years ago,
when Rachel Carson published a book called Silent Spring. It's
kind of one of the foundational texts of the environmental movement, right,
And I think people often credit like Rachel Carson with

(20:34):
being the only person that that's not necessarily true. Like
you can look at migrant farm workers actually and see
that they have been for a long time being Like,
I don't think it's great that you're dosing us with
this pesticide all the time. Like maybe maybe stop spraying
us with the DDT. You stopped playing the places. I
want to quote a really good piece there in the
New Republic on DDT. We now know that DDT causes

(20:54):
tumors in myce and rats. It thins birds eggs to
the point that mothers indiversally crushed their gestating offspring. It
may disrupt bird sense of orientation, sending them out to
see to die. It fundamentally alters the reproductive ordinance of
a array of critters. It can poison animals even decades
after spraying has ended. Further, a growing body of evidence
has linked DT to numerous forms of cancer in humans,

(21:16):
especially breast cancer. Studies have shown how the levels of
DDT in our bodies track inequalities in human society. For instance,
there are higher DDT levels in black people than in whites,
and higher levels in poor people than in rich ones.

Speaker 4 (21:29):
Sounds like you reliant to me when you said that
there are friends.

Speaker 3 (21:32):
Yeah, I feel like within the cool zone media network
of making podcasts about evil shit DDT I think fits perfect.
That's terrible. Yeah, it's terrible. There's recently like a resurgence
in I guess like people standing DDT again and then
questioning some of it, like research around it. But we
know for sure that it's ecologically damaging, and what we

(21:54):
don't know is the consequences of wiping out a bunch
of species in the ecosystem. So we probably don't want
to use DDT. One thing we can do to kill
them is they introduce predators, which is kind of cool.
Tilapia is one predator. Dragonflies or another. I love a dragonfly.
Big interesting flies. So like in Bikina Faso, they're working
on a fungus with a mosquito specific neurotoxin, which is

(22:16):
kind of cool. It can just grow and kill the mosquitos.
The World Mosquito programs also trialing a bacteria that when
mosquitos carry it, it amps up their immune system, so
like they kill the virus or the parasite or whatever
it is more quickly, so then they're less lightly to
be vectors. There's also programs which introduce male mosquitos which

(22:36):
are not able to have kids either they're sterile or
they're breeding results in eggs that won't hatch, so that's
kind of interesting control the population that way. And they
also have these really interesting genetically modified mosquitos that need
antibiotic tetracycline to grow. So they raise a batch in
the lab and gives them the tetracycline that they need right,

(22:57):
and then they let them out to breed and then
when they read because they're young don't have tetracycline that
they don't grow and they don't make it. It's really
interesting to think about. Like some folks are advocating for
completely eradicating them, just wiping them off the face of
the planet, which would seem to have many benefits, right
with all these diseases that they vector. I'm one of
those people. Yeah, you're a mosquito genocider. I found it's

(23:20):
interesting pieces that they're like a forest's defense mechanism against humans.
Like if we look at that, like the ecosystem's.

Speaker 4 (23:26):
Way of being like get out of here, yeah.

Speaker 3 (23:29):
Like leaves this place alone. Yeah, which is interesting, But
like I know, it's hard because the people who mostly
die from mosquito vector diseases and the people with the
least access to resources, right, right, Yeah, even things like
you know, when you're very sick with some of these things,
you need to be you know, kept hydrated and kept
cool as your temperature gets up and stuff, and you
don't have AC and you maybe you can't get an

(23:51):
IV or whatever, like a very preventable death could occur,
right and so right, it's hard, real hard for me
sitting in America to be like, no, we shouldn't. But
I guess I understand that argument. But if we go
about it by fucking dousing whole areas and DDT again,
then that's not great either, right, that can have it.

(24:11):
That can then can have it downside. Anyone else has
its downside, shrim It's having to pivot to add every
ten to fifteen minutes in this job that we do.
So we're going to do it now we're back. We

(24:34):
are entering the final trimester of our podcast. And yeah,
if you like that, I'd like to. I'd like to
think of them as trimesters, the last slice of this
little podcast cake for you guys. So I wanted to
present some little strategies I like to use please when
I am going to places where I am worried about

(24:55):
being eaten alive by the little flies.

Speaker 4 (24:58):
Wait, okay, you see all these like di I like
this is how track mosquito somewhere else. But like none
of those have been mentioned, So is that all bullshit?

Speaker 3 (25:05):
What do they taught me through it? I don't know.

Speaker 4 (25:07):
I have to look it up, but I feel like
I've seen like little things where it's like put this
bucket of water here, or like put like lemon or
honey or like something to attract like general insects and
then mosquitos or like even like light can attract mosquitoes.
They put like a light somewhere. But this sounds all
like bullshit.

Speaker 3 (25:23):
Now, yeah, you can do that. You can even use
a fan, right because I know it's very good flyers
like they you can just kind of blow them away
from you. So yeah, in terms of like small scale
mosquito prevention, yeah, I'm going to get into some of those, Okay, cool.
The most useful thing for me is mosquito in its actually,
so like in the jungle, I like to sleep in
a hammock. This one called the Jungle Nest. The Eagles

(25:45):
Nest outfit is make that has like a built in
mosquito net. That's nice. Yeah, it's really nice. Like I
like it so I don't have to fuck around with
like draping it and worry about like the little gaps,
right yeah, And I use that a lot. I use
a whole little system that they make, and it's it's
really nice. If I'm in hotels, seat a Summit makes
a sleeping bagliner. A I like to take seking bagline
out when I'm going places like I got fucking fleas

(26:07):
from a hotel bed in Rwanda. Oh no, yeah, it
was bad, like if you think mosquito had to try
it having And for people who haven't seen me, I'm
a hairy person, like have long hair and had a beard,
and fleas were just upon me and it was bad.
So I like to take a little sleeping bagliner. Now
that's treated with a mosquito repellent. But it must be

(26:29):
safe for skin and stuff though, right, yeah, yeah, it's
it's embedded in the fabric called permethrine. We'll talk about
it in a second. It's the last thing I use
is a head bugnet. I'm a massive advocate for the
head bugnet. I know you look like a complete lemon,
but like it's just I don't like to be bitten
in the face. No, I have been bit in the face,

(26:50):
so yeah, it's not fun. Yeah, take it from Charine
bite survivor. If you have a brimmed hat, it's much
nicer because it sort of hangs in front of your face. Then,
but I wear with these all the time. If you
like to see wildlife, it's nice to you because it's
kind of camouflaging, like it takes the glare off your face.
You get really bad in sticks up in Scotland, like
when I've been out there in the summer time at
Form one, and I wear a lot in California, like

(27:12):
there are some places like to hike where we have
year round water here, but it's definitely pretty gross by
like the end of the summer. You know, it's like
it's been sitting for a while. But water is a
bit constraint on your on your hiking out here, right,
so you kind of need it. So I'll go down
there and filter my water. But I wear my little
bug face net and it works great. I love it.
So after that, you can also do repellance. These come

(27:35):
in two forms, so it's the one that you put
on your clothes and the ones that you put on
your body. Right. The one that you put on your
clothes is called permethrine. The thing with permethrin is that
it's a neurotoxin for cats, which is very bad for cats.
So Soya makes a little spray bottle of it and
you can spray it on your own clothes and treat

(27:56):
them right. But if you have cats you have you
must do this outside like you can't do in your house.
With your cats. It's safe once it's dry, so that
you can spray them, let them be on your washing
line or what have you, and then and then when
it's dry you can you can bring them aside and
then it's safe, honestly, Like you can also send them
off to a company I think it's called Insect Shield

(28:16):
and they'll spray them for you. In the way they
do it somehow bonds it for much longer, like normally
at lasts for about six washes, but with them you
can get like ten times as many washes. You can
also buy shit, like I've just got a hoodie from
a company called First Light, who make like fancy hunting
stuff that has the insect stuff built in. Yeah. I
like that because then if you have a hoodie as well,

(28:37):
you can put you know, you get like a lot
of coverage. But like, if a cat likes sat on
this clothing, it's fine now because it's bonded. Yeah, your
cat could like go and curl up in it and
then have a sleep and things. So even if it
gets wet, that's okay. It's when the permethro in itself
is wet the first application, that's when it's risky. Okay,
I see, I see. If you're going to do that,
you want to do your socks as well, because they

(28:58):
fucking love to bite around the ankle.

Speaker 4 (29:00):
Yep, my legs are their prime target.

Speaker 3 (29:03):
Yeah, that's their their favorite area to bite here. I
don't know why.

Speaker 4 (29:07):
I mean, they're probably easier to access and you're less
likely to see them, I suppose, like and also I
feel like if you're sitting, you're moving probably your upper
body more than your lower body.

Speaker 3 (29:17):
So it's like, I don't know, Yeah, it's still like
it sneak in their lasted. So things to like repel them.
One of them is have you seen the thermo cells?
Are you familiar with them? It's a brain called off
that makes them too. It emits something called metha fluthern
and Metha Lutheran is like a non toxic I was
looking at the EPA guidelines for this. It's mostly non toxic.

(29:41):
It should be fine in your house, but it is
toxic to aquatic invertebrates, fish and bees. Because with all
these things that, I don't want to just be spraying
and insecticide into the world, right like yeah, and damaging
like innocent non micro predators. So what the thermo cell
does is you know what people have those little things
in their houses where they put an essential oil in

(30:02):
and it puffs and picture house not nice. Yeah, it's
like that. It's like that, okay, and it does that.
But with this metaphlutherin and they work okay, like if
you're in your tent stuff they work like they don't
work if it's windy, they don't really work. They can
be nice, like if you set them up and let
them get going for a while and then come into
a space, they can be really nice. And then you

(30:23):
have other things like a fan. You can have the
electric traps, right, which kind of bring even electrocute them.

Speaker 4 (30:29):
How do those electric traps attract them? Just the light
or like what I.

Speaker 3 (30:33):
Think it's a UV light because yeah, it has that
really bright I actually don't know they think that electrocutes
them like when they land on it, right, Yeah, I
think it's the light.

Speaker 1 (30:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (30:40):
Those seem to be like a more multi purpose insect
zappa though, right, So I've not preferred those. I don't
want to be killing everything else, like just try and
you know, leave no trace. And then the last thing
is for some reason I've become obsessed with this recently,
the different creams you can put on yourself to stop
mosquitoes going away. Ideally you canind of layer up all

(31:00):
the things right to limit, you know, like the amount
of just chemicals you have to rub on your skin.
Deep is the most popular one. People are pretty familiar
with Deep. It was developed by the US Army in
the forties. The big thing with D is it's really
hard on plastics. So I'm not a contact lens or
glass wearer. I don't know a contact lens is made
of glass or plastic? Isn't the wrong person? Man? Okay, yeah,

(31:23):
I have worn both, and I have no idea. I'm
going to say, like a that's with that perfect vision.
I have won neither, So I don't know.

Speaker 4 (31:30):
I mean, I don't think it's crazy who was made
out of glass or plastic?

Speaker 8 (31:35):
Right?

Speaker 4 (31:36):
What are contact lenses?

Speaker 3 (31:40):
Welcome to the portion of podcast. We're sure he googles
the thing.

Speaker 4 (31:43):
I guess there are types of plastic, but not the
kind of plastic that comes to mind when you hear
the word high tech polymers that allow oxygen to flow through.

Speaker 3 (31:53):
To reach the cornea body body blow. So I guess, yeah, sure, yeah,
be careful with your deep.

Speaker 4 (31:57):
They actually there's a question that says our contacts glass
or plastics. So I guess I'm a dummy because that's
a legitimate question.

Speaker 3 (32:03):
No, it's a good question. That just like sounds crazy
to me. Anyway, I don't know if the deep can
get to them. It can definitely, Oh yeah, it does
contact lenses. There we go. It can damage your contact lenses.
It definitely will mess with your rain gear, your tent,
your sunglasses, especially in higher concentrations. So like deep you
can get ten percent deep, you can get one hundred

(32:23):
percent deep. You get maximum protection at thirty percent deep.
So after that it's just you're buying yourself more time
between applications. Also, it gets more concentrated your risking damaging
your gear. And like, I don't like the way it
makes my mouth feel, like with the spray. If you
spray it, you get this like metallic dry mouth. It

(32:44):
seems like you're killing yourself when you walk into a
cloud of deep.

Speaker 4 (32:48):
Okay, cool, cool, cool.

Speaker 3 (32:49):
I like pickcard in. It's a synthetic version of a
element that's found in pepper plants. Yeah, that's what I
usually use when I go camp. Yeah, there a little
Soayer makes a really nice piccard. Eventually it's got like
a blue label on the bottle. Yeah, that's what I use. Yeah, Soyer. Yeah,
we like Sawyer. I got to try. The reason I've
I've suggested so many Soy products is because the Sawyer Foundation.

(33:10):
We're there in the Marshal Islands when I was there. Nice,
I mean I like their sh yeah, I do. I
think they're really cool company. Actually, they seem to make
stuff that like solves problems and then just keep making it.
They don't make a new thing every year, different color
and trying and rehype it, you know. Like they did
really cool shap in the Marshal Islands. It's cool to
see and like. Yeah, as companies go, I think they're

(33:31):
pretty right on. They also gave us some water filters
to help with the migrants the other day, which is
very nice of them. We needed some water filters for
folks crossing the border and they gave us some. So
they are my friends. But yeah, their one is good.
They make a nice sun cream actually as well, so
you can you can double dip there. I'm sure it's
not up to the standards of your your imported sun creams, but.

Speaker 4 (33:52):
That means sunscreen British translation.

Speaker 3 (33:54):
Yeah, yeah, if you can't make the logical leap from
suncream to sunscreen, yeah, that is. That is what I'm
talking about.

Speaker 4 (34:02):
In the British defense though it's definitely a cream and
not a screen.

Speaker 3 (34:05):
So yeah, that's on us. Yeah, another incidents of British excellence.
Oh my god podcast to be fair one of the
few what have we got? We've got that we have
the baking show and that's about it. Yeah, kind of
think of much else. So there are also like natural ones,
you know, like citronella is the one that people like.

(34:26):
But I have just found that those don't work very well.

Speaker 4 (34:28):
I feel like it's a hit or miss. Yeah I
was gonna say, I feel like it's like kind of
for fun.

Speaker 3 (34:32):
Yeah, like you'll feel great that you've done something.

Speaker 7 (34:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (34:35):
I think they just work by being strong smells that
kind of mask your other smells.

Speaker 9 (34:39):
Hm.

Speaker 3 (34:40):
And you can get synthetic and natural plant oils, and
there are people who will sell you bracelets with like
a little thing that's supposed to secrete the citronella.

Speaker 4 (34:47):
Oh, I use I've used those. The ones I have
used look like like phone cords that are all spirally. Yeah,
the little bracelets and I have filled my ankles, put
them on my wrists. Sometimes they work and sometimes I
look like a but I don't know, so it was
worth I've tried everything.

Speaker 3 (35:04):
Yeah, sometimes I just burned incense and that kind of works. Again,
I think this kind of it's a strong smell and
the mosquitoes don't like it. Okay, that makes sense. Having
incense and a box fan is not a bad solution.
Like I've done that in places where you know, nothing
else was available. That's pretty good. But yeah, if you're
in a place where this is a problem, and it's
becoming a bigger problem, right, the world is getting hotter,

(35:25):
the climate is changing. These swampy marsh areas are drying up,
so we're getting more stagnant water and less through flow.
Like this is becoming a bigger problem, and our healthcare
system is continuing to be fucked and getting worse, certainly
in the United States, but so United Kingdom and other places.
So yeah, be careful of the mosquitoes. Remember to do
your sun cream before you're before your mosquito cream or

(35:49):
lotion or whatever you're using, screen your mosquito screen. That's
sort of a I got a mosquito scream? You got
anything to add?

Speaker 4 (35:57):
No, I think that's a good little summary about what
to do for mosquitos. I hate mosquito so much, and
I'm one of those people that don't think they should
be around. But since they are, I guess we got
to deal with them. So, Yeah, it's nice to know
that I use like a good thing. Like I think
if I use something that you use, I'm like, wow,
I did.

Speaker 3 (36:15):
Something right, so to get way ahead of me on
the on the sun cream.

Speaker 4 (36:24):
But no, I think it's a it's helpful to know.
I'm sure many people out there are sensors to mosquito
bites and anything will.

Speaker 3 (36:31):
Help if they I don't know. Yeah, it sucks.

Speaker 4 (36:35):
It's getting so hot and they're everywhere. And now what's
really bothering me is that they're getting smaller and harder
to see, but they're just as annoying.

Speaker 3 (36:44):
Yeah, the bite still even if there's yeah, yeah, you've
got to get a really fine mesh field mosquito nets
for that. You can't be using other products. Yeah, I
don't have a mosquito net. I should go one. Yeah,
I get a mosquito net. I love a head mosquito net.
It's great. It serves you some. It stops the mosquitoes
biting you, it stops other people talking to you. Wow,
it's a great, great thing to have. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (37:04):
I have seen these videos of like someone having a
mosquito on it on them and then like the mosquitoes,
you see it poking and not being able to reach.

Speaker 3 (37:12):
It's kind of funny, like mosquito ares very funny. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
yeah cool. Yeah, thanks James. Yeah, that's why it's a
podcast brought to you by me hyper focusing on things,
which is what I do, is the way I deal
with my anxiety about going to places which aren't necessarily
places people go for fun. Word all right bye.

Speaker 5 (37:33):
So yeah, welcome to cut Up Here. I'm Andrew Siege
from the Future Channel Andrewism and I'm joined today by James.

Speaker 3 (37:54):
It's me Hi, Andrew, So James.

Speaker 5 (37:56):
Just before the show we were talking about it a
couple of different places that we've either been to or
would like to visit. Have you ever been to the Andes.

Speaker 3 (38:05):
No, anything I have, Actually i'd like to I like mountains.

Speaker 5 (38:08):
Yeah, the Andes is one of my bucket list destinations
for sure. They've always enticed me, you know, as a
place of settlement, a center of culture, a place of
political struggle. So you know, I had to do an
episode or the development of anarchistsinicalism in Peru. So they
continuing along with my previous research on anarchism and other

(38:30):
parts of the world, much information I've gathered as thanks
to the work of Stephen J. Hush and they shoudn't
found the world, particularly anarchism and cynicalism in the colonial
and post colonial world eighteen seventeen, nineteen forty. And you know,
people don't usually think of Peru when they think of
anarchistsinicalist struggles, not even in the context of Latin America.

(38:52):
Folks familiar with that history would quicker consider Brazil or
Argentina as sites of anarchistsinicalism. You know, in Brazil, the
roots of anarchism could be traced back to the late
nineteenth century, to the influence of European immigrants, and by
the early twentieth century had anarchist ideas keen interaction across
the working class, with the establishment of various associations and
newspapers like the Brazilian Workers Confederation founded in nineteen oh six.

(39:17):
Anarchists would play, of course, a crucial role in the
General strike of nineteen seventeen, and then, unfortunately, with the
rise of Jitulio Vargas and his Estado Novo regime in
the nineteen thirties, there was a very severe oppression of
anarchist activities in Argentina. He also had anarchism taken route
in the late nineteenth century, again largely due to the

(39:39):
influence of European immigrants, and by the early twentieth century
Buenos Aires had become a hub of anarchist activity, with
numerous anarchist newspapers, clubs and unions. The Argentine Region of
Workers Federation, foundated nineteen oh one, was a leading anachosynicus
organization that advocated for workers' rights and direct action. Sadly,

(40:01):
the movement reached its peak during the first two decades
of twentieth century, and fortunately, similarly to Brazil, due to
the repression they endured, particularly during the infamous Tragic Weak
in nineteen nineteen, where a major workers strike led to
violent clashes and a crackdown on anarchists and labor activists.
The overall movement went into a decline. Peru during this

(40:22):
period was predominantly an agrarian society with a large and
economically marginalized indigenous population. It hardly resembled a nation into
throes of industrialization. So although there was significant capitalist growth
in Peru's export sectors, chiefly mining, sugar, cotton, and wool,
vast areas of the country remained largely unaffected by these

(40:45):
capitalist changers. Aside from Lima and its adjacent port city, Calau,
which served as the nation's administrative, commercial and financial hub,
sizeable Iwan economies were conspicuously absent. This lack of urban
centers typically assumed eight with industrial growth post a unique
challenge for the development of a robust labor movement, but

(41:05):
laborment would still arise. The working class in Lemaclaur would
emerge beginnings in the eighteen nineties and early nineteen hundreds,
spurred by the export boom that invigorated the urban economy.
Profits from the export sectors with reinvestments and new financial institutions,
infrastructure projects, utility companies, and consumer goods industries by native

(41:26):
and foreign capitalists, and this economic growth led to a
dramatic rise in the urban labor force in Lima. The
number of manual workers grew from about nine thousand in
eighteen seventy six tony twenty four thousand and nineteen oh eight,
making up seventeen percent of Lema's estimated one hundred and
forty thousand residents. In Kalau, the workforce grew at a

(41:47):
slower pace, doubling in size Streeen nineteen oh five nineteen
twenty to around eight thousand out of a total population
of fifty two thousand. So this is not a bustling
industrial heartland by any means, and peasant based society is
are not exactly known for their syndicalism, But despite its unlikelihood,
Peru was indeed also a place of anarchist cynicalism, though

(42:10):
most notably within Lima and Callao. The nineteen tens and
twenties were the Heydi of syncalism Peru, as anarchist ideas
and publications were circulated by a small handful of radical
immigrants intellectuals, alongside the labor organized and efforts of craftsmen
and machine tenders who were inspired by Pruron, Bercunan, Kropotkin,
and Manchester. Thanks to their efforts, anarchist cynicalism would come

(42:34):
to dominate the still fledgland labor movement in Peru, spreading
its influence beyond Limacalau to the working classes along Peru's
northern coast and central and southern highlands. Workers in factories, crafts, transportation,
and rural settings all found appeal in the ideals and
practice of the ideology. Of course, at the size of
the movement of the time, the anarchists may have dominated

(42:56):
the movement, but the movement itself and the anarchists with
that had constituted a minority of Peru's urban and rural
working classes. Keeps that in mind as we proceed stea
emerging Peruvian working class was highly diverse. He had workers
of different origins, gender, race, ethnicity, age, skill level, and
despite these differences, they all were dealing with long working

(43:19):
hours after between twelve to sixteen hours a day in
poor conditions for meager wages that barely covered basic living expenses.
Seeking to improve their dire working and living conditions, workers
began to turn to anarchism because the elite dominated political
system in Peru was simply not taking them on. But
there was a handful of sympathetic dissolusion elites like Manuel

(43:41):
Gonzalez Prada, an upper class intellectual who became an anarchist
after interacting with French and Spanish anarchists during a self
imposed European exile between eighteen ninety one and eighteen ninety eight.
Gonzales Prada founded the first anarchist publication, Los Parias in
nineteen oh four, and this was soon followed by other
anarchist newspapers like Lassimier and the Roja, Elambriento, Umanidad and Oprimido.

(44:06):
Anarchist slogans like Kropotkins liberties and not bestowed, They're seized
were prominently featured in these newspapers, and these publications, mainly
produced by radical intellectuals such as Glicerio Tassara and hil
Rihi Cali, Carlos del Barzo and Ino Sincio Dombarozzi, introduced
workers to European anarchist ideas and perspectives on the state,

(44:28):
the Bouchoisi, the church, property and class relations. Anarchist study
circles further promoted these ideas among workers, operated by both
workers and radical intellectuals. Groups like the Center of Socialist
Studies First of May in Lima and Love and Light
in Calao, provided spaces for discussing anarchist principles, and these
study circles, like the anarchist press, emphasized workers, self emancipation

(44:53):
and cultural advancement. And somehow this man manages to come
up in practically every single one of my explorations of
anarchist history, that being the Spanish anarchist Francisco Ferrer. He
was the guy who kick started the modern school movement
in Spain and led to the creation of anarchist schools worldwide,

(45:13):
and he was also unjustly executed by the Spanish state.

Speaker 3 (45:17):
Yeah, Frere is like a guy I like to a lot.
I like to If you're in Barcelona, you can visit him,
along with Ascastle and de Ruti on much week. They're
in the cemetery there. They have like a little little
area with the three of them.

Speaker 5 (45:32):
I was wondering for a second. He said, oh, you
could visit him. I was like, well, really, yeah, pretty sure.

Speaker 3 (45:37):
He's six feet under he's immortal, like they've re reanimated him.
It's like zombie for their Yeah.

Speaker 5 (45:44):
I feel like the Simpsons did an episode of that
with Lenin.

Speaker 3 (45:48):
Fortunately, I'm trying to think. I'm pretty sure that anarkids
have we have spared the world the embalming of our leaders.

Speaker 5 (45:56):
Fortunately, yeah, fortunately, I mean his death. Though despite not
being embalmed, his death still continues to refiberate across these
historical episodes across the world. Upon his death, anarchists went
out in their numbers to protest his execution, and Peru
was no different. On October seventeenth, nineteen oh nine, the

(46:18):
Center of Socialist Studies First of May organized a public
protest in response to the execution of federer A by
the Spanish government, and these sorts of demonstrations were not
new to the workers in Peru at the time. In
the previous year, an anarchist musical group associated with the
Center held a performance to commemorate the nineteen oh seven
massacre of Chilean mine workers. Furthermore, annual media celebrations in

(46:41):
honor of the Chicago Martyrs were also supported by these
study circles and the anarchist press. The first media celebration
in Lima, organized primarily by the Federation of Baker Workers
Staff Peru, took lace in nineteen oh five, highlight an
international working class solidarity and the struggle for the eight
hour workday, while honoring Peru's first worker martyr, and to

(47:03):
the dedication of anarchist leaders, publications, and study circles, the
early years of Peruvian anarchism and labor organization laid the
groundwork for a movement committed to justice and dignity for
all workers. We can say that by nineteen eleven anarchist
cynicalism had truly firmly taken route. Why because this was

(47:25):
the year of the first general strike in Peru by
the urban working class, spearheaded by anarcho synicalists. In March
nineteen eleven, five hundred workers at the US owned Vitarite
cotton mill initiated a strike demanding higher wages, a reduction
of the work day from thirteen to ten hours, and
the elimination of the night shift. And I found these

(47:45):
demands very interesting because I'm imagining even now people back
then saying, you know, how lazy can you be? You
know you only want to work ten hours? Like, come on,
some of us, some of us are putting in sixteen, seventeen,
eighteen hours, pick up, pick up the slack.

Speaker 3 (48:07):
Yeah. And it's always like these early anarchist demands, you
just realize the unfathomable misery of being like part of
the industrial working class in the late nineteenth and early
twentieth century.

Speaker 5 (48:20):
Yes, like can you can you ease the boot off
my neck for like two seconds a day? You know?

Speaker 3 (48:27):
Yeah? Yeah, it's people fighting and dying right to work,
like the amount of hours that most of us are
awake in a day, and they would work that much
without taking care of any of their family or personal
or other.

Speaker 5 (48:39):
Needs, like can I please see my family for more
than an already?

Speaker 8 (48:44):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (48:44):
Absolutely not no uth, And then the Pinkerton's come out
and yes, exactly, like, yeah, people are asking for sixteen
hour day and their response is is to send out
someone to murder them.

Speaker 5 (48:55):
Yeah, it's ridiculous. Yeah, but I am impressed by the tenacity,
you know, yeah, absolutely, even with the what I would
consider to be rather self demands, I mean, a ten
hour worth, the higher wages, and the eliminition of the
night shift. I mean those are things that some people
take for granted today, right, Yeah, but that's something they

(49:18):
had to fight for and their strike lasted twenty nine days.

Speaker 3 (49:22):
Oh wow, that's very impressive. Yeah. This has reminded me
of like I'm working on a book right now and
I've been reading this biography of Duluti for a while
that Able pass wrote and it passes book when de
Ruti goes into exile for a Way too and turn
travels across South America, and these these anarchist schools are
being set up along the modern system as envisaged by

(49:44):
IF and I just fl air. And they don't have
any funding, right because everyone's so dirt poor that like
that there isn't much surplus to contribute to their children's education.
And they have once they've taken care of their subsistence needs.
And there's this line in the book which for whatever reason,
it's just like a line I aspire to write something
that's beautiful. It's the Ruty was very fond of children,

(50:06):
and so he risked his life robbing banks to fund
their education, which is like, I just love the pivot
from like he liked kids and therefore he conducted arm
bank robbery throughout the world.

Speaker 5 (50:19):
Yeah, yes, it's like you know, put the money in
the bag and maybe some textbooks while yeah at.

Speaker 3 (50:24):
Ith Yeah, and like he at this time, like the
anarchists were so pure at this time, and like in
their sort of aspirations and in their actions in many
ways in other ways, not of course that they could
not rid themselves to some of their gender assumptions. But
they would make an accounting of everything they stole, which

(50:45):
is really not like if if you're involved in crimes
and you're listening, it's not a good idea yea, yeah.
But he would do it to to like prove sure
everyone that he wasn't stealing for his own personal benefit.
They'd be like, we get this to this school and
we bought some textbooks and like that. You know, they
needed school lunches, so we got some sacks of rice

(51:06):
and bananas, and like, as you can see, the entire
money from this bank heightst has been redistributed, and we're
off to another country to do the same.

Speaker 5 (51:13):
Now I'm just imagined and this guy like, you're keeping
all these records because the anarchist auditor is going to
come and you know check all.

Speaker 3 (51:21):
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Like I'm not sure who would like
doubt the commitment of the man traveling around the world
robbing the banks. But apparently they felt that like no
one should be above approach, which is admirable. Yeah, yeah,
you know what's not admirable, Andrew ads, Yeah, it's our
obligation to include products and services in these podcasts, but

(51:41):
we have to. So here we go. Okay, we're back,
and yeah, you're telling me about their their twenty nine
day general strike or the strike rather than a general strike.

Speaker 5 (51:59):
Yeah, strike, but you're close, because the strike started in
March as a regular strike, it lasted twenty nine days
and then eventually escalated into a general strike on April tenth,
bring in Lima's business and transport to a complete halt.
And so the following day, President Leguya intervened and forced
the mills management to meet the workers' demands.

Speaker 3 (52:23):
That's a win.

Speaker 5 (52:24):
It is away of a ten hour workday, but a way.

Speaker 3 (52:27):
Nonetheless, Yeah, I guess it's approved that you can force
them to change and then you can you can continue
from there.

Speaker 5 (52:34):
Yeah, And so to save safeguard their heart won victories,
textile workers in Vitarite established the Textile Workers Unification of
Ittarity in May nineteen eleven, dedicated to defending the rights
of all workers. Inspired with Vitarte's example, workers at other
major mills and Lima began forming their own resistance societies

(52:55):
dedicated to serving and defending the right of the proletariat
In general and the textile workers in particular. The movement
continued to gain momentum in nineteen twelve nineteen thirteen. In
October nineteen twelve, the La Protest group succeeded in forming
the first Workers Regional Federation of Peru, united various worker
resistance societies modeled after Argentina's Workers Regional Federation. The FORP,

(53:18):
as it was also called, advocated for both immediate improvements
and long term social revolution, even to unite workers across Peru. Unfortunately,
as is the case with many workers struggles in this time,
economic instability and state hostelity during World War One led
to the disillusion of the FRP in nineteen sixteen. Thankfully,

(53:38):
this setback was temporary. Between nineteen sixteen and nineteen nineteen,
Anacosynicolus redouble their efforts, focusing on organizing both urban and
rural workers. Following the death of Manuel Gonzalez Prada nineteen nineteen,
worker run union presses emerged, spreading anarchosynicalist ideas and replace
in earlier anarchist publications. This renewed activity strengthened the labor

(53:59):
move lead entity establishment of new labor federations and the
revival of the FORP, and with the deteriorating conditions during
the war years and real wages fallen sharply, they had
to be a wave of strikes in nineteen eighteen. The
most significant strike occurred in December nineteen eighteen b nearly
twenty nine hundred textile workers demanded an eight hour workday,

(54:22):
finally making some progress.

Speaker 3 (54:24):
Yeah, yeah, we'll get in there.

Speaker 5 (54:27):
What I find so interesting about the demand of an
eight hour workday is if we look at their first
demand nineteen eleven, they fought to reduce their workday from
thirteen hours to ten hours, right, and then a mayor
seven years later, nineteen eleven to nineteen eighteen, I mean
seven years.

Speaker 3 (54:45):
Later, Yeah, they got them down to eight They go from.

Speaker 5 (54:48):
Ten hours to eight hours. And by the way, by
January nineteen nineteen, they organized a general strike. They moved
on to a general strike. The led to street clashes
and business shutdowns, and despite the arrests and the torture
strike leaders, the strike continued until President part of they
were conceded to eat hour weekday. So in seven years
they went from ten hours to eat hours.

Speaker 3 (55:09):
Yeah, and then we've.

Speaker 5 (55:10):
All collectively as a global society been stuck on eight
hours for the past century, over our century at this point,
I mean it's twenty four this was nineteen nineteen.

Speaker 3 (55:22):
Yeah, wow, putting it that way, that is bleak.

Speaker 5 (55:25):
We should we should be down'd on hour this point.

Speaker 3 (55:27):
Yeah, yeah, we give it extrapolate, right, we take two
points and draw the line. That's what happens when like
they see the success of the people in the streets, trained,
and they know they have of power and they can
keep going.

Speaker 9 (55:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (55:39):
Yeah, because they wouldn't have felt so bull as to
demand the eight hours if they didn't fight and win
that ten hours at first, just a couple of years before.

Speaker 3 (55:48):
Yeah, Like, it's why we have made a versus International
Workers Day, right, Like, because like the number of rights
we enjoy visa v our employers and the state were
all fought for and one by people who sometimes died
in the process, and like, yeah, we ought to remember that.
I think like sometimes now organizing forgets how hard fought

(56:09):
those were. But also like they won. Yeah, we have
not had many dubs in the in the intervening period.
Of course, the state has like the state has grown
exponentially stronger.

Speaker 5 (56:20):
Yeah, yeah, I mean the situation has changed. We have
to acknowledge that. Yeah, but it's just it's it is
very fascinating, you know, the way that you know, these
small winds was able to embolden bigger winds, yeah later
down the line, and that keeping that momentum really is vital.

Speaker 3 (56:39):
Yeah, definitely, it still works that way when I, like,
you know, in the last couple of years, I've been
to Java and to mian Maar, like, they have done
things that would have seemed inconceivable to them ten years
before they did them. And in both cases it's by
staying in the streets, right or staying in the jungles
or the mountains or wherever you're fighting them, and then
refusing to like accept that the state can tell you

(57:02):
what to do, even when the state tries to bring
its coercive violence against you. And like that's how all
of these these winds occur. But it doesn't happen without organization,
without community, without like all the things that they had
built in Peru, right like before they did their first strike,
they had to have confidence that their strike woul succeed,
and presumably a strike fund and a means to collectively

(57:25):
support the people who weren't getting paid and they have
to build all that and then like these things can
kind of cascade once the once the movement has a
strong base.

Speaker 5 (57:33):
Exactly. There's the reason that I'm going through these histories.
You know, these are the sort of lessons I want
people be able to glean.

Speaker 3 (57:39):
Yeah, totally. I think it can be frustrating otherwise, like
it can be frustrating to be people. I'm not saying
people right now aren't trying, because people do a lot
and they're working hard. But it can be frustrating until
you see that it takes years of building that base,
and then things can things can seem to come quickly,
but it does years of work sort of behind the scene.

(58:00):
That has happened first.

Speaker 5 (58:02):
Absolutely so. In the months following the general strike, workers
continue to protest the rising costs of living. Organizers like
Alberto Funken Nicolas Gutara formed the Committee for the Cheapening
of Prime Necessities, mobilizing thousand. I think we definitely need
a Committee for the Cheapening of Prime Necessities today.

Speaker 3 (58:23):
That's an amazing group. Like I was just what a
great thing.

Speaker 5 (58:27):
Yeah, fantastic name. When the demands were ignored, you know,
here we go again. A general strike was declared in
May nineteen nineteen, resulted in violent clashes with the state
and the arrests of Kutara and another figure, Carlos Barber.
Upon their release, resolve unshaken, Gutara and Barbara defiantly addressed

(58:47):
President Laguya, stating in part that the populace of today
was not the team one of yesterday, which had silently
borne all attorneys. Sounds like a threat.

Speaker 3 (58:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (59:00):
Two days later, FORP was reactivated with a mission to
dismantle capitalism and create a society based on mutual aid
and equality. The aerocosilicust movement had dissolved any linkering passivity
among Lemaclau's workers. The passion, hunger, and aggression towards state
and employer threats had reached a crescendo by this point.
For example, in September nineteen twenty one, textile workers seized

(59:23):
el InCor mill in response to management's plans to close
the factory. Although they were eventually dislodged by troops, their
active resistance demonstrated their determination and boldness. It isn't that
fascinating that these workers were willing to seize the mill
they had worked at because the mansion plan and closing
it down. They were willing to take control of ath
place and work at it and you know, couldn't contribute

(59:47):
to the economy. But the troops were mobilized to ensure
that they did not exercise autonomy as workers to self
organize their own labor. It's either under management or out
of a or there's no working for yourself or working
as a collective. Also, in nineteen twenty one, the FORP

(01:00:08):
was replaced by the Local Workers Federation or FOL, which
lashed out against the government's legal rules against strikes. So
in nineteen twenty President Leaguiya put forward a new constitution
with very strict provisions to regulate this wave of strikes

(01:00:29):
and to put the labor conflicts under arbitration by the state.
And so the Local Workers Federation the FOL, which had
replaced the FORP in nineteen twenty one, lashed out at
this government's legal ruse and vowed to completely ignore it.
At the time, as well, alongside the labor struggles, Anaqua

(01:00:51):
Syncalists were struggling to transform culture. Contrary to the idea
that the f WEL neglected cultural issues, evident shows they
actively developed as work in class culture. Their strategy was
a war of position against rule elites, even to create
a counterculture that challenged the dominant bourgeois values. At the
nineteen twenty one FOL Congress, workers affirmed the importance of

(01:01:13):
both economic improvements and cultural uplift, which led to the
establishment of initiatives like a worker's daily newspaper, a popular library,
and various cultural associations. One key example was the central
musical Obrero de Lima, founded in nineteen twenty two, which
used music to promote workers' rights and solilarity. Workers also
participated in social events like the Fiesta de la plant

(01:01:36):
a secular festival designed to compete with Christian holidays and
promote class unity. They also held Madia celebrations and organized
tributes for foreign comrades. Moreover, the FOL supported the creation
of popular universities to educate workers and foster cultural and
political awareness. Meanwhile, also in the late nineteen tens and

(01:01:56):
nineteen twenties, the southern highlands of Peru saw the emerging
of a dynamic network of anarchostynicalist movements. The network thrived
amid the burgeoning will export economy. The will trade's expansion
spurred economic links and infrastructural development, which turned Arakeeper into
a key economic center and the hub of the anarchisyndicalist

(01:02:17):
network in the region. Aracosynicalism and Araqkeeper was influenced by
four major factors. A radical liberal press, the labor movement
and Lima, immigrant anarchists and cross border connections with Chilean
anachosynicalists influenced by thinkers like Manuel Gonzales Prado, intellectuals, artisans, critique, Arakeepers,
conservative society through radical publications such as Lariete and Bandera Roja.

(01:02:42):
These radical ideas burned significant actions like Atraqueper's first major
strikes in nineteen oh two, the inaugural media celebration in
nineteen oh six, and the establishment of pivotal organizations such
as the Worker's Social Center of Araqkeeper and the Worker
Coalition of the Neighborhoods. The labor movement in Lima, along
with influenzers Argentina and Chile, further inspired Attkeepers workers. By

(01:03:04):
December nineteen eighteen, motivated by reports of workers struggles abroad,
Artisans and Workers and Arakeeper, founder of Society of Workers
and Mutual Assistants, the SOSM. In July nineteen nineteen, following
Lema's example, at Keeper's main labor organizations established a committee
to combat the rising cost of living. When the demands
were ignored, they too launched a general strike, which lasted

(01:03:27):
eight days and received widespread support. While some wage and
benefit demands were met, many of the committee's requests remained unaddressed.
So after the general strike, Atkeeper's workers founded the Arakeeper
Worker Federation to advocate for their rights and demands. Further,
that federation was one of numerous unions and federations, either
being the Local Worker Federation of Arakeeper or Fuller, which

(01:03:49):
emerged between nineteen nineteen to nineteen twenty six in response
to calls from the fr Repeats enhanced the worker's capacity
for direct action against capitalists and state depression. Like their
count parts in Lima, at A Keepers, anarchistynicalists employed direct
action to achieve both immediate and long term goals. The
protests against a railway tariff hike in nineteen twenty three

(01:04:10):
pressure the government enough to suspend the increase, but nineteen
twenty five was perhaps their most pivotal year because the
Popular Workers Assembly, which is an ad hoc coalition of
anarchistnicalist groups to at a Keeper and Lima called for
a general strike against the Road Conscription Law, which required
adult males to register and to work on unpaid state
infrastructure projects for upward of twelve days per year. For

(01:04:32):
the Assembly, this was more than just an unfailed law.
This was a symbol of the state's utter disregard for
the working class. As a strike unfolded, the authorities sought
to crush the movement, arrest in labor leaders and attempting
to dismantle the anarchist organization's influence. But even with only
a small industrial sector and a relatively small population, at

(01:04:53):
a Keeper's labor movement demonstrated a remarkable level of class
consciousness and solidarity beyond strike to use a variety of
methods to build solidarity and consciousness among workers, from worker
libraries to football clubs. One key figure in this movement
was Ramon Rossignole, a Spanish architect and passionate anarcho syndic list.

(01:05:15):
Arriving an araqueper in nineteen nineteen, Russignole turned his office
into a hub of anarchist thought at activism. His influence
was profound as he trained future leaders like Jacinto Leendo
and Francisco Ramos, who would become central figures in the
labor movement. Roussignol's efforts extended beyond traditional activism. He also

(01:05:35):
founded a popular university in the footsteps of Francisco Ferrer,
and it stuve as a place for workers to receive
education and become politically conscious. Endo, a key port city
in Peru, the influence of the International Workers of the
World was particularly strong. Louis Armando Trivigno, a key Chilean
IWW leader, published a series of influential articles in a

(01:05:57):
newspaper called Labor Testa in nineteen twenty two. He extolled
the virtues the IWW's methods and called for international solidarity
among workers. He was best received right in Moyendo, where
by early nineteen twenty five, maritime workers from Chile had
established close and secretive tie to the local Peruvian workers.

(01:06:17):
Under the cover of darkness, they held clandestine meetings and
an old house at Ailey Street. These meetings would lead
to the formation of a local IWW branch right in Moyendo.
But it wasn't just a meeting of the minds, but
of the shared struggles and victories of the workers that
sevented these ties. In February nineteen twenty five, a popular

(01:06:38):
general strike in Moyendo saw workers fighting back against unjust
practices by British owned companies. The strike was a massive success,
and the solidarity from Chile and IWW members bolstered the
Approvian workers' resolve. The government's response the anarchist synicalist movement
was severe there on the spread of what they saw
as Bolshevik ideas. They cracked down hard on the Moyendo

(01:07:02):
labor movement. Security forces were deployed to suppressed protests and
activists were arrested or reported to Chile. Of course, government
repression efforts were not fully successful due to resilience of loose,
flexible and decentralized organizing the seeds of anarchistniclists thought had
already taken route. Throughout nineteen twenty six and beyond, the

(01:07:23):
labor movement and Moyendo continued to be a site of
struggle and resistance. Workers engage in protests and work stoppages,
driven a by the ideas of direct action and social
justice that have been nurtured through the interaction with Chilean Wobblies.

Speaker 3 (01:07:35):
Do you know what was almost certainly not nurtured through
interactions with Chilean wobblies Andrew ads Yeah, and we are
back from the outbreak.

Speaker 5 (01:07:55):
Beyond the cities. Anarchistinicalism had a profound impact on the
rural indigenous communities in Cusco and Puno. Internal migration and
the exchange of ideals led to the rise of a
new political consciousness among the peasantry. Carlos Condorina, an indigenous
peasant from Puno, became a key figure in the Tejuante

(01:08:15):
Suyo pro Indian Rights Central Committee the sept where he
championed indigenous labor rights and the struggle for better work
and conditions. His work, along with that of other provincial
migrants like Esequiel or Viola, bridged the gap between the
urban anarchosynicalists and the rural indigenous communities. Reviola was a

(01:08:35):
passionate advocate for both indigenous rights and the broader anarchosynicalist course,
pushing back against the paternalism of the state toward indigenous
community and connecting the struggles of workers and peasants alike.
He spoke out against bourgeois pigs Yankee imperialism, all while
encouraging pride in one's indigeneity. Alongside Reviola, Salazar and Ayulo

(01:08:56):
would also guide the SEPT and the Provian region of
Indian Workers Federation toward anarchist syndicuist ideology, organization, and tactics.
Even after his untimely death in nineteen twenty five, with
Viewler's legacy continued to inspire anarchists and indigenous movements. Indigenous
leaders and activists have been grown fed up with the

(01:09:18):
abuse of practices of local authorities and the gaminalists, the
rural bosses who exploited the peasants. Pedro Jose Rada Igama,
the Minister of Government and Police at the time, blamed
these uprisings on known agitators. He claimed that these agitators
were convincing the indigenous people that they rode conscription law
and other municipal laws were designed to oppress them, even

(01:09:41):
though the indigenous people could see for themselves the effects
of the law. Both the anarchists and the indigenous organizers
had laid the crown work, but it was the people
themselves who chose not to accept such state impositions. Uprisings
broke out across Cutsco and Puno District authorities had to
suspend the conscription several provinces due to the intense resistance.

(01:10:04):
The sheer force of the crackdown was so extreme that
the city mayor and the municipal council had to appeal
to President Leaguya for the suspension of the law, and
they succeeded at least temporarily until July nineteen twenty six,
and as soon as the law was reinstated, the Popular
Assembly reignited the resistance, leaving went as first issuing direct

(01:10:26):
threats to the officials enforcing the law, noting that they
had the home addresses of the Conscription Council and was
not responsible for any potential consequences of their actions.

Speaker 3 (01:10:38):
That's definitely a threat.

Speaker 5 (01:10:39):
That's definitely out there.

Speaker 3 (01:10:40):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:10:41):
They also sent delegates to Lima to organize a nationwide
campaign against the law, which led to their arrest and
sparked even more protests in Atkeeper and Lima throughout late
nineteen twenties. Despite increasing state repression, the anarchists Sanrachist Nicholas
did not let up for as long as they could,
so over the first three decades of the nineteen hundreds,

(01:11:05):
anarchist syndicalism in Peru spread thanks to a mix of factors,
the distribution of radical ideas through publications, the influence of
activists from other countries, and most importantly, the work of
local organizers, most prominently in Lima Kalau. Despite facing immense
challenges and a significant decline by the end of the

(01:11:26):
nineteen twenties, the movement laid the groundwork for future labor politics.
Former Arachas cynicalists joined new political parties and an effort
to carry forward their ideals, compromising a long way, so
the influence didn't fully disappear, but it did transform. Still,

(01:11:46):
their spirit lived on somewhat in the ongoing fight for
justice and equality in Peru, one that continues.

Speaker 1 (01:11:54):
To this day.

Speaker 3 (01:12:10):
Hello podcast fans, Me James and my friend Scherene, and
also Cherene's cat Bunny.

Speaker 4 (01:12:17):
Yes, yeah, she is here. She is here and ready
to pod.

Speaker 3 (01:12:21):
Yeah. She loves to cast a pod and so do we. Today, Cherene,
we have the great pleasure of talking about the border again,
which is something I talk about a lot, something that
politicians also talk about a lot. Today, what I want
to talk about is the difference between Kamala Harris and
Donald Trump when it comes to the border, Because shockingly,
there's been a lot of crap reporting on her border stance.

(01:12:44):
There has been some good reporting, and like, there's always
going to be right wing disinformation anytime you talk about
the border. Right, just today, Border Patrol released video of
a woman falling to her death from the border wall.
Border Patrol agents stood there for twenty four minutes watching
her struggle. There was a ladder, and they decided to

(01:13:04):
watch her struggle until she died as she fell, and
then she died well watching this like objectively tragic thing, right,
Like when we think about how we get to fascism,
we get to fascism when my taxes pay people to
stand there and watch a woman die rather than do
a single thing to help her. And then a bunch
of fuck wits on the internet immediately start excusing this

(01:13:27):
like it's it's so predictable that it was going to happen,
and I'm just once again disgusted by the whole fucking apparatus.
It's the border, I guess. So I want to talk
about the things that have changed, right, and I want
to talk we'll sort of start Boy outlining who Kamale
is with respect to the aborder. So everything she took
over from Biden, Kamala has been sort of offering more

(01:13:49):
platitudes than specifics, right like her campaign is mostly based
on vibes. Like I went to her campaign website to
see what her stances were on the border. It is
not mentioned. I think that's notable. But recently, in some
speeches she did offer some concrete ideas of what her
border policy might look like. So I'm going to start
with her campaign ad. This ad incidentally opens with what

(01:14:10):
I'm pretty sure is a drone shot from Campo, California.
I've taken pictures in reverse of that shot hundreds of times.
You can find them on my website. Slate bought some
of them off me. Maybe a month or two ago, No,
not even like, maybe maybe two or three weeks ago,
I guess. I watched a mother breastfeed her five month
old child, maybe a couple of miles from there. It

(01:14:32):
was one hundred and five degrees. We were able to
give them water. I saw someone in severe hypothermia right
very hot. We were able to call them off. I
spoke to a Sudanese family who were really struggling with
making this long walk. They have to make out there.
None of that shit made it into the Karmela border advert, right,

(01:14:53):
of course not. So I'm just going to play this
advert for you, Shuen on the border. The choice is simple.

Speaker 10 (01:15:00):
Kamala Harris supports increasing the number of border patrol agents.
Donald Trump blocked a bill to increase the number of
border patrol agents. Kamala Harris supports investing in new technology
to block fentanyl from entering the country. Donald Trump blocked
funding for technology to block fentanyl from entering the country.
Kamala Harris supports spending more money to stop human traffickers.

(01:15:23):
Donald Trump blocked money to stop human traffickers. Kamala Harris
prosecuted trans national gang members and got them sentenced to prison.
Trump is trying to avoid being sentenced to prison. There's
two choices in this election, the one who will fix
a broken immigration system and the one who's trying to
stop her.

Speaker 4 (01:15:47):
A cop or a clown?

Speaker 3 (01:15:48):
Who should we vote for president? And that's exactly it, right.
She's leaning really heavily on this, like I am a
cop thing and like we have spent and continue to
spend billions of dollars on border cops. That is not
the fucking solution. It never will be the solution. We
cannot make this giant border so full of cops that

(01:16:09):
it's impossible for people to cross it. People will still
cross it because cops ain't going to go to the
middle of the desert, because you know, be inherent in
being a cop is also being lazy. So I want
to play some stuff that she said in Atlanta this week.

Speaker 11 (01:16:22):
So here is my pledge to you. As president. I
will bring back the border security bill that Donald Trump
killed and I will sign it into law. And so
Donald Trump, what real leadership looks like?

Speaker 3 (01:16:45):
Oh fuck off? Yeah, So I'm going to subject you
to some Carmela and some Trump today. That's okay, I
signed up for this, Okay. So here's another one of her,
and this I think is really telling right where she
is bragging about the most conservative Republicans her bill.

Speaker 11 (01:17:01):
Donald Trump, on the other hand, has been talking a
big game about securing our border, but he does not
walk the walk, or as my friend Quavo would say,
he does not walk it like he talks it.

Speaker 12 (01:17:30):
Where if.

Speaker 11 (01:17:38):
So, Look, our administration worked on the most significant border
security bill in decades. Some of the most conservative Republicans
in Washington, d C. Supported the bill. Even the Border
Patrol endorsed it.

Speaker 3 (01:17:54):
So I'm going to read some transcription that speech as well.
Just this is pretty much the only point of data
we have on her proposed border policy. So we're going
heavy on this speech that she gave in Atlanta at
a rally. Right, I went after transnational gangs, drug cartails,
and human traffickers that came into our country legally. I
prosecuted them in case after case, and I won, Harris said.

(01:18:16):
Donald Trump, on the other hand, has been talking a
big game about securing our border, but he does not
walk the walk. That's what you just heard, right, And
then she goes on to reference Quavo, which is cool
and normal. So let's talk about that leadership, and let's
talk about the bill she's proposing. Right. This is a
bipartisan bill that was proposed last year and that didn't succeed. Right,

(01:18:38):
it's the one that Democrats are making a big fuss about.
Republicans getting the border bill. It's one of the only
good things they've ever done, actually, because it represented a
massive right wood swing from where Democrats have previously been
on immigration. In the bill, DHS could close the border
if border patrol encountered four thousand or more migrants on
average over a seven day period. The border would then

(01:18:59):
have to be shut down if encounters reached a seven
day average of five thousand, or if they exceeded eighty
five hundred in a single day.

Speaker 4 (01:19:06):
Does that happen on these numbers like realistic?

Speaker 3 (01:19:09):
Yes? Well, A really important thing to remember when we
talk about these numbers is did you notice that it
was phrases encounters, not people. So this is a thing
that is apparently impossible if you write for a fucking
broadsheet corporate legacy newspaper to understand an encounter does not
represent a unique individual. Border patrol do not give us

(01:19:32):
data on unique individuals. They give us data on encounters.
And this is important because under title forty two, which
I made a series about last year that you can
listen to, I would like it if you did, people
can be returned to Mexico. And as you'll see, and
under this proposal, people can be returned to Mexico and
then they will try and come back because most of
the people coming to our border are not from Mexico.

(01:19:53):
Nor do they have roots in Mexico, nor can they
be safe in Mexico. So they will try and come back,
and they will try and come back in a different place,
in a more remote place, and that will result in
a higher risk to their lives making that journey. Right, So,
eighty five hundred individuals across the whole border doesn't mean
it to have them five hundred people. But yes, those

(01:20:13):
numbers are reachable.

Speaker 4 (01:20:15):
That's just so that's so disingenuous to word it that way.

Speaker 3 (01:20:19):
Yeah, Border Patrol just had like I don't know, they
had so much success with doing this under title forty two,
Like we're flooded with migrants and I've spoken to people
who have tried seven times to cross. You know, it's
extremely disingenuous, and I think we're going to get onto this.
But this is a debate about the border happening by
people who never go to the border and don't understand
what it's like, both in the media and in politics,

(01:20:42):
and I think that that is a problem. So when
it's closed, quote unquote, now, we can't close the border
right like a physically we cannot be We're not going
to close the border and be like Okay, Mexico. No tomatoes, Okay,
No tourists can come into Orlando now, right that that's
not what it's about. Is open to capital and is
open to wealthy people. All we're doing is closing it

(01:21:05):
to the people who most need a help, that being
people seeking asylum. Right, So when it's quote unquote closed,
they would still process fourteen hundred migrants through ports of entry.
That would presumably be people arriving using CBP one, which
is a fatally flawed app which doesn't work for black folks,
which has been hacked. All the appointments are sold booked

(01:21:27):
up month in advance. You can only use it north
of Mexico City. It's a complete mess. Every single migrant
I have encountered has tried to use CBP one and
given up. It's not even available in that many languages, right,
I think is English, Spanish, and Haitian creole. Right now, Well,
it's ludicrous to suggest that this is accessible, and it
doesn't work very well on Samsung phones. I have a

(01:21:49):
pra a foil. I guess a foyer out to CBP
about that. But you know, maybe in six years, after
like several court cases, I'll get it back. But I
know that people are buying iPhones migrant advocates both in
Mexico City and north of there to allow migrants to
access the app. They're trying to help them overcome these hurdles, right,

(01:22:11):
but like, fucking come on, you know, we've got the
entire US government here and it's my friends trying to
get five bucks from from you know whoever to buy
an iPhone so migrants can share it, Like it's obscene.
Only unaccompanied miners would be processed if they between ports
of entry, right, So that's people under the age of
eighteen without their folks, anyone who tried to cross between

(01:22:32):
ports of entry. So port of entry is when you
cross the border with your passport and you go through
an office at support of entry. Right, So if you
cross in another fashion over a river, over a wall,
around a wall, under a wall, through a wall, just
across the desert where there isn't a wall, that's between
ports of entries. If anyone tries two or more times,
then during a border emergency, they will be barred from
the United States for a period I think it's a year.

(01:22:54):
I should note that this bill didn't pass, but Biden
did write an executive order setting an arbitry cap twenty
five hundred encounters per day, which you will notice is lower.
And it removed the requirement that border patrol ask migrants
if they fear persecution. So this is really important. It's
called a shout test. And the difference here is between
me saying and ensuring you've just come across the border,

(01:23:15):
are you here because you fear persecution? Can you not
safely go home? And me just saying get in the
fucking van, and you having to articulate that you fear persecution, right,
Which is that requires them to know that they have
to articulate it. It requires them to be able to
articulate it in a language it's intelligible to the officer
or whoever's interviewing them. Right, it's a much higher barrier.
And in both cases, right, you could have the same

(01:23:37):
person and they could be rejected because they didn't pass
this so called shout test. It's ridiculous. It's a really
bullshit workaround for someone who is clearly eligible for asylum, right. Yeah,
And like any good faith actor wants to find out
if that person is going to be persecuted when they
go home. And so moving to a shout test like
you are consciously saying some people would and to send

(01:24:00):
home they will fucking die, or they will be tortured,
or they will face persecution of other means, right, because
they didn't articulate in the right words their fear of persecution.
And it's just there is not a good faith argument
for this. It's just get numbers down at the cost
of human suffering. So in this case, right, I have
met migrants with pretty rock solid claims. I don't want

(01:24:23):
to go into the details of their cases too much.
I will in the future, but like you know, I'm
out at the border a lot, and I'm out in
the back country there a lot, and I try and
help people whenever I can. I talk to them about
their claims. And I'm not going to ask someone to
justify their trauma to me with seventeen documents, right, But
some of them have shown me things which I do
believe would would be a very cast iron assilum claim,

(01:24:45):
and they seem to be since Biden's executive order just
getting booted back across the border, so he kind of
worked around that part of the bill failing. But let's
look at what else is in it. So if the
bill that Harris is saying she will reintroduce. Of course
she herself can't, right, it's a legislative act or senator
or how over the House would The bill would limit

(01:25:06):
border closures to two hundred and seventy days, two hundred
and twenty five days, and one hundred and eighty days
for the first three years, which no, there's no limit
in the Biden executive order, So I guess that's better.
I guess I mean fucking two hundred and seventy days
when you can't claim asylum, that's a lot of days.
There's also funding a lot of funding for more border
patrol agents, of course, more asylum officers, as well as

(01:25:28):
more than one hundred judges. We do need to move
people through the immigration system, but a lot more pressingly,
we need to open legal passways that are not walking
across the desert and passing a shout test. It would
mandate detaining migrants so they try to enter the US
outside of ports of entry, depending their asylum claim. So
this is really big. Actually, it's going to result in
a massive increase in the amount of asylum detention beds

(01:25:49):
we need. The bill contains funding for another ten thousand
more beds will probably end up needing more than that.
But all of these beds are not in state run facilities, right,
and private facilities. ICE coordinates with it's cour civic. It's
people who when Biden first came into office, he wrote
he wrote an executive order about getting rid of private prisons.

(01:26:09):
These are the private prisons. This is how we reallocated
money to those same people doing this terrible thing, right,
which is locking people up for profit. I've heard terrible
stories about the conditions in some of these detention centers.
And this is the guy who ran on and bragged
about closing down private prisons, sending more money to private
prisons just for migrants dot citizens because apparently their rights

(01:26:33):
don't matter as much, their lives don't matter as much.
Talking of things that don't matter, Sharin, should we take
an at break? That was beautiful, James, thank you. So
we're back, and I want to talk about what Harris

(01:26:55):
has done as VP, which is they put her on
this root causes beat right, what she's supposed to go
after the root causes of migration. So I want to
start with this message that she sent to the people
of Guatemala.

Speaker 11 (01:27:10):
I want to be clear to folks in this region
who are thinking about making that dangerous track to the
United States Mexico border, do not come. Do not come.
The United States will continue to enforce our laws and
secure our border. They are legal methods by which migration

(01:27:35):
can and should occur. But we, as one of our priorities,
will discourage illegal migration. And I believe if you come
to our border, you will be turned back.

Speaker 3 (01:27:51):
Do not come. Yeah, I think I've seen that before. Yeah.
She took a lot of shit for that one, rightly understandably.

Speaker 13 (01:27:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:27:59):
Yeah, this is not the only time to bide. Administration
said this. By the way, they were tweeting do not
comb in Haitian creole in twenty twenty one from the
Embassy of the United States in eighty. This has been
their message and continues to be their message.

Speaker 7 (01:28:14):
Now to the ongoing crisis down to the southern border.

Speaker 14 (01:28:16):
The focus of Vice President Kamala Harris's first overseas trip
since taking office.

Speaker 15 (01:28:21):
She had some Mexico today after spending yesterday in Guatemala,
where she announced several initiatives and delivered a message to
potential migrants there, do not come to the United States.
The Vice President also sat down exclusively with the NBC's
Lester Hoole, who began by asking her about that warning.

Speaker 14 (01:28:38):
In the news conference here in Guatemala City. You had
a message for would be migrants, don't come. Why should
they believe you when they know that people are getting in.

Speaker 11 (01:28:48):
I've been working on this issue for a very long
time and the kind of violence and danger that is
associated with that track. Actually, when we're talking about from
Guatemala through Mexico to the United States, it's extremely dangerous.
We are looking at a situation where people are fleeing

(01:29:11):
because of hunger, because of the hurricanes, because of the pandemic.
So the reason I am here is to address those issues.
Knowing that the people who are here for generations, they
want to stay, they don't want to leave, but they
need opportunity, they need assistance, they need support.

Speaker 14 (01:29:27):
Americans don't see a lot of them on a daily basis.
What they do see it at their own border, children
being lowered over offences, children coming in with phone numbers
stenciled on their hand. And so the question has come up,
and you heard it here and you'll hear it again,
I'm sure it is why not visit the border? Why
not see what Americans are seeing in this crisis.

Speaker 11 (01:29:48):
Well, we are going to the border. We have to
deal with what's happening at the border. There's no question
about that. That's not a debatable point. But we have
to understand that there's a reason people are arriving at
our border and ask what is that reason, and then
identify the problem so we can fix it.

Speaker 3 (01:30:06):
Okay. So all of this was while the Biden administration
continued to defend and force Title forty two. If people
haven't listened to the series that made about Title forty two,
and I've said that twice, but that's like two three
hours of me explaining Title forty two, so that would
explain it better than a cand in twenty seconds. Here,
Title forty two is a public health law, and the
idea of Title forty two is to prevent people with

(01:30:26):
tuberculosis coming into the United States. An element of Title
forty two of the United States Code it contains this.
The idea was never to use it as a de
facto block on asylum, which is what the Trump administration
did for a year and the Biden administration did for
nearly three years. The Bidens Registration did it for much
much longer. This ended in May of twenty twenty three,

(01:30:47):
and it was used. They called it catch and release, right.
It was used to bounce people straight back. As we
spoke about before.

Speaker 4 (01:30:54):
Catch and release. It's like you're literally like an animal practice,
you know.

Speaker 3 (01:30:58):
Like right, yeah, like these people are fucking fish, and
I don't like doing that to fish. Personally, I shouldn't
stress out of fish. It's just vibing down there. Don't
ruin its day. So later in that same interview, she
was very defensive about her failing to visit the border.
But I think there are very reasonable questions. Sometimes these

(01:31:20):
criticisms are used in bad faith by Republicans, So is
everything right? It doesn't mean that we shouldn't talk about this.
We should. I didn't see a single elected official from
the Democrat Party. I guess fucking Jim Desmond turned up,
but I wish he wouldn't. He turned up, told lies
about who paid for the aid, and then forced his

(01:31:41):
in turn to apologize for it when a bunch of
people turned up at his office. Really great integrity. I
didn't see a single Democrat for the months that border
patrol held thousands of people in open air attention without food, water,
or shelter, and for the months of my friends and
I took care of them instead. What was doing was
trying to connect business leaders with economies in Central America

(01:32:04):
to quote create jobs. Right. She has some success with
a Japanese car factor in Guatemala and a Swiss coffee
processor buying more beans and committing to more coffee purchases. Right.
But this shit does not work and it has never worked. Right. Obviously,
my position on global economics is not the same as hers.
But we can't trickle down the causes of migration. We

(01:32:28):
can't do this with like a rising tide levels or
boat GDP stuff. Even if we do buy this kind
of freakonomics tier bullshit, it doesn't matter because the change
is going to take decades to come.

Speaker 5 (01:32:43):
Right.

Speaker 3 (01:32:43):
You can't just just change a national economy. Change deals
with unemployment, with violence, with state violence, with nonstate violence overnight.
And it's very likely that the pace of climate change
alone will outstrip any benefits that these programs provide. Right,
Because we are seeing increasingly people coming from countries that
are the most impacted by climate change to countries like

(01:33:06):
the United States, one of the countries that has made
the largest contribution to the climate change. Right, But this
idea of like trickle down economics to stop migration, it
doesn't address the issue that most of the migrants are
no longer coming from the places she's going, right, So
she's worked pretty extensively in the Northern Triangle, Guatemala, Hondoras,
in El Salvador. These are places which sent a lot

(01:33:29):
of migrants. May be in the earlier Barber administration, but
that's not the case anymore. Right, those are not typically
places I see migrants from, right, I see migrants from Venezuela,
and we're going to get a lot more of those.
I see migrants from Turkey, many of them, but not
all of them, Kurdish. I see migrants from North Africa.
I see migrants from the Sahel. I see migrants from India.

(01:33:50):
I don't particularly see people from the Northern Triangle. So
the idea that like lifting the economy in the Northern
Triangle is going to move the needle. It's just not.
Even if we buy the idea that it's possible, I
don't think it is. So that's calmer. Let's take a
look at Donald Trump. I guess I should give people
a trigger warning I'm only going to include a little
bit of Donald Trump audio here, but yeah, you can

(01:34:14):
tap the skit button if you don't want to hear
Donald Trump talking. So, Donald Trump's policies largely are in
response to things that are not real or proposing things
that the president or Congress cannot do, or that the
president cannot do without the support of Congress. So his
first thing is talking about ending birthright citizenship. This is

(01:34:37):
not a thing that he can do by executive order, right.
This is an amendment to the Constitution that requires an
amendment to the Constitution to party back. Now, you can
mend the constitution, but I don't think you'd ever get
support for ending birth right citizenship. Right. This has been
the case since after the Civil War, and it exists
to stop people disenfranchising the children of formally enslaved people.

Speaker 9 (01:34:58):
Under Biden's current policies, even though these millions of illegal
border crosses have entered the country unlawfully, all of their
future children will become automatic US citizens. Can you imagine
They'll be eligible for welfare, taxpayer funded healthcare, the rate
to vote, chain migration, and countless other government benefits, many

(01:35:19):
of which will also profit the illegal alien parents. This
policy is a reward for breaking the laws of the
United States and is obviously a magnet helping draw the
flood of illegals across our borders. They come by the
millions and millions and minions.

Speaker 3 (01:35:37):
So another thing that don Trump wants to do is
do away with the Diversity Visa program. Are you familiar
with the Diversity visa.

Speaker 4 (01:35:45):
No, I'm going to say no, I'm familiar with it,
but I have to like know what it is in detail,
So please tell me, James.

Speaker 3 (01:35:53):
Okay, I would love to tell you. Sharing the DV program.
I will avoid using the acronymagine because can be unfortunately
send us down. Yeah, they were just sending cops all
over the world. Yeah. The Diversity Visa program, better known
as the Green Card Lottery, allows about fifty five thousand
or exactly fifty five thousand in theory, immigrant visas a

(01:36:14):
year for individuals from countries that are underrepresented in the
US immigration system. I remember that. Well, that sounds familiar. Yes, okay, yeah,
so like you'll meet people almost everywhere I go. I
tend not to go to countries that are highly represented
in the US immigration system, right, those being countries that
find it easier for people to get visas like h
one B's right because they are more economically maybe close

(01:36:37):
to the United States and have educational credentials that translate across.
So the Trump administration had made the diversity visa program
it's such a massive cluster fuck that it effectively didn't work.
And the way that this happened was because you don't
just win the green card lottery and they mail a
green cards to your house, like come on over, Bud,
you win the lottery, and that gives you the right

(01:36:58):
to go to the EMBAS set to do an interview,
and then you make the application. Right then the check
you off on any checklist you might be on, all
the stuff that would normally apply to a migrant. It's
not like an amnust visa. And what the Trump administration
did was make it very hard for people to get
these appointments, especially during COVID and this has been the

(01:37:19):
case with the Bide administration as well. They get the
lowest priority now the cambuc and appointment that other people's
stuff gets to sort of overtake them in the line, right,
because you only have a year from receiving it to
claiming it. De facto. This means that people don't get
it right, So we are not fifty five thousand people
are not coming because of the diversity visa. Even if

(01:37:41):
they were, this is not very many people. And like
it's just Trump. I don't know, maybe he saw the
phrase diversity and became triggered. But it's a weird little bugbear,
which I guess if you can focus on weird little things.
But still, the diversity visa is great. The people I
know who often most deserve visas people who can't even
afford to make the trip right to walk here or

(01:38:02):
you know, if you're not in the continental Americas, it's
a lot more expensive you have to fly. I guess
you could take a vote. But some of those people.
I thank my friend who driving all around Iraq is
applying for a diversity visa, and like, I really hope
he gets it. Lovely man. Trump also has this buck
there about DHS paying benefits to quote illegal aliens.

Speaker 9 (01:38:26):
Crookie Joe Biden is running a NonStop conveyor belt importing.

Speaker 3 (01:38:29):
Illegal aliens from all over.

Speaker 9 (01:38:31):
The world into our country, and the Biden Department of
Homeland Security is abusing it. So called parole authority to
give them more governmental benefits than many law abiding citizens,
including our vets. Our vets are being taken advantage of,
Our citizens are being taken advantage of. It's very unfair

(01:38:53):
and it's not going to stand.

Speaker 3 (01:38:55):
The Department of how my security doesn't pay and benefits
to anyone. I guess it pays like border patrol agents
and people who work for it, but it's not giving
anyone public benefits. Right. Undocumented people are normally ineligible for
most benefits, even people who do have legal status, and
he consistently conflates asylum seekers with undocumented people, right, maybe
because he genuinely doesn't know the difference, and it doesn't

(01:39:15):
care to learn the difference. Even people who have legal
status face a range of hurdles, like sometimes they have
a forty quarter work bar for example, right, so that
it means you have to have been working for forty
periods of three months consecutively. Again, this is kind of
He might be talking about something called the public charge rule,
which can interfere with your citizenship or visa application if

(01:39:41):
you've taken certain times of benefits. So maybe he's looking
to make that a little bit broader. But again it's
really unclear, and it's kind of identity politics s grifting.
The next thing is we're getting towards QAnon territory. Now, great, I.

Speaker 9 (01:39:55):
Will use Title forty two to end the child traffic
in crisis by returning all trafphic children to their families
in their home countries and without delay. And I will
urge Congress to ensure that anyone caught traffic in children
of course our border receives the death penalty immediately, and
that includes also for women, because women, as you know,

(01:40:17):
are number one in trafficking children are actually number two.

Speaker 3 (01:40:21):
This is some weird shit. First of all, right, but
he talks about using Title forty two. This is not,
as I've talked about three times now, what Title forty
two is for. It's very obvious that he thinks Title
forty two is immigration law, because he very obviously used
it as that. Right. He was not using Title forty
two to stop people getting COVID because he did square

(01:40:42):
root of fuckles stop people getting COVID, right, and there
were not exemptions for vaccinated people. It's very obvious that
they use Title forty two cynically as an immigration law.
That is not what it is. Also deporting someone back
to the situation they were trafficked from. Maybe not smart,
like maybe maybe especially a miner who is trafficked here,

(01:41:02):
maybe we could help them, you know, one of the
richest countries the manager has ever seen. Maybe not just
bumping them straight back to that country, maybe showing a
little bit of compassion. Human trafficking is a problem, but
this is not the solution. So Harris kind of touts
her prosecutorial experience when she talks about human trafficking. She's

(01:41:23):
actually been better than some not punishing people who were trafficked, right,
So I was reading that at one point she asked
prosecutors not to use the term teenage prostitute because like,
that's not really a thing. What we're seeing there is
somebody who is being trafficked, right, or somebody who has
been victimized to taken advantage of manipulated, and seeing them

(01:41:45):
as perpetrators is fundamentally missing the fucking problem. And this
is what the legal system does far too often, right,
is it goes after the people who are the vactims,
not the criminals. She twice brought criminal charges against backpage
dot Com, which is a website. I guess what peop
book and like find escorts. I'm not familiar with these things,
but I know that some sex workers were opposed to

(01:42:07):
that because they felt it drove them kind of onto
more underground platforms, which which were even more risky to them.
But obviously if people were also being trafficked on this platform,
So like her record, I guess it is somewhat mixed.
You know what else is somewhat mixed? Shereen what James,
it's the products and services that we get to support
this show. You know, sometimes it's the cops. Sometimes it's

(01:42:29):
terrible coffee, sometimes it's gold. You never know what you're
going to get. Ooh, we are backed, and we are
back to one of Donald Trump's oldest chestnutes, and that
would be his stupid wall right that he wants to build.

Speaker 9 (01:42:51):
We created the most secure border in US history, by far,
dealing a major blow to the cartels and traffickers. We
built hundreds of miles of war, We renovated hundreds of
miles of war.

Speaker 3 (01:43:05):
We never had anything like it.

Speaker 9 (01:43:07):
And then I got Mexico free of charge to give
us twenty eight thousand soldiers to protect us from people
coming into our country illegally.

Speaker 3 (01:43:15):
He talks about building hundreds of miles of wall. He
sets up a couple of times. Right, we've renovated hundreds
of mile the wall. You know, did they build hundreds that?
Maybe just technically that they really fudged the numbers. Yeah,
I found a lot of freedom of information requests for that.
I guess what's more relevant is that Biden also built
the wall, right, mm hmm, calm, that's not talking about it.

(01:43:36):
But as we've documented numerous times, Biden has continued to
build the wall. He's continued to build the barrier, which
is a wall. He has repaired other sections of war,
he has upgraded sections of fence to wall. They're both
doing this, right. There's maybe Donald Trump would do more
of it, but sometimes I feel like his general and
competence might prevent him from doing any more than Biden's.

(01:43:59):
Like potent migrant. If they call it deterrents, right, deterrence
through death, it is probably a better way of phrasing it.
Trump also talks about a total ban on taxpair dollars
to give legal aid to undocumented people. Again, I'm not
sure if he knows what he's talking about. I don't
know what he's talking about. He might be referring to it.
We have a program in San Diego County where San

(01:44:19):
Diego County pays for some people to defend migrants who
are detained by ICE, right so they can have access
to a lawyer. ICE has responded to that by moving
those people to Texas. Oh that makes sense, Yeah, yeah,
totally normal. Good, I'm glad we voted for the anti
fascist guy. Everything's going great, exactly. You can listen to
my episode about that if you want to know more
about that. But I don't know if he means like

(01:44:42):
they don't get public defenders if they're accused of a crime. Certainly.

Speaker 4 (01:44:45):
Isn't it just true that he can also just like
use these trigger words to make people mad.

Speaker 3 (01:44:49):
Yes, yes, that is what he's doing.

Speaker 4 (01:44:51):
Yeah, yeah, it's not necessari always has to be base
in fact.

Speaker 3 (01:44:55):
No, yeah, that's to be found with Donald Trump. This
doesn't matter. And then finally, talking of stuff that doesn't
have to be real, it's absolutely batshit insane idea of
fucking invading Mexico to kill members of cartels, which that's unhinged. Yeah,
that is unhinged. That will resolve in more violence, It
will result in more instability. It will result in more death.

(01:45:17):
I think Car'm's pretty much unclear when it comes to
that one, Like she is not proposing invading Mexico. So
much of what Donald Trump says is insane and it
doesn't make sense. So I wanted to look at some
of the people who kind of lean on Trump, some
of the people who might be a little bit more
coherent right when it comes to crafting that policy. Right?
Could it get Steven Mirror on the podcast sad? But

(01:45:39):
we did get these people from the Texas Public Policy
Foundation who Robert and Gare spoke to at the Republican
National Convention. So here's zem talking about visas and immigration.

Speaker 8 (01:45:50):
I've tried to hire people from other countries. It takes
months and months and months to get that done. It
usually spend a lot of money doing it as well,
and the system is disincentivized to do that. So you know,
actually during the last Trump administration, they started looking at like,
let's reduce the number of visas and have broader categories, right,
So I think they're trying to get down to about
seventeen visas, get to more marit based program to fit

(01:46:14):
the needs that we have. Make sure that you can
you know, it's not about like what is the total number,
But if we are needing labor, we needing people in
these areas, you can you can kind of like as
a dial, you can turn up and down in certain
areas on certain visas. And so I think if you
do have to first like stop the problem, and then
you also have to make systemic changes that will overhaul

(01:46:36):
the system and make a lot easier so that people
are incentivised to actually do it the right way.

Speaker 3 (01:46:40):
Yeah. So these people aren't stupid, right, they won't just
spew hate. Yeah, They're much more competent in the facts.
So I think what we're seeing here, right is this
undoubtedly is a way to reduce what they see is
undesirable migration, which is to say, poor people and brown people.
You can phrase however you want it, right, But.

Speaker 4 (01:47:01):
I mean, in the Republican's eyes, and maybe a lot
of people eyes, all migration is undesirable migration.

Speaker 3 (01:47:07):
I feel like, yeah, well, people will talk to me.
I'm for those of you who have just listened to me.
I guess a white person.

Speaker 4 (01:47:15):
British, You're not white, you're British.

Speaker 3 (01:47:17):
Yeah, Love, which is more like a kind of translucent
really you think about it. Yeah, so yeah, I am
a British person, which is important, I guess because people
will talk to me about immigration like I'm one of
the good migrants and they can go fuck themselves. Yeah
that position, right, that like it's a like implicit white

(01:47:39):
people are okay. Yeah, absolutely, that's all that means.

Speaker 4 (01:47:43):
It's like, oh, yeah, you speak English and you're like me, great,
come out, come on into my racist country.

Speaker 3 (01:47:50):
Yeah exactly. Yeah, I'm like funny foreign as opposed to
like evil foreign. I guess.

Speaker 4 (01:47:55):
I think it's also just like they don't see you
and whatever in their mind is a three right like
to I don't know, it makes no sense logically.

Speaker 3 (01:48:04):
But yeah it does if you understand it's relents of race.

Speaker 4 (01:48:07):
Yes, yeah, but I mean their perspective makes no.

Speaker 3 (01:48:09):
Sense to me. Yeah. Same people who are barking about
my fellow British people being a threat because they happened
to be Muslim, right or brown or seek in people
that don't understand it seeks Anonymouslims. So what we actually
need is more legal pathways. He is correct that the
visa system needs changing, and we need ways that people
can apply and come here safely and not have to
be trafficked and not have to take massive risks, right.

(01:48:33):
I wanted to see what Robert and Geh had asked
some about this mass deportation seeing because I've seen some
people holding like mass importations now sign at the RNC,
and that's always a good sign that we're not sort
of sidestepping into fascism. So let's hear what you said
about that.

Speaker 12 (01:48:48):
Is that plan kind of the mass detention and expulsion
of undocumented migrants in the US something that you think
is a good idea, something you support as the Heritage Foundations.

Speaker 8 (01:48:57):
Yeah, generally, you know, obviously there you got to look
at implementation, right and how you actually go about doing
that in the right way. But yeah, absolutely generally.

Speaker 1 (01:49:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 12 (01:49:07):
And then what kind of time frame then, because you
just said this is something you have to like lay
some groundwork on, and what time frame do you see
it being feasible to carry out something like that?

Speaker 8 (01:49:15):
You know, I actually don't have a good answer for that,
because you have to first get your arms around the problem.
We don't even know how many people are here, and
you don't know where they come from, and so it's
not like you're just trying to deport them all just
to Mexico or something like that, or the southern border, right, Like,
you you have to first get your arms around the problem.
That's the first step, and then I think from there

(01:49:37):
you can actually understand figure out what a reasonable time
frame to do that is.

Speaker 3 (01:49:42):
Yeah, so this is pretty fucked. Like I should point
out that the Bilbah Harris is proposing also proposes bumping
people back to Mexico without the permission of Mexico.

Speaker 1 (01:49:52):
Right.

Speaker 3 (01:49:52):
I think so many of these policies just rely on
Mexico being kind of a sponge for US policy, like, oh,
they'll they'll be fine, like God forbid Mexico actors a
sovereign country. But this one seems different. Right. We had
I feel like, pretty good liberal support on abolish ice
under Trump that has completely evaporated under Biden. But because

(01:50:15):
we solved racism and everything. Yeah, yeah, we fixed it.
I've forgotten about that. Yeah, that was that was the
big crunch point. So what this means is taking people
who have homes, lives, jobs, and families and tearing them
away from one of those things and tending them back
to a country that they may not have been to
in decades, that they may never have been to at all,

(01:50:35):
a place where they will undoubtedly face hardship, if not persecution,
and certainly having lived here having family here will make
them more likely to be ransomed or blackmailed or any
of these things that happened to migrants when they're deported. Right,
this is pretty bleak. Like I guess Harris hasn't advocated
for this, which seeing the amount of the amount of

(01:50:58):
people who fucking respond to my tweets with your going
home to like I A am a US citizen and
b fuck you. They yeah all the time, all the time. Yeah,
it's so funny. Okay, got a life, But yeah, it
does seem that there is a wing of the Trump
And I talked to Trump people. I was in the
mountains this weekend, like I was in Wyoming mincing about

(01:51:21):
in the mountains. It's lovely, but in talk to some
people and I've never really come across anyone who can
like in the flesh. Maybe it's just because those people
are so repulsive. I wouldn't talk to them, and it's
probably quite likely. But advocated for this right, like this
idea of mass deportations, Like like I said at the
start of this show, like how does a country get
into full on fascism? It is this. It is my

(01:51:43):
taxes and your taxes, and some of the people who
are listening taxes paying for people who have done nothing wrong, right,
who have lived here, who haven't done any crimes, who
haven't hurt anyone, to be at our expense, expelled from
their home, detained in a private prison, who's own a company,
make massive donations to politicians, and then flown across the

(01:52:05):
world at are expense, and then dumped into a country
where they no longer belong. And that is as close
as we get, I think to like someone saying like
send them to the camps without saying that, like, yeah, look,
what was the Armenian genocide? The Armenian genocide was a
mass deportation, right of people forced to walk across the
desert and die on the way. Like if you don't

(01:52:26):
think this Trump ship is fascist, like I really don't
know what to do. It doesn't matter if it's fascist
or not, right, Like this is the kind of rhetoric
that's genocidal. Like I don't want to argue about like
Robert Preston and like different definitions because that doesn't matter.
Like this shit is it is genocidal, It is dehumanizing migrants,
which is been a project of the right wing news

(01:52:48):
media and increasingly the liberal news media and also the
Democrat Party now apparently as well as the Republicans. But
this is a market step to the right. Both of
these are right. The Overton window has moved so far
right on migration in the last eight years that it's
almost an unrecognizable place. And I guess what I when

(01:53:10):
I end up by saying what I always say about
this is like the solution is not within the argument
about who to vote foreh Like these are state policies.
These are also often set by the legislature, as we
saw when Biden's board bill failed, right, and that would
require a change in the legislature, Like there isn't a
third party that can get a majority in the legislature
right now. So the way we fix this is ourselves,

(01:53:34):
right like we are seeing in the UK right now,
like violence towards Muslim people and itance towards masques, violence
towards Islamic cultural centers and people stepping up to defend
them like that is the only way we fix this
is by stepping up and shouldering our responsibility to our communities,
and people did that in the Trump administration to a degree,

(01:53:55):
Like when I'm twenty eighteen, when I was down in
Tijuana looking after folks who were part of the caravan
that Trump made a big spectacle in the midterms. People
showed up, churches, showed up, a soccer mom showed up
in minivans and helped us, and it was cool. The
thing was fucked, but like, I respect that we look
after those people, and that hasn't happened to as much
of a degree since. And we've had more people than

(01:54:18):
we had in twenty eighteen in the open air detention sites.
And so I guess where I want to end is
whoever wins, it's still our responsibility to take care of migrants,
because neither of them is going to And we are
continuing with policies that will accelerate climate change, We are
continuing with policies that will impoverish people all over the

(01:54:40):
world and enriching people who are already super wealthy, and
those things will continue to drive migration. We can't change
those things in an actionable amount of time, but what
we can do is try our best to meet people
who come here with Kindness and so yeah, I would
urge you to do that. I guess if you want
to volunteer, you can email Altro Lado It's ala Trelado

(01:55:04):
dot org. Border Kindness always need your money, borderlind Relief Collective,
always need your money. And those are always things that
you can volunteer with or places you can say your
money if you don't have your time. But you can
also organize in your own neighborhood. I'm speaking to some
people today who are organizing in Maryland to take care
of some Kurdish refugees who I know, like they weren't

(01:55:25):
doing anything a year ago, right, they saw a need
and they saw it being a met and they realized
that they could meet it, and they've made a huge
difference to people's lives. So like, wherever you are, there
are migas in your community and you can do that too.

(01:55:52):
Welcome to it could happen here.

Speaker 6 (01:55:54):
I'm Garrison Davis and today I'm joined with the authors
Shane Burley and Ben Laubert who have a new book
out called A Safety through Solidarity, A Radical Guide to
Fighting Anti Semitism, and Jane reached out to me to
talk about both the book and a variety of issues
revolving around this topic. Thank you for coming on, both

(01:56:15):
of you.

Speaker 7 (01:56:16):
Yeah, thanks for having us on.

Speaker 16 (01:56:17):
Yeah yeah, thanks for having us so.

Speaker 6 (01:56:19):
A few months ago I put out an episode looking
at a genuine uptick in anti Semitic incidents that have
happened in the United States and Europe, and sometimes it
feels kind of like a tricky thing to talk about.
In some ways, it's like you're threading a very difficult needle.
It's like you're caught between a rock and a hard
place when discussing this topic, because if you point to
an actual trend that you're seeing showing a genuine spike

(01:56:40):
in anti Semitic incidents, there's like a subset of people
who are very focused on the genocide in Gaza, very
rightly so, but they might push back since claims of
anti Semitism have been so conflated with any display of
anti Zionist politics, or even worse, they might even question,
why are you talking about this when there's this other
horrible thing going on right the actual genocide in Gaza. Now,

(01:57:01):
I think, meanwhile, if you avoid this as a lesser
or a non issue, if if you don't talk about
these things. I would argue that actually strengthens the Zionist
political project of tying Jewish safety solely to the state
of Israel. And in some ways, I think ignoring this
entire issue legitimizes a degree of criticisms that are being
leveled against these massive protests and calls for a ceasefire

(01:57:23):
and justice in Palestine. So, I guess how long have
you been putting together this book and how much did
the war in Gaza this past year kind of change
the scope of it as you were writing this?

Speaker 7 (01:57:33):
Yeah, I mean we started I think Ben and I
started talking about this and in the twenty nineteen beginning
of twenty twenty, so it's a totally It was a
totally different context when we started working on the book,
and what we had been wanting was actually to sort
of like drive a wedge into what you're talking about here,
which is like that there isn't really good discourse on
what anti Semitism actually is that takes it seriously, that

(01:57:55):
doesn't just kind of deflect and project onto anti Zionism.
Since Ben and then I both come from like a
history of organizing a Palestine solidarity movement and me with
Students for Justice Palestine on campus, then with the Jewish
Voice for Peace. So we had seemed to basically firsthand
how accusations of anti semitism basically leveled just constantly at

(01:58:16):
Palastine solidarity protesters, and then also in research and covering
the far right, seeing obviously the growth of anti Semitism
in white nationalism, both in the US and internationally, and
that only increased increased over time. So we wanted to
work on something that took that seriously and also sort
of revive different traditions from the left that talk about
anti semitism, whether it's anti fascism or different kind of

(01:58:38):
Marxist trends or the Jewish left kind of bring it
to one place, talk to other folks who are also
taking it seriously, and weave that together. All of that
is different. And before October seventh, because we were turning
in the draft of a book like a matter of
days after October seventh happened, Oh wow. We went and
talked to the publisher and we're like, well, the whole
world just changed. I mean, we have to we have

(01:58:59):
to make changes the beat it. And so we've made
some and basically like address some questions there and I
think you can kind of see the in the conclusion
of like the very end of the book kind of
where we cut it off in November December area and
sort of have acknowledge that things are different here. But
I think that there's also bigger questions that we're talking
about now that like we're doing interviews and writing articles

(01:59:20):
and stuff afterwards about how that's changed. But a lot
of this really I think one thing that's important is
that because we make very clear, like very incredibly clear,
the anti Zionism not the same as anti semitism, in
a way, that conversation is the same as before, because
we're actually talking about where real anti Semitism lives. And
if you look at the way that this course is now,
particularly from groups like the Defamation League, is it's basically

(01:59:42):
built entirely around, you know, attacking college protests, right, attacking
these mass anti genocide demonstrations, right. And since that's so
foundationally different than how we understand anti semitism, there's a
way in which, like the conversation that has the book
is sort of the same. And what do you think
about this, Ben.

Speaker 13 (01:59:59):
Yeah, I know, I mean I agree that it really
hasn't changed that much. Even though it's just a lot
bigger and more prominent, and the forces that are trying
to attack the Movement for Justice and past that are stronger.
They're trying to pass legislation taking away our free speech rights.
They're trying to restrict academic freedom, They're trying to go
after the irs status.

Speaker 16 (02:00:20):
Of justice organizations. So the stakes are really high.

Speaker 13 (02:00:24):
But I think the intervention that we've always been wanting
to make is to really put the conversation backward along
on the rise of the far right, on the rise
of white Christian nationalism. Right anti Semitism is part of
the right wing worldview. It's just like the other systems
of oppression, like anti blackness, anti LGBTQ, bigotry, Islamophobia, anti

(02:00:48):
immigrant xenophobia, Anti Semitism is deeply connected. Right, these George
Soros conspiracies are being used by authoritarian leaders like Donald
Trump and JB. Evans and the rest of them to
build up the MAGA base and to attack the foundations
of our multi racial democracy. And we've seen it have

(02:01:09):
deadly results for Jews and for other groups. You know,
white nationalists, you know mass shooters who are motivated by
anti semic conspiracy theories have attacked synagogues, have attacked Latin
X communities like black communities, and so yeah, anti Semitism
is part of that machinery of oppression. And so our
book tries to reframe the conversation and give Justice Organizer

(02:01:30):
a way to take back the conversation away from the right.

Speaker 6 (02:01:34):
Would what have you be willing to give, like a
workable definition of anti Semitism, because this is a word
that's certainly been used a lot, but I think it's
a word that signifies possibly a lot of different things.
And I guess what is the definition of anti Semitism
that you are using in your book.

Speaker 13 (02:01:49):
Yes, so Att, we really see anti Semitism as a
form of conspiracy theory thinking that developed out of Christianity
in Christian Europe, and that essentially sees Jews as the
root cause of evil or the root cause of the
world's problems, kind of behind the scenes. It trades in

(02:02:11):
images of a cabal lurking behind either government or the
media or the economy.

Speaker 16 (02:02:18):
And these conspiracy theories are.

Speaker 13 (02:02:20):
Core to an authoritarian and nationalists worldview that mobilize, you know,
millions really away from examining and confronting the root causes
of oppression and convinces them to chase you kind of
illusory shadows instead.

Speaker 6 (02:02:37):
Why do we have like a harder time kind of
pinning down this term? You know, I think people have
a general idea and a pretty easy way to like see, like,
you know, what's like is homophobic?

Speaker 5 (02:02:47):
Right?

Speaker 3 (02:02:47):
What's racist?

Speaker 6 (02:02:49):
There's a few points in your book that you talk about,
you know, instances of people maybe unintentionally spreading anti Semitism
that if they were instead talking about like Muslims, or
like trans people, or or like black people, they would
easily identify as like, oh, this is very clearly a
form of like xenophobia, and this is very clearly like
based on some kind of like conspiratorial discrimination.

Speaker 9 (02:03:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 7 (02:03:10):
I mean I think there's a few reasons for this,
and we talk about this in the book. I mean
one of them is that the way the anti Semitism
has operated is generally a narrative about punching up against
power versus a lot of narratives of oppression, which are
basically about how various groups are subhuman or lesser than
dominant population. That's slightly different with Jews, though that has

(02:03:31):
been a component of some pieces of it historically is
basically a narrative that people who feel disempowered then use
to sort of like reclaim a sort of kind of
populous energy. And a lot of ways it ends up
being a place where folks are directed by people in
power to put their class anger away from the actual
rule in class. So I think in a way, when
people see anti semitism, they also recognize that there's legitimate

(02:03:54):
class anger or legitimate like disenfranchisement, and I think that's
actually troubling to sort of want to undermine that feeling
always necessarily. I think there's also just the complexity of
Jewish identity that's shifted over time, different populations, different communities,
different politics, sometimes religious, sometimes more cultural, sometimes more ethnic.
That can make it confusing. So it's hard to use

(02:04:15):
one model for understanding impression than projected onto this And
so in a lot of ways, you kind of have
to come at this question distinctly from kind of other
forms of oppression. That's actually true of most forms of oppression.
They have a lot of distinctiveness. But I think like
you have to kind of learn about those contours. And again,
I think part of it is also that this hasn't
been a big part of the left conversation in the

(02:04:37):
last twenty or thirty years. It is to be more
frequent that this would be like you know, maybe trainings
and left spaces where people would talk about that. It
just simply hasn't been the case that much recently, and
so I think there's actually a big lack of just
understanding of how to notice those things and to talk
about them. And then I think weaponization has become such
it's not just such an overwhelming part of it. It's

(02:04:58):
actually the dominating converse station on antisemitism, particularly in the US.
So when you hear about anti semitism, it's overwhelmingly going
to be directed by the center or the right, or
for institutions directed at Palestine solidarity movements. And again, people
get heartened skin to that because they don't want to
like give an inch on those sorts of things, and
I totally understand why, and so I think that also
has created that boundary of where examination would normally take place.

Speaker 6 (02:05:21):
It is interesting looking at like how much the right
wing has been able to weaponize claims of anti semitism
against the left. I think the term that you use
in the book is selective outrage on anti semitism, because
I mean, I was just at the RNC and you're
hearing Marjorie Taylor Green talk about how there's like antisemitic
protests happening around the country, and you're like, wait a minute,

(02:05:43):
you're the Jewish space laser person, what are you talking about?
And I think it was DeSantis who just called all
university protesters hamas, right, not saying that they're like Amas,
but just literally saying that these people are like are Hamas,
Like Hamas took over university tests. And meanwhile, you would
be hard pressed to find anybody on this camp talking about,

(02:06:05):
you know, this strong degree, especially considering DeSantis, the strong
degree of anti Semitic people either involved in their own
campaigns or like their actual supporters. It was just a
year ago where DeSantis's campaign staff released a video of
him with the sonnet rat It's like com on, buddy.
So it is interesting how how they've been able to

(02:06:26):
try to weaponize those claims while completely ignoring like the
structural anti semitism like baked into this new wave of
nationalist politics that we're seeing in the United States.

Speaker 13 (02:06:37):
Yeah, no, it's totally the example of marginit Tayla Green
is so striking. I mean, she, I believe, in the
same day once she called the protesters on college campuses
of anti Semitic and then she said that they were
funded by George Soros, right, so yeah, yeah, yeah, And
she's using them both for the same purpose. And it's
not only DeSantis, and they're right, I mean in Jonathan
Green Black ahead of thedl I remember, like a few

(02:06:59):
months ago, said that students of college campuses were Iranian proxies.
And when you use that language, you're basically authorizing military
counterinsurgency against protesters. It's just it really puts Jews in danger,
you know, not to mention Palestinians and the Muslims, you know,
basically all groups, right, because sure there's occasionally a stray

(02:07:22):
anti Semitic comment that shows up at protests, because anti
Semitism is part of our world. There's anti blackness, injustice movements,
antiology gutsppistry, and anti Semitism, I'm sure, but that's no
comparison to when you have like Elon Musk, the richest
person in the world, one of the most powerful people
in the world, saying that Jews are engaged in patriot

(02:07:43):
against whites. Right, there's no comparisons in terms of power
and threat level, So it's really making Jews less.

Speaker 7 (02:07:49):
Say yeah, And we also talk about the fact that
because anti Semitic conspiracy theories are such a foundational part
of the rights form of populism, it's sort of how
they explains anger and energy from the base that there's
really no way to detach it, and so it ends
up being this foundational piece that even when they talk
about Israel consistently, the way that they've built a connection

(02:08:10):
with their base is by trumping up towards Soros or
Rothschild's conspiracy theories or basically presenting kind of us in
them populous narrative around theories about globalists and things like that.
So there's really no comparison that we're talking about anti
simpatism when it shows up on the left versus the
really deeply inlaid way that it exists on the right.
And like Ben was saying, right now, we have a

(02:08:31):
situation where the right is overwhelmingly united in support of
Israel and using that as their evidence of support for Jews,
and then pushing great replacement theory claims which are inherently
anti Semitic on the one hand, or really kind of
mobilizing Jews in their rhetoric for their own kind of
geopolitical aims, which again is not based out of like

(02:08:51):
a deeply held love for Jews. It's either built on
sort of a Christian Zionist eschatology or just simply an
opportunistic use of this might already grew up to sort
of push their other political values, which itself is kind
of a deeply held anti Semitic way of treating the
Jewish community. And so when we're looking at this, we
can't let the rhetoric that's become the dominate actually stand

(02:09:13):
for how we understand anti Semitism because it's been so
politically motivated.

Speaker 6 (02:09:18):
Yeah, I mean, as a researcher has it has been
quite frustrating because I've used to, you know, and a
lot of people used to be able to rely on
some degree on like data aggorates like the ADL and
putting together like lists of incidents, like maps. And as
I was putting together my piece looking at this uptic
and anti Semitism a few months ago, I was, you know,

(02:09:38):
looking through this ADL map and the amount of like
equivocation between just a standard pro Palestine protest protest that
I was present at, and I was like, this was
a Jewish led protest, and having that be equivocated with
acts of like actual like neo Nazi terrorism as well
as acts of like genuine anti semitism from people on

(02:10:00):
the left. Basically it's resulting in like data poisoning, which
makes it really hard to actually unpack some of these
like larger issues that are that are facing both like
Jewish people, people who are very concerned about Palestine and
people who take like the threat of like you know,
you know, far right nationalism quite seriously.

Speaker 7 (02:10:17):
Yeah, I went through all of the ADLs twenty twenty
three anti semitism data with like in this project with
Jewish currents, and the reality is is that the standard
they use on sort of like left oriented Palestine protests
is to have almost any measure of support for Palestinians
or any kind of global call for justice in Palestine

(02:10:38):
that is de facto anti semitism, And like you said,
it then overwhelms the data of sort of shuts out
other things. And the way that they even set up
the reporting system just privileges those kind of protests, so
people it teaches, for example, they'll partner with the organizations
and show people how to report, and so they'll end
up mass reporting these protest events and then underreporting white

(02:11:00):
nationalist incidents or like violent incidents. So what you end
up seeing in their data is that they've actually undercoded
white nationalist events because of the way that they kind
of set up the data, and they don't really track
things like housing discrimination, workplace discrimination, and extews. Those kind
of things really don't fit into their model. So what
you end up with is this kind of map that
just privileges people saying from the River to the Sea

(02:11:23):
is like this inherently anti Semitic meme, and then undercounts
like what often Jews will report as what makes them
feeling unsafe, comments of work, or actual pressures when buying homes,
things like that, like that doesn't really show up. You've
experiences of Jews in prison, those don't show up. So
you end up with this really skewed image on what
it is, where you assume that the left is overwhelming

(02:11:44):
the responsible party, and then it actually in visualizes a
pretty growing force on the right, and even institutionally just
like in structures of kind of like American culture. So
it's really hard then to say, like, well, how do
I know what's actually happening here? The adail's the largest organization.
Every organization then uses their data where am I going?
It leads you in a really big kind of a

(02:12:06):
gap in how to understand what's happening. So we can
look at pretty clear evidence that there's a rise in
anti Semitism by looking at things like street attacks or
by looking at the rhetoric on the right, but it's
hard to get like a clear picture of it because
every organization is that's oriented looking at the left.

Speaker 13 (02:12:20):
Like I was just going to say, like this goes
way back to the ADL. Like you know, in our book,
we talk about how even in the nineteen seventies and
the eighties, the eight I was like spying on left
wing activists as part of their pivot towards seeing the
most important side of anti Semitism on what they call
the radical left right. In the nineteen seventies, as global

(02:12:40):
criticism of Israel's occupation mounted after the nineteen sixty seven
you know, six Day War Group sixty, ADL look really
pivoted further from whatever original mission they may have had
about like genuinely countering bigotry to really becoming like Israel
defense organizations, and so in the seventies and eighties, like
you saw them spuying on anti apart side activists, You

(02:13:02):
saw them attacking Arab American you know, professors at universities.
You saw them spying on acta even left than Jewish
groups like New Jewish Agenda, you know. And so it's
not only Jonathan Greenblatt, It's not only since October seventh.
The d L has been playing this role for a
long time, along with a whole lot of Christian Zionists
and both sides of the US political establishment and the

(02:13:25):
other career is setting like the stakes are extremely high.
The right and the center are trying to legislate their
definition of anti Semitism, to destroy free speech and to
protect his real's genocide.

Speaker 16 (02:13:36):
So the stakes are very high about this right now.

Speaker 6 (02:13:49):
I think one of the most troubling notions about how
those groups like the ADL and others that are kind
of like like you said, like logging for legislation and
trying to encourage like extreme crews on human rights protests
and antigeness hide protests, is that this is also like
materially harms a whole bunch of Jewish people who are

(02:14:09):
involved in these protests and in organizing. You're trying to
get the FBI to investigate Jewish people who are protesting
against the genocide. And we saw this with the with
the campus university protests. You saw this, you know, especially
at Columbia of like a lot of a lot of
these kids are Jewish people who are heavily involved in
these protests and in calls to do a very extreme

(02:14:32):
crackdown and investigations, It's hard to see how that's not
just like calling for for our government to like further
oppressed these Jewish people who don't like agree with one
side's opinion on something.

Speaker 16 (02:14:45):
Yeah, yeah, you see it. You know, in the most
kind of ironic twist of history.

Speaker 13 (02:14:52):
In Germany, where you know, the state was once a
Nazi state, is enforcing some of the most brutal crackdowns
on the poust on solidarity a speech, and Jews are
disproportionately represented among the crackdown there. And so you have
you know, German police pulling people with pipos and arresting them,
you know, shutting down events with Jewish speakers. Right, So
it's it's really like literally policing Jewish thought, right Like,

(02:15:16):
we know, there's over a century of Jewish opposition to
Zionism and Jewish solidarity with Palestinians, and from the very
beginnings of the Zionist movement, which was originally a Christian
movement in Christian Europe by the way, you know, and
we've always had long traditions of Jews who have resisted it.
And so when the state is legislating saying only like

(02:15:37):
a certain expression of Jewish identity is valid, that's also
anti Semitism, right like.

Speaker 16 (02:15:43):
And we see it, you know, not only from Trump, right.

Speaker 13 (02:15:46):
You know, Trump will always say, oh, Jews who are democrats,
Jews who are quote unquote disloyal to Israel are problematic.
You also see it from Biden who says, you know,
without Israel, there's not a Jew in the world who's safe.

Speaker 16 (02:15:58):
Right.

Speaker 13 (02:15:58):
So I think, you know, Jews who descend on Israel
are rapidly becoming enemies in a way of the right,
you know, and of forces align with it, right, And
I think that's an aspect of of anti Semitism that's
not talked about enough today.

Speaker 7 (02:16:11):
Yeah, and there's a lot of examples of this too.
During the Labor Party controversy around Corbin and anti Semitism,
it was Jewish members who were overwhelmingly expelled from the party.
I think it's almost like a dozen times more likely
to face kind of consequences there, right, So like those
ended up being the centerpiece of it. But I think
even when you when you broaden out, this ends up
being the case. And we kind of talked about this

(02:16:34):
as like a good Jew bad Jew distinction, where like
anti Semitism ends up being mobilized against whatever kind of
the culture decides as a bad Jew or whatever the
organization's decides, it's the bad version of a Jew, the
kind of Jew that they don't want to actually deal with.
And this happens in this pro Israel consensus whereby the
khu Nyahu, basically the far By coalition running Israel right now,

(02:16:55):
builds alliances that they need around the world with far
Bright parties and Hungary in South Asia, Indian with the
Hindian Nationalism, with other places, and then those movements are
pretty explicitly anti Semitic, therefore making Jews in various countries
around the diaspora less and less safe, right, and so
this sort of model of making Israel the bottom line

(02:17:15):
on defending against anti Semitism is one that strengthened the right,
helped to build up Christian nationalism domestically, and then that
creates this kind of general culture of unsafety for Jews
where the only Jewish voices that are then held up
are the ones that justify Christian nationalism on the one hand,
like you'll see at the National Conservatism Conference, or ones
who are so aggressively pro Israel that they're totally willing

(02:17:37):
to partner with Christian science groups or the far right
wing of the Republican Party or national conservative parties in Europe.
And so this ends up as a situation where like
a increasing number of Jews, particularly in the US, or
Jews around the left, which again is still disproportionately Jewish,
feel increasingly targeted by the political consensus, and at the
same time, this pro Israel rhetoric ends up being with

(02:17:59):
the fact of sure by which anyone's kind of set to.

Speaker 3 (02:18:02):
Yeah, I did.

Speaker 6 (02:18:02):
Like there was this part in the book where you
were talking about the good Jew bad Jew binary, specifically
on the left, where there's like a minority of Jews
who identify as anti or non Zionist who are very
like celebrated, sometimes maybe even in like a tokenizing kind
of way, while the rest of Jewish people who do
not identify as such are belittled as unworthy or like untrustworthy,

(02:18:23):
where their opinions are dismissed or seen as morally compromised
on like an inherent level. And this can also be
coupled with this assumption that like every Jew is a
secret Zionist until proven otherwise, and you have to like
get every new Jewish person you meet to like prove
to you that they're not secretly as Zionist, which is,
you know, very antisemitic.

Speaker 3 (02:18:43):
And we also do have this good.

Speaker 6 (02:18:44):
Jew bad Jew binary mirrored in like an inverted form
on the right, with Zionist Jews, you know, being seen
as the good ones, and anti Zionist Jews have their
like jewishness questioned or are seen as like untrustworthy or
inherently evil. And I do believe it is worth discussing
kind of the flip side of this, and I think

(02:19:06):
avoiding talking about actual antisemitism on the left I think
only serves to harm all of us, and because it
is something that I think is happening, and I think
should be talked about even if it makes people like uncomfortable.
And I think it's a it is a mistake to
assume that just because you're on the left, that you're
like somehow immune to antisemitic thinking, whether purposeful or not.

(02:19:27):
Like like both of you mentioned, like we live in
a society that has a great degree of structural anti Semitism,
and a lot of these people, I think, who might
be attending some of these protests or might just be
posting online who knows, might not even be intentionally spreading
anti Semitism, right, but in action, that's kind of what
they're invoking through like ideas of like you know, the
Zionist cabal that secretly controls all of the media, all

(02:19:50):
all of all of the government. You know, those types
of things. We're starting to like invoke these like larger
secretive organizations that are that are pre planning this whole thing.
And like just to some degree from a lot of
the discourse that you see, I feel like some people
think they can just like control f Jews to Zionists,
and like if you're able to control f Jews to

(02:20:12):
Zionists and the sentence still works, that means that you're
doing it wrong. That means that you're probably approaching this
from a problematic standpoint. And there's a whole bunch of
aspects about this sort of thing that you do talk
about in the book, like, you know, including identifying Judaism
with Zionism and how that also only hurts all of us,

(02:20:32):
including this like weird uptick in like Jewish race science
that you're starting to see more and more of claiming
that like all modern Jewish people only come from Europe.
And it's like there's just a whole bunch of this
kind of stuff that we're all kind of pushing to
the side. But I do believe it is like worth
talking about in some degree because this is going to
not only harm people who are calling for an end

(02:20:54):
to the genocide in Gaza. I think it does like
strengthen this notion that a lot of this and this
project is built on, which is saying that we need
Israel as a way to secure safety for Jewish people
around the world.

Speaker 7 (02:21:08):
Yeah, I think we talk about this, you know, we
have a couple of chapters that talk kind of explicitly
about this at different points in the history. But I
think there's a tendency, and I kind of get where
this comes from. To basically see any ally or any
kind of voice in support of a movement as like
a partner, particularly when you're trying to build like mass
support against something that basically has kind of mass opposition

(02:21:29):
on the other side, like liberating Palestine. But what you
see oftentimes when you see a mooment grow really dramatically,
really quickly, is that there's just not a kind of
like common baseline understanding always of that, and conspiracy theories
are a great way to fill the gap on them. Yeah,
and that's true of really any movement. It's just that,
in particular, in this case, we have this long history
of anti Semitic conspiracy theories about Jewish power in particular,

(02:21:52):
and then we're talking about sort of like powerful political
actors on the other and so making clear distinctions is
just not there necessarily. So, you know, we talked with
lots of folks that have been sort of litmus tested
when entering kind of less spaces about Zientism. I talk
to folks where other organizers ask to see their passport
before they're allowed to come to media's crazy. It's it's wild,

(02:22:13):
and you think in most of the cases people we
kind of identify that as being kind of wild. We
make a lot of distinctions. We talk about, like the
sort of difference between talking about a Israel lobby organization
like APAC and its power or kind of a vague
diffuse Israel lobby that you know, control controls Western politics,
that kind of thing.

Speaker 3 (02:22:30):
Like a like a this is predeces Israel lobby.

Speaker 7 (02:22:34):
Exactly exactly, and instead talking about like why would we
understand Israel is part of kind of a Western imperial
project rather than the flip side, this kind of small
country controlling Western foreign policy, that kind of thing, and
make a lot of those clear distinctions. And again, I
think it's been sort of suggested like these ideas eanthismenic
ideas are a part of the culture. And you know,
I've been around the left long enough to see like

(02:22:56):
virulent transphobic ideas show up, to see like queer phobic
is in general be very very present. There's no reason
to believe that anti Semitism wouldn't show up here either.
Where folks are sort of like consumed by anger, what
people are looking for clear answers, what people are trying
to identify that And I think the easy answer is
often to paper over it. And I think what we
talk about here is that that exactly is what sort

(02:23:17):
of pro Israel voices want in this case, is to
know that the Left isn't good to deal with it,
and so the alternative to that is to both like
create like a sense of like how would we confront
antisemitic institutions and where structural anti semitism comes from? And
then also how do we deal with that internally? And
we talk with a bunch of social movements that have
done that. Right, anti fascists are actually pretty used to

(02:23:38):
talking about anti semitism when it shows up on the left.
That's pretty common. Jewish left has talked about this historically.
There's other voices, So bringing that back and sort of
making that a safe place to confront and then then
figure out then where is it like you know, just
a bad idea that you deal with and you talk
about you have like education, and where do you draw
lines where like you know, this is now not a
person that's not allowed in or these are voices we

(02:24:00):
can't partner with that kind of thing. I think that's
something people work out on the ground.

Speaker 6 (02:24:03):
No, and you make a really good comparison in the
book about how like anti Smdic conspiracy theories inhibit a
actual understanding of like the mechanisms of capital right, like
it makes you unable to actually like analyze how capitalism operates.
And similarly, having like an anti Semitic conspiratorial view of

(02:24:25):
like anti Zionism, that also will mask the root cause
of Palestinian impression by distracting from like the like the
very like real like geopolitical mechanisms that have caused this
situation to take place, and distracting from that with like
these tales of like you describe it as like innate
Jewish wickedness or a global Zionist power. And I think

(02:24:46):
that's a really good understanding because people often, like I think,
have a general idea that like, yeah, anti Semitism is
like in a lot of ways used as a way
to not fully confront like the mechanisms of capitalism, and
realizing how you know, it's kind of a kind of
like a similar situation with Palestine is a way for
people to understand that a little bit easier and to

(02:25:06):
like reiterate the point about how you know you're not
immune to anti semitism just because you're on the left right.
Something else you also bring up in the book is
like Marxist Leninism has a very mixed history with their
relationship to anti Semitism, and I think you do see
this with with with the degree of the discourse on
this issue. You know, if you compare you know, anarchist

(02:25:27):
viewpoints on like statism and anti Zionism to a whole
bunch of Marxist Leninists talking about this issue, I do
believe there is you know, generally maybe more anti Semitic
undertones among some of the more like statist communists. And
I think you talk about like the Soviet Union's own
oppression of Jewish people and kind of the continued programs

(02:25:50):
that happened even after the end of World War Two.

Speaker 16 (02:25:53):
Yeah, I'd say, like a history of the nineteenth and
the twentieth century left, I think the record of both
camps has been fairly mixed. I think it was anarchist
like you know, Bakunen who maybe like the ins yeah, totally.

Speaker 13 (02:26:05):
And you know, like I guess I have to also
have to say, you know, the the was the nineteen
seventeen October Revolution, and that was like probably one of
the first times that are left led society did pass
you know, laws out long antisemitism and then like they did,
you know, defeat the Nazis.

Speaker 16 (02:26:21):
So there I have to give them some credit where
it's due. But yes, there's also like a very mixed,
you know.

Speaker 13 (02:26:26):
Record, especially in the thirties and in the forties and beyond,
and certainly yeah, today, I would completely agree with you
that like the more statist camps on the left are
the most kind of aligned with conspiratorial thinking with campus
and yeah, I really like the way that you broke
down just how these conspiracy theory can distract us from

(02:26:47):
the root causes of power. And that's really I think
where if you want to develop like a structural understanding
of anti Semitism and how it connects to capitalism and
all the other systems of oppression, that's where you got
to go, right Seeing how, especially in times of crisis
and massive discontent like today, with the rise of nationalism,

(02:27:08):
with you know, widespread alienation, that's when anti Semitism really
rises and is mobilized by authoritarian and nationalists, you know leaders,
when there's millions of people who are are fed up
that they don't have a job, they don't have any savings.
They know the media is lying to them, they know
that politicians don't represent them. That's when these conspiracy theories,

(02:27:30):
you know, really take root on the right and on
the left. And that's why you have you know, Trump
and Steve Bannon and the rest of them, you know, saying, oh,
go look at the globalists, Go look at George Soros,
you go look at cultural Marxists.

Speaker 3 (02:27:42):
Right.

Speaker 16 (02:27:42):
And I think the more that you know, the left
can advance our own understanding of why the world is
so fucked up in how to make it better, then
we can really undercut the root causes of anti Semitism
and move more people into our coalitions. So yeah, that's
really key.

Speaker 1 (02:27:57):
I think.

Speaker 6 (02:28:08):
I have two examples I like to kind of bring
up as ways to like springboard discussions and like how
we can actually like handle this going forward, whether that
be you know, if you hear someone say something at
a protest that makes you think that's a little questionable,
or as ways to like actually just like continue like
your own like active participation in calls for ceasefire and

(02:28:31):
ending the genocide in Palestine and whatever justice in Palestine
might look like. So a few months ago, I was
at the Emory University campus occupation and maybe like a
week in or so, Enemy of the Pod Jackson Hinkle
showed up in person along with Hawes and a few
of those kind of like cronies. Right, These are people

(02:28:53):
who are like conservative communists, mega communists. They're basically like
Douganists or like third persists, and they basically become influencers
that monetize the genocide and gaza for their own like
personal political profile. So this guy showed up one night
and no one really knew what exactly to do, Like
people knew who he was. There was people talking with organizers,

(02:29:16):
and like organizers tried to talk with him and be like, hey,
can you like not be here and he's like, well, no,
I want to be here because blah blah blah blah
blah blah blah. And you know, certain people would try
to get into like political arguments with him, which is
I think is completely useless. And it was. It was
kind of a weird situation. And then we learned that
he was slated to speak at an event the next day.

(02:29:38):
Now it's unclear if he was kind of hijacking this
event or if he was actually invited to speak, but regardless,
he was going to show up and make some kind
of speech at an event later that next day. So
some people put together this flyer kind of going through
Hinkle's politics, his history of anti semitism, rabid queer phobia, racism,
all these things that explain kind of who he actually

(02:30:00):
is as a person. And these flyers were distributed that morning,
like before before he was slated to speak around the venue.
As he went up on stage, a decent number of
people in the audience who had these flyers protested to
be like no, like you can't be here. He was
escorted out of the building, and then he was escorted
off of campus. I think this was a very effective

(02:30:22):
way of handling a situation like this. It didn't give
him like an opportunity for like extra clicks.

Speaker 11 (02:30:27):
You know.

Speaker 6 (02:30:28):
It wasn't a super volatile way to handle this. It
was it was very simple. It was it was kind
of elegant. There was just no way for him to
really like weaponize this effectively. So we have something like
that as a way to like, you know, clamp down
on people who are either disingenuous or just actually antisemitic.
We're trying to like infiltrate or take over in some degree,

(02:30:50):
this kind of general call to stop the genocide in Gaza. Meanwhile,
a few weeks ago, there were protests in DC as
net Nyahu was speaking to Congress, and there's this video
going around of people like graffitiing the fake liberty bell
with like just pro Palestine slogans and stuff, and like,
everyone's freaking out about this. Not everybody, you know, a
certain section of political people, we're freaking outbout this. A

(02:31:13):
whole bunch of other people were like, Okay, well it's
graffiti on a fake bell.

Speaker 3 (02:31:16):
Who cares?

Speaker 6 (02:31:17):
But I actually watched that whole video, and after they
look at the Liberty bell, it pans over to this
other monument nearby where in big red lettering is written
Hamas is coming. And I see this as a pretty
bad way to handle a situation like this, because from
what I can tell here, all that matters is just

(02:31:39):
being like edgy and freaking out libs, and it kind
of destroys any ability to cultivate forward momentum. It's like
they're doing it just so that Democrats will be pressured
into condemning it to reinforce like their own hopelessness, performative
spiral of doing nothing but edgie graffiti as political praxis,
And I see this as kind of a general pattern
of people trying to establish themselves as like the most

(02:32:01):
radical and using that as a weapon against anyone else.
And it's just like a form of political posturing. It's
it's hardly any different from posting a black square on Instagram.
They don't want any actual movement or any actual change.
They want to be the coolest, most correct people as
the world ends. It's kind of like a cowardly way
out because, as you point out in the book, it's
kind of hell to actually have to deal with and

(02:32:22):
work with people who have some degree of like morally
compromised politics, and that actually requires like caring about the ends,
but it's the means that make you look cool. Things
like this are kind of bound to happen. At any
kind of protest that has more than, like, you know,
fifty people, right, there's going to be someone who does
something that the main protest is not aligned with. And

(02:32:43):
on that note, like what advice would you have to
people who are attending these protests and you see someone
who maybe does something that's a little bit questionable whether
that be you know, like harassing just a random like
visibly Jewish person, or you know, writing graffiti on a synagogue. Right,
these things that are like really not helpful and actually
kind of do display a degree of maybe like like

(02:33:06):
like coded anti Semitic motivation.

Speaker 7 (02:33:09):
Yeah, so I think that's prepaiding of habas on the statue.
I think it's an interesting example because that was just
brandished all over right wing media. You know, Tablet magazine
did an article about how these folks should be deported
with all their Instagram It was like a trending thing
on Instagram, and it did very little like protests wise, right,
And actually at that same demonstration, there's a number of rabbis,

(02:33:29):
particularly kind of like movement elder rabbis Lindholtzeman, other folks
that were arrested by cops, yeah, pretty brutally and then detained. Right,
So there actually was these attacking like a Jewish contingent
of like religious figures totally. I think also there's been
a number of examples, I think where folks really just
aren't prepared for something. And I think this is actually
sort of a long conversation people should have on the left.

(02:33:51):
I remember years ago, I was with a group that
created sort of like an accountability document. The idea was
is that if something happens in an organization, it often
just organization. If there's interpersonal issues, if there's like interpersonal
trauma or assault, things like that, and so getting out
in front of it and just like having a sense
of like how you want to deal with things, and
like having had consensus amongst folks with like this is

(02:34:12):
like appropriate behavior, this is how we want to handle stuff.
That's always a strong thing to do. But at did
George I think it was at George Washington University campus
at the end of April. Patrick Casey, who's formerly of
Identity Europa and the American Identity Movement, showed up at
the encampment and wanted to talk to people, want to
ask them questions and that kind of thing. And people
were totally obliged him. They were in photos with them,

(02:34:33):
let him take video. It's because they didn't know who
he was. Yeah, right, in reality, he didn't actually find
anyone that was going to basically support his vision. He
stopped people asked, you know, will you allow right wing
anti zionists here? They basically said no. He did find
one person with a hat that said Israel did nine
to eleven, who then told him that the Jews projected Christ.
But he was also kind of on the edges of

(02:34:54):
the encampment. Sure, the reality is what happened was a
white nationalist came into an encampment and took photos of
use and posted them on a white nationalist website. That's
what happened, you know. So there actually was anti semitism.
It affected the Jews of the encampment, but no one
know who it was. And I think the flip side
of that is having partners with groups that actually do
know who Patrick Casey is and be able to say, oh,
that guy is not here, it's not legitimate. I think

(02:35:16):
with someone like hinkele Maga communists, that's really confusing to
people group. I mean, that's why he does it, Like
it's a duginous and kind of grave zone types and
this kind of version of authoritarian kind of like right
leading right coded so called communists. It's there literally to
confuse people and to bridge the gaps between the right
and the left, and so again pilding that base of

(02:35:37):
people talking to them, having like internal trainings about how
this stuff works, and like, what these groups are? I
think that's always going to be a good thing. We
talked with one organizer who had an organization that had
put together a training for other groups on anti semitism
and invited all these groups to come, and you know,
wanted to get feedback on the training. So they did
the training and everyone kind of like thanked them and

(02:35:57):
then went on to ask them questions. And the questions
were exceedingly anti Semitic. It was things like, well, how
do you talk about the New York housing market when
clearly Jews.

Speaker 3 (02:36:06):
Go oh no.

Speaker 7 (02:36:07):
And these were major, major organizations and so basically they
had like a choice like are we going to deal
with this here? Are we going to cut these relationships?
And they basically were like, Okay, let's talk about this,
let's deal with it.

Speaker 3 (02:36:16):
Yeah yeah, and it moved.

Speaker 7 (02:36:17):
The organization is huge. Like they were like, we don't
want to make these kind of decisions. We want to
realize where we've made mistakes. That's not true if everyone
do not be polyanna about it and assume it's always
going to go overwell. But I think we have to
actually attempt to make those changes. And the reason is
is that the left and building kind of left social
movements build on solidarity inequality. That's the only option we

(02:36:39):
have to do something about anti Semitism. The right has
never made Jews safer. We have right now a system
where Israeli nationalism is supposed to be the primary vessel
for Jewish safety. I don't know about you, but when
I look at Israel, I don't think to myself, what
a tremendously bumps of safe Jews? Like this, we have
a situation that I don't think the political solutions actually
offer Jewish safety and instead just create like more and

(02:36:59):
more social division and more and more social hierarchy. So
we have to kind of look at the left and
how to build a left that can confront anti Semitism,
and that is really the only option we're being given.

Speaker 6 (02:37:09):
Yeah, I think like avoiding this whole issue out of
fears that like it, like it, like somehow like takes
away from other bad things that are happening in the world,
like it, like somehow it takes away from the genocide
in Gaza. I think is so misplaced thinking because I
view this as all part of the same struggle and
actual like active efforts to combat any any degree of

(02:37:32):
anti Semitism that is witnessed, I think will serve to
only like strengthen a general like overall united call to
stop what's going on. And I think like people have
this like inclination that maybe we shouldn't talk about it,
maybe we should just like try to ignore it because
it's uncomfortable or it might like hurt the cause. And
I think that's just absolutely reversed. And I think, like

(02:37:56):
you said, like making making inroads with like anti fascist
researchers to help, like I to fy you know, when
these things are happening, who bad actors might be, you know,
people that might try to trojan horse certain issues to
kind of alter a popular movement. Is all great ways
to start, Ben, Did you have any other other kind
of thoughts on how to handle this like unique political moment.

Speaker 13 (02:38:17):
Yeah, no, I mean I've been around Palestine solidarity movements
for like, you know, over a decade. I remember, like
a decade ago, I was in a rally and you know,
most of the signage there was like really inspiring and awesome,
but at one point I saw like a sign that
showed like kind of like a hook nose Israeli soldier

(02:38:38):
who was like feasting on children's blood. And it was like, Okay,
this is definitely like there's an anti Semitism here. And
I actually like went up and like talked to the
person and they were like really nice, and you know,
I explained to them, like, you know, there's a thing
called the Bible which is an anti Semitic myth that's
harm juice for centuries that is like feased on Christian

(02:39:01):
children's blood, and that like it seems like that image
of the Israeli soldier is like seems to like have
a big nose and that's kind of like a hy
stereotype from Europe. And they were like, oh, I didn't
really know these things. They took the sign down and
left feeling like it was a good conversation, and so
like things like that, I think there's some understandable fear,
like among Jewish people that you might see signs like

(02:39:24):
this at rallies, and when you do, I think, just
like trying to have conversations, it doesn't always go well,
but often it does. And I just think, like you know,
for any marginalized group or form of oppression, the more
that people just deep in their understanding of like what
anti Semitism is how it shows up what some of
these these tropes are.

Speaker 16 (02:39:44):
Like. The more that it becomes normalized, the more that it.

Speaker 13 (02:39:48):
Will become second nature to people, and people won't be
as afraid to talk about it. There won't be this
kind of like weird silence around it, and there's some
decemitism in that silence. To be clear, like for any
kind of oppression. If you thought, oh, if people don't
want to talk about like anti black racism in the movement,
that's that itself is like is part of anti blackness, right,
so we should be clear. And I also think, like

(02:40:09):
you're saying, the fact that so often, like atmusations of
anti semitism are weaponized against our movements makes people don't
want to talk about it, makes people think, oh, this
is just a right wing issue, or if we talk
about it, or we're just lending treat ince to the right.

Speaker 16 (02:40:23):
But I think that's changing.

Speaker 13 (02:40:25):
Especially with the growth of the Jewish left and with
an understanding that anti semitism is real and needs to
be tackled. And so I think, yeah, the one of
the things to keep changing, this conversation will be a
lot easier.

Speaker 6 (02:40:37):
Yeah, is there any other thing that you would like
to mention kind of near the end of this piece,
you know, anything on like the Jewish left, any of
the other kind of closing thoughts that didn't get brought up.

Speaker 7 (02:40:46):
Oh, the only thing was say, we spend a lot
of time talking about the stake that non Jewish folks
have in this, and I think there's there's a couple
of things that are worth considering. Like we've sort of
talked about anti semitism. One of the key features of
anti semitism is that it's not true, Like it's a
bad actual analysis about power, state, empires, and capitalism works.
So if that is sort of steeping in, and this

(02:41:08):
is true of conspiracy theories broadly, if that's cp into politics,
that's just a failure right there. And so it's really
incumbent on people to sort of try and move past
that and confront those things, because that's the only way
that like social movements can actually gain kind of efficacy.
And the other thing is that they're directly tied to
other forms of oppression. If you look at like the
all out assault on trans healthcare and transtitutions right now,

(02:41:29):
it's overwhelming using anti Semitic conspiracy theories as sort of
the scaffolding to hold it together. Absolutely, And this has
been historically true about anti blackness in the US and
the other forms of oppression, and so these things are intertwined.
So I think it's important just to acknowledge that like
anti Semitism is not like just a Jewish problem or
affect Jewish people. It's really baked into these kind of
interlocking systems of oppression. So we should see it as

(02:41:51):
a way of confronting other things as well. And to
make that, can I give it value or can value
to confront on its own terms?

Speaker 13 (02:41:58):
Yeah, And I think this book came out really at
a moment when like these conversations are needed more than ever,
and also at a moment when the Jewish left is
just growing by leaps and bounds, and I think to
end on a hopeful note, and that gives me a
lot of hope. Along with the growth of the left,
you know, more broadly right surging to the streets in

(02:42:20):
support of Palestine, we're seeing like new generations and folks
across all generations and Jewish communities who are building new
ritual modalities, new modes of Jewish identity, new politics, who
are really questioning old ways of doing things and really
building a Jewish future beyond nationalism and militarism, and connecting

(02:42:41):
our struggles with all other struggles as they've long been connected,
you know, like Jewish left has been around for a
long time. And so yeah, we're really living at a
historic moment, both around this issue and around all of
our movements in general. So that gives me a lot
of hope.

Speaker 6 (02:42:56):
Thank you both so much for coming on to talk
about these not very fun topics. I spent two hours
this morning reading through the book.

Speaker 3 (02:43:03):
It was very good.

Speaker 6 (02:43:04):
I strongly recommend people read it, especially considering everything that's
happened like these past eight months. I think there's a
lot of very good insights in there. Where can people
find a copy of Safety through Solidarity?

Speaker 7 (02:43:17):
I think I think you can pick it up anywhere.
Appreciate the kind of words. I appreciate you having us
on the talk about it. We've been directing folks to
sort of like movement bookstores, and we've been partnering with
a bunch of them, you know, so I think, like
local read bookstores are always a great place. We have
to like actively sustain those places and be a part
of them. So I think that's a great place to
do it, and also kind of requesting them at libraries,

(02:43:38):
sort of like pointing folks to both of those things.
So that's a great way to support the book.

Speaker 16 (02:43:41):
Great. I really appreciate you having us on Garrison. It's
been a great conversation and we appreciate all the work
you do so needed to be connective.

Speaker 3 (02:43:48):
All right, thanks much.

Speaker 17 (02:44:02):
Welcome to Nick Dafa here a podcast of once Again.
I have forgotten to write an intro for I'm your
host bi along with these chains.

Speaker 3 (02:44:09):
I'm here. It's great to be here. Intro on.

Speaker 17 (02:44:14):
Yeah, and this interless episode is I think the first
episode that well, can I promise this is the first
episode that was recorded after we learned that Tim Wallas
was going to be the vice presidential nominee, defeating the
sexual assault guy and then the other sexual assault guy
who probably covered up on murder.

Speaker 3 (02:44:34):
Yeah, Dan slack on it also coming up a murder
an me.

Speaker 17 (02:44:37):
Yeah. That was a truly impressive, truly impressive sort of
set of candidates that party elite were choosing from.

Speaker 3 (02:44:44):
It's still somewhat surprising that they didn't like Fumble. I
mean to they will still fumble. We have months to go,
But that's true.

Speaker 17 (02:44:54):
Yeah, I mean, to be fair, I think, oh god,
we figured out this guy covered up a murder. That's
probably the kind of thing that like even the Dems
like dog shit opposition research people were like, hmm, okay,
we shouldn't run that guy.

Speaker 3 (02:45:08):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that tweeting about his murder cover up.
Let's leave this one.

Speaker 17 (02:45:13):
Yeah, that's Shapiro out of Pennsylvania, who's one of the
other candidates by the way.

Speaker 3 (02:45:16):
Yeah, sucks shit.

Speaker 17 (02:45:18):
But you know, so the guy we ended up with
a sort of folksy Midwestern actually I think it was
just a defensive coordinator or whatever, the defensive coach for
his football team. He's a very sort of folksy guy.
We're going to get more into him next week. But
the thing that I wanted to sort of start our
discussion about the vice presidential candidates with is attempting to

(02:45:40):
reconcile something that I've seen a lot of discussion about
and sort of I don't know, kind of confusion to
some extent about about how do you actually make sense
of the sort of two halves of Tim Walls's record,
right which, on the one hand, he's signing a bunch
of extremely progressive, sort of welfared legislation while being the
governor of Minnesota, including things like universal free school lunch.

(02:46:04):
I said it was lunch of breakfast.

Speaker 3 (02:46:05):
I don't remember.

Speaker 17 (02:46:06):
It was both, it was both, yeah, yeah, yeah. And
you know, the on the one hand, you have this
sort of sparkling record, and then on the other hand,
you have you know, him hauling in the National Guard
and deploying it to suppress the uprising in twenty twenty, which,
lest we forget started in Minnesota. Yeah, that's where the
Third Precinct burned, and also using the police to sort
of like horribly brutalize protesters against Line three, which is

(02:46:29):
an oil pipeline through a bunch of indigenous land that
probably I don't know, we're probably two years out from
like an unbelievably horrific oil spill coming out of it
that everyone's gonna go, how can we possibly have predicted this?
It only had spilled a million times before, et cetera,
et cetera, and that walls like rammed through and had
the people who were resisting it like horribly beaten by

(02:46:49):
a cop. So how do you sort of reconcile these
two halves of this guy's record. And there's like a
local politics explanation which I see bandied about a lot,
which is true to some extent, and that explanation is
that he's not really a progressive and he's mostly kind
of a moderate who she's going along with a pro
fairly progressive Minnesota legislature and is getting credit for just

(02:47:12):
like signing bills. And that's kind of true, but it's
also I think ultimately a cop out, because we are
on year about one hundred and forty of the welfare
state and this shit keeps happening every single time. And
what's really sort of at stake here analytically is that

(02:47:33):
the relationship between the welfare state and violence is significantly
deeper than the record of one guy. And so today
what we're going to be doing is not really talking
about Tim Walls so much. What we're going to be
doing is we're going to be going back through some
of the history of social democracy and trying to understand
how it became entangled with the sort of use of

(02:47:53):
force with police violence, because I think there's a story
there that's been completely buried by the tidal wave of
just like I don't know whatever walls takes. And you know,
I think presidential elections are something that has a tendency
to just destroy everyone's analytical capacity for like two years.
So yes, let's resist that and go do something interesting. Yeah, okay, Yeah,

(02:48:15):
So I think the place to start with this is
this is a place that we start I think not
infrequent amount on this show, or at least I do.
And that's the sort of original debates from you know,
about the eighteen thirties through roughly the eighteen seventies early
eighteen eighties, when it changes about what socialism was going
to be. There's always been to some extent, like a

(02:48:38):
bunch of different kind of understandings of it. But something
that you know, what you'd call the sort of left
wing of the Democrats, which is like everyone at that point, right,
and the anarchists kind of agree about. And something that
Mars agrees about with sort of the anarchists at the
time is that socialism is you know, it's the free
association of producers, right, you know, it is the working

(02:48:58):
class abolishing itself, but then also like being the people
who directly run the new society that's sort of brought
about by this thing without sort of the stage or
sort of political mediation.

Speaker 3 (02:49:07):
Et cetera, et cetera.

Speaker 17 (02:49:08):
And even you know people like Angles who are like
ore statists, right, like Angles, you know, uses the theoretical
justification for like every time a socialist picks up a
machine gun to shoot someone and that works for the state,
Like that's Angles justification for it. But even he's talking
about how like one day the state will be like
put on a shelf in a museum and people will
walk past to look at it and then like walk

(02:49:30):
by it because it's like it's a tool of a
Bibegone era that nobody needs anymore. And in this period,
it's very clear that socialism is we're just directly controlling
the musa production and it's directly democratically managing their lives.
But this becomes less clear as the eighteen hundreds go on.

(02:49:50):
Something that David Grayer points out, and I think I've
quoted this on the show before, but it's important here.
While this is sort of going on, right, there's two
kind of trends in the development of the state and
the development of sort of socialist ideology. One is a
move in the eighteen seventies and eighteen eighties, socialists start
watching states build railroads and this drives them completely nuts.

(02:50:12):
It just obliterates their brains. It's like this and the
post office just like absolutely nuke their brains, and they
start going, Okay, hold on, but what if instead of
workers directly managing their affairs and having you know, workers
coordinating like the production of society, what if instead the
state did that? And socialism was literally when the state
did things. And this is something that like even Angles

(02:50:35):
is like pretty hostile to in the sense that like
he's a status to some extent, but he also is
very wary of doing things like calling state onwn enterprises socialism,
right because like, well, no, obviously that's not necessarily true,
because like you could just have capitalists state owned enterprises
like lots of places US and includingly importantly sort of
Bismarck's Germany in this period, which we will come back
to in a second.

Speaker 3 (02:50:55):
Yeah, and lots of the places that people on Twitter
to think are socialist paradise is today.

Speaker 17 (02:51:00):
Yeah, are just these sooe like state on enterprise hell holes.
We've I talked about this extensively with China elsewhere, and
this sort of like shifts the conception of what people
think socialism is, and you get these more sort of
reformist trends in sort of socialist circles.

Speaker 3 (02:51:15):
You get your.

Speaker 17 (02:51:15):
Cot Skis, your burn Steams, people who think that, like,
you don't need a revolution. You can sort of just
like you can vote your way into the state owning
property and that will somehow achieve socialism, or you can
sort of like stabilize capitalism and make it not bad anymore.
Now that's what's happening on the socialist side. So there's
this sort of project of like autonomous workers control over everything.

(02:51:38):
Right that that had been the original socialist project is
being eaten away on one hand from its own parties.
But then on the other hand, as sort of David
Error points out, the capitalist class realizes that all of
these sort of autonomous institutions that the working class is building,
like your unions and your giant political parties have their
own sort of welfare system. The state realizes that you

(02:51:58):
can replicate these and use it like a direct buy
off to stop these people from revolting. I'm going to
read a passage from David Graver's The Utopia of Rules
outovon Bismarck's reaction to Socialist electoral success in eighteen seventy
eight was twofold on the one hand, banned the Socialist Party,
trade unions, and leftist newspapers on the other, while when

(02:52:18):
this proved ineffective, socialist candidates continued to run and win
as independents to create a top down alternative to the
free schools, workers associations, friendly societies, libraries, theaters, and the
large process of building socialism from below. This took the
form of a program of social insurance for unemployment, health
and disability, etc.

Speaker 3 (02:52:38):
Etc.

Speaker 17 (02:52:39):
Free education, pensions, and so forth. Much of it watered
down versions of policies that have been part of the
socialist platform, but in every case carefully purged of any
democratic participatory elements. In private, at least, he was utterly
candid about describing these efforts to buy out working class
loyalties day as conservative nationalist project. When leff Ring regimes

(02:52:59):
later did take path, the template had already been established,
and almost invariably they took the same top down approach,
incorporating locally organized clinics, libraries, mutual banking initiatives, workers education
centers and the like into the administrative structure of the state.

Speaker 3 (02:53:15):
So there's two.

Speaker 17 (02:53:16):
Interesting things here. One is that the developments of the
things that are going to become the body welfare state,
this is implemented not by you know, all these sort
of policies that we're talking about walls doing. Now, these
were originally implemented not by the left, but very deliberately
by Auto von Bismarck, like the arch late nineteen eirly
twenty century conservative, the guy who is literally responsible for

(02:53:39):
the foundation of Germany, right, Like, that's that's his project.
He is the guy who creates the nation of Germany
and thus will forever live in infamy. Is one of
the most evil people in human history. The line directly
from him to Hitler is incredibly straight. But the second
part of this is what social democratic politics turns into, right,
which is this effort to sort of central all of

(02:54:01):
the sort of autonomous institutions that the working classic constructed
and to centralize all of that activity into the state.

Speaker 12 (02:54:08):
Right.

Speaker 17 (02:54:10):
You know, this is like having your sort of clinics
be state run, having your libraries be state run, having
your like mutual banking things, like all of these things
that had that had been independent institutions are folded into
the state project by folding these things into the state.
Graper's interested in the extent to which they become deuaucratized
and the cerb democratic elements fanish entirely. I am less
interested in that here, and I am more interested in

(02:54:31):
the extent to which it ties all of these things
to state violence. Now, James, do you know what else
is tied to state violence?

Speaker 3 (02:54:39):
That was a master stroke.

Speaker 7 (02:54:41):
Me.

Speaker 3 (02:54:42):
Mac did not have that one written down. Came up
on the cuff. Absolutely fantastic. Please tell me mea what
is connected to day?

Speaker 17 (02:54:50):
It is the products and services that support this podcast.

Speaker 3 (02:54:59):
We are back.

Speaker 17 (02:55:01):
So we've gotten into sort of how these things that
used to be mutual aid, right, these are these sort
of programs that were developed by working class institutions to
support each other, where we're sort of folded into the state.
And now we have to get into the reverse of
this process, which is how violence was folded into social
democracy in the eighteen hundreds. And this is something I
think is kind of well known among the extremely nerd left,

(02:55:24):
but I don't know if it's very well known outside
of that. But in the late eighteen hundreds and early
nineteen hundreds, everyone who is like a Marxist in any
stripe is a social democrat. And this is true equally
of reformists like Burnstein and also people like Lenin right,
like the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks, both are splits from
like the social Democratic Labor Party is it social Labor

(02:55:47):
Party was I forget the actual name of the Party
of the Swim, but it was a social democratic party
of like Russia.

Speaker 3 (02:55:51):
Right.

Speaker 17 (02:55:52):
This is the thing, like all of the communists and
all the socialists like split from these sort of social
democracy things, which means that inherently, and this is something
that you can see reflected in the ways that they
come to power and in the ways that they sort
of govern. Len it is communism and social democracy are
both just two variants of the same thing. And you
can see this most clearly ether ways they come to power,

(02:56:13):
the way they embark on this project of centralizing power, violence, production,
and the organization of society into the state. Both of
them take power by machine gunning their enemies, and the
left with the newfound power of the state. Alongside this
sort of Russian revolution, there is the German Revolution. And
the German Revolution is defeated when the Social Democratic Party

(02:56:34):
of Germany, which had been the Party of angles right
like Marx like write stuff about their platform like this
is the premier social democratic party in the world. They
take power by stopping the revolution, slaughtering the communists and
using the sort of proto fascist Freikorps to just kill
them all. This is how Rose Luxembourg is killed. So

(02:56:54):
the first social democratic government to come to power in
Europe since I guess technically there was about two months
in eighteen forty eight when there were also Democrats in France,
but that lasted very very brief amount of time, you know,
So the first time they come to power is in Germany.
And in Germany they come to power in this blood
bath that you know, sort of destroys like the rest

(02:57:16):
of this like armed left and attempting to centralize politics
and military power in the hands of the state. This
is how they defeat the revolutionary movements. In Russia. Basically
the same process happens. Right, There's the first revolution, which
is the February Revolution nine seventeen, and then the Bolsheviks
take power in the Second Revolution, and the moment the
Bolsheviks take power, they spend basically the entire rest of

(02:57:37):
the Russian Revolution in the Russian Civil War just straight
up slaughtering every single other left wing faction in the
entirety of Russia, which ends in sort of the massacre
beyond Oh yeah, oh yeah, they tell a lot of
Ukrainian leftist they are killing anarchists from like azuer Baijan
to like fucking Spain, like a prominent appearance.

Speaker 3 (02:57:56):
In Spain kidding anarchist in May nineteen thirty seven. Yeah.

Speaker 17 (02:57:59):
In the sort of Russian context, right, this is solidified
by the massacre at Kronstat where the Bolsheviks sealed there
sort of opposition to any kind of like autonomous working class. Right,
for the Bolsheviks, the working class is going to be
directly subordinated to the Bolshevik Party and to that platform,
and any dvash or any attempt to sort of like

(02:58:19):
manage yourself like autonomously is just going to be stamped out, right,
And Lenin's attempt to do this is going to be
sort of like followed by Stalin doing this even more.

Speaker 3 (02:58:28):
Yeah.

Speaker 17 (02:58:29):
And so what you have here, right, what collective ownership
is in social democracy, and this is true of both
the German social Democrats, who are what we think of
social democrats today, right, they're sort of like electoralists, they're
like capitalists, and also the Bolsheviks. What collective ownership is
is the state owns things and if you try to
do anything about this, they shoot you. So this is

(02:58:51):
sort of the origin of like these two forms of
social democracy. There's also sort of more liberal forms of this, right,
like FDR does not conceive of himself as a social democrat,
like he thinks of himself as a liberal when the
emergan liberal tradition is a bizarre one. But you know,
we actually talked about this in my episode about the

(02:59:12):
time that Wizards of the Coast, the creators of magic,
the Gatherery deployed the Pikerton's against the guy for revealing
what was in.

Speaker 3 (02:59:20):
A magic product to her. Amazing. I think it also
has some route I think in like this kind of
I mean the examples I'm most familiar with the British
like post eighteen thirty two Reform Act, right, like of
like this paternal state benevolence. Right, they all line the
same thing, right, which is state trying to buy off

(02:59:43):
co opt resistance and doing so in a way that
like it's karrot and stick.

Speaker 17 (02:59:48):
I guess Yeah, there's elements of this in Leninism too, right,
Like Lenin's like great theoretical contribution to whatever is when
Lenin talks about like trade union consciousness, people bring this
up a lot because like, yeah, like there is obviously
issues which is like all of your organizing being you
make a trade union, and then your trade union becomes
the afl CIO and tries to actually not he tries
to successfully overthrows Allende and installs Pinochet, right, like there's

(03:00:11):
a thing there. But when Lenin is talking about trade
union consciousness, the thing that Lenin believes is that they
need like middle class petite bourgeois like fucking theorists to
come in and teach them what socialism is. And this
is an explicit part of their theory, right, And this
is the same sort of paternalisms that they have to
be like led, even the sort of vanguard working class
needs to be led by these like theorists who I

(03:00:33):
don't know, emerge from like Lenin's friend group in exile
in Switzerland or whatever. And FDR's sort of policy works
as I think, it's not really understood how similar FDR's
stuff is to like how the New Deal's seen at
the time even by people like outside of the country

(03:00:55):
as compared to like the others from massive social up
people say he plays supposed to sort of Soviet com
munism or even like fascism. Like Nehru, the guy who
is going to become like the founding Prime Minister of India,
has this whole thing in like nineteen forty one where
he's look at the New Deal and he's going, this
is either going to produce communism or fascism.

Speaker 3 (03:01:12):
So like the New.

Speaker 17 (03:01:13):
Deal is a fundamental rewriting of the American social contract,
and a big part of it is she's doing the
same thing that the social democrats are trying to do,
which is that he's trying to centralize everything into the state.
He's trying to centralize partially this as welfare benefits. Right,
He's trying to centralize like unions very specifically into the state.
And he's also trying to centralize violence into this state.

(03:01:34):
Because before this, the US, I mean, we've talked about
sort of Blair Mountain on behind the Bachelors before, right,
like there are just open wars between the like literally
capitalist armies and sort of union armies, armies formed by
labor unions, not like the Union army, Like you need.

Speaker 3 (03:01:49):
To clarify this. Yeah, yeah, the great anti capitalist of
the Union army.

Speaker 17 (03:01:53):
And a big part of what FDR is like running
on like part of his platform is like, Okay, we
need to end this like era of gun thugs, right,
Like we can't have these fucking like robber barons running
around with their private armist killing people. And like, yeah,
that's obviously good, right, But his solution to this is, again,
we're going to centralize all of the violence into the police.
And unfortunately for sort of the rest of us, Right,

(03:02:14):
if you're going to maintain like a capitalist system, somebody
has to be pulling the triggers, and that's now the
police instead of these sort of like private armies. And
the other part about this bargain is that the unions
also have to basically disband their armies, right because the
miners are blurboutain right, they have like seventeen thousand guys,
like all of them have rifles. They will go out
and they will fight. They have machine guns like they

(03:02:36):
have cannons.

Speaker 3 (03:02:37):
Yeah, and it's FDR who begins the gun control in
the US for the National Firearms Act of nineteen thirty four. Right,
Like they talk a lot about prohibition are of violence, right,
but what happens at Blair Mountain is why you have
the NFA.

Speaker 17 (03:02:50):
Yeah, and so what you have it's the same process,
the process of sort of turning mutual aid into state programs.

Speaker 3 (03:02:57):
Right.

Speaker 17 (03:02:58):
Walls is very explicitly doing this.

Speaker 3 (03:02:59):
Right.

Speaker 17 (03:03:00):
I saw people talking about how like, oh, he's achieved
the dream of the Black Panthers, like free breakfast program
by like making it into the state, and it's like, no,
you don't understand. The reason the Panthers were doing that
was to build the roots of an autonomous society. The
reason the state is doing that is so that you
don't fucking revolt and you don't do twenty twenty again.

Speaker 3 (03:03:18):
Yeah, these are different things.

Speaker 17 (03:03:21):
Yeah, and this is something that as the US welfare
state cycles through, you get various versions of this. There
is another version of this that is the products and
services that support this podcast by centralizing all of your
money into their pockets and the music at the higher
security guards.

Speaker 3 (03:03:45):
We're back.

Speaker 17 (03:03:47):
So the Great Society was just Johnson's sort of like
big We're gonna end poverty thing. You know, He's doing
the Vietnam War at the same time. Yeah, so you know,
those are the sort of domestic kind of resurgency stuff,
and the central lation state viol is now being projected
out and in the US it's always happening, right, The
US fundamentally is a project of colonial expansion, going from
fucking one coast to the other, killing everyone in your

(03:04:08):
path and season their land. And the contradiction of this, right,
the fact that like the people who nominally want sort
of welfare state also normally are like revolted at the
fact that they're burning millions of people alive, and like Vietnam,
Cabodia and Laos, like, this contradiction is kind of what
terrors a part of social democratic politics and what replaces
it is. You know, like if social democracy is a

(03:04:32):
carot and a stick, right, neoliberalism is just the stick.
It's just more prisons and hit you with the thing
instead of this sort of like more genteel process of
while we're still hitting you with the stick. But also,
here are these handouts if you don't like oppose us. Yeah,
so we've talked about these examples. I want to kind
of move into some more modern examples of this because

(03:04:53):
I think everything I've been saying is old, right, but
this stuff is still happening today in the social democracies
that exist, right. Like one of the biggest examples of
this is there's two kinds of social democracies that people
point to, depending on where in the political spectrum they are.
One is like the Nordic countries, right. And this never
worked on me because one of my foundational experiences, like

(03:05:13):
as an activist when I was like a little baby
at fifteen year old in twenty thirteen, was talking to
someone who had a mounted cavalry charge done against them
by the Swedish police because they were doing an anti
fascist action and trampled by fucking horses because that's what
the state is. And you know, so like that's like
kind of on the one hand, but the thing that
we're seeing right now is, you know, the remains of

(03:05:36):
the welfare state being paired with this incredible, like rabid
anti immigrant violence, right. And this is the thing you see
in places like France too, right, where you still sort
of have the welfare state. It's also this unbelievable violence
against sort of non white people and anyone who's trying
to like enter the country. Yeah, I think it's was
it Sweden or was it Denmark that had these laws
were like they would like seize the property if any

(03:05:59):
immigrant who came into the country.

Speaker 3 (03:06:02):
Jesus, I don't remember that. I know more people who
have migrated to Sweden. I think I'm not familiar.

Speaker 7 (03:06:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 17 (03:06:10):
They're also part of the sort of broader like European
border project, which is unbelievably violent. And you're getting this
with Walls too, right, he's signing on to sort of
Kamala Harris's like fucking terrifying fascist border violence. And that's
again because like all of this project is tied in
with state centralizations. Well, okay, so what happens when you
centralize the state? The answer is it starts enforcing its borders. Yeah,

(03:06:31):
in order to sort of like create underclasses of incredibly
dispossessed and incredibly battered and brutalized people who can be
splitted for labor.

Speaker 3 (03:06:39):
Yeah, like people who are insecure with respect to the state, right,
and so they can be expected by the state all
by captives and this importans the state.

Speaker 17 (03:06:47):
Yeah, and you know, obviously, like the US is sort
of one of the global pioneers, but like the norder
social democracies are also really sort of part and parcel.

Speaker 5 (03:06:55):
Of the system.

Speaker 17 (03:06:56):
The other things I want to turn to here is
is Latin American social democracies, because I talked about this
at length in the Brazil episodes. Right, Brazilian social democracy
Lula's like first term, right, has simultaneously this massive sort
of push and social spending and then also enormous like

(03:07:16):
a budget increases for the military. There's this incredible, unbelievable
spike in police violence, like rate of police killings is
way worse than the US. Yeah, and this is true,
and like fucking all of these places, right, Like this
is surely how the crew worked in twenty twenty was
because the Bolivian government kept just like handing money to
the police over and over again, and the police like
did a cue against them.

Speaker 3 (03:07:34):
Right.

Speaker 17 (03:07:34):
This is also true in Venezuela, which is like unbelievable
rates of police killing like terrifying.

Speaker 3 (03:07:40):
Oh yes, I was fair after the revolution, but I
saw some of this happening, right, the revolution going from
spontaneity and work is controlled and people's control to a
degree to like being which happens in almost every revolution
that we've seen. Right, It begins with the people, and
then it becomes co opted by the state. It's wild
to see like the equipment and weapons of their police

(03:08:01):
on one hand, and then the poverty of yeah folks
that they are policing on the other.

Speaker 17 (03:08:05):
And then this has also been Omlo's thing in Mexico, right, Like,
even though he came in on the like Hugs not
Bullets campaign, which for something comprehensible reasons, you still see
like the fucking Washington Post writing about Omlo talking about
how he was doing like hugs.

Speaker 3 (03:08:18):
Not bullets, Like she never she there was not a single.

Speaker 17 (03:08:21):
Day where he implemented that shit. She came in and
immediately was like, hey, the army, do you want control
of even more of the country.

Speaker 3 (03:08:29):
Yeah, Like, it was very funny when Amla came in,
right and he was doing get like hugs not bullets
the English translation, and then simultaneously I was getting press
releases being like, we have deployed several thousand more troops
to the Tijuana area, come to the parade, and I
was like, good, no, look are they huggers? They send
in their tactical cut.

Speaker 17 (03:08:46):
Lula does this exact same thing in Haiti, where he
goes to Haiti and he plays soccer with these kids,
and he says, we will show them another way. And
then just like in the backgrounte are all the armored
vehicles from b resilient occupation of Haiti. It's just like, wow,
oh my.

Speaker 3 (03:08:57):
God, did this show them? Sound thing?

Speaker 17 (03:09:01):
Yeah? And so the tie between this absorption of socialist
politics into the state, you know, and this sort of
centralization and increasing of state violence is something that continues
to today. And you know, we're now kind of in
the last decades probably too strong, but roughly decade we're
kind of seeing social democrats like who want to break

(03:09:21):
out of this in the form of the kind of
like moderate abolitionists. So these are the people who are
you know, whose thing is like, Okay, we're going to
defund the police and we're going to like reallocate their
resources to like funding welfare programs. And this is like
obviously this would be good. But if you know anything
about what happened after twenty twenty, none of this stuff

(03:09:42):
ever happened, right, No one ever defunded the police, right, Like,
there was no sort.

Speaker 3 (03:09:45):
Of movement we defunded the libraries into.

Speaker 17 (03:09:47):
The Yeah, but even on a fundamental level, like, I
don't believe that this can work. And the reason I
don't believe that this can work is because in order
to have a state that functions, you need an apparatus
of violence. It can inflict it subjects. I'm going to
turn here.

Speaker 3 (03:10:01):
Oh this is a joke.

Speaker 17 (03:10:02):
You're probably not gonna get.

Speaker 16 (03:10:04):
Oh.

Speaker 17 (03:10:04):
No, I'm going to turn here to feigned political philosopher
Brennan Lee Bulligan quote. Laws are threats made by the
dominant socioeconomic ethnic group in a given nation. It's just
a promise of violence as an act in the police
are basically an occupying army.

Speaker 3 (03:10:18):
You know what I mean? This is the I'm aware
of this dude. He places to chess drackens on the internet.

Speaker 17 (03:10:25):
Occasionally he says something that's right. And you know, the
important thing about this is that you know, without without
the threat of violence behind it, right, laws are just suggestions.
You can't have a state without an apparatus of violence.
You can't stay in power without one. And this has
always been the sort of central contradiction of social democracy.

Speaker 5 (03:10:43):
Right.

Speaker 17 (03:10:44):
In order for Walls to have his sort of like
pretty sparkling programs, he needs to have the cops to
destroy you if you attempt to do anything different. And
this is what twenty twenty was, right. Twenty twenty was
was the most serious uprising in the US, like the
most serious challenge to the authority of the sort of
draychnically anti black like settler American state, right, and it

(03:11:06):
was something that promised something different and even in you know,
and that meant that everyone, whether you were a fucking
like hardline fascist or you know, you were Tim Walls, right,
your one goal was to smash it and was to
deploy state violent. The state violence you had in your hands,
which in this case was a National Guard, was to
send them in to make sure that these people never

(03:11:27):
fucking burden their police station again. And that's what happens.

Speaker 3 (03:11:30):
Yeah, it's like obviously like the ability to have I've
been thinking about this a lot because I've been writing
a book and I'm really trying to get it fucking finished,
so I've been writing it a lot. And like when
a conflict, be it one within a country or between countries,
stops being between states or about what the state should

(03:11:52):
do and starts being about weather the state should be,
then we see the entire state system like pivoting on
all its suggesting more right and just being like, no,
we cannot allow this to happen. And I think we've
seen that domestically to a degree in the US.

Speaker 16 (03:12:06):
Right.

Speaker 3 (03:12:06):
But like the state can't abolish itself, state won't abolish itself.
The scene qua non of the state its ability to
lock you up, beat you up, or shoot you up
if you do what they don't want. And that will
always be the state as a matter. If it's got
like a hammer and sickle or like your based fucking
Vasha or Alassat or whatever, like, the state will still

(03:12:26):
come and kill you if you become a threat to it.

Speaker 17 (03:12:29):
Yeah, And that's the solution to what hopefully will be
the title of this episode. Why did Tim Wollz call
the National Guard? And the answer is to make sure
that you're never going.

Speaker 1 (03:12:38):
To be free.

Speaker 2 (03:12:42):
Hey, we'll be back Monday with more episodes every week
from now until the heat death of the universe.

Speaker 3 (03:12:48):
It could happen here as a production of cool Zone Media.

Speaker 4 (03:12:50):
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
cool zonemedia dot com, or check us out on the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts
and find sources for it could happen here. Updated monthly
at coolzonemedia dot com Slash sources. Thanks for listening.

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