Why Marvel Movies Are America’s Greek Myths, QAnon Invades Yoga Studios 7.19.21

In episode 953, Jack and guest host Joelle Monique are joined by comedian, physician, and HypochondriActor co-host Priyanka Wali to discuss Covid-19 cases, the wellness world having a QAnon problem, California's new guaranteed income program, the cost of living going up, the unprecedented flooding in Western Europe, a box office update, and more! Plus Joelle defends Loki and MCU fandom!

FOOTNOTES:

1. Covid-19 Positive Case List (From 1 July Onwards) 
2. California’s yoga, wellness and spirituality community has a QAnon problem
3. QAnon Just Keeps Making Inroads into New Age Wellness Circles
4. California approves $35 million plan for nation's first state-funded guaranteed income program
5. How Inflation Became the Gasbags’ Favorite Moral Panic
6. Floodwaters still rising in western Europe with death toll over 120
7. ‘Loki’ just gave us Marvel’s best Disney Plus finale yet
8. ‘Luca’ Leads Nielsen Movie Streaming Rankings With Huge Launch
9. LISTEN: Empara Mi - Ditch

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello the Internet, and welcome to season one, Episode one
of Jose Days. Like guys to production of My Heart Radio.
This is a podcast where we take a deep dive
into America's shared consciousness. It's Monday, July one. My name
is Jack O'Brien a K. I got my vaccination last week,

(00:22):
just like we always talked about. You were so excited
for me to finally get up about the house. But
today I checked on the case counts crying because they
keep going up. And I know we weren't perfect, but
I told you a d mask for no one, and

(00:47):
I just can't imagine how you can be so okay
less mento queueing on. Yes, you lied when you told
me that you got your back scene, but you picked
up COVID now, I said, alone and just tweet. All right,
that's courtesy of just listening at c k UH and

(01:12):
I'm thrilled to be joined by today's extra very special
guest co host, the brilliant, the talented Joel Mo. Yeah, okay,
so I felt bad because I too hungover to create
a song this morning, but that song was so fucking
brilliant that we didn't need another one. Like yeah, and

(01:35):
and the last time I was on here, I also
didn't live Rodrigo Pie, So it was just it just
felt right. It was spiritual, it was good. Yeah. Yeah,
she's doing the work both on this show for vaccination
purposes and at the White House, in the actually White House,
Chanel no Less get it. Yeah. I think I feel
like if she knew that I was going to do

(01:57):
that a k, she might not have even needed to
go to the White House. Joel, We are thrilled to
be joined in our third seat by a very funny
comedian who's been featured on the Today Show Cosmo. I
was named by Refinery twenty nine is one of fifty
female comedians you need to know. She also happens to

(02:17):
be a board certified physician. Please welcome pri uncle Wally.
What's up? Thank you so much. I'm so stoked to
be here. We're excited to have you. Yeah. So, I
have to assume that being a physician has been difficult
over these past couple of years. I mean, that's one

(02:39):
way to put it. I remember when I was younger,
my dad was like, if you become a physician, like
you're you're always gonna have job security, Like you'll never
have to worry about having a job, and then when
the pandemic hit, I was like, this wasn't exactly what
I had in mind. Right, You weren't like, yes, right,

(03:02):
wasn't chomping at the bid. But I don't know what
to say. I mean, people need help. There's lots of
people that don't get access to really good healthcare. So
I mean, I'm not saying, you know, one doctor can
make a difference or anything, but I every little thing helps.
You know, people need and don't want help. Apparently is

(03:25):
the is the new trend in America. Yeah, keep your
vaccine out of my arm. Bill Gates. Alright, well, we're
gonna get to know you a little bit better in
a moment. First, we canna tell our listeners a couple
of things we're talking about. We are, of course going
to talk about COVID nineteen back in l A County
and especially in Tokyo, Um not great. We'll talk about

(03:49):
what's being termed woo and on, which is the q
and on invasion into the wellness world, particularly in out
in California, but it's also called pastel. Q and on
was sort of the instagrammification of Q and on and like,

(04:10):
making it pretty and part of that whole movement, that
whole world. Joel is going to finally say enough is
enough with the marvel slander, the hard facts about Loki.
I wish Whiles were here so I could tell him
to his face, but he's gonna I'm gonna send him
this immediately afterwards, like, yeah, we have words to exchange.

(04:33):
Did he even watch it or what was I forget
what he even Did he have like a real spicy
take on Loki. Yeah, he was basically just like dismissing
it out right, and that's just low key, but the
full and see you and I've been listening right right, Yeah,
he's like, I'm not interested. No, no, wrong, wrong decisions,

(04:53):
incorrect sir. We're gonna talk about Texas rebooting Trump's border wall.
We're gonna talk a about California approving thirty five million
dollars in guaranteed income, which is exciting, some good news.
And we will talk about Luca, which was a massive
hit in the streaming world, and also Army of the Dead,

(05:15):
which was the last kind of movie to open like
a blockbuster on streaming. I finally watched that ship very weird.
So we'll talk about that plenty more. But first, Prinka,
we like to ask our guests, what is something from
your search history. Yeah, so I had to look this up,
and it was why is caviar so expensive? Why? Why

(05:40):
did you have to look it up? It's really expensive,
and I would love to be eating more caviar because
I think there's a lot of really good nutritional benefits.
But it's it's ridiculously expensive. So I had started this,
but then of course I got distracted. I never finished
the article. So, but it's it's a very like it's

(06:01):
a it's a very like intricate process where they extract
eggs from the sturgeon, and now sturgeon or endangered, so
they only use farm sturgeon. And so yeah, I guess that.
You know, it's it's like this luxury good idem. I mean,
it's like it's like the Louis Vatton of the food

(06:21):
and industry apparently, and and you just like get this
much and it's it's like it's really expensive. It's like
over a hundred dollars for like just a little bit,
and it's so tasty, like it's like like eating I
was like, I'm not eating fish eggs like I've seen
how they're extracted and it looks vile, not interested, and

(06:44):
then they would put it on some lobster mac and
cheese and that was it. I was like, I'm a
full convert delicious, did not know it was healthy? Right
under that then was best outdoor lunch spots near me,
because you gotta eat outdoor. When you're eating your caviar,
you gotta flux on the on the people. Full disclosure,

(07:07):
I have not had caviar in a very very long time,
but I very much would love to if I could
get access to I want cheap caviar. Yeah, yeah, I
have a caviar connect. I'll hook you up with all
of what. Let's get out of here. No, I'm just choking.
I do not. You're like friends with the sturgeon basically exactly.

(07:29):
She's very productive. I feel like you would not want
black market caviar. Maybe, but maybe I'm migerating the black
market caviar. I know, like these like under the table eggs.
I like salmon row. I feel like that's a little Yeah,
salmon is like a nice, like affordable kind of option,

(07:50):
right because it's Yeah, I think it's relatively inexpensive and
nutritionally you do get kind of the same benefits. There's
lots of omegas and all this stuff. But but that
coveted sturgeon caviar that it's that it's the idea of
wanting something that you can't have. You know, I'm sure
if caviar was like really cheap, I wouldn't be like,

(08:11):
you know, thinking about that. So yeah, samum roe is
like Nature's boba. I feel like this gives you what
is something you think is overrated? Oh? Man? So you
know when I heard you guys were gonna ask me this,
I really went back and forth because by definition, like,

(08:33):
no matter what I say, it will like isolate, like
it will cause uprest in one one population, because by default,
the fact that something is overrated means that there is
a significant population that likes it. So I realized, like,
no matter what I say, people will be like, oh

(08:55):
hell no, this bitch didn't say that. So I went
been forth and I came up with all these things,
and then finely I honed it down two Pokemon cards,
because I think Pokemon cards are ridiculously overrated. They're worth
like hundreds of thousands of dollars depending on what kind
of card do you have. And it's like it's a

(09:15):
piece of paper, it's a card, and yet this is
like this is like a whole industry on it, And
I think that's crazy. I think that's totally nuts. Now
you've stepped in it so many thoughts. Yeah, all right,
Like I agree with you because at one point Targets
said it's so out of control we can no longer

(09:36):
sell Pokemon cards. What's crazy? Like, no sense, I never
read the history of like baseball cards, horrid shop being like,
y'all are acting too wild in these streets. We're just
not cut off. Yeah. Also, isn't it like targets shop
to get people to Target, Like, isn't that the whole goal?

(09:59):
Who too many? Sorry, I've had enough customers. Target already
has such a high threshold for holding lots of people, right,
it's like a it's like a it's a like muted
down version of Costco without samples. And to even have
Target be like whoa, okay, guys, we need a tone.

(10:21):
This is a bit much for us. You know that
That says so much about the consciousness of our art population. Yeah. Also,
I mean not just the Pokemon cars, but like, let's
not forget that when what was that video that that
app on the phone was a Pokemon Go or that

(10:41):
game where people died. There were literally there was loss
of life over this. I mean, that's that to me,
says a lot. Yeah, it was not the CIA is
Deadliest operation, but it was you for for a app.
It wasn't great for a c I A opp which

(11:05):
it probably was. But like real talk, though, what other
apps have actually killed human beings? Yeah, that's a good question,
Uber quite a bit. Okay, yes, Uber, all the social
media ones, that's fine, all the social media Okay, let's
ever make it to an applist. It didn't. Actually, I

(11:25):
don't know if Craigslist did make it to an app.
It's probably the most murderous app, right for sure. But
which gaming app has actually killed people? Yeah, that's a
good question. So candy Crush probably killed It's like if
you if you add up all the time that candy
Crush has made disappear, it's like probably caused people to

(11:49):
die of old age if you think about it that way.
But yeah, I mean, candy Cush just definitely like been
a contributor to destroying the fabric of our society, right
for what is something you think is underrated. Yeah, so
this was actually a lot easier for me to answer.
And honestly, I think meditation is really underrated because it's

(12:14):
something you can do on your own. You don't need
to like buy something in order to meditate. It involves breathing,
and it actually is like there's so much data about
how mindfulness practices can improve health outcomes and wellness. And

(12:36):
and I'm not talking about like the wellness industry. I'm
just talking about like sitting and being with your feelings
is a type of meditation, or taking deep breaths is
another kind of meditation. But I think meditation as an
as a form of therapy if you will, it's it's affordable,
it has benefits. What harm can come from that? I

(13:00):
think this is like seriously a super underrated thing. I
think we should be like teaching this in schools, you know,
just like spreading the word. I think we should have
work accommodation so that people can take meditation breaks. I
think the world would just be a better place if
there were more people meditating and fewer people playing Pokemon.

(13:24):
There's like a lot of studies to where they replace
you know, detention with meditation, right, and the overall improvement
of these kids from a discipline perspective over time. And
it's just like I just started meditating seriously maybe two
or three weeks ago, and it's crazy how fast the

(13:45):
change is. Like it's the first thing I do when
I wake up. I did have to buy I have
a d h D, so I buy um like a
guided meditation thing so that I wouldn't wonder too far
off the thinking path. But it's it's just as far
as like getting set for your day. But also you know,
if you find yourself in a overly emotional state in being,
I'm just gonna remove myself and sit and think for

(14:07):
a second. It's you're right, It's just it's completely changes
your perspective and ability to handle difficult situations, difficult emotional things.
I'm a very emotional person, so oftentimes like this is
just too much and some sort of like letting it overwhelm.
You can just go meditate for humanists, and it's it's transformative. Yeah.
And here's the thing, right, Like the world is full

(14:28):
of problems, Like we all have issues, whether it's within
your own self or interpersonal issues. But here's the thing
about changing. You can't change what you can't see and
if if there's no self awareness, then you can't change
your behavior. And meditation is one of the basic, most
simple task you can do to at least make the

(14:52):
effort to become more self aware by just noticing the
thoughts that you're having, the emotions that you're having. If
you you can't change a problem if you can't see
the problem. Right, Yeah, I do want to say it's
so meditation can be cheap, but if you want to
do it correctly, you do have to buy my meditation
sportswear and meditation sports sprints which help you with the

(15:17):
meditation process and make you meditate harder than you've ever
medicated before. Right, I'm actually wearing a meditation headband. I
do wonder how much the lack of like meditation being
woven into our day to day lives is that meditation

(15:41):
makes you a worse consumer, because I think I feel
like a lot of air consumption as members of a
capitalist culture is like compulsive and an attempt to fill
a whole that meditation actually requires you to take a
look at and like become familiar with. Yeah, I love

(16:03):
that point. I mean, yeah, it is meditation, this anti
capitalist sort of entity and to be honest, like emotions
they change with the wind, they change constantly. And if
you develop enough self awareness that you're not sort of
controlled by your emotions, what does that mean? That's freedom.

(16:24):
And you know, when it comes to controlling societies, the
last thing you want are your constituents to to be free, right,
because it's harder to control them. So, yeah, I think
it's that's such a really interesting perspective. So meditation is
a form of protest. I guess yes, all right, let's

(16:46):
take a quick break and we'll be right back. And
we're back, and so is COVID nineteen baby so l
A County. On Saturday night this past Saturday, we went

(17:10):
back to having to wear masks again, masking up and
then in sort of a more broad international scope, the
Tokyo Olympics is a little less than a week away,
and it's it's just not going well, you guys. It's

(17:32):
so frustrating, Jack, because knowing that this could have been
like very much one and done, if somebody had had
the tenacity to be like, everyone go inside for four months,
double outside, we're gonna mask up, just be really really responsible.
Here's like could be even to get everybody through the
next four months, eradicated get back out there, half fun

(17:52):
and then to be like we knew that the minute
they were like, okay, you're good to go back out,
like it's not done yet. When new variants come being in.
My friend works for the CDC and she was like, no, guys, like, seriously,
don't Delta virus is coming, even if you're vaccinated, must
be safe. So when they say when they then announced
mess have to go back on, like it's you We've

(18:13):
crossed the threshold of back and forth. I feel very
strongly that people are like I'm done now. They just
don't want to to take the precautions and it's scary.
And now of course our numbers are going back up,
and it's making everything like clipping a verse of people
who thought they were going to finally become financially stable
and they were going to get back to like having
these like steady jobs where they could be out in

(18:35):
the world, you know, and I'm talking everything from like
hairstylists to to photographers to anything like that's very basic
requires you to be in person. You know, all of
those lives are now again and upheaval, and it's i
don't understand why we have to keep going back and forth,
Like I really wish we could just be like we're
just gonna stay locked down until this is resolved. Did

(18:58):
you guys see this is the This is really random,
but did you guys see on social media? I don't
know what channel, but this was like early when people
were like, hell, no, I'm not going to wear a mask,
or like I can't breathe in those masks, like it
doesn't feel comfortable. And did you guys ever see on

(19:19):
social media? Someone was like, if you're a straight guy
and you don't want to wear a mask because you
don't like the way it feels on your face, you've
basically just added yourself as someone that's never eating someone else,
Like way to go. It was so good, it feels bad.

(19:45):
I can't breathe my face free. So on Thursday last Thursday,
the president of the International Olympic Committee, Thomas Bach, insisted
that there was no risk that the games would spread
infection and there have been thirty total confirmed cases like

(20:07):
just within either athletes or planning committee members. And the
US basketball is like starting shooting guard Bradley Beale had
to go into COVID protocol and will not be able
to be a part of the Olympics. It's just it
feels like we're watching, you know. It feels like a
lot of stories and moments have felt throughout this pandemic

(20:30):
like we're just watching something in slow motion happen. The
power of capitalism has become so it's not a mystery
anymore to me. I guess before I was like, oh, yeah,
that's a system and I I've always lived under it,
and I'm not sure like what would replace it the
drive to make money in the phase because because I

(20:51):
can't solve for X, like what kind of person who
is any level of intelligence says the pandemic can't touch us.
We're gonna bring people from all over the world. It's
still going on, but there's no way it'll spread here. Well,
there's no I don't know if that's you know, is
it stupidity, is it pride? Or is it literally just

(21:12):
we have to make money. We don't know what else
to do. You're the Olympics, like you'll you'll get more
money in a couple of years, and you don't have
stake in anything. You make, the city you choose pay
for everything. So what is really the problem here incredibly
confusing to me. Well, who pays for the Olympics? Is
it the hosting city? So I mean there's probably like
a pretty complicated weaving of corporate interests who are sponsoring it,

(21:37):
with the planning committees, with the local government. But it
has a lot of a lot of money tied up
in it. Interesting. Yeah, So last Friday, the organizing Committee
reported four new infections among Olympic related personnel, which brings
that to thirty total confirmed cases this month. There's twenty

(21:59):
one South African rugby players went into isolation after being
identified as close contacts of an infected person on their flight.
And again just have to read that quote one more
time from the president of the International Olympic Committee that
there is no risk that the game's would spread infections.

(22:21):
So I wonder if some of the because some of
the sports, the Olympic sports are like isolated events, like
they're just one person, I don't know, I don't know
what they do now to throw a javelin or something.
So I wonder if they like evacuated the entire stadium
to allow the like one COVID positive athlete to like

(22:44):
throw this javelin and then they like disinfect the whole
stadium and then they like wait a week and they
allow the next person to come in. They can have
like a really prolonged Olympics. Yeah, that sounds rate. I
hope somebody is able to pull that off. It just

(23:05):
it sounds like it's gonna be such a mess. Yeah,
that's too bad. I hope no one no one dies
from from it. Have you Like, it does seem like
young people are We're having a hard time get to
getting young people on board the vaccination tray. I have
a theory about that because, like kids don't typically watch

(23:27):
the news, and there's not like a solid source space
source to like get them the information they need to
get vaccinated. You know, a lot of them aren't aware
that it's free. You can just walk into all the
means and get your shot and be done with it.
And I think also a lot of misinformation at the
top of the pandemic of like children can't catch it
has thrown a lot of them into just being indifferent

(23:49):
about it. And then of course, you know, if you're young,
you just tend to be more reckless anyhow. But yeah,
I think a lot of young people think they're invincible.
I mean I was never like that because I think
learning about medical illnesses, I was just like afraid all
the time. So like when COVID. When COVID happened, it

(24:10):
was just like business as usual for me. But yeah,
like I think there's a you know, young folks think
they'll they'll live forever right for wherever you are, they'll
just be a cold. But it's not just a cold kids,
it's not people your age have died from this. It's yeah, yeah, shot,
it doesn't hurt. That's really hard too, especially when I

(24:33):
read about like kids, kids dying from it. I think
that's a hard pill to swallow. Yeah. Well, speaking of
spreading misinformation, we've talked recently about ways the Q and
On has kind of you know gone underground. January six,
bad look, bad branding for the whole Q and On brand,

(24:55):
and so they've had to kind of go underground, changed
their look a little bit. Uh. One thing that we
talked about them doing is you know, competing for spots
on school boards, so like trying to do take practical
steps to make their worldview that there's a Satanic cabal
controlling everything practical on a local level. Another way that

(25:18):
it's metastasized is in the wellness and yoga and you know,
stay at home mom and alternate medicine communities. Some people
are calling it pastel q and on because of like
the Instagram aesthetic that those communities usually adopt. But basically

(25:39):
the Q and On movement took the opportunity took like
the skepticism around vaccines and the pandemic and like just
the discomfort caused by the pandemic and this idea of
like bodily autonomy, like that nobody can tell you what
to do with your body, and like turned used that

(26:04):
as like kind of a toe hole to introduce Q
and on theories. And there's this article in the l
A Times and also in l A Magazine about how
you know these people who are like yoga teachers and
sound healers and they're like, yeah, no, all of my
friends are now part of Q and On, Like I've

(26:24):
had to move and like that. I think it's a
helpful idea to like view the world on this continuum
of like from the east, like East Asia being more
like collective minded all the way to like California being
the most individualistic minded of of people. I feel like

(26:47):
that isn't explicitly true, like specifically true, but I think
it can be like just broadly speaking somewhat true. And
I think that makes southern California and the whole like
wellness movement and the rejection of like Western medicine especially
susceptible to some of these ideas. If there's a lot

(27:10):
to exploit within those communities as somebody who who dabls
it and out of multiple crossovers of that community, that
truly doesn't surprise me at all. And the more I
think about how we are sourcing our information and the
fact that there's really no guidelines anymore as far as
like journalistic integrity is really just only applies to actual journalists,

(27:35):
and there's so much information being spread but people who
might claim to be journalists, people who claim to be
knowledgeable on a subject, and people just sort of take
it at face value. It's scary to think that there
might be no end to this. Yeah, yeah, And I
and the beginning I said, like, oh, meditation is really
under very underrated. But it's like come on, now you're

(27:58):
gonna you're gonna this thing to come on something, you know,
like you colonized our countries, you colonized our bodies. Now
you're going to colonize our minds and our spirits and
our psyches co on. Yeah, I mean this kind of

(28:18):
yoga teacher leader in southern California was talking about how she,
like mid pandemic had like posted on social media and
was like, look, I'm seeing a lot of these like
dangerous q and on ideas popping up and like kind
of just laid out why they were bullshit, and she
saw like in the comments section a lot of like

(28:40):
q and On evangelists like just putting their ideas down
there being like actually, like when you look at it
this way, but like they used the language of the
ways that people argue online. But it's you know, it's
just it really is like metastasizing and like, uh, evolving
into a more effective weapon of disinformation. Yeah, And I

(29:06):
mean it's born of a form of privilege, like the
ability to be civically disengaged from your local government because
you don't think you need to be and then like
everything is just you and your version of the world.
And interesting is watching these people like have to collide
with the rest of the world every so often, did

(29:27):
you guys see there's a video floating around I think yesterday,
of a woman being hauled off of a Royal Cribby
and cruise. She was determined to make viewers believe that
real Cribbian faked her COVID results, which that she was
positive for COVID and she's like, I've already had COVID

(29:49):
and they're like, yeah, man, he can definitely get COVID again.
She was like, they're trying to make me get vaccinated.
You don't have to do anything but get off of
our ship. You can't be anymore. And it was like
it's so dramatic. She's like screaming through the ship and
they eventually like literally had to force her off and
put her on a plane, like a medical plane. To

(30:10):
be thinking back to the States and we're seeing this continuously.
People be like, I'm just not going to get back
to people. That's fine, but you can't come in here now,
which I think, on the one hand, is obviously the
right choice. You can't be spreading this disease. It's literally
tears people's lungs apart, like it's it's not something you
can play with. But on the other hand, there's the

(30:32):
thought of is this going to continue to drive even
a further wedge between us, you know, like this bar,
you don't need vaccines, like come in and just free
spread like they were trying to do early on. They're like, oh,
well do like the chicken pox parties, Like just come
in here and catch it and it'll be fine. What's
crazy about this story is that people were still willing

(30:53):
to get on cruises that like, how are people doing
cruises after like what happened with the Princess cruise that
landed in the Bay Area, Like I'm just like, well,
that's something I will never do again, like in my life.
I also wasn't pro cruise before the pandemics start to say,

(31:13):
this is just like confirmed my anti cruise sentiments. To
go back to Jack's theory of like this space being
the most individualistic. The only positive thing about a cruise
is an individual's experience of being on that cruise. Because
the workers aren't getting paid anything, it's creating horrible results
for the environment, and on top of all of that,

(31:36):
their cesspools for disease. Like it's such a problem. I
don't understand why people are going on cruises, especially right
now either, But you put a hole in that cruise
ship and suddenly they get very collective minded. So I'm
just saying, you know, we started thinking some of these
cruise ships. That was not the lesson we learned from
the techanic jet. People did not come together. People together,

(31:59):
my father. Yeah, bro the movie industry together. As with
many of the sort of most mind breaking problems that
we see in the modern world, the engine for a
lot of this, like I said, is social media Instagram.
So like in behind the scenes marketing training, these aspiring

(32:20):
wellness influencers were told that quote being controversial, taking definitive
positions that make people love you or hate you is
a great way to build your brand. Wow gosh that
is And here I am spending ten minutes humming and
huwing about what I'm going to say as the most
overrated things so that I'm not too controversial. And oh man,

(32:42):
I should have attended one of those marketing trainings. Yeah,
I want to be I want to be upset at
the advice, but I see it being true. It's true. Yeah, definitely,
just be as divisive as possible and then just really
really sick to your guns and the people who enjoy
you are really to follow you. And then on top
of that, people who hate you will follow you so
that they can make sure that you know you're wrong.

(33:04):
And that's why people are looking at the end results
of that number. How many people saw this? But you're
not really looking at content at all. Yeah, that's kind
of death stating. Yeah, yeah, great society you have there, America.
Let's talk about some good news. So California approved a
thirty five million dollar guaranteed income program. So, as Joe

(33:25):
Biden is on the international stage saying communism don't work
and socialism isn't a good alternative, Jack, California is actually
implementing a very limited but still pretty groundbreaking state funded
guaranteed income plan. The payments will be focused on qualifying
pregnant people and young adults who recently left foster care.

(33:48):
So it's a very limited, like trial run. But the
point is that these are these people are just being
given money to spend it on the things that they
feel they to spend it on. It's not like means tested,
it's not like tied to you're going out and getting
a job and checking out with the pro officer like
whatever the fuck, you know, it's it's just money given

(34:12):
to these people. And it passed through the state Congress.
It was approved thirty six oh and oh and you
know this article points out that the vote came on
a day where the expanded child tax credits started hitting
parents around the country, which is kind of another limited
form of You know, when you give people money, they

(34:36):
know what to do with it. You don't have to
tell them what to do with it. And giving people
money generally makes their lives better and easier and the
lives of their community better. Yeah, spend money on products
hopefully made within your community. You're giving that person a
chance to invest in their passions. You know, it may

(34:56):
not yet be profitable, but might down the line. Allowed
them to be not just independent, but creatively fulfilled, which
makes them happier, which brings down domestic violence. Like there's
just it's a sea of change with something so simple
as a dollar, and it's it's still well to be.
The people are like this is awful. You don't want
them to work. It's like there's never in the history

(35:19):
of the world been people who are just like, I'm
not gonna work, I'm not interested in work. Even even
people who live lives of luxury and have everything they
need typically find that they want to do something with
the time that they have here. Maybe it's not you know,
the most giving or the most responsible thing for them
to be doing, but people like to work, people like
to create and involve themselves and activities, and so I

(35:43):
think it's great, and I think it's particularly great that
we're starting with kids who age out of adoption or
or foster families. Those kids have such a difficult time
getting started, and so to sort of put them first
and give them opportunities to basically start their lives. Like,
that's an incredible you know, first round tests, and I
hope it goes well because California, you know, in the

(36:04):
middle of a huge housing crisis, specifically here in the
Lake County specifically coming off with this pandemic, and on
top of all of that, you know, we just have
industries here tend to be less sustainable, particularly to new
commerce to Los Angeles. You know, like if when I
was peeing, if I could have had a guaranteed income,
life changing literally life changing, it would have leached so

(36:27):
much stress. I could have you know, been involved in
the programs that have allowed me to be further in
my career. Like there's just so much opportunity and development
that can happen when you have a little bit of
money to support you. I think also, you know, this
would actually help the health care system because if you
have chronic illnesses, stress is only going to make it

(36:48):
harder to deal with those illnesses. So stress is actually
a risk factor for getting sicker, and so you know,
more and more people would come in with health issues.
If you reduce stress, you'd actually save the health care
system money in that way too. So yeah, one thing
that I saw kind of being bandied about as there's

(37:09):
a slight uptick in minimum wage, and as like some
of these more you know, socialists leaning slightly programs come out,
people are especially on the right, are talking about inflation,
and I think I think it's worth I feel like
people don't talk about inflation because it's usually like a

(37:31):
thing that the right will blame on any policies they're
slightly left leaning. I think it's something that everybody should
be aware of that like the world just in in
the month of June got five percent more expensive to
live in. It's costs five percent more this month than

(37:51):
it did last month, too, exists as a person in America.
That's crazy but like how overall uptick in a lot
of like staple needs. So the price of gas has
gone up, I think like a lot. I think he
said like nationally, and cars got really expensive, so used

(38:14):
cars got really expensive and they're a big expense, and
so that like contributed to the uptick. But you know,
also like food got more expensive, and like it's just
I feel like the default mainstream conversation around this just
defaults to the right wing talking points like well, this

(38:37):
must be because like one company decided to pay more
minimum wage, and it's actually like, well, how about the
fact that we are just coming off of a pandemic
that was like profoundly mismanaged and like put pressure on
all supply chains and like created a drop and then

(38:58):
a spike in demand for rs and just like all
these things that like you could put the point point
the finger anywhere, but I just feel like it always
comes back to because it's America. They they're just as
this inherent like knee jerk anti social safety net bias
that we always do. It's wild huble to blame that

(39:21):
on someone raising their minimum wage what and to not
take a look at like what CEOs of the company
are making and just completely dismiss the idea that that
maybe if those guys made a little less and pay
their employees a little bit more, but this would not
there would be a zero some impact overall, Like it's

(39:41):
this is not it's I don't know, it's it's it's
pay people what they're worth. It's so expensive to just
be alive. It's so much money just to be alive.
And then to constantly deny workers that on very arbitrary
things like oh well that job isn't complicated enough for
you to make enough money to live. Shame on you,
Like wild mm hmmm, alright, let's take one more break

(40:05):
and we will be right back, and we're back, and
you know, just something we're keeping our eye on obviously,
and you know, sending out thoughts to the people of

(40:25):
Western Europe right now, there's just pretty mind breaking pictures
coming out of just these old like European villages that
have been there for hundreds of years, that are just
like entire chunks of them are being washed away by
this unprecedented flooding. This is one of the times where
meteorologists are just like, oh, yeah, no, it's climate change,

(40:48):
Like it's for for sure, climate change because and this
this is also an example of just one of those
like small things that changes in one part of the
world and and has a devastating impact elsewhere. Apparently because
of the jet stream, like a change in temperature in
the ocean basically has caused a bunch of storms inland

(41:12):
in Western Europe that would normally happen out over the ocean,
and that's what is causing just entire chunks of Western
Europe to just be washed away, and you know, hundreds
of people to die and probably eventually thousands. So it's
probably something we're gonna be seeing more and more of, unfortunately,

(41:32):
but we we will see how they react to this
in Europe. I think there's an election coming up in
Germany where a lot of this is happening, and people
are pointing out that, like climate hasn't even been a
subject that people talked about in this election, so maybe
that will change. All right, let's talk about some bullshit,

(41:54):
and not in a disparaging term, Joel. I know you
are here to send the Marvel cinematic universe, because you know,
we we were a little bit dismissive, so a little
bit a little I listening together yesterday's episode, and I
was like, Okay, wow, guys, Wow, So first of all,
none of y'all launched it, so why talk about it?

(42:18):
But too, I know you think Moki has like at
first of all, I just wanted to talk abat before
we begin in here. Uh, that's not in defense of
the Disney Corporation at all. It's Disney. They're massive, they
do what they do. I have no control over that,
and I understand why some people have issues with Disney.
I get it, I get it. It's not what we're
talking about here, talking very specifically about my love for

(42:39):
comic books and the incredible range of what has happened
from picking up like monthly comic book series and following
them for literally years. It's comics will sometimes number in
these seven hundreds, so that means your granddaddy could be
reading the same storyline that you are currently picking up on.
I think the way comic books have formed as an
American art form is up there with jazz as far

(43:01):
as being like this is strictly American and it's beautiful.
It says a lot about who we are as a community,
both the good and the bad, and these heroes we've created.
Are literally our Greek gods are ancient myths come to
life and and absolutely set a tone for what again
we as a society, maybe not as individuals vi as

(43:24):
the ideal human. And again there's a lot to critique
in there. What does that mean when all of our humans,
like all of our aspirations are hyperfit fish first discussions
later kind of individuals. And you can absolutely break all
of that down. But there's something just from an artistic
standpoint that is absolutely mind boggling of how they took

(43:45):
what was, you know, a thirty page book and took it,
you know, a thirty page book monthly and brought it
to the screen and do it almost every three to
six months, and a continued storyline that you can choose
to be invested it in, but light comic books you
can also just jump in and enjoy as a singular unit.

(44:06):
One of the show was like the most watched show
in America. Statistics aside things are kind of crazy. You
can look at just an A plus is uh stats
in all of streaming. They're still pretty low. But they
just launched last year, so I think that those sort
of discussions need time to sort of flush out. Netflix
says like a fifteen year gain on them. But what

(44:27):
they've done in creating specifically these shows during the pandemic
and and glimpsing these like side characters, positioning them as
so like feature characters, broadening their stories gives viewers like
me who've seen every part of the MTU like this
rich tome of cinematic glory. And on top of that,

(44:51):
they're hiring a ton of women to make these shows,
and not just in four ground roles. You know, they
brought in Lady Loki for this news series. You know,
Wanda was Got. You know, that's the very first streaming
show they created and it was a woman, And I
think that was sort of a rough decision for a
company that took forever to bring a black widow movie

(45:13):
to the screen. But they're also doing it as directors,
show runners, composers, like women are really dominating and actively
involved in creating this universe. And that to me, as
a woman who really invested in film and television and creation,
know who knows and his friends with a lot of

(45:33):
women either in it or struggling to get in, struggling
to stay in, it's really really important from a company
that is absolutely monopolizing this industry. It's really vital that
while they're in this position, that they're offering roles to
a lot of different people, you know, because otherwise we're
just gonna be out of it period. And on top

(45:53):
of all of that, Lookie is just really good. It's
just really good. Like take all of the politics and
and and I don't know, theory and everything like Loki
and the television show is just solid writing. And on
top of that, solid performances from actors who've been in
the game for a very long time. One Masaku, who

(46:14):
if you watched Lovecraft Country, she was in that. She's
sort of been everywhere. She's I don't have words to
describe the talent that this woman brings to the screen,
but she is a down performer. And watching her throughout
this series and knowing that she might come back for
bigger and better things is it's so thrilling. And then

(46:35):
you get Lookie. It's like an entire series about what
is it to find self love? And as we talked
about individualism throughout this entire episode, Lukey is an admitted narcissist.
This is the essence of the character pre his marvel entrance.
You know, this is an self obsessed guy who likes
playing tricks on people, and he's blossomed into this guy

(46:55):
who's questioning his entire existence and what it's for. They
get into philosophy in theory of religion, they start questioning,
you know, who created you? And what does that mean?
And are you stuck on the path that you know
someone else is laid for you or can you vir
off of that? And if you do vir off of that,
what is that? Like? It is so complex and fun
and like just everything everything, everything, someone is who's just

(47:19):
inside of herself, a nerdy comic book kid who would
rather be reading comics on the floor of her bedroom
than doing anything else. To see a blossom into this,
it's just been transformative and I do get you know,
as I mentioned already, I'm a little bit emotional as
a human being. You know. Some people are just like, no,
that's not art and it's not good and oh my god,

(47:40):
it is Tobey Maguire coming back, so full it listen.
Maguire is not confirmed. We don't know if he's coming back.
It's very much a possibility because there are many spider
men across many different universes and we know that the
multiverse action is coming, so maybe he's coming, maybe he's not.
We don't know. But I think it's so much bigger
than all of that. I think it's it's just an

(48:02):
entire community of creators has moved into another community and
succeeded and done it so well and so beautifully. And
I have to sometimes just stand back away from everything
and just marvel everything that's across this timeline. That's my field, right, yeah,

(48:27):
uh yeah, yeah, yeah, I like Marvel. Have not seen
Loki yet, but planning on doing so. And you're right, Joel, like,
it's this whole different world that you can enter and
the lessons that you can learn. I mean when I
saw wand Division, I was so I was like, oh,

(48:51):
this is a story about holding your pain, this is
a story about recovering from grief, and it was so
it was like I did not expect it to be
that profound in that aspect, but that, to me, it's like,
how can you not call this art well? And then

(49:13):
through the lens of what I've JUMBD is like depression TV,
which is the shows you like that shows you think
into when you're like, I don't really want to think
too much, and I want to know what happens to
the end, so there's no scary bad surprises. That's what
this thing come is. And and so took us through
that lens and and again through the scope of like
how Americans viewed themselves throughout each decade, and then using

(49:35):
that as a template for how we evolve through our
Greek like it's so good that, yeah, it is brilliant,
it's so true. Yeah, I've enjoyed, you know, the m
CU world and and yeah, no, I'm totally like, yeah,
Joel Preach, you are pre Someone in Variety said, you know,

(49:58):
sometimes Marvel has a challenge being more than the sum
of its parts. And by that they mean at the
end of each Marvel property, whether it's a film or
television show or whatever, even in the comic books, you
have to set up for the next thing because it
is ongoing. The end is not the goal. It's always
about pushing onto the next storyline. And so to that point, like,

(50:19):
as much as I love One Division, there's absolutely really
good critique about the way that show ends, And like
you basically mind kidnaps people for months at a time,
and all they did was look at you me and
she's like, wow, that's really awful and then escaped. Right, Well,
not a lot for consequences, but again the joint in

(50:40):
having something that's that ongoing, and it almost almost feels
like the origins of oral storytelling, right if you look
at old societies, before we're writing things down, we were
constantly telling and retelling the stories. And that's all to
me anyway, that comic book characters have sort of become
America's oral storytelling, this idea of gonna keep reusing these

(51:01):
same superheroes to analyze where we are as a culture
in this moment. And I also know that because these
stories are constantly evolving, no character fully escapes the flaws
that occurred in their previous mentioned Right, you can rewrite
in in a form in a later iteration, you can

(51:22):
rewrite what has happened. You can, and by rewrite it,
I mean you can actually give consequences. You can explain
away things that don't quite make sense. Star Wars did
this really well with like why were Stormtrooper a shot?
They have all this armor on and get shot, just
fall down and it's like it didn't go through, It's
just a blast pattern on your armor. It's not making
sense to me, right, So they were like, well, when

(51:44):
the Empire took over the Clones and started kidnapping children
to become soldiers, you know, they didn't put as much
money and thought into the armor, and so now they
just go down. It's just it's cheap because the Empire
doesn't care about people. They're replaceable. Well, now it all
makes sense and I lost the old versions and still
love it. And that's what I love about fandom. Like

(52:06):
to me, I just I'm so enamored with fandom, groups
of people coming together to try to tell stories. It
expands beyond what is cannon and goes into you know,
fan fiction goes into things that have been retired that
people individually have not let go and then rebirth. It's
just and to me, it's the core essence of what

(52:27):
makes storytelling so good and lovely and fun and full
of like escape. And as much as I think it's
important that we be present and active and and try
to make our world in our neighborhoods better, I also
understand the absolute essential necessity of escape. And to me,
Marvel is one of the greatest escapes. Like I love
sinking away into a good Marvel piece. I love that

(52:48):
weekly like going into my comic book store and having
waited four weeks for the new issue to come out.
I can see a new episode of Loki and be
like blown away by what all the people have put
into this show and made. I just think, I just
think it's really beautiful. I mean he's said that. Myles,
who I love, was like, no, they just want the
chore back and makes no sense. Yeah, this is much

(53:11):
more in keeping with the philosophy of the show than
our conversation at the end of last week when we're
just like, yeah, I haven't seen a dude of you,
all right, well whatever, yeah, no, everything, Like these characters
are hugely important archetypes in like probably as important as

(53:31):
like our presidents. Like everything you need to know about
American conservatism you can learn from Batman. Like there's there's
a reason we keep returning to the same characters over
and over and the people who keep returning to them
over and over keep making so much fucking money off
of it. Is because they occupy a very central role

(53:54):
in like the collective consciousness of of the country. So
they're important. It's important to think about them. I do
wanna just briefly get to another I think important archetype
in the collective unconscious, which is monsters and the monsters
that we're into because so Luca, the Pixar movie was

(54:17):
seen by the equivalent of a hundred and sixty million
dollars worth of box office of eyeballs on Disney Plus.
So that's one that will be streaming in the coming
months and you know, evaluating how it relates to the zeitgeist.
But I finally watched the last kind of streaming movie

(54:39):
to be watched by that many people, which was Army
of the Dead on Netflix, which is a Zack Snyder
zombie movie, which is has a lot of like zombie cliche,
is a lot of cool zombie deaths, a lot of
rotting flesh, and then they put it all on the
skeleton of a heist movie, which makes it fun. A

(55:02):
Vegas heist movie. You know, you it gives you everything
you expect like from a Zack Snyder movie, secondhand embarrassment.
The movie climaxes with the Cranberry song zombie uh played
like Ernest as Buck. But I I think zombie so zombies.
We we've talked before. There's a cultural theory that zombies

(55:25):
represent like how liberal Americans view Republicans as like this
sort of mindless, droning hoard of like crowds that are
coming for you, and I I think there's some truth
to that. I think that this movie kind of makes

(55:47):
sense of that. And it also like, you know, we've
had the zombie movies in malls which are like sort
of the ultimate symbol of or where the ultimate symbol
of consumerism, and Vegas is a pretty get symbol of
consumerism too. Wow. Yeah, but I do feel like zombies

(56:08):
are going to like now that we've had the January
six failed insurrection and like just seeing the violence and
havoc that conservative masses can cause. I do feel like
we probably have a zombie movies have a bright future
in in the country. That's so interesting, Jack's I was

(56:30):
thinking almost the exact opposite, not because of you know,
from a political standpoint, they make it like a really
good symbol I mean truly throughout the history of cinema,
but because we're straight coming out of the pandemic and
I wonder how we're going to want to or if
we'll want to explore the spread of disease in that way.

(56:52):
You know, there if we look at like post nineteen
twenties Spanish flu era, all art that comes out after that,
it's like far away, removed from anything. Don't talk about
it passed, too many people died, were too scarred. Leave
it alone. So I don't know. We we've already seen
a couple of people during the pandemic trying to make

(57:14):
movies about the pandemic that happenedly gone well, uh, not
of time to process what was happening. So but I
have a feeling that we're going to want to and
and given the recent success of shows like ted Lasso,
really lean hard into like positive, upbeat sort of things.

(57:35):
At least my guess of what studios will be wanting
to purchase. Maybe on the indie circuit will have a
nineteen seventies era movement of independent people thing no, this
is the truth and you need to hear it. Uh.
And here's great movies, which would be great. I would
really appreciate it. Yeah, how does it feel when you
have you when you guys watch shows that reference the pandemic?

(57:57):
How does this sit with you? Usually pandering sort of
it's how I feel like, I'm like, oh, it's really
so sad what we're going through, and it's awful. It's
so hard, but like love is there, so we're gonna
be all right. This temporary uh seems to be the
same message from everybody, as opposed to sort of how
I've experienced pandemic, which was either I mean I don't

(58:20):
live alone, but still very isolated from the rest of
the world, and or like horrified at the lack of
control I have with how bad things are being handled
around me. You know, you're literally locked into your box
watching everyone make horrifying decisions, you know, watching people who
are really enjoyed our company, like go to vineyards and stuff,

(58:40):
and like, what are you doing? It is June. You
should be in the house, for sure. We're still watching groceries.
Like this is very scary, please come home. Yeah. I
definitely don't feel like anyone has had anything artistic or
interesting to reveal about what we lift through. The best

(59:01):
thing I've read about this pandemic is like a book
from the I think is like the fifties Camus. I
think it's called The Plague, But I read that in
the early days and like that felt like it was
very poignant and very Uh. Didn't feel like shitty, like
the way that like people trying to talk about this

(59:23):
current pandemic feels where it's you know, because it's about
a different thing, because it's about a different plague, but
it's still like covering a lot of the same stuff
Army of the Dead, like even though it had some
of those things like one of So there's a camp
of people who are basically migrants from like fleeing Vegas,

(59:44):
and they're like held and tested with a temperature gun frequently,
and like that's a I think a reference to, you know,
the temperature guns that we all got familiar with during
the pandemic. But it never really like felt like it
was overtly like trying to comment on the pandemic in

(01:00:05):
any way, which I think was good. Like we've had
zombie movies for long before. And as far as I know,
you don't pass COVID nineteen by biting someone on the arm,
but I can't. I can't say for sure. Hmm, how
about you do you have you like has that bothered
you at all? Yeah, it kind of has. I remember

(01:00:27):
I was watching an episode of Grey's Anatomy, and I
usually full disclosure, I usually do not watch Grey's Anatomy
because it hits too close to home and I over
analyze things. But a friend of mine reached out to
me it was like, you need to watch this one
specific episode from season blah blah blah, like I need

(01:00:47):
and anyways, they it's like, yeah, they they make the episode.
So it's like, these are people living in the pandemic
and da da da da, and I don't know. It
was kind of like, come on, like I don't, like
I want to not I'm watching this because I don't
want to, like I'm trying to escape, right, So it's

(01:01:08):
like you're bringing it back in. It's like, I know,
the pandemic has like shown very clearly, like the disparities
in our social structures and health care outcomes and all
this stuff. But yeah, it's just sort of like I
could feel my body kind and tightening a little bit
because I was just it was like, yeah, a reminder
of the reality. But I mean, you know, maybe that,

(01:01:32):
you know, maybe that's not the worst thing in the world,
that we're being reminded of our reality, but that's not
usually why I turn on Netflix, you know, right, Yeah, totally.
I also feel like the commercials from early in the pandemic.
There's like this now more than ever aesthetic that I
just like can't that's true. I can't help but like

(01:01:55):
associate any pandemic based thing with anyways, Yeah, Army of
the Dead five stars worth watching. It sounds like low
key five stars worth watching, all these things worth watching. Well, Prianka,
it's been such a pleasure having you on the daily Zeitgeist. Oh,
thank you, it's it's been a it's been a blast.

(01:02:15):
Thank you so much for having me. Where can people
find you and follow you? And? Yeah? Yeah, so um,
I actually I am co host of my own podcast.
It's called Hypochondriactor. It's with me and Sean Hayes, and
every week we interview a celebrity with a medical illness.
So we just interviewed Dex Shepherd for this week, and

(01:02:38):
so you can find me on that. I'm also on
Twitter at Wallyprianca and Instagram and Facebook and all the
all those social media feeds that are making the world
a better place. There you go, and is there a
tweet or some of the work of social media you've
been enjoying. Yeah, actually I found this tweet that is

(01:02:59):
from Aimes the Tang and he says, my mom said,
we should speak tie in public so we don't get
targeted for speaking Mandarin. And I think it's so sweet
that she's nice enough to believe that these stupid, fucking
racists can differentiate between Asian languages. Idealist Joel, where can

(01:03:23):
people find you? And what's a tweet you've been enjoying?
You guys know me. I'm Joel Monique. You can find
me all over the internet. Ageal Monique. That's j O
E l E m O n I q u E.
A tweet I've been enjoying comes from Franklin Leonard. If
you don't know him, he started the Blacklist, which is
a bunch of screens plays that couldn't be produced. Uh
he featured them and now every year one of them

(01:03:44):
wins an Academy Award. It's incredible. Uh So his tweet
goes like this, surprise, when you asked me for names
of black writers to partner with a senior white screenwriter
to tell a black story, I'm going to suggest that
the white screenwriters step aside and do everything in their
power to make sure that the black writer succeeds and
get so low credit. This is a man walking his

(01:04:05):
walk and talking his talk and actively using his power
to put people who are just in franchise, who would
often then be asked like, oh, help me with the
script and then get no credit. That means your name
is not on the awards when they get announced. It
means when you go into interview for the next writing job,
they're gonna ask you what he did, and basically all
you can say is I punched it up, and they're
gonna consider that not having written the script at all.

(01:04:28):
It is horrible to constantly ask people of color to
come in and support your projects because you want to
make sure that you're not being offensive. Don't do that.
Just give them the money and tell them to go
write the story. Is that easy. You are probably still
going to get a producer credit and still make your money.
Everyone could be making money. Don't be greedy, and don't

(01:04:48):
take black people's perspectives just because you know it's popular
right now. It's dumb and annoying. The power to Franklin
Leonard for for being that person and making the change
he wants to see. One of the greats. Former guests
on Daily's I guess tweet I've been enjoying at brow
tweeting tweeted Bear robbing a bank, stick him up, Teller

(01:05:10):
raised his hands, Bear nervous, how did you get so big? Uh?
And then Iris at just Underscore Iris tweeted, I was
today years old when I realized rumba is an anagram
of a broom and that just just blew my mind.

(01:05:31):
You can find me on Twitter at Jack Underscore O'Brien,
you can find us on Twitter at Daily Zeitgeist. We're
at the Daily Zeitgeist on Instagram. We have a Facebook
fan page and a website, daily zeitgeist dot com, where
we post our episode and our foot no where we
link off to the information that we talked about in
today's episode, as well as a song that we think

(01:05:53):
you might enjoy. And today with Miles out, super producer
Anna Hosnier is providing the song we recommend, which is
Ditch by Empire Me, So Ditch by Empire Me. We
will link off to that in the footnotes. The Daily
Zeitgeist is a production of I Heart Radio. For more
podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app,

(01:06:16):
Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorites shows
us gonna do it for us this morning, but we
will be back this afternoon to tell you what's trending,
and we'll talk to you all day. Bye. By