May 27, 2024 • 36 mins
The best of the Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show Hour 3.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thank you for listening. This is the best of with
Clay Travis and Buck Sexton.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
I think the big Tech hearing has been a result
in not very much other than soundbites.
Speaker 3 (00:11):
But let's talk about it. Let's get into some of this.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
I mean the big headline right now Clay is lawmaker saying, quote,
you have blood on your hands to text CEOs. I
mean that's a pretty pretty intense allegation. It's pretty severe.
So let's see what they say.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Here we go.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
We have Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, and yeah, here he
is saying that social media doesn't Actually this is cut
one harm teen health play it.
Speaker 4 (00:40):
With so much of our lives spent on mobile devices
and social media, it's important to look into the effects
on team mental health and wellbeing. I take this very seriously.
Mental health is a complex issue, and the existing body
of scientific work has not shown a cause a link
between using social media and young people having worse mental
health outcome. A recent National Academies of Science report evaluated
(01:04):
over three hundred studies and found that research quote did
not support the conclusion that social media causes changes in
adolescent mental health at the population level.
Speaker 5 (01:13):
End quote.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Okay, Clay A few things.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Just let me give you a few of the headline
takeaways here from CNN as we dive into this, Senator
Lindsay Graham quote, the dark side of social media products
is too great to live with. This is also from CNN.
Senator Amy Klobash are visibly upset while questioning CEOs, and
then they've got a South Carolina lawmakers suing Instagram after
(01:39):
his son died by suicide. It goes through this at
some length. Okay, I got a few things here that
I want to do you. One is one of these
legislature legislators suggesting be done. And two, can we have
a conversation about how tech platforms are largely information dissemination vehicles.
(02:05):
The same way that you know, you could use a
phone and threaten someone's life, and you could make them depressed,
and you could, you know, do psychological damage to them.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Social media can do the same thing.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
So I think there has to be some specificity in
this conversation about what they want to do about it
and how they think there's a way forward.
Speaker 6 (02:25):
I've spent a lot of time thinking about this again
as a as.
Speaker 5 (02:29):
A parent, and in my own experience.
Speaker 6 (02:34):
So buck, I I think my thesis in general is
that you're in mind generation and you're basically my generation,
even though you're a millennial and I'm the.
Speaker 5 (02:44):
Last year at gen X.
Speaker 6 (02:46):
We grew up by and large in an earrow without
the internet in our early youth in terms of an
all encompassing way, and but we're old, but we were
not so old that we didn't understand how the Internet worked.
So I feel like we're kind of a bridge generation
because people who are older than us. Let's say you're
(03:09):
listening to us right now and you're sixty or older,
the Internet came along long after you were grown, and
so you know, it's just kind of something that you
layered on. And I think in general that's more complicated.
But I feel like we kind of had the perfect
raising in the eighties and the nineties where you had
(03:29):
a real world raising but you weren't immersed online. But
then you understood as you became a teenager or got
older in your twenties and thirties, how the Internet worked.
And I think that's so healthy because I see people
now that and I think about it not only for
my kids, but also we have a lot of I
still consider them kids at some point you get older
(03:50):
and you start thinking, anybody in their twenties still kind
of a kid, right, college kids I call them whatever.
They have grown up entirely online.
Speaker 3 (04:00):
And I don't think it's again, I just come back
to it.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
It's not.
Speaker 6 (04:03):
In my opinion, it is not a coincidence that mental
health fell off a cliff right as social media took root.
And part of it is not just social media, buck,
it's the combination of social media and for those of
you watching on video, I'm holding up my phone right now,
is social media and a computer in your pocket, because
it is I think impossible to recognize how much life
(04:28):
has changed with phones. Some of it's for the better, right,
I mean, my favorite thing about my phone is probably Uber, honestly,
because the idea that if you ever tried to get
a taxicab back in the nineties and much of America
was almost impossible. I mean, like, you couldn't get a
taxicab in Nashville unless you were coming out of a
bar at two am and they were just lined up there.
You couldn't get a ride anywhere. So the idea that
(04:49):
I can just be on a corner and I can
get a car in five minutes and it's reasonable cost
is amazing to me. But the way that people define
them based on the uh, social media universe, it's scary.
I just and and I think it's toxic.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
I think it.
Speaker 6 (05:10):
I think social media is the cigarettes of our generation.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
So so so here's what I what I want to know.
And I there's so many parents listening.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
If you have.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Strong thoughts on this issue. Remember this is given what's
going on in the world. Congress or the sentence holding
this hearing today on Capitol Hill. Mark Zuckerberg is there.
I mean they're bringing in it's it's I'm trying to
find all.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
The different.
Speaker 2 (05:34):
Like everybody, everybody, it's all the big tech CEOs. It's
the CEOs of Meta, TikTok, Snap, discord x formerly known
as Twitter, all of this right, And and here's what
I what I see though, is well, you don't want
to ban social media, okay, because there's actually a lot
of good and a lot of companies and a lot
of things that rely on different social media applications. You know. Uh,
(06:00):
that's I think one part of it. And ultimately, I
feel like this is up to parents. If you're talking
about protecting kids when it comes to social media. It's
really up to parents for the most part. I'm not
saying there aren't things that maybe could be done. I'm sure,
although I want to hear what the specifics are.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
What should be done.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Will I think that, you know, Clay, you said you
let you don't let your son on social media untill
he sixteen?
Speaker 3 (06:23):
Right?
Speaker 2 (06:23):
I mean for me, that seems reason that, that seems
about right. I don't think thirteen year olds need to
be on social media. I definitely don't think ten year
olds need to be on social media. I think that
people and I see this, and I'm not a parent,
I know, but I'm an observant fellow people use iPads
as like stand in babysitters instead of human beings. There's
(06:44):
way too much of that going on, you know. I
just see this increasingly as it's about parenting. I mean,
some of these arguments were made about television. They were
certainly made about video games. Oh, video games will rot
your brain unless you're Elon Musk, who stays up until
four am playing video games many nights and is the
richest guy in the world and is changing the world
we live in, right, Like, you know, it's all about balance.
(07:07):
It's all about having boundaries and understanding. And I think
that on social media, for example, you know, first of all,
I would assume is this the case. Parents should all
have all the passwords and full access to anyone under
eighteen social media period, full stop.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
Right. So that's one thing.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
And I don't know how easy it is to set
that up, but I would assume that that's possible to
do right, so you can see every interaction, everything that's
going on. That's a safety thing as much as it
is also a mental health thing.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
I don't know what I mean, Like, what do you
think needs to be done right?
Speaker 2 (07:36):
Because right now Lindsey Graham yelling about how social media
companies have blood on your hands.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
Is hysterical theatrics.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
It's, oh, you know, I'm making such a big deal
of It's okay, lindsay, what.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
Do you want to do?
Speaker 6 (07:48):
So my yeah, my thought would be And I'm not
claiming that I'm some kind of an expert on this,
although I am active in media, I am active on
social media. I think I understand it better than the
average parent would. We don't get phones for our kids
until they are fourteen. Some people will say that's too early.
Some people will say that's too late. Fourteen seems to
(08:11):
me like a reasonable age where a kid could have
access to a phone, and a lot of that is
to help with him, and frankly, I like to be
able to know where he is. But so fourteen, social
media at sixteen. So and I'm not telling other parents
what they should do. I'm saying what my wife and
(08:32):
I have decided to do with our kids. I think
you shouldn't be able to have a social media account
until you are, honestly sixteen at their earliest. And I
think that the Metas of the world and the twitters
of the world and you should have to establish how
old you are legitimately to be able to get on
(08:55):
to have a social media account.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
When I was like a freshman in high school, if
I had had the ability to talk to girls of
my own age on I don't think I would. I
would have failed Algebra two, you know, I would have
done anything else right, So we were lucky in the
sense that you didn't have these constant, you know, social
interaction tools that aren't real. The other part, it's not
(09:18):
real social interaction, that's the problem. It is in the
sense that you're talking to people but it's not in
the sense that real human beings in person is still special.
It's still more worthwhile. Yeah, and even remember the telephone.
It was a big deal. I bary a lot of
you out there, Remember the Star six ' nine era.
If you had a brother or sister, somebody was always
(09:38):
on the phone. But mom and dad could always pick
up the phone and know who it was, or mom
and dad could answer the phone.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
And there was something to.
Speaker 6 (09:45):
Be said for being a boy or a girl calling
another boy or a girl and having to talk to
a parent in order to be able to be on the.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Phone with them.
Speaker 6 (09:53):
And you knew again mom and dad could pick that
phone up at any point, or your brother and your
sister could right there a interaction associated with it. And
what I would just say in general is when you
are a teenager, everybody is racked with self doubt, you're growing,
you're changing. Instagram in particular, to me, is so fake.
(10:15):
It is everybody's best photo that they've ever taken. It
is everybody's best vacation that they've ever taken. And if
you're a fourteen year old girl, and whoever the prettiest
fourteen year old girl is in your class, or the
richest fourteen year old girl and she has the best clothes,
and she has the best friends, and she has the
best trips. I can see how if you're constantly forced
(10:39):
to marinate in somebody else.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
Remember, it's not the real world that somebody else officially. Yeah, yeah,
they're artificial, somebody else's fantasy.
Speaker 6 (10:47):
And then you see if there are six kids that
you thought you were friends with and they all go
to the mall, or they all go to your movie
and they post it. I don't think it's coincidental that
teen mental health has collapsed at the exact same time
that phones and social media, because I.
Speaker 3 (11:03):
Do think they're connected.
Speaker 6 (11:04):
Everybody's got them in their pocket, and buck to your point,
you can't escape. You know, if you were a kid
and you didn't like school and there are a lot
of people out there, you might have to be there
from seven o'clock to two thirty or whatever it is.
But then you get home and you can have your
own life outside of that world.
Speaker 3 (11:20):
It never ends.
Speaker 6 (11:21):
You're always snapchatting, you're always on group text, you're always interacting.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
You can't think of develop as a real person. You
think about the pressure to create. What is effectively your
own individual brand online, right, Everyone now is a brand
in the online social media world, whether you think of
yourself that way or not. It's here's my best fishing photos.
I'm like, here's me with my family, and like, look,
ask you who my dog is. And we're all anyone
who's using social media. So cryber audience isn't on it all,
(11:49):
by the way, congratulations list in the radio. They're like, yeah,
I don't mess with any of that stuff. So you
guys are and gals are ahead of the curve.
Speaker 6 (11:55):
But you're the people who are not smoking, you know
in nineteen forty when everybody else was smoking all day long.
Speaker 5 (12:01):
Every day.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Yeah, So you know, I think.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
I think that this is it's just a bigger conversation
with more facets than just you know, Ben TikTok and
like Facebook should be able to be sued and repeal
section two thirty.
Speaker 3 (12:18):
The people who say repealed section two thirty.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
The problem is with this is if if you think
that that's going to mean that all of a sudden
they're going to be these benevolent actors one of these
social media companies, it just means they're gonna crack down
even more actually they're gonna have even stricter and more
arbitrary guidelines that they're using, and they're gonna say, sorry,
we got to avoid getting we got to avoid being sued.
(12:43):
So it's not as easy as just repealing section two thirty.
I know that's a common refrain for people. This is
a complicated thing and humanity has never faced this before.
And I would add this as we go to break,
We'll take some of your calls eight hundred and two
A two two eight A two. Particularly parents, I'm interested
from a lot of your kids are way smarter.
Speaker 6 (13:01):
With tech than we are, right the parents. My oldest son,
my wife put up parental safeguards trying to limit how
much he could use certain websites, and he knew almost
instantaneously how to get around the guards. I mean, he
is more sophisticated and native to the space. So even
(13:22):
if you are this is where I would say buck,
even if you're a super engaged parent, and even if
you are a parent that is really on top of
what your kids are doing online. They are smarter than
you about using that in the same way that whatever
you were into when your parent when you were sixteen
and your parents were you know, forty five, whatever you
were doing then, that was smarter than your parents. They're
(13:45):
doing that now, except it's with tech, and so it is.
I think it's the most challenging single part of parenting
today by far.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
You're listening to the best of Claye Travis and Buck Sexton.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
I've been getting a bit of heat because of my
stance on the movie Oppenheimer, which even some of our
esteemed patriot scholar listeners, some of them seemed to disagree.
Speaker 3 (14:11):
With me on a lot of them.
Speaker 2 (14:14):
A lot of you agree with me that Oppenheimer was
long and boring and kind of a whitewash of the
threat of communism. The idea that, oh, well, we have nukes,
so now the Soviets should have nukes too, because that
will be parody because you know, everyone's the same. That's insane.
It was a horrible, insane idea, and people betrayed their country,
(14:34):
including some people who had been given refuge in this
country from other places, in order to give that parody.
But anyway, put that aside, the most important thing is
that it was just boring, and the middle part of
it was okay, but the first hour and the third
hour really bad. And people can disagree with me on that,
but that just means they're wrong. Now, Clay, you saw
Dune two and you were a big fan, A plus fantastic.
(14:59):
Everyone should it.
Speaker 6 (15:01):
Yes, I went with my sixteen year old yesterday, who
has read the Dune books.
Speaker 5 (15:06):
I have not.
Speaker 6 (15:08):
He read the Dune books. We watched this weekend. I
think I told you, guys, I somehow missed it. In
twenty twenty one with the kids and everything else, I
used to see every movie that came out. I haven't
seen Oppenheimer, I haven't seen Barbie. I haven't seen any
of these things that everybody's watching. I barely can keep
up with the sports now, so I had not seen it.
This weekend, he said, Dad, I think you'll like it.
(15:29):
We watched June one. Dune two is fabulous, and I
didn't even realize it feels as I watch it like
George Lucas for Star Wars used a ton of the
Dune story as part of the inspiration. Even Tattowin compared
to the desert planet that starts with Luke Skywalker on
(15:51):
it it even, I mean, it's amazing how much he borrowed.
And again that's how culture works. You see something, you
build something new. But it's amazing how much he borrowed
from the books Dune to create Star Wars and the
way it's being watched now. A lot of people are saying, oh,
Dune looks like Star Wars.
Speaker 5 (16:09):
No, no, No.
Speaker 6 (16:09):
Dune was the beginning part of the inspiration I think
for Star Wars, but chronologically, because the Star Wars movies
were made before these Dune movies, it feels like that
dude is borrowing from Star Wars instead of vice versa.
Speaker 2 (16:24):
I'm glad we get to talk about this because occasionally,
especially for people who have listened to me for a
very long time now going on thirteen years, I'm accused
of being grumpy about movies and saying that all movies suck.
That is not true. Dune one is a very good movie.
You and I liked it too.
Speaker 5 (16:40):
I had not seen it.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
Fantastic Dune one is a fantastic movie for what it is.
I'm sure I haven't seen it yet because Carrot doesn't
like sci fi. You know, nobody's perfect, but I'm I'm
sure I'm going to like Dune two. You and I
both like Top Gun Maverick. I thought all quiet all
the Western Front The Net, which was released on Netflix,
was a phenomenal World War One movie like that I
call them like I see him just I know that
(17:03):
it got seven oscars. Oppenheimer is a trash movie and
it's way too, way too favorable to comis in my opinion,
because that was actually a big problem for me.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
You're listening to the best of Clay Trapps and Buck Sexton.
Speaker 6 (17:17):
I want to start with a story that for some
of you out there may not be on the top
of your radar, and you may not be thinking about
what the impact of this may be. But as we
come into twenty twenty four, and I bet your kids
and grandkids become more and more active in experiencing it online,
(17:40):
I want to talk about what's going on with a
AI artificial intelligence. The growth that we are seeing there
and the degree Buck, to me, of what I am
seeing is just a sort of a recapitulation of all
of the flaws that existed in so social media now
(18:01):
being created and impacted in AI. In the same way
that every social media site, whether it's Facebook, Instagram, Twitter
on some way designs an algorithm by a human that
determines what you do and do.
Speaker 5 (18:16):
Not see AI.
Speaker 6 (18:18):
There's a scary, ridiculous, somewhat maybe a little bit funny,
but also terrifying story of what's going on with Google's
AI service. Buck and I know we were talking about
this off air, so I know you've seen it too. Basically,
they designed it so there's no way that you can
get an image of a white person, no matter what
(18:40):
your prompt of request is. And for those of you
out there who are not familiar with AI at all,
trying to explain it in just a couple of sentences,
it's a video or image based version of search, also
very strong textually, but it's moving more and more into
(19:01):
imagery and videos, and the idea is basically, you give
it a prompt. For instance, with Google, where they were
using this and being able to expose its flaws, it
was saying, hey, Google, give me a picture of the pope,
and the pope pictures that AI were returning were all
minority figures. If you asked for a Viking a picture
(19:25):
of a Viking, the people that you were getting back
were black Vikings, obviously, who did not exist. If you
asked for pictures of the founding fathers, they were giving
you pictures back of some black people sitting at the
table with the founding fathers. And I would guess Buck
that the intent here is to avoid being racist, and
(19:50):
they wrote in code which basically made it impossible for
a white person to be revealed when it was making
when you were getting the prompts. To me, that's maybe
somewhat a little funny also scary, but to a larger
context when when you know that kids growing up today
(20:12):
are going to be using this as a default Google
search instead of the way Google works now. You type
in you know, hotel on South Beach or something, and
you get a bunch of different hotels that would show
up as the link. Or you type in you know
who was the eighth President of the United States, and
you get a prompt that allows you to go click
(20:33):
on links. You're not actually going and reading and discovering
the information from your request.
Speaker 5 (20:40):
It's being given to you.
Speaker 6 (20:42):
Search is being created more powerfully than maybe it ever
has been before, and it's making these algorithms even more powerful,
and so as a result, they are now stopping the
Google search. Buck on ai, But are you troubled by this?
Because I think it could be a huge story for
(21:03):
twenty twenty four and all of these AI woke ified.
I would say algorithms are going to artificially distort the
real reality in a similar way that I think we
have seen with social media, and I think that's going
to be the challenge.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
Yeah, what they're saying about this is that it's an
over correction, right. They're saying that they were trying to
make sure that racist things didn't happen, and so they
made it so that there are no you're not getting
any images of anyone who is white. But this also
is occurring in a broader context, Right, There's something else
(21:43):
that's going on here. I mean I think everyone has
seen now, particularly the last few years, but it stretches
back for about a decade that diversity and inclusion is
effectively a religious belief that people feel there is a
need to fill our society, our history, everything with the
tenets of diversity and inclusion, especially anything that has to
(22:07):
do with with pop culture. I mentioned before on this show,
I watched you know, I like anything that has vikings
in it, and I should note that there were there
were some people that did a Viking search, and sure enough,
the vikings were, you know, people of of dark dark skin,
and and that's a bit unusual, right, I mean, historically
(22:29):
that would not be accurate. And the reality here is
when they were doing the Netflix show, when they were
trying to get people interested in I guess the beginnings
of I think it's Viking, I forget what the full
title is, Viking something or other Clay. They cast a
(22:50):
black woman as a tenth century Viking yaarl or kind
of like an earl or a king who really existed.
So this stuff is already happening, meaning that there's the
rewriting of history and pop culture with people who are
being depicted as non white. And it's in that context
(23:13):
that when you have an AI machine that is doing this,
everyone starts to feel like, is it I mean, okay,
this went too far, but is it really a mistake?
Is diversity and meaning from their end, is diversity and
inclusion a part of the algorithm, such that they're going
to try to create more inclusiveness throughout history, and they're
going to try to elevate some things. The whole notion
(23:35):
of a neutral algorithm from the beginning, really the earliest
days of Google is really a fiction, just like editorial
lines at newspapers being neutral is a fiction, and I
think this goes toward everyone understanding that better.
Speaker 6 (23:47):
Yeah, and I would say this is a natural outgrowth
of Hamilton, which decided, Hey, we're going to put minority
characters into the role of historical characters, which then was
followed by what is the show Bridgerton that they make
such a big deal about, Hey, this is a story
about eighteenth century England, but the race of the characters
(24:07):
really doesn't matter at all, which is a form of
color blindness which you're not supposed to do, which is
its own interesting story we've talked about on this show.
Speaker 5 (24:15):
Buck Hannibal.
Speaker 6 (24:17):
I believe they're making a movie with Denzel Washington playing Hannibal,
which is not accurately reflected obviously of what his skin
color would have been, so Leopatra. I think they just
did recently and it did horrible. It did horribly on Netflix.
No one want to watch it.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
I would just add my issue with Look, you and
I both love Denzel Washington as an actor. I think
he's one of the best living actors today and with
one of the most impressive bodies of work, I think
he may be a fantastic Hannibal.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
I actually don't really have.
Speaker 5 (24:45):
An issue with it.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
My issue is I want people to at least understand
or want people to be taught that Carthage, those the
Carthaginians were not North Africans in the way we think
of them now, which would be predominantly sort of olive
skinned Muslim, right, I mean, or you know, tan complexion Muslims.
(25:06):
They were white, They were Greeks. Effectively, they would have
looked very much like the Greeks looked, or like the
Romans looked. And as long as people understand that history,
I have less of in it.
Speaker 3 (25:16):
But very few people do.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
And so when you start introducing these things into the
popular culture, it erases the historical reality. And I think
some of that is intentional. And I was somebody who
said early on, I think Hamilton is a very honestly
kind of a strange premise in a lot of ways.
Speaker 5 (25:33):
To keep in mind, the only white.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
Person in it is the King of England, who's terrible, right,
who's like the bad guy, which I think if you
did that in any other context, people would recognize that's
that make them feel little bit uncomfortable. But I also
just thought it wasn't good and what bothered me and
I really mean that as a piece of art, I
didn't think it was good. And what bothered me was
I actually thought it was crap, but that you were supposed.
Speaker 3 (25:55):
To say it was good.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
Like if you didn't say it was good, there was
something wrong with you. That felt very Soviet to me. Right,
it felt like everyone has to stand and clap because
Stalin likes the symphony.
Speaker 6 (26:05):
I also would say I'm not aware, and I would
I would love if somebody did know this. Is there
any other country in the world that is obsessed with
making historical characters a different race than they would otherwise be?
In other words, if you're making a movie in India
right now and you're doing a story about Indian history,
(26:28):
would there be any call in what they call Bollywood
to come back in and cast someone who is historically
Indian and a different race.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Well, you also get to clay history is often very
non inclusive, right, I mean, if you're going to go
back in history and look for great female leadership two
thousand years ago, you can find it here and there,
but there's not going to be a lot of it, right.
Speaker 6 (26:54):
Joan of arc Cleopatra. I mean there's like two or
three characters right, I said fifteen.
Speaker 3 (26:59):
Hundred years ago.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
But yeah, if you go back far enough, what you'll
find is that a lot of history is actually quite exclusionary.
You could even argue mankind was predatory against mankind, and
there was no effort made to balance things out. And
so if you're looking at what actually happened, who discovered stuff,
who conquered stuff, who found stuff, it's not going to
(27:24):
be what the sociology department at Brown University wants it
to be. And that's a challenge that they're always going
to face, which is why I think there's such an
obsession with making, you know, a tenth century Viking earl
a black woman. There were no black women who were
tenth century Viking earls.
Speaker 6 (27:43):
Western civilization triumph. Thankfully, it's why we all have democracy, republics, freedom,
freedom of speech. All those things are good, good cultural appropriation.
Here's a kind of summing it up. And I'm open
to your calls because some of you out there probably
are far more sophisticated in terms of your AI knowledge
than either Bucker.
Speaker 5 (28:02):
Myself would be.
Speaker 6 (28:03):
On a scale of one to ten, I'm about a
nine on being concerned right now based on what I'm
seeing about what the impact of these AI algorithms are
going to be, because I think we're finally catching up
buck with Twitter, where Elon Musk is giving us some
form of a free expression site, and I think that
can be very helpful. It took a decade for that
(28:24):
to happen on social media, fifteen years. I don't know
that there's going to be the equivalent in AI. I
hope I'm wrong, but it seems to me like we're
just creating new woker algorithms that could be even more impactful.
Speaker 2 (28:35):
Absolutely, and when you're talking about AI, you're not just
talking about the editorial choice of what to put up
the page. You're talking about the ability to fabricate primary
source material, archival footage, archival photos, all kinds of texts
that would be you know, aged looking, and AI can
(28:59):
make it look real, right, so our perception of the past.
I don't think people should should leave out the possibility
here because I think it's very real that there are
people on the left who would feel ideologically they would
feel righteous in doing their version.
Speaker 3 (29:17):
If you know what the Soviets used.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
To do when they would when they would eliminate something
they kept, you know, pretty detailed records. Sometimes they would
use a razor blade clay to remove the name from
paper because they just figured, you know, we're going to
excize it that way, so it's like it was never
even there. Yeah, you know there's still a hole, right,
but it doesn't matter. It's gone forever. It feels very
(29:39):
Soviet to me that they want to try to change
what our perception of history is because they recognize that
controlling the past gives you power over the narrative of
the present.
Speaker 6 (29:49):
I think everybody out there should be terrified. I'd be
interested in your calls. And again, so many kids. The
power of AI is they're going to blindly accept what
they are told. And that is scary no matter what
the concept is. But I think it's even more so
because at least Google buck gives you the opportunity. When
you do a Google search, you can scroll down. A
lot of people click on the first thing, whatever it is,
(30:12):
but you can scroll down and you can look at
the first seven or eight or even the first page
results and make a choice about the source that you
want to pick.
Speaker 2 (30:19):
Not here, you know, it would be a fascinating ven diagram.
People who enthusiastically masked up people who had Ukraine flags
in their bio, and people who openly loved Hamilton, when
these are all people that do whatever the machine tells
them to do.
Speaker 6 (30:39):
One thing as we go to break here in the
first segment, I want someone smart to do a country
and Western version of the Obama administration, and I want
them to have a white guy playing Obama and see
what the result is. Barack and Michelle Obama country and
Western version. I want white people playing Barack and Michelle
Obama in a country and Western version of their of
(31:00):
their administration, and see what the reaction would be.
Speaker 1 (31:03):
You're listening to the best of Clay Travis and Buck Sexton.
Speaker 5 (31:06):
I didn't see the oscars.
Speaker 6 (31:08):
I was out running around with my family down here,
but I did this weekend Buck watched I want to
give people a movie recommendation.
Speaker 5 (31:18):
And you had already seen this. I had not. I
watched the movie.
Speaker 6 (31:22):
Dune, which is based on the book, and it came
out a couple of years ago. I had not seen it.
My sixteen year old said, Dad, you're really gonna like this.
I think you're really gonna enjoy it. Dune two is
out now in theaters, and Greg on our team said,
he's already seen it.
Speaker 5 (31:39):
Buck.
Speaker 6 (31:39):
As soon as we finish this show, I'm taking my
sixteen year old We're going to watch Dune two at
the Imax. The reviews have been incredible June one, which
again I'm a couple of years behind on watching this.
I somehow missed it during all the chaos of twenty
twenty one. Dune one fabulous movie. You had seen it.
(32:00):
You told me you really liked it too. Word is
this new movie that is out by the way, no
woke angles on it, no like hidden that I can see,
hidden awful messages, just what Hollywood did in the eighties
and the nineties. A really good movie that if your
kids are thirteen or older, you can take them to
(32:21):
go watch it and enjoy it, which is what I
think should be the goal of every movie. Right just
about so, I'm excited. I can't wait. I don't remember
the last time I was this excited to go see
a movie. As soon as we finished the show, I'm
headed to the theater.
Speaker 2 (32:36):
I remember reading the original Dune novel years ago. It's
by many, I think, consider the greatest sci fi novel
ever written, or certainly in the top ten. You know,
people would probably think there's some HG. Well stuff and
other things they would throw in there. But Dune is
an incredibly fun read and.
Speaker 3 (32:54):
Holds up really well.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
And then there are Children of Dune, and there's some
of the follow ups.
Speaker 5 (32:58):
The original movie.
Speaker 2 (33:00):
I remember watching it and thinking to myself, you know,
they could do this, like they could just make movies
again that are supposed to be well executed and entertained.
But Hollywood has become so diluted with its narcissism and
its dei seminars and it's belief that it needs to
(33:21):
be political along with every like deeply political, not just
political partisan, along with everything else in our society. I
think is the big problem. So I actually may go
Carrie's not into sci fi stuff, It's okay, I ever
like to sci fi. I'll probably go see do In
two on my own at some point. I actually think
going to a movie by yourself on an off day
at a random time is great because you really just
(33:42):
get underrated the movie undert eating alone at the bar
at a restaurant underrated. Going to a movie alone when
you really want to see the movie and you've got
a couple of hours and you know you just unlike
eating an ice cream cone alone as a guy apparently
which place that is not okay with? But I would
say it's funny to be his last night I was
for the Oscars. I mean most of those movies I
(34:03):
haven't even seen. Oppenheimer completely dominated the Night Oppenheimer is.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
I'll put aside my.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Historical political objections to it, which are substantial. It's just boring.
It's just boring, Like there's all this stuff about his
private life, and am I really a communist?
Speaker 5 (34:20):
Or what is that?
Speaker 2 (34:21):
You know that's boring. The Robert down Downey Junior stuff
is boring. There's like a middle portion of that movie
it's three hour long movie. I also, I don't want
three hour long movies anymore. I haven't a long time.
It's really hard, with attention spans getting so used to
on demand to have someone sit for three three and
a half hours for anything. I think in one sitting.
You know, That's why The Lord of the Rings was great.
(34:42):
But when you went to see the Hobbit movies, you're like,
this is the first movie. It's like four hours long.
What's going on here? I know there's two more coming
that that wasn't even the director's cut anyway, Oppenheimer. The
middle section where they're testing the bomb and then getting
ready to do that, that's that's well done and interesting.
Speaker 3 (34:56):
But I don't know.
Speaker 2 (34:57):
I actually think after last night, I'm miss to say it,
I think Christopher Nolan might have taken uh, who's the
guy who did pulp Fiction?
Speaker 5 (35:05):
Who's the director Tarantino?
Speaker 2 (35:08):
I think that Christopher Nolan may have taken the crown
from Tarantino as the most overrated.
Speaker 5 (35:12):
Director of all time.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
That's that's how I feel after last night. Yeah, yeah,
I'm just sing today. Yeah, that's that's what because I'm
not a good watch. It's just not fun to watch.
And everyone's like, oh I really liked it. Now you've
been told to like it. It's not very good.
Speaker 6 (35:27):
I didn't see any of the movies that were nominated
for Best Picture this year, and this is Isn't.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
The isn't the Killer Flowers of the Summer Moon? Isn't
it like eight hours long? It's crazy, it's really long.
I didn't see that either. Once I had kids, I
see a lot of kids movies. So if you want
me to know, give a review on kids movies. I
got a funny story for you Buck on the Solo movie.
When I was going out all the time to Fox Sports,
you know, I would stay. For those of you who
know La, there was a hotel that looks over the
(35:53):
Fox lot, right at the intersection of Pico and Motor
and as the Intercontinental Hotel.
Speaker 6 (35:58):
You could walk back and forth. There's also the Westfield
Mall there and they have a great movie theater. So
every now and then I would have time off in
between television shows or whatever else, and I would walk
and go see a movie. I went to go see.
Do you remember Gone Girl? I went to go see
Gone Girl by myself. They changed our filming time. I
had my phone off. They couldn't get in touch with me.
(36:21):
For a Fox Sports television show. Coach Dave Wonstet many
of you will remember, awesome guy was there ready to tape.
They couldn't figure out where I was. And when they
finally got me on, they were like, You're gonna have
to tell coach where you were. He's really fired up
about this, and I was like, well, you gonna have
to tell him that I went to see Gone Girl
by myself at the Westfield Mall and that's why he
was late and there was a pause and they were like,
(36:43):
I think you got to come up with a better
story than that. You can't have gone to see Gone Girl.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
At least you weren't in line alone at the dairy
Queen Clay, that's true.
Thank you for listening. This is the best of with
Clay Travis and Buck Sexton.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
I think the big Tech hearing has been a result
in not very much other than soundbites.
Speaker 3 (00:11):
But let's talk about it. Let's get into some of this.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
I mean the big headline right now Clay is lawmaker saying, quote,
you have blood on your hands to text CEOs. I
mean that's a pretty pretty intense allegation. It's pretty severe.
So let's see what they say.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
Here we go.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
We have Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, and yeah, here he
is saying that social media doesn't Actually this is cut
one harm teen health play it.
Speaker 4 (00:40):
With so much of our lives spent on mobile devices
and social media, it's important to look into the effects
on team mental health and wellbeing. I take this very seriously.
Mental health is a complex issue, and the existing body
of scientific work has not shown a cause a link
between using social media and young people having worse mental
health outcome. A recent National Academies of Science report evaluated
(01:04):
over three hundred studies and found that research quote did
not support the conclusion that social media causes changes in
adolescent mental health at the population level.
Speaker 5 (01:13):
End quote.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Okay, Clay A few things.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Just let me give you a few of the headline
takeaways here from CNN as we dive into this, Senator
Lindsay Graham quote, the dark side of social media products
is too great to live with. This is also from CNN.
Senator Amy Klobash are visibly upset while questioning CEOs, and
then they've got a South Carolina lawmakers suing Instagram after
(01:39):
his son died by suicide. It goes through this at
some length. Okay, I got a few things here that
I want to do you. One is one of these
legislature legislators suggesting be done. And two, can we have
a conversation about how tech platforms are largely information dissemination vehicles.
(02:05):
The same way that you know, you could use a
phone and threaten someone's life, and you could make them depressed,
and you could, you know, do psychological damage to them.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Social media can do the same thing.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
So I think there has to be some specificity in
this conversation about what they want to do about it
and how they think there's a way forward.
Speaker 6 (02:25):
I've spent a lot of time thinking about this again
as a as.
Speaker 5 (02:29):
A parent, and in my own experience.
Speaker 6 (02:34):
So buck, I I think my thesis in general is
that you're in mind generation and you're basically my generation,
even though you're a millennial and I'm the.
Speaker 5 (02:44):
Last year at gen X.
Speaker 6 (02:46):
We grew up by and large in an earrow without
the internet in our early youth in terms of an
all encompassing way, and but we're old, but we were
not so old that we didn't understand how the Internet worked.
So I feel like we're kind of a bridge generation
because people who are older than us. Let's say you're
(03:09):
listening to us right now and you're sixty or older,
the Internet came along long after you were grown, and
so you know, it's just kind of something that you
layered on. And I think in general that's more complicated.
But I feel like we kind of had the perfect
raising in the eighties and the nineties where you had
(03:29):
a real world raising but you weren't immersed online. But
then you understood as you became a teenager or got
older in your twenties and thirties, how the Internet worked.
And I think that's so healthy because I see people
now that and I think about it not only for
my kids, but also we have a lot of I
still consider them kids at some point you get older
(03:50):
and you start thinking, anybody in their twenties still kind
of a kid, right, college kids I call them whatever.
They have grown up entirely online.
Speaker 3 (04:00):
And I don't think it's again, I just come back
to it.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
It's not.
Speaker 6 (04:03):
In my opinion, it is not a coincidence that mental
health fell off a cliff right as social media took root.
And part of it is not just social media, buck,
it's the combination of social media and for those of
you watching on video, I'm holding up my phone right now,
is social media and a computer in your pocket, because
it is I think impossible to recognize how much life
(04:28):
has changed with phones. Some of it's for the better, right,
I mean, my favorite thing about my phone is probably Uber, honestly,
because the idea that if you ever tried to get
a taxicab back in the nineties and much of America
was almost impossible. I mean, like, you couldn't get a
taxicab in Nashville unless you were coming out of a
bar at two am and they were just lined up there.
You couldn't get a ride anywhere. So the idea that
(04:49):
I can just be on a corner and I can
get a car in five minutes and it's reasonable cost
is amazing to me. But the way that people define
them based on the uh, social media universe, it's scary.
I just and and I think it's toxic.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
I think it.
Speaker 6 (05:10):
I think social media is the cigarettes of our generation.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
So so so here's what I what I want to know.
And I there's so many parents listening.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
If you have.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Strong thoughts on this issue. Remember this is given what's
going on in the world. Congress or the sentence holding
this hearing today on Capitol Hill. Mark Zuckerberg is there.
I mean they're bringing in it's it's I'm trying to
find all.
Speaker 3 (05:32):
The different.
Speaker 2 (05:34):
Like everybody, everybody, it's all the big tech CEOs. It's
the CEOs of Meta, TikTok, Snap, discord x formerly known
as Twitter, all of this right, And and here's what
I what I see though, is well, you don't want
to ban social media, okay, because there's actually a lot
of good and a lot of companies and a lot
of things that rely on different social media applications. You know. Uh,
(06:00):
that's I think one part of it. And ultimately, I
feel like this is up to parents. If you're talking
about protecting kids when it comes to social media. It's
really up to parents for the most part. I'm not
saying there aren't things that maybe could be done. I'm sure,
although I want to hear what the specifics are.
Speaker 3 (06:17):
What should be done.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Will I think that, you know, Clay, you said you
let you don't let your son on social media untill
he sixteen?
Speaker 3 (06:23):
Right?
Speaker 2 (06:23):
I mean for me, that seems reason that, that seems
about right. I don't think thirteen year olds need to
be on social media. I definitely don't think ten year
olds need to be on social media. I think that
people and I see this, and I'm not a parent,
I know, but I'm an observant fellow people use iPads
as like stand in babysitters instead of human beings. There's
(06:44):
way too much of that going on, you know. I
just see this increasingly as it's about parenting. I mean,
some of these arguments were made about television. They were
certainly made about video games. Oh, video games will rot
your brain unless you're Elon Musk, who stays up until
four am playing video games many nights and is the
richest guy in the world and is changing the world
we live in, right, Like, you know, it's all about balance.
(07:07):
It's all about having boundaries and understanding. And I think
that on social media, for example, you know, first of all,
I would assume is this the case. Parents should all
have all the passwords and full access to anyone under
eighteen social media period, full stop.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
Right. So that's one thing.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
And I don't know how easy it is to set
that up, but I would assume that that's possible to
do right, so you can see every interaction, everything that's
going on. That's a safety thing as much as it
is also a mental health thing.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
I don't know what I mean, Like, what do you
think needs to be done right?
Speaker 2 (07:36):
Because right now Lindsey Graham yelling about how social media
companies have blood on your hands.
Speaker 3 (07:40):
Is hysterical theatrics.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
It's, oh, you know, I'm making such a big deal
of It's okay, lindsay, what.
Speaker 3 (07:47):
Do you want to do?
Speaker 6 (07:48):
So my yeah, my thought would be And I'm not
claiming that I'm some kind of an expert on this,
although I am active in media, I am active on
social media. I think I understand it better than the
average parent would. We don't get phones for our kids
until they are fourteen. Some people will say that's too early.
Some people will say that's too late. Fourteen seems to
(08:11):
me like a reasonable age where a kid could have
access to a phone, and a lot of that is
to help with him, and frankly, I like to be
able to know where he is. But so fourteen, social
media at sixteen. So and I'm not telling other parents
what they should do. I'm saying what my wife and
(08:32):
I have decided to do with our kids. I think
you shouldn't be able to have a social media account
until you are, honestly sixteen at their earliest. And I
think that the Metas of the world and the twitters
of the world and you should have to establish how
old you are legitimately to be able to get on
(08:55):
to have a social media account.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
When I was like a freshman in high school, if
I had had the ability to talk to girls of
my own age on I don't think I would. I
would have failed Algebra two, you know, I would have
done anything else right, So we were lucky in the
sense that you didn't have these constant, you know, social
interaction tools that aren't real. The other part, it's not
(09:18):
real social interaction, that's the problem. It is in the
sense that you're talking to people but it's not in
the sense that real human beings in person is still special.
It's still more worthwhile. Yeah, and even remember the telephone.
It was a big deal. I bary a lot of
you out there, Remember the Star six ' nine era.
If you had a brother or sister, somebody was always
(09:38):
on the phone. But mom and dad could always pick
up the phone and know who it was, or mom
and dad could answer the phone.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
And there was something to.
Speaker 6 (09:45):
Be said for being a boy or a girl calling
another boy or a girl and having to talk to
a parent in order to be able to be on the.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Phone with them.
Speaker 6 (09:53):
And you knew again mom and dad could pick that
phone up at any point, or your brother and your
sister could right there a interaction associated with it. And
what I would just say in general is when you
are a teenager, everybody is racked with self doubt, you're growing,
you're changing. Instagram in particular, to me, is so fake.
(10:15):
It is everybody's best photo that they've ever taken. It
is everybody's best vacation that they've ever taken. And if
you're a fourteen year old girl, and whoever the prettiest
fourteen year old girl is in your class, or the
richest fourteen year old girl and she has the best clothes,
and she has the best friends, and she has the
best trips. I can see how if you're constantly forced
(10:39):
to marinate in somebody else.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
Remember, it's not the real world that somebody else officially. Yeah, yeah,
they're artificial, somebody else's fantasy.
Speaker 6 (10:47):
And then you see if there are six kids that
you thought you were friends with and they all go
to the mall, or they all go to your movie
and they post it. I don't think it's coincidental that
teen mental health has collapsed at the exact same time
that phones and social media, because I.
Speaker 3 (11:03):
Do think they're connected.
Speaker 6 (11:04):
Everybody's got them in their pocket, and buck to your point,
you can't escape. You know, if you were a kid
and you didn't like school and there are a lot
of people out there, you might have to be there
from seven o'clock to two thirty or whatever it is.
But then you get home and you can have your
own life outside of that world.
Speaker 3 (11:20):
It never ends.
Speaker 6 (11:21):
You're always snapchatting, you're always on group text, you're always interacting.
Speaker 2 (11:27):
You can't think of develop as a real person. You
think about the pressure to create. What is effectively your
own individual brand online, right, Everyone now is a brand
in the online social media world, whether you think of
yourself that way or not. It's here's my best fishing photos.
I'm like, here's me with my family, and like, look,
ask you who my dog is. And we're all anyone
who's using social media. So cryber audience isn't on it all,
(11:49):
by the way, congratulations list in the radio. They're like, yeah,
I don't mess with any of that stuff. So you
guys are and gals are ahead of the curve.
Speaker 6 (11:55):
But you're the people who are not smoking, you know
in nineteen forty when everybody else was smoking all day long.
Speaker 5 (12:01):
Every day.
Speaker 3 (12:02):
Yeah, So you know, I think.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
I think that this is it's just a bigger conversation
with more facets than just you know, Ben TikTok and
like Facebook should be able to be sued and repeal
section two thirty.
Speaker 3 (12:18):
The people who say repealed section two thirty.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
The problem is with this is if if you think
that that's going to mean that all of a sudden
they're going to be these benevolent actors one of these
social media companies, it just means they're gonna crack down
even more actually they're gonna have even stricter and more
arbitrary guidelines that they're using, and they're gonna say, sorry,
we got to avoid getting we got to avoid being sued.
(12:43):
So it's not as easy as just repealing section two thirty.
I know that's a common refrain for people. This is
a complicated thing and humanity has never faced this before.
And I would add this as we go to break,
We'll take some of your calls eight hundred and two
A two two eight A two. Particularly parents, I'm interested
from a lot of your kids are way smarter.
Speaker 6 (13:01):
With tech than we are, right the parents. My oldest son,
my wife put up parental safeguards trying to limit how
much he could use certain websites, and he knew almost
instantaneously how to get around the guards. I mean, he
is more sophisticated and native to the space. So even
(13:22):
if you are this is where I would say buck,
even if you're a super engaged parent, and even if
you are a parent that is really on top of
what your kids are doing online. They are smarter than
you about using that in the same way that whatever
you were into when your parent when you were sixteen
and your parents were you know, forty five, whatever you
were doing then, that was smarter than your parents. They're
(13:45):
doing that now, except it's with tech, and so it is.
I think it's the most challenging single part of parenting
today by far.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
You're listening to the best of Claye Travis and Buck Sexton.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
I've been getting a bit of heat because of my
stance on the movie Oppenheimer, which even some of our
esteemed patriot scholar listeners, some of them seemed to disagree.
Speaker 3 (14:11):
With me on a lot of them.
Speaker 2 (14:14):
A lot of you agree with me that Oppenheimer was
long and boring and kind of a whitewash of the
threat of communism. The idea that, oh, well, we have nukes,
so now the Soviets should have nukes too, because that
will be parody because you know, everyone's the same. That's insane.
It was a horrible, insane idea, and people betrayed their country,
(14:34):
including some people who had been given refuge in this
country from other places, in order to give that parody.
But anyway, put that aside, the most important thing is
that it was just boring, and the middle part of
it was okay, but the first hour and the third
hour really bad. And people can disagree with me on that,
but that just means they're wrong. Now, Clay, you saw
Dune two and you were a big fan, A plus fantastic.
(14:59):
Everyone should it.
Speaker 6 (15:01):
Yes, I went with my sixteen year old yesterday, who
has read the Dune books.
Speaker 5 (15:06):
I have not.
Speaker 6 (15:08):
He read the Dune books. We watched this weekend. I
think I told you, guys, I somehow missed it. In
twenty twenty one with the kids and everything else, I
used to see every movie that came out. I haven't
seen Oppenheimer, I haven't seen Barbie. I haven't seen any
of these things that everybody's watching. I barely can keep
up with the sports now, so I had not seen it.
This weekend, he said, Dad, I think you'll like it.
(15:29):
We watched June one. Dune two is fabulous, and I
didn't even realize it feels as I watch it like
George Lucas for Star Wars used a ton of the
Dune story as part of the inspiration. Even Tattowin compared
to the desert planet that starts with Luke Skywalker on
(15:51):
it it even, I mean, it's amazing how much he borrowed.
And again that's how culture works. You see something, you
build something new. But it's amazing how much he borrowed
from the books Dune to create Star Wars and the
way it's being watched now. A lot of people are saying, oh,
Dune looks like Star Wars.
Speaker 5 (16:09):
No, no, No.
Speaker 6 (16:09):
Dune was the beginning part of the inspiration I think
for Star Wars, but chronologically, because the Star Wars movies
were made before these Dune movies, it feels like that
dude is borrowing from Star Wars instead of vice versa.
Speaker 2 (16:24):
I'm glad we get to talk about this because occasionally,
especially for people who have listened to me for a
very long time now going on thirteen years, I'm accused
of being grumpy about movies and saying that all movies suck.
That is not true. Dune one is a very good movie.
You and I liked it too.
Speaker 5 (16:40):
I had not seen it.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
Fantastic Dune one is a fantastic movie for what it is.
I'm sure I haven't seen it yet because Carrot doesn't
like sci fi. You know, nobody's perfect, but I'm I'm
sure I'm going to like Dune two. You and I
both like Top Gun Maverick. I thought all quiet all
the Western Front The Net, which was released on Netflix,
was a phenomenal World War One movie like that I
call them like I see him just I know that
(17:03):
it got seven oscars. Oppenheimer is a trash movie and
it's way too, way too favorable to comis in my opinion,
because that was actually a big problem for me.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
You're listening to the best of Clay Trapps and Buck Sexton.
Speaker 6 (17:17):
I want to start with a story that for some
of you out there may not be on the top
of your radar, and you may not be thinking about
what the impact of this may be. But as we
come into twenty twenty four, and I bet your kids
and grandkids become more and more active in experiencing it online,
(17:40):
I want to talk about what's going on with a
AI artificial intelligence. The growth that we are seeing there
and the degree Buck, to me, of what I am
seeing is just a sort of a recapitulation of all
of the flaws that existed in so social media now
(18:01):
being created and impacted in AI. In the same way
that every social media site, whether it's Facebook, Instagram, Twitter
on some way designs an algorithm by a human that
determines what you do and do.
Speaker 5 (18:16):
Not see AI.
Speaker 6 (18:18):
There's a scary, ridiculous, somewhat maybe a little bit funny,
but also terrifying story of what's going on with Google's
AI service. Buck and I know we were talking about
this off air, so I know you've seen it too. Basically,
they designed it so there's no way that you can
get an image of a white person, no matter what
(18:40):
your prompt of request is. And for those of you
out there who are not familiar with AI at all,
trying to explain it in just a couple of sentences,
it's a video or image based version of search, also
very strong textually, but it's moving more and more into
(19:01):
imagery and videos, and the idea is basically, you give
it a prompt. For instance, with Google, where they were
using this and being able to expose its flaws, it
was saying, hey, Google, give me a picture of the pope,
and the pope pictures that AI were returning were all
minority figures. If you asked for a Viking a picture
(19:25):
of a Viking, the people that you were getting back
were black Vikings, obviously, who did not exist. If you
asked for pictures of the founding fathers, they were giving
you pictures back of some black people sitting at the
table with the founding fathers. And I would guess Buck
that the intent here is to avoid being racist, and
(19:50):
they wrote in code which basically made it impossible for
a white person to be revealed when it was making
when you were getting the prompts. To me, that's maybe
somewhat a little funny also scary, but to a larger
context when when you know that kids growing up today
(20:12):
are going to be using this as a default Google
search instead of the way Google works now. You type
in you know, hotel on South Beach or something, and
you get a bunch of different hotels that would show
up as the link. Or you type in you know
who was the eighth President of the United States, and
you get a prompt that allows you to go click
(20:33):
on links. You're not actually going and reading and discovering
the information from your request.
Speaker 5 (20:40):
It's being given to you.
Speaker 6 (20:42):
Search is being created more powerfully than maybe it ever
has been before, and it's making these algorithms even more powerful,
and so as a result, they are now stopping the
Google search. Buck on ai, But are you troubled by this?
Because I think it could be a huge story for
(21:03):
twenty twenty four and all of these AI woke ified.
I would say algorithms are going to artificially distort the
real reality in a similar way that I think we
have seen with social media, and I think that's going
to be the challenge.
Speaker 2 (21:22):
Yeah, what they're saying about this is that it's an
over correction, right. They're saying that they were trying to
make sure that racist things didn't happen, and so they
made it so that there are no you're not getting
any images of anyone who is white. But this also
is occurring in a broader context, Right, There's something else
(21:43):
that's going on here. I mean I think everyone has
seen now, particularly the last few years, but it stretches
back for about a decade that diversity and inclusion is
effectively a religious belief that people feel there is a
need to fill our society, our history, everything with the
tenets of diversity and inclusion, especially anything that has to
(22:07):
do with with pop culture. I mentioned before on this show,
I watched you know, I like anything that has vikings
in it, and I should note that there were there
were some people that did a Viking search, and sure enough,
the vikings were, you know, people of of dark dark skin,
and and that's a bit unusual, right, I mean, historically
(22:29):
that would not be accurate. And the reality here is
when they were doing the Netflix show, when they were
trying to get people interested in I guess the beginnings
of I think it's Viking, I forget what the full
title is, Viking something or other Clay. They cast a
(22:50):
black woman as a tenth century Viking yaarl or kind
of like an earl or a king who really existed.
So this stuff is already happening, meaning that there's the
rewriting of history and pop culture with people who are
being depicted as non white. And it's in that context
(23:13):
that when you have an AI machine that is doing this,
everyone starts to feel like, is it I mean, okay,
this went too far, but is it really a mistake?
Is diversity and meaning from their end, is diversity and
inclusion a part of the algorithm, such that they're going
to try to create more inclusiveness throughout history, and they're
going to try to elevate some things. The whole notion
(23:35):
of a neutral algorithm from the beginning, really the earliest
days of Google is really a fiction, just like editorial
lines at newspapers being neutral is a fiction, and I
think this goes toward everyone understanding that better.
Speaker 6 (23:47):
Yeah, and I would say this is a natural outgrowth
of Hamilton, which decided, Hey, we're going to put minority
characters into the role of historical characters, which then was
followed by what is the show Bridgerton that they make
such a big deal about, Hey, this is a story
about eighteenth century England, but the race of the characters
(24:07):
really doesn't matter at all, which is a form of
color blindness which you're not supposed to do, which is
its own interesting story we've talked about on this show.
Speaker 5 (24:15):
Buck Hannibal.
Speaker 6 (24:17):
I believe they're making a movie with Denzel Washington playing Hannibal,
which is not accurately reflected obviously of what his skin
color would have been, so Leopatra. I think they just
did recently and it did horrible. It did horribly on Netflix.
No one want to watch it.
Speaker 2 (24:31):
I would just add my issue with Look, you and
I both love Denzel Washington as an actor. I think
he's one of the best living actors today and with
one of the most impressive bodies of work, I think
he may be a fantastic Hannibal.
Speaker 3 (24:44):
I actually don't really have.
Speaker 5 (24:45):
An issue with it.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
My issue is I want people to at least understand
or want people to be taught that Carthage, those the
Carthaginians were not North Africans in the way we think
of them now, which would be predominantly sort of olive
skinned Muslim, right, I mean, or you know, tan complexion Muslims.
(25:06):
They were white, They were Greeks. Effectively, they would have
looked very much like the Greeks looked, or like the
Romans looked. And as long as people understand that history,
I have less of in it.
Speaker 3 (25:16):
But very few people do.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
And so when you start introducing these things into the
popular culture, it erases the historical reality. And I think
some of that is intentional. And I was somebody who
said early on, I think Hamilton is a very honestly
kind of a strange premise in a lot of ways.
Speaker 5 (25:33):
To keep in mind, the only white.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
Person in it is the King of England, who's terrible, right,
who's like the bad guy, which I think if you
did that in any other context, people would recognize that's
that make them feel little bit uncomfortable. But I also
just thought it wasn't good and what bothered me and
I really mean that as a piece of art, I
didn't think it was good. And what bothered me was
I actually thought it was crap, but that you were supposed.
Speaker 3 (25:55):
To say it was good.
Speaker 2 (25:55):
Like if you didn't say it was good, there was
something wrong with you. That felt very Soviet to me. Right,
it felt like everyone has to stand and clap because
Stalin likes the symphony.
Speaker 6 (26:05):
I also would say I'm not aware, and I would
I would love if somebody did know this. Is there
any other country in the world that is obsessed with
making historical characters a different race than they would otherwise be?
In other words, if you're making a movie in India
right now and you're doing a story about Indian history,
(26:28):
would there be any call in what they call Bollywood
to come back in and cast someone who is historically
Indian and a different race.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Well, you also get to clay history is often very
non inclusive, right, I mean, if you're going to go
back in history and look for great female leadership two
thousand years ago, you can find it here and there,
but there's not going to be a lot of it, right.
Speaker 6 (26:54):
Joan of arc Cleopatra. I mean there's like two or
three characters right, I said fifteen.
Speaker 3 (26:59):
Hundred years ago.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
But yeah, if you go back far enough, what you'll
find is that a lot of history is actually quite exclusionary.
You could even argue mankind was predatory against mankind, and
there was no effort made to balance things out. And
so if you're looking at what actually happened, who discovered stuff,
who conquered stuff, who found stuff, it's not going to
(27:24):
be what the sociology department at Brown University wants it
to be. And that's a challenge that they're always going
to face, which is why I think there's such an
obsession with making, you know, a tenth century Viking earl
a black woman. There were no black women who were
tenth century Viking earls.
Speaker 6 (27:43):
Western civilization triumph. Thankfully, it's why we all have democracy, republics, freedom,
freedom of speech. All those things are good, good cultural appropriation.
Here's a kind of summing it up. And I'm open
to your calls because some of you out there probably
are far more sophisticated in terms of your AI knowledge
than either Bucker.
Speaker 5 (28:02):
Myself would be.
Speaker 6 (28:03):
On a scale of one to ten, I'm about a
nine on being concerned right now based on what I'm
seeing about what the impact of these AI algorithms are
going to be, because I think we're finally catching up
buck with Twitter, where Elon Musk is giving us some
form of a free expression site, and I think that
can be very helpful. It took a decade for that
(28:24):
to happen on social media, fifteen years. I don't know
that there's going to be the equivalent in AI. I
hope I'm wrong, but it seems to me like we're
just creating new woker algorithms that could be even more impactful.
Speaker 2 (28:35):
Absolutely, and when you're talking about AI, you're not just
talking about the editorial choice of what to put up
the page. You're talking about the ability to fabricate primary
source material, archival footage, archival photos, all kinds of texts
that would be you know, aged looking, and AI can
(28:59):
make it look real, right, so our perception of the past.
I don't think people should should leave out the possibility
here because I think it's very real that there are
people on the left who would feel ideologically they would
feel righteous in doing their version.
Speaker 3 (29:17):
If you know what the Soviets used.
Speaker 2 (29:19):
To do when they would when they would eliminate something
they kept, you know, pretty detailed records. Sometimes they would
use a razor blade clay to remove the name from
paper because they just figured, you know, we're going to
excize it that way, so it's like it was never
even there. Yeah, you know there's still a hole, right,
but it doesn't matter. It's gone forever. It feels very
(29:39):
Soviet to me that they want to try to change
what our perception of history is because they recognize that
controlling the past gives you power over the narrative of
the present.
Speaker 6 (29:49):
I think everybody out there should be terrified. I'd be
interested in your calls. And again, so many kids. The
power of AI is they're going to blindly accept what
they are told. And that is scary no matter what
the concept is. But I think it's even more so
because at least Google buck gives you the opportunity. When
you do a Google search, you can scroll down. A
lot of people click on the first thing, whatever it is,
(30:12):
but you can scroll down and you can look at
the first seven or eight or even the first page
results and make a choice about the source that you
want to pick.
Speaker 2 (30:19):
Not here, you know, it would be a fascinating ven diagram.
People who enthusiastically masked up people who had Ukraine flags
in their bio, and people who openly loved Hamilton, when
these are all people that do whatever the machine tells
them to do.
Speaker 6 (30:39):
One thing as we go to break here in the
first segment, I want someone smart to do a country
and Western version of the Obama administration, and I want
them to have a white guy playing Obama and see
what the result is. Barack and Michelle Obama country and
Western version. I want white people playing Barack and Michelle
Obama in a country and Western version of their of
(31:00):
their administration, and see what the reaction would be.
Speaker 1 (31:03):
You're listening to the best of Clay Travis and Buck Sexton.
Speaker 5 (31:06):
I didn't see the oscars.
Speaker 6 (31:08):
I was out running around with my family down here,
but I did this weekend Buck watched I want to
give people a movie recommendation.
Speaker 5 (31:18):
And you had already seen this. I had not. I
watched the movie.
Speaker 6 (31:22):
Dune, which is based on the book, and it came
out a couple of years ago. I had not seen it.
My sixteen year old said, Dad, you're really gonna like this.
I think you're really gonna enjoy it. Dune two is
out now in theaters, and Greg on our team said,
he's already seen it.
Speaker 5 (31:39):
Buck.
Speaker 6 (31:39):
As soon as we finish this show, I'm taking my
sixteen year old We're going to watch Dune two at
the Imax. The reviews have been incredible June one, which
again I'm a couple of years behind on watching this.
I somehow missed it during all the chaos of twenty
twenty one. Dune one fabulous movie. You had seen it.
(32:00):
You told me you really liked it too. Word is
this new movie that is out by the way, no
woke angles on it, no like hidden that I can see,
hidden awful messages, just what Hollywood did in the eighties
and the nineties. A really good movie that if your
kids are thirteen or older, you can take them to
(32:21):
go watch it and enjoy it, which is what I
think should be the goal of every movie. Right just
about so, I'm excited. I can't wait. I don't remember
the last time I was this excited to go see
a movie. As soon as we finished the show, I'm
headed to the theater.
Speaker 2 (32:36):
I remember reading the original Dune novel years ago. It's
by many, I think, consider the greatest sci fi novel
ever written, or certainly in the top ten. You know,
people would probably think there's some HG. Well stuff and
other things they would throw in there. But Dune is
an incredibly fun read and.
Speaker 3 (32:54):
Holds up really well.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
And then there are Children of Dune, and there's some
of the follow ups.
Speaker 5 (32:58):
The original movie.
Speaker 2 (33:00):
I remember watching it and thinking to myself, you know,
they could do this, like they could just make movies
again that are supposed to be well executed and entertained.
But Hollywood has become so diluted with its narcissism and
its dei seminars and it's belief that it needs to
(33:21):
be political along with every like deeply political, not just
political partisan, along with everything else in our society. I
think is the big problem. So I actually may go
Carrie's not into sci fi stuff, It's okay, I ever
like to sci fi. I'll probably go see do In
two on my own at some point. I actually think
going to a movie by yourself on an off day
at a random time is great because you really just
(33:42):
get underrated the movie undert eating alone at the bar
at a restaurant underrated. Going to a movie alone when
you really want to see the movie and you've got
a couple of hours and you know you just unlike
eating an ice cream cone alone as a guy apparently
which place that is not okay with? But I would
say it's funny to be his last night I was
for the Oscars. I mean most of those movies I
(34:03):
haven't even seen. Oppenheimer completely dominated the Night Oppenheimer is.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
I'll put aside my.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Historical political objections to it, which are substantial. It's just boring.
It's just boring, Like there's all this stuff about his
private life, and am I really a communist?
Speaker 5 (34:20):
Or what is that?
Speaker 2 (34:21):
You know that's boring. The Robert down Downey Junior stuff
is boring. There's like a middle portion of that movie
it's three hour long movie. I also, I don't want
three hour long movies anymore. I haven't a long time.
It's really hard, with attention spans getting so used to
on demand to have someone sit for three three and
a half hours for anything. I think in one sitting.
You know, That's why The Lord of the Rings was great.
(34:42):
But when you went to see the Hobbit movies, you're like,
this is the first movie. It's like four hours long.
What's going on here? I know there's two more coming
that that wasn't even the director's cut anyway, Oppenheimer. The
middle section where they're testing the bomb and then getting
ready to do that, that's that's well done and interesting.
Speaker 3 (34:56):
But I don't know.
Speaker 2 (34:57):
I actually think after last night, I'm miss to say it,
I think Christopher Nolan might have taken uh, who's the
guy who did pulp Fiction?
Speaker 5 (35:05):
Who's the director Tarantino?
Speaker 2 (35:08):
I think that Christopher Nolan may have taken the crown
from Tarantino as the most overrated.
Speaker 5 (35:12):
Director of all time.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
That's that's how I feel after last night. Yeah, yeah,
I'm just sing today. Yeah, that's that's what because I'm
not a good watch. It's just not fun to watch.
And everyone's like, oh I really liked it. Now you've
been told to like it. It's not very good.
Speaker 6 (35:27):
I didn't see any of the movies that were nominated
for Best Picture this year, and this is Isn't.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
The isn't the Killer Flowers of the Summer Moon? Isn't
it like eight hours long? It's crazy, it's really long.
I didn't see that either. Once I had kids, I
see a lot of kids movies. So if you want
me to know, give a review on kids movies. I
got a funny story for you Buck on the Solo movie.
When I was going out all the time to Fox Sports,
you know, I would stay. For those of you who
know La, there was a hotel that looks over the
(35:53):
Fox lot, right at the intersection of Pico and Motor
and as the Intercontinental Hotel.
Speaker 6 (35:58):
You could walk back and forth. There's also the Westfield
Mall there and they have a great movie theater. So
every now and then I would have time off in
between television shows or whatever else, and I would walk
and go see a movie. I went to go see.
Do you remember Gone Girl? I went to go see
Gone Girl by myself. They changed our filming time. I
had my phone off. They couldn't get in touch with me.
(36:21):
For a Fox Sports television show. Coach Dave Wonstet many
of you will remember, awesome guy was there ready to tape.
They couldn't figure out where I was. And when they
finally got me on, they were like, You're gonna have
to tell coach where you were. He's really fired up
about this, and I was like, well, you gonna have
to tell him that I went to see Gone Girl
by myself at the Westfield Mall and that's why he
was late and there was a pause and they were like,
(36:43):
I think you got to come up with a better
story than that. You can't have gone to see Gone Girl.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
At least you weren't in line alone at the dairy
Queen Clay, that's true.
The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show News
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Buck Sexton
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