March 7, 2023 • 57 mins
In 2017 South Korean President Park Guen-hye was impeached and ousted from power as a result of a wide-reaching corruption scandal touching everything from big business to religion. In the aftermath, the world’s been left asking: What exactly happened? Was this another tragic case of nepotism and bribery, or … something more? Was South Korea’s President the victim of a cult?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
So this classic was a wild ride for us. We're
doing this back in what was this twenty seventeen? Oh, yes,
in October of that year. Oh, you've read the title already.
Was a cult trying to take over South Korea. You know,
I'm trying to remember if I had been to South
Korea by this point. But the one thing we know
(00:23):
for sure is that there's still questions about the extent
of the extent of power and influence this spiritual Organization
had in the halls of power of the South Korean government.
I like how you pulled spiritual organization out there, Ben,
I've watched you do it. It's the right it's the
(00:44):
right phrase. They don't like the sea word. And if
a group doesn't like the sea word, you gotta find
out why. That's exactly. From UFOs to psychic powers and
government conspiracies, history is riddled with unexplained events. You can
turn back now or learn this stuff they don't want
you to know. Welcome back to the show. My name
(01:18):
is Matt, my name is Noel. They call me Ben.
You are you? And that makes this stuff they don't
want you to know. First off, it's very important to
all of us just as individuals and on this show
to provide credit good and bad where credit is due.
And in this case, we're very fortunate because we have
a lot of good credit to provide and we actually
(01:40):
might be a little bit late on this. We want
to give a massive Gargangeline shout out to our fantastic
intern for fantastic former intern Sam T. Garden, who had
the unenviable or very enviable task of sifting through months
of email to learn what you friends and neighbors, our
(02:00):
listeners the most important part of the show found most intriguing.
You've met Sam before? Yes, Sam was our guest on
the Gulan Movement episode because of some personal involvement in
the issue at one of the charter schools. And now
again thanks Sam for being on the show for that.
Thank you, Sam. Hey also our super producer Tristan McNeil. Here, Tristan,
(02:21):
can we have like some sort of applause queue for
Sam perfect. I like that you had a cranky Tristan
sound effect because he's mad because I was late to do.
Oh he's not mad. I can see it in his eyes.
He's definitely shooting some emoji's our way. Though he writes
this guy writes to us an official work correspond it's
(02:42):
solely an emoji. Sometimes it'll just be like a cat
and I don't understand a saxophone. Have we already talked
about this on air? We have. It's okay. It's a
great like Tristan. Probably I'll get his own episode one day.
It'll be all in an audio emoji. Yes, with Sam
Tea Garden. One thing we want to point out is
several of the recent episodes you have heard on our
(03:03):
show relied on his initial research for us, going through emails,
seeing what he thought had some sand. And we really
trusted him on this and he did a bang up job.
We can't thank him enough. Yeah, but he's back in
school now. But we can promise you that you haven't
heard the last of good old Sam the sift Kid
(03:23):
Tea Garden. What the sift kid like sifting through stuff? Oh?
I thought you meant like panning for gold or yeah?
Kind of yes, the same, yeah for gold. Yeah. And
whether or not you are familiar with our friends Sam
Tea Garden, who've probably heard a great deal about a
country called the Democratic People's Republic of Korea street name
(03:44):
North Korea. And you've heard it in the news lately
for the ratcheting tensions rights As we record this now,
North Korea has made some progress in their icebm's intercontinental
ballistic missile programs, and the US and North Korea are
(04:08):
playing a game of brinksmanship. Yeah, the DPRK recently shot
a missile across the bow of Japan. Then they had
another missile shot down I believe by China. So yeah,
fun stuff going on. May you live in interesting times? Right? Yeah? Exactly,
Chief the curse that keeps on cursing. For some background
(04:28):
on the truth behind the fiction surrounding the so called
Hermit Kingdom, please check out our earlier episode on this country,
which unfortunately we may need to update soon for sure. Today, however,
we're looking south. We're looking at South Korea, or the
Republic of Korea, that's the other half of the Korean
(04:48):
peninsula in particular. We're exploring a story about two long
time friends, a story about corruption, a story about religion,
and a story about the fall of a president. And
murder most foul, murder, well there is one, there is one,
oh cool, and murder most foul, seriously, all of those things.
(05:10):
But first, here are the facts. So we're gonna give
you just like a quick, down and dirty, kind of
top down reader's digest view of the past, just for
a little bit of background. So here we go. We
have two countries, the Republic of Korea and the Democratic
People's Republic of Korea, which we're both formed by the
same historical events, beginning with the division of the peninsula
(05:32):
along the thirty eighth parallel at the close of World
War Two, and that was formerly a single country. All
of that. So then we fast forward to nineteen forty
eight and Ben Bolin, Oh, yeah, I was there. That's
when the divided haves each declared themselves sovereign nations. So
one says we're the Republic of Korea. One says we're
(05:55):
the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. The problem is each
to plared themselves the lawful governing force of the entire peninsula. Yeah, so,
as you might imagine, this situation was obviously unsustainable. Fast
forward to Matt Frederick. Then we get to the Korean War,
which occurred between nineteen fifty and nineteen fifty three. Overall,
(06:18):
throughout this conflict there were five million, both military and
civilian casualties. And here's the thing. When it ended in
fifty three, there was no real defining winner, and it
didn't technically end, yeah, an armistice, right exactly. They just decided, okay,
we're going to stop actively attacking each other. And South
(06:38):
Korea then shifted after this time back and forth between
military then democratic rule, then back and forth, back and
forth over the decades. Right. And during this time from
the end or from the I guess cessation of large
scale warfare to the modern day, South Koreas struggled more
(06:58):
or less continually again widespread corruption in the highest government
and business offices. Part of this is, of course due
to nepotism, and that's no different from any other country.
And part is due to the existence of gigantic corporations
with their fingers in every single pie. These things are huge, Yeah,
they're They're called the chabole, which I may be mispronouncing,
(07:21):
their massive family controlled conglomerates with international reach. So you
can think of businesses like LG or Samsung, or maybe
Hyundai or Hyundai yet like Christmas in July. These are
examples of these chabole and the amount of influence that
(07:42):
these conglomerates wield in South Korea. It would astonish you.
You your jaw would drop to truly understand it. It
would probably confuse you too, especially if you live in
let's say, the western world. Right. The one example in
twenty fourteen, Samsung alone comprised it is about seventeen percent
of South Korea's entire economy. And here's the thing, don't
(08:06):
you know, don't get up on your high horse like,
oh well, we would never allow that to happen in
here land. Well, they exist all over the place in
the US, the UK, France, all these places of conglomerates.
And here is a perfect example. This is a fun one.
Lay it on me. This is new to me. Man,
The Louis Dreyfuss Company. Have you ever heard of that
(08:29):
Louis Dreyfuss Company? Like a lane from Seinfeld? Yeah, it
sounds familiar, right, Julia Louis Dreyfuss is the great great
granddaughter of the founder of Quote, the world's largest cotton
and rice trader. Hey. And also it's considered to be
the second largest player in the world sugar market. And
very soon it's going to capture officially the third place
(08:52):
ranking of the largest trader of copper, zinc and lead concentrate. Jeez.
In twenty fifteen, this conglomerate post did a revenue of
over fifty five billion dollars. I guess we know how
Julia paid for all those acting classes. But nothing against Julia.
Yeahs and Seinfeld's a great showy. But does this company
(09:14):
have a podcast? There we go. It's just crazy to
think of how like I think about that, right, And
in those different like agriculture and medals, there are companies
like that. They're you know, they're largely out of the
public eye. You won't hear the news reporting on them
as much. But yeah, a lot of the world's wealth
(09:36):
and resource extraction does come from companies like this, and
they have international reach. Can I fast forward back to
the modern day? Please? Please? Do? We're in the modern day? Perfect.
The current government of South Korea is the sixth Republic.
It began in nineteen eighty seven and continues at least
(09:57):
as we record this episode. It's so funny to think
of it like a country forming in nineteen eighty seven. Yeah,
you know, we were, we were all alive. Then it's yeah,
I don't I don't know why that's that's remarkable to me.
I just listen Yeah, it's kind of like a government too,
you know, it's more I guess it's more a government
because they didn't change the borders of the country. But yeah,
(10:19):
it also reminds me of Italy, which has had um
a historic problem in Germany too, right, like there we go. Yeah,
it's not that remarkable, but for some reason, I just
it strikes me. It's like, whoa a country that formed
in my lifetime? Yeah, yeah, large enough scope, just so
I can do the accent again. There are a lot
of people in this world that at a time said,
(10:42):
forming your country in seventeen seventy six. Congratulations, that's true
today he is? Were you watching BBC or something. It's
just the Hamilton soundtrack, That's what it is in my head.
They don't have British. It's when I when I sing
(11:02):
it back, it's all British. King George does. That's tough.
That's true. That's that's a good song too, That's like
probably that's a great run. You got to have a
you've got to have a large range for that one,
you know. Um, But the here's another one. Um. South
Sudan formed quite recently in or within our lifetime. It's okay,
it's not remarkable. It's just no, it's I think it's
super remarkable. It's weird. I collect I stand by it
(11:25):
feeling weird. I stand with you in the fact that
that is incredibly weird. Yeah, you know what I mean.
Imagine being born in earlier generations before the fall of
the USSR, and all of a sudden you're like, oh, well,
we had all these new countries now yea, many of
which I probably can't visit. And I have to remark
on the sinister nature of your coffee cup. It has
(11:45):
a like a Christmas reindeer cartoon on it, but the
top is like blacked out, like it's been spray painted over,
and it's like half of the reindeer's head is shrouded
in shadow. It's it's incredible. It's a gift. Well, these
are burn marks. I was actually on fire when I
was drinking from it. No, this is inact, this is
(12:07):
a great um. This is a gift, as Matt said,
from our friends Joe and Linda. And if you look
really closely, you can read the writing under the black
part says happy holidays to conspiracy stuff. This is a
coffee cup that is heat sensitive, so it's so it's
all black unless you pour something hot in it, like
(12:28):
coffee reveals the picture and reveals the picture. Well, I'm
just tickled by all kinds of simple stuff today. No,
I think it's remarkable too. And thanks again to Joe
and Lindau. I hope you're listening, and I hope that
Joe and Linda, along with the rest of you find
folks forgive me for butchering Korean names throughout this episode.
(12:50):
So there's a person named Park Gunhi was born in
nineteen fifty two. That was pretty good. Well, we'll see
we never know that the emails come in right now,
that's fair Park. Miss Park is the eldest child of
South Korea's third president, Park Chung he. She was elected
(13:11):
president of South Korea in twenty thirteen and served until
twenty seventeen. Wait record, scratch, pump, yeah, pump the brakes.
I know, I know how it sounds. It sounds pretty
freaking insane for a democracy to elect the child of
a former president to the same position, right, I mean,
(13:31):
what are the odds You'd have to be a pretty
corrupt country to ever allow that to happen, especially if
you purport to be a meritocracy, right, sarcastic. Then I
just think it's ridiculous for any democracy to do. We
know how you feel about political dynasties. Yeah, thank you, Okay,
all right, all right, let me you're right it is.
It is my opinion, but technically it's unsound anyway. Yeah,
(13:56):
whenever your vote matters. In South Korea, president is elected
for a five year term, meaning President Park was set
to hold office from twenty thirteen to twenty eighteen. But
as we said, she left office in twenty seventeen. So
what happened? Scandal, that's what happened. Yes, long story short,
(14:17):
the first female president of South Korea was impeached this year.
But that's only the beginning of the rabbit hole. And
we're going to go down that rabbit hole right after
a quick word from our sponsor. Here's where it gets crazy.
So President Park had a very close friend, a woman
(14:39):
named Chu Soucil. That's what we're going to pronounce it as.
But it's ccho O s O D S I L.
How else would you pronounce that? That's how I would
do it. So Choo is the daughter of this cult
leader Shamanesque, if you will, named Choi Ta Men and
Choi was a former Buddhist. He formed a religious group
(15:03):
called Eternal Life Church. Doesn't that sound wonderful right now?
This thing in itself is relatively innocuous. It's it's a
religious organization that he founded. Sure, great, going on, you
you can do that. South Korea has no laws barring
religious practice of any kind. And again you have to
take our word for it here. But despite the absolutely
(15:25):
cartoonish practice, like Ben said, of making a former family
you know, a family member of a former president president,
it's pretty ridiculous. South Korea functions democratically, which means citizens
have freedom of religion, they have the ability to vote
for you know, people going up for president what they
(15:45):
call a sham democracy. He totally he could totally tell
what mudo is. Some of this research look good. The
problem is if you try applying that across the board
and you start to realize any relative the holes in
everybody's tomocracy. But anyway, that's what I'm saying. Democracy is
a bit of a magical loaded term. But no, I
(16:09):
don't know. Cake, Yeah, coffee's coffee. You know, sometimes what
if it's gluten free cake. That's a good point. So
the Church of Eternal Life or the Eternal Life Church
saw Joy as a messianic figure, a self described future
boot like a prophet, a prophet becoming a demi god.
(16:31):
Oh so it's like a step up. Yeah, like the
bad guy in Lord of Illusions. I love that. It
was so great. It holds up too. It holds up
better than you would think. You know, what was his name, Nicks? Yeah?
What I think it might have been Nick? It was Nick.
Swan was the magician. We're getting knock Wrecker. But y
all check out Lord of Illusions. That's an underappreciated Clive
(16:53):
Barker movie. He gets him aligned quite a bit. And
does I think he I think he's worthy. His short
fiction is great Books of Blood, and that's a nice one. Anyhow,
CHOI was a close associate of miss Park's father until
and here's the murder, most foul my friend, until her
father was assassinated by Korea's Central Intelligence agency, most foully.
(17:15):
And admittedly that's what's different with this case versus a
lot of other cases of an intelligence agency assassinating their
elected leader. Not to say that happens a lot, just
to say that this is not the only example members,
officials or former officials from Korea's CIA said, yeah, we
(17:38):
shot him because we thought he was super corrupt and
we were doing the right thing for the country. It's bold,
it's bold. During the younger Park's childhood, Miss Park's childhood
and political ascendency, Choi, the leader of the Eternal Life Church,
was a mentor figure. And this much is acknowledged by
(17:58):
everybody in the conversation station Miss parks supporters, miss Park's opponents,
everybody knows he was somewhere like a father figure, somewhere
an advisor, you know. And this is an isolated person
who has lost their parents. However, leaked diplomatic cables from
the American Embassy and Seoul, the capital of South Korea,
(18:21):
they came to. These cables come to us via the
wiki Leaks Enterprise, which we should also probably check back
up on. Is Julian Assange still there, still in London
hanging out? Okay? All right? Every so often I asked
Matt on air off air, what's happening with Julians? Usually, yeah,
(18:44):
he's still there. He's still there. Uh So. Anyway, these
leaked cables report a bunch of rumors flying around Seoul
that mister Choi was a Korean Russ sputant and had
complete control roll over Park's body and soul during her
formative years, and then his children accumulated enormous wealth as
(19:05):
a result. I love how the idea of like Rasputin
conjures the images of like magical powers almost you know,
or like mind control abilities. Absolutely yeah, And just using
the phrase control over Park's body and soul. Yeah though,
and he's a puppeteer of sorts. Well, you know, the
historical Rasputin is pretty fascinating character, and I wonder what
(19:33):
it means, you know, like Tonol's point, calling someone a
Rasputin definitely does have this tinge of occult nature, right
or a cult power. All I know is that Resputin
makes a fine dark beer, is it true? It's called
old Resputin and it's delicious. You know, I'm so skeptical
dark beer. Somebody told me that Gainnis is actually a
(19:54):
people go on at Gainnis diet, and I thought it
was a joke because dark beers always seem really heavy
to me. It's like, you know, I want my loaf
of bread and a glass. But apparently I was wrong
on that. Then you hear about an olden time where
people would drink a dark ale with their breakfast. Yeah,
come on, because the water would kill them. That's true.
(20:14):
That's a great way to start your day. Did you
ever hear that theory that the Dark Ages it could
be chalked up the Dark Ages being the period of
stagnation and education in Western Europe can apparently be chalked
up to fundamentalist religious practices and booze. There are a
couple of historians to say everybody was just pissed drunk
(20:38):
for like several centuries. Wow, I think that's an oversimplification.
And speaking of oversimplifications, let's continue with some of the
backgrounds here. So after becoming fast forward, as we said,
after becoming President of South Korea, Miss Park and her
friend Miss Chew continue to have a close relationship. So
the timeline of Miss parks fall from grace began in
(21:04):
October of twenty sixteen, which was about a year ago
from now. So here's the rundown. On October seventeenth, students
protested at the prestigious Ewaha Women's University in Seoul, which
sparked a much wider investigation into corruption and influence pedaling
(21:25):
in parks Inner Circle. And then specifically we had protesters
arguing that miss Choi's daughter was unfairly admitted to the
school due to potential influence, shall we say, from the
administration from Park's office. And then we've got one of
the weirdest little bits from this scandal, which was the
Choi's daughter was able to list her champion dressage performance
(21:50):
on her application. And so anyone doesn't know, that's like
where the horse just kind of steps right like it's
almost like a little prancing. The horse and the rider
perform a series of predetermined move moves. It's not like jumping,
it's not racing. It's like kind of trotting in a
circle or tapping and like racing. Your okay for every
(22:10):
I literally a show pony, Yeah, yeah, exactly for everyone
who doesn't have some weirdly specific version of synaesthesia, clairvoyance
or telepathy. What Nolan I were doing when we were
trying to explain, we were both using a right hands
like like the front hooves of a horse. Um, I
hope that doesn't come back to hunters. So yeah, yeah, dressage, dressage, dressage.
(22:34):
I think it's dressage sounds more fancy let's let's go
with Yeah, I was gonna say that is something I
would associate with wealth, opulence. Yeah, here we go, affluence
and influence. As it turns out, yes, because this training
was apparently paid for by the South Korean government, So
taxpayer money essentially sent this kid to a horse school. Yeah,
(22:57):
well they would. I'm sure they call it at that level.
I'm sure they don't call it horse school the Grsage Academy. Yes,
and we continue, right, Oh boy do we ever? We
have October twenty fourth, wherein the South Korean broadcaster JTBC
broke open the scandal wide open by uncovering a tablet
(23:17):
computer belonging to Choi Soon. Still. Yeah, the friend was
a friend of miss Park, who had no official government
post whatsoever, and documents found on this device suggests that
miss Joy had received confidential presidential documents and edited key speeches.
So yeah, she's editing speeches for the president who's not
(23:40):
officially a part of anything. And again, I'm not one
hundred percent, you know, clear on the particulars of the
you know, chain of command and levels of clearance I
guess in this government, but I would imagine people would
have to be vetted and assigned some kind of clearance
to get these documents. Oh sure, it's obviously might not happen.
(24:01):
We'll imagine President Obama or imagine President Trump saying saying, well,
you know, these might be confidential, but I don't keep
any secrets from a boy jelly Roll. Yea jelly jelly
Roll has got all these documents on his tablet and
he's just editing speeches. He got me into that Floyd concert.
This is a man who understands the world, and I
(24:22):
want him working with these secrets. Jelly Roll. Yeah. Well,
it'd be one thing if jelly Roll was an accomplished
speech writer who just wasn't officially working on the thing,
but was a friend and was like helping him out.
But if it's somebody even though dude, can't you I mean,
in our government at least you know he had just
(24:42):
like slip people that kind of stuff. I mean, you
get big trouble for that, like at the highest levels.
I mean I would think of sure, I mean confidential
documents though, that's that's a huge problem. I guess the
president has the agency to just kind of do whatever
and listen. I don't know, Ye, it seems like in
our government, we have situations where the president, by virtue
(25:03):
of his own office can just kind of like say, yeah, no,
it's cool, We're just gonna do this today, right, like
when we had that discussion in Zone of Death about
whether a president can pardon themselves, you know. October twenty fifth,
Miss Park admits to the country. She says, yes, I
have close ties to Miss Choi, who has at this
(25:26):
time been nicknamed the Shaman Advisor already because her father
was a cult leader. And she apologizes for causing the
nation grief, Like, my bad, I'm friends with her. That's crazy,
all right. So then October a little bit later, like
right at the end October twenty third and the thirtieth,
hundreds of thousands of people began protesting and gathering in
(25:47):
Soul for the first of six giant rallies about this scandal,
protesting against the administration, and Miss Park accepts the resignations
of several key aids who have gotten caught up in
this whole affair, which probably means they knew about it
and didn't say anything, yeah exactly, so they got cut first.
(26:08):
Then on November first, Miss Choi returns from Germany. She's
been in Germany, kind of escaping the situation in a way,
and she comes back and she gets questioned and even
detained by prosecutors to figure out what the heck is
going on. So then on November eighth, we have investigators
raiding the headquarters of Samsung Electronics for the very first time.
(26:30):
What Yeah, and the company was believed to have come
under pressure to make donations to Miss Choi. That's weird. Samsung,
all right? Fourteen was seventeen percent of the economy. Yeah, huh,
So what next? Then on November twentieth, Miss Park gets
(26:50):
accused by prosecutors of being a conspirator of the criminal
variety in Miss Choi's alleged scheme. So Miss Choi is
kind of in this version like they accused her of before,
being a puppet master of sorts, and the president is
just one of the puppets that she's manipulating. And then
on the twenty ninth of the same month, Miss Park
(27:15):
offers to resign but does not say when in her proposal,
then is dismissed by the opposition and the protesters as
a stalling tactic of sorts. On December sixth, the heads
of the country's largest companies. Those tribal we mentioned earlier
are interrogated by lawmakers in the National Assembly, and on
(27:39):
December ninth, lawmakers vote to impeach Miss Park. So what
kinds of things are being whispered into President Park's ear
Here's where it gets kind of spooky too, you know.
According to the BBC, critics believe Choi perpetuated her father's habits,
Choi's father being, of course, the leader of the Eternal
(28:02):
Life Church. Uh. Some media reports suggested that Miss Park
held shamanistic rituals at the presidential compound under choice influence.
Miss Park, for the record, denied this. Yeah, the president
holding shamanistic rituals in and if we apply it to
(28:24):
the United States president, just in our recurrent situation, President
Trump performing rituals in the White House with other people around.
You know, maybe they're not so creepy, but but the
rituals were we talking about, well, first, you know, for
another example, Ronald Reagan consulted an astrologer. Yeah, it's true,
leader of the free world, the most dangerous nukes at
(28:46):
the time, and presidents do hang out at the Bohemian
Grove right at the time of our recording, Park continues
to deny any allegations of participating in cult rituals at
the Blue House. Think of it as the South Korea
White House is the president's home. Specifically, to answer your question, Noel,
these rituals included, but we're not limited to acts of
(29:07):
alleged clairvoyance, fortune telling, and channeling. Yes, Miss Choi is
rumored to have told Miss Park she was capable of
channeling the spirit of the president's dead mother. Additionally, she
gave the President amulets that had purported abilities to provide
magical protection. She also listening devices. Quite possibly, she also
(29:33):
advised the president on which sorts of colors to wear
and when, for example, red and white clothing. I want
to stop here before we're before we get too far,
and note that one thing I really liked about the
question you asked Nol when you said, well, shamanistic rituals.
What type of these things for someone who you know,
(29:56):
historically all the US presidents have outward at least if
only for the votes, said that they were Christians. Well,
I was kind of getting at you. I mean, like,
is it that bizarre and another culture to perform these
kind of quote unquote rituals is it any more bizarre
than presidents holding prayer meetings or something like right, or
(30:16):
a prayer breakfast or something. Yeah, exactly, And you know,
I really appreciate that point because I think it's it's
a fantastic points when we need to make because there
there are there are shamanistic religious practices in Korean and
they're a part of the culture, you know, And so
it's it's not necessarily it doesn't necessarily mean that this
(30:42):
is stuff that Choi and her father just made up. However,
it does seem that it does seem that the daughter
took up the father's mentor role and definitely put the
kid in horse school. That's what that thinks for sure.
So opponents a Park allege that their friend Choi was
(31:03):
actually less like a friend and more like a behind
the scenes puppet master, picking up where her father left
off and directing the president in matters of state policy.
We know the choy ad access to secret government documents.
We also know that she edited the president's speeches. But
that leads us to a couple of questions. Right, Yeah,
we don't know exactly what types of edits were made
(31:25):
to the speeches. On one hand, it could be as
simple as proofreading. Maybe she's just fixing some typos, right sure,
just going through right clicking in the word document and
or whatever document and then fixing the red saying that's
actually further not farther, Yeah, for sure. But on the
other hand, CHOI could have been altering the content of
(31:45):
these speeches, like meaning, somebody with absolutely zero official government
position was creating public policy through the words of the
president and possibly even swaying these things like whatever is
happening in either the favor of the church or in
personally you choice favor me because we know, like I mean,
(32:06):
speeches don't necessarily dictate policy directly, but they can certainly
shape perception. And you know, the give the impression of
support of certain things, and that matters. We know words matter,
and that can make a big difference in you know,
the way things move in terms of actual policy. Yeah,
(32:27):
you're you're sending signals to the rest of your government
by saying things in public. That's just it signaling, Yeah,
and it is. It is very important. It's a crucial
component of foreign policy. So somebody with no qualifications other
than being someone's friend and or manipulator had their hands
(32:48):
at the wheel in one of the most um I
would say, one of the top three most fragile geopolitical areas.
Sure time, you know, what if? What if? Kim Jong
un here's his speech that he or his advisors don't like.
You know, I have a feeling that happens all the time.
(33:12):
Probably does it, Probably does. So this is an ongoing situation,
and where does it leave us in the modern day.
We'll draw some conclusions after a word from our sponsor, Well,
we're back, and it doesn't look good, right, Miss Park
(33:37):
certainly did seem to be under the sway of choice
influence as well as choice fathers and heads of the
corporation involved are saying, you know, it's fairly it's incredibly
uncommon for these very powerful business leaders to be called
into a member version of Congress. They're saying they were
(33:59):
a core into donating millions of dollars to choice organizations. Wow,
South Korea already elected a new president, Like, how do
you I'm just wondering about being coerced into donating millions
of dollars to this stuff because I guess you couldn't.
You could threaten to impose sanction or you know, new taxes,
(34:20):
or you know, things that would make operating your giant
conglomerate unfeasible. I can't imagine how much pressure, but there
must have been something there, some triggers to pull. Well,
there's also the yeah, they're they're definitely triggers. There. There
are hard triggers and there are soft triggers that might
not ever legally be personal stuff you're right, or legally
(34:46):
recognized as a threat too. Yeah, there might be personal stuff,
but it might also be something as simple as we
have new complications on building codes, right, yeah, or tariffs
or something, you know. Yeah, I wonder if Choy threatened
to summon the dead relatives of some of the leaders
(35:06):
of the conglomerates. That's an interesting idea, Matt. At this point,
we don't At this point, we don't know. Yeh sure,
if it's anything like that, and most likely as not,
it would just be interesting. Well, that's the thing. Without
knowing what was happening, right, it's it's very difficult for
people to form concrete opinion or sort of chronological chain
(35:30):
of events. We do know that since the tenth of
May twenty seventeen, there's been a new president in South Korea,
Moonji In, who as far as we know, is not
under the sway of a cult. As a former human
rights lawyer and chief of staff to another former president,
(35:55):
Romo hun he was he was elected with a with
an okay, okay share of the of the vote. It
seems like in all honesty, they just had to have
a snap election to get this other person out. So
that's that's the case. So far as this is a
(36:18):
developing situation, we'll probably hear more about it. Um it
does not come at the best time of course, geopolitically,
we are this. This is going to come out after
we record it, so some of the events may seem
a little bit older or changed even slightly, but not
much hopefully right like we are currently recording this the
(36:42):
day before the DPRK is set to launch another ICBM,
and they'll be launching it on Saturday, September ninth, yep
eehaw right, And we can do an entire episode about
North Korea's purported nuclear capabil these plus versus their actual
(37:03):
nuclear capabilities. But at this time the region is under
intense global scrutiny and the powers that be are are
flocking there. This is a this is going to be
Asnell said, interest a series of interesting times for South
Korean president and for the people of the region. Just
(37:27):
as a side note, I know a few people, multiple people,
who are in the navy, and they have been snapped
up from being on leave to go on an adventure
somewhere that they cannot discuss. So it always makes me think, Oh,
I wonder if they're heading that way. Who knows. At
(37:47):
the same time, we have signals from officials in the
Russian and US governments talking about that are indicating arms
build up, training exercises. What a time to be alive.
I hope that the streak of being alive continues not
(38:09):
and of course we hope that everyone hearing this is
in a safe place, and we are sending our thoughts
and support to the innocent people of the world because
you know, as they say, what's that old quote, when
elephants go to war, only the grass suffers. Oh geez,
(38:29):
trampling on all. Now, just one last thing here before
we you know, end of this episode. Per se, are
you doing the voice? Do the voice of work? We
just have to remember in our own country, if we
look at ourselves. The United States has a long tradition
(38:52):
of secret societies among the upper echelons of our government. Yeah, heah,
including Freemasonry, let's say, the illuminosis perhaps of Bavaria, and
you know, the Bohemian grove, skull and Bones, all of
these other secret societies that the United States voter just
(39:14):
has to either not know about or completely ignore when
they make their decision on who they're going to vote for,
because most of the people that get up to that
level have been a part of one or more of these.
You know, that's a great point, Matt, and I'm glad
you made it, because it goes so it's in the
great interest of people who profit from a status quo
(39:37):
to enforce disunity amongst the bottom part of society, right,
or any lower part of society. So often you'll see
this false dichotomy hinging on a political position or a
(39:57):
I mean, the best is when there's blind loyalty to
a party, because when the parties are both fingers on
the same hand, then everybody gets to have a little
bit of bread and circuses, a little bit of Facebook liking,
a little bit of clicktivism or whatever, and feel that
they've done their part for reproduction or gun ownership or
(40:21):
whatever whatever their issue is, and Honestly, just saying it
on a podcast that I know goes out to a
number of people makes me feel good. But ultimately, what
does it do? What does it do? R right? And
the groups who are participating in the just buffoonish, buffoonish
(40:46):
summer camp that is Bohemian Grove or the dumb fraternity
that has skull and bones. I mean, look, here's the
thing with tradition. I've never been in them, just I
don't have an opinion because well, it's a very powerful
organization with very powerful people in it, and hopefully those
(41:10):
people are using their power to keep this species alive
and push it toward its ultimate destiny, which is expanding
beyond this planet before we destroy it one way or another. However,
I think that it is a lapse in critical thinking
to assume that because something has existed for a long time,
(41:34):
or that because powerful people like it, it is therefore
somehow correct or superior. I mean, look at sadly, there's
so many examples of times where people said, well, that's
tradition or that's how we've done it, and those turned
out to be terrible, terrible, incredibly stupid things. And we're
(41:58):
still doing a lot of them, and we can't we
as individuals, we as groups, whatever group you align yourself
with have to be have to take great pains to
note that the problems we so easily spy or so
we easily perceive in other organizations, whether that's a religion,
(42:20):
a state, or a business or a family, whatever, a
fan club for Christopher Walkin. Groups of humans tend to
have some of the same root problems, you know, and
the same rotten tooth of corruption in the mouth of
the South Korean government and still exists. Right, the president
(42:44):
was corrupt, But we can't act like the US doesn't
have its own cavities in this terrible analogy. Dude, Hey,
I feel that the big thing for me is loyalty.
If you if you are swearing an oath to serve
as a democratically elected official, especially and in the executive
(43:04):
office as the president for the people, you are you
are acting as an executor of the people's will essentially
and also you know in a way, and that's at
least what it says. But what if you've already sworn
an oath to one of these secret societies prior to
swearing that oath? Do they exist simultaneously? Do you know
(43:27):
who do you serve? If you are a public public figure,
if you're a government official, should you be required to
disclose all all the ins and outs of those businesses
or you know, swear like break that oath in some
way officially? Well, then is it a violation of because
a government official is still a citizen, is a violation
(43:49):
at least in the US of their right to privacy?
Oh my god? You know what do you think? I
don't know. I just I support the right to you know,
for a high level government to have a guru of
some sort they just keep around, you know, I think
that's that's cool. Yeah, what's the point of having a
stressful job like that if you can't have some sort
(44:09):
of weird magician that you hung around with all the time? Merlin,
there should always be a resputant a choice and still
there you go. You know, that's interesting because we do
know that there are advisors in different countries that would
they're doing things that would be considered magical acts, right
(44:30):
like Myanmar were also aka Burma had the military powers
there for a long time, took the advice of astrologers
and actually relocated the capital for that and even magical beliefs,
aside just having a trusted confidant or an advisor, especially
(44:51):
if you're in a series, if you're in a position
where several million, several hundred million people in case of
any US president past nineteen fifty probably would like to
kill you. You know, it's good to have friends. Are
sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name. Yeah,
(45:14):
you know, you know, I haven't learned much from TV
and movies, but one thing I have learned is that
the bad guy is almost always the close trusted advisor.
Oh like Scar almost always in the Lion King or Iago,
there's so many A lot of times it's the magician.
(45:36):
A lot of times, you know, it's the religious leader.
Just saying yeah, you know, that makes me think. Leads
and gentlemen, if you were in a position of immense power,
or if you are now, do you practice having gurus?
Do you have a trusted advisor? Do you have even
(45:57):
if you are not in a position of quote unquote
immense power? Now, do you have a spiritual advisor? Do
you have someone that has a connection to things unseen
and little understood, and if so, do you follow their lead?
Have you met with success or have you been burned
in the shamanistic rituals? We'd like to Yeah, whatever the
(46:20):
belief system, maybe we'd like to hear from you. And
speaking of which reminds us it's time for first shout
out Today comes from Simon Hey from Australia. Says, Simon
love the show, so I thought i'd give you a
story I heard from a friend's grandpapa. I inserted the
(46:42):
extra papa. He was in the navy in Al Salvador
or the US, and after this encounter, he and his
shipmates have never set foot back on a boat. When
they were out in the Atlantic one night, massive swells
began to form out of nowhere, and he said something
came out of the water that was so big that
its eyes were the size of a semi trailer. It
looked directly at the boat and went back under water.
(47:04):
So Simon says that when they reported this to the command,
they were basically dressed down by their commanders or whatever
and basically accused of being drunk. So he swears to
the story, and it doesn't go into too much more detail,
but he hates talking about him. Also, have you ever
heard about the westall Ufo sighting. I highly recommend you
sus it out as Australia is known for weird things
(47:26):
like UFO sightings. Keep up the good work and skadooche
nice Simon. That's a cool story. You know, the size
of a semi I like that. Yeah, that's a tough one.
You gotta really believe that, friends Grandpa, but you know,
I believe him, but I want to learn more. Also,
(47:48):
if there's a massive storm, maybe it's possible that something
that typically would be in the lower levels of the
ocean was pulled up to the surface momentarily or just
came to check it out, or just came to check
it out, just to see what the HAPs were. The
Westall UFO Encounter is a UFO story from nineteen sixty
(48:13):
six where more than two hundred students and teachers at
these two schools witnessed in UFO descending on a field.
And it's an interesting case because I remember this, you know,
over two hundred people. Yeah, so there's a lot of corroboration.
That's a really good point, Simon. That's a really good
idea too. Thank you so much for writing in And
(48:35):
I hope your friend's grandfather talks about it more. Often
that's you'd be surprised what people can remember when they
try the size of a semi that keeps yelp and
keeps baffling me. I don't want to see that. Thanks,
Writing in Simon, who's next next? Shout out goes to Cameron. Cameron,
that's your shout out, Cameron says, I was listening to
(48:55):
the Lucky Yates episode, and you pondered why aliens would
analyze the ethics of abducting humans and come to the
conclusion that they must return us to Earth after abducting us,
but that they do not have to ask permission in
the first place. It stands to reason that, by our morality,
the most ethical way to approach an abduction would be
to ask permission first and return the abductee to their
(49:16):
original state afterwards. This is a primary tenet of the
American justice system, after all. Cameron says, However, what if
alien morality does not parallel our own? Consider a man,
a human man who's sitting on a boat on a
lake with a pole attached to that pole as a
string with a hook on the end. This man is fishing.
(49:36):
I like, how You're right, Cameron. He will not ask
the fish for their permission before catching them. But there
stands a good chance that if he will not eat
the fish, he will throw it back into the lake.
Why does the man do this Well, because humans have
an ethical standard that they apply to fishing, whereby the
fish is returned to the water if it will not
be eaten. We call this catch and release. We do
(49:59):
this because we do not assign enough value to the
lives of the fish to require their permission. Oh wow, right,
good point. So is it possible that the aliens operate
with the same ethical dichotomy? Could they see us as
fish hiding underneath the surface of Earth's atmosphere and reason
that their ethics do not require them to ask permission
of us fish human folk, but do require them to
(50:23):
return us to Earth if they don't plan to eat
us and or to you know, do something that would
end our lives. Hmm, you know, I really I really
appreciate that point. To me, probably the stranger thing is
just how one would traverse the gulfs of time and space. Sure,
I really love the catch and release comparison. The reasoning
(50:48):
here is yaiful. What do you think, Matt? What do
you think? Though? I love this Cameron. If there are
in fact species of some sort that are advanced enough
to want to study humans and this is in fact
what they're doing, this makes so much sense to me.
M hmm. And that that one line in particular, we
do this because we do not assign enough value to
(51:09):
the lives of fish to require their permission. WHOA isn't
it funny to how even people that are like a
lot of you know, non meat eaters are okay with
eating fish like pesketarians because they aren't cuddly, they don't
seem to have you know, anthropomorphic type of traits. Yeah.
I wonder if anyone's out there, like I'm interested actually
to hear what your reasoning is behind it. Is it
(51:31):
like a health thing or is it in fact a
kind of more of an emotional thing. It's because their
water breathers. Man, they ain't breathe in air. Now, an
octopus is capable of experiencing emotion and recognition, right, So
so if that's if it's an ethical concern about like
the ability to suffer or have experience experience emotions, then
(51:56):
I guess a pescetarium shouldn't eat an octopus. I have
known pesket arians that will not eat cephalopods. So yeah,
I think it's different for different people, but let us know. Yeah,
that's a great idea. And how can you prove if
a fish feels emotion or not because they're always just
going oh sorry, I'm so sorry. Oh man, no, I
(52:19):
respect that we're working live. Yeah, all right, Nolan, I
did a horse dance earlier. So now now the three
of us are back on even keel, we have time
one more shout out today from riconomed name assumed name.
Ricon says, I just listened to the Pyramid podcast and
(52:42):
the part at the end where you said your conversations
normally continue at a bar somewhere. I'd love if you
all did an after hours podcast where you were drinking
at a bar and continuing the conversation from a normal podcast.
Thanks so much, Ricon um drunk conspiracy see or I
mean even just like conspira drunk, the ambiance of a bar,
(53:06):
hanging out and having just maybe even if it's just
a beer or something with the cameo from the bartender.
Well yeah, and then just have we could have special
guests come over and just hang out with us. You say,
all kinds of weird stuff once you've had a logger
or two. Well, yeah, look, we're still will still listen
back and Tristan will do his magic on whatever it is.
But I can imagine something really cool being there Tristan.
(53:28):
You have to edit sober though, right, that's that's the
rule he's given the no like not possible. Tristan will
be there with us, and he'll edit real time as
we're going, just like cut and then keep going. I
love this. I like the idea too. And we have
you know, we have a couple of regular spots maybe
sometime in like October later in the year. Yeah, I've
(53:50):
been off the sauce this month. Yeah, we both have. Yeah,
that's true. You can have a cranberry. I didn't want
to talk out of school, but yeah, it's been pretty great. Actually,
I'm I might. I might never go back. Oh well, hey,
if that's what you want to do, man, more power
to you. Thanks buddy. Yeah, then I gotta tell you, hey,
(54:11):
you out a bar is not drinking. It is actually
really interesting and a lot of fun. I went to
a show the other night at a concert, saw this
amazing band, the Ocs. If anyone's ever heard of them,
or check them out there like this m LA kind
of garage e psychedelic punk kind of I don't know,
it's hard to even describe, but the dude that plays
guitar just blows it up. He's amazing and he's it's
(54:33):
it's really really cool music. But it was one of
the first times I've been to a concert like that
and not had a drink. And I felt so undistracted,
Like I watched the whole show, never moved, never worried
about getting back the bar, you're getting in line whatever.
I felt like it was a much more full experience.
I really enjoyed it. Not to nice, sound preachy or anything.
(54:55):
I really have been kind of digging. It's not more
of your money's worth. Just try too, you know. Yeah,
I went to a I went to one of our
local bars in the area here and I hung out
for a couple hours and my bar tap was seven dollars. Yeah,
we got a hot dog from fries. Wow. It was great.
(55:17):
So we were obviously into this idea. Ricon and fellow listeners,
let us know if you would want us to take
a recording out and about in the world where it
would be believe it or not, probably even more casual.
My thought is we could incorporate the Lucky Yates style
of hanging out and discussing multiple topics. I think we
(55:40):
might be able to make this work. Gentleman, I'm game,
and hopefully you are. To let us know. For now,
that concludes ours but not our show. We will be
back next week with something weird, fast snating, perhaps disturbing.
(56:02):
There's one way to find out. Tune in when we've published. However,
before then, if you would like to learn more stuff
than want you to know, you can find Matt, Noel
and I on Instagram. You can find us on Facebook.
You can find us on Twitter. If you are a
long time listener, you've heard the names of all those.
If it's your first time listening, let's make it interesting
and just search see what you find. Right it's conspiracy stuff,
(56:27):
And then with Instagram, just add show to the end
of it and that's the end of this classic episode.
If you have any thoughts or questions about this episode,
you can get into contact with us in a number
of different ways. One of the best is to give
us a call. Our number is one eight three three
stdwy TK. If you don't want to do that, you
(56:48):
can send us a good old fashioned email. We are
conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com. Stuff they don't want you
to know. Is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts
from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you listen to your favorite shows.
So this classic was a wild ride for us. We're
doing this back in what was this twenty seventeen? Oh, yes,
in October of that year. Oh, you've read the title already.
Was a cult trying to take over South Korea. You know,
I'm trying to remember if I had been to South
Korea by this point. But the one thing we know
(00:23):
for sure is that there's still questions about the extent
of the extent of power and influence this spiritual Organization
had in the halls of power of the South Korean government.
I like how you pulled spiritual organization out there, Ben,
I've watched you do it. It's the right it's the
(00:44):
right phrase. They don't like the sea word. And if
a group doesn't like the sea word, you gotta find
out why. That's exactly. From UFOs to psychic powers and
government conspiracies, history is riddled with unexplained events. You can
turn back now or learn this stuff they don't want
you to know. Welcome back to the show. My name
(01:18):
is Matt, my name is Noel. They call me Ben.
You are you? And that makes this stuff they don't
want you to know. First off, it's very important to
all of us just as individuals and on this show
to provide credit good and bad where credit is due.
And in this case, we're very fortunate because we have
a lot of good credit to provide and we actually
(01:40):
might be a little bit late on this. We want
to give a massive Gargangeline shout out to our fantastic
intern for fantastic former intern Sam T. Garden, who had
the unenviable or very enviable task of sifting through months
of email to learn what you friends and neighbors, our
(02:00):
listeners the most important part of the show found most intriguing.
You've met Sam before? Yes, Sam was our guest on
the Gulan Movement episode because of some personal involvement in
the issue at one of the charter schools. And now
again thanks Sam for being on the show for that.
Thank you, Sam. Hey also our super producer Tristan McNeil. Here, Tristan,
(02:21):
can we have like some sort of applause queue for
Sam perfect. I like that you had a cranky Tristan
sound effect because he's mad because I was late to do.
Oh he's not mad. I can see it in his eyes.
He's definitely shooting some emoji's our way. Though he writes
this guy writes to us an official work correspond it's
(02:42):
solely an emoji. Sometimes it'll just be like a cat
and I don't understand a saxophone. Have we already talked
about this on air? We have. It's okay. It's a
great like Tristan. Probably I'll get his own episode one day.
It'll be all in an audio emoji. Yes, with Sam
Tea Garden. One thing we want to point out is
several of the recent episodes you have heard on our
(03:03):
show relied on his initial research for us, going through emails,
seeing what he thought had some sand. And we really
trusted him on this and he did a bang up job.
We can't thank him enough. Yeah, but he's back in
school now. But we can promise you that you haven't
heard the last of good old Sam the sift Kid
(03:23):
Tea Garden. What the sift kid like sifting through stuff? Oh?
I thought you meant like panning for gold or yeah?
Kind of yes, the same, yeah for gold. Yeah. And
whether or not you are familiar with our friends Sam
Tea Garden, who've probably heard a great deal about a
country called the Democratic People's Republic of Korea street name
(03:44):
North Korea. And you've heard it in the news lately
for the ratcheting tensions rights As we record this now,
North Korea has made some progress in their icebm's intercontinental
ballistic missile programs, and the US and North Korea are
(04:08):
playing a game of brinksmanship. Yeah, the DPRK recently shot
a missile across the bow of Japan. Then they had
another missile shot down I believe by China. So yeah,
fun stuff going on. May you live in interesting times? Right? Yeah? Exactly,
Chief the curse that keeps on cursing. For some background
(04:28):
on the truth behind the fiction surrounding the so called
Hermit Kingdom, please check out our earlier episode on this country,
which unfortunately we may need to update soon for sure. Today, however,
we're looking south. We're looking at South Korea, or the
Republic of Korea, that's the other half of the Korean
(04:48):
peninsula in particular. We're exploring a story about two long
time friends, a story about corruption, a story about religion,
and a story about the fall of a president. And
murder most foul, murder, well there is one, there is one,
oh cool, and murder most foul, seriously, all of those things.
(05:10):
But first, here are the facts. So we're gonna give
you just like a quick, down and dirty, kind of
top down reader's digest view of the past, just for
a little bit of background. So here we go. We
have two countries, the Republic of Korea and the Democratic
People's Republic of Korea, which we're both formed by the
same historical events, beginning with the division of the peninsula
(05:32):
along the thirty eighth parallel at the close of World
War Two, and that was formerly a single country. All
of that. So then we fast forward to nineteen forty
eight and Ben Bolin, Oh, yeah, I was there. That's
when the divided haves each declared themselves sovereign nations. So
one says we're the Republic of Korea. One says we're
(05:55):
the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. The problem is each
to plared themselves the lawful governing force of the entire peninsula. Yeah, so,
as you might imagine, this situation was obviously unsustainable. Fast
forward to Matt Frederick. Then we get to the Korean War,
which occurred between nineteen fifty and nineteen fifty three. Overall,
(06:18):
throughout this conflict there were five million, both military and
civilian casualties. And here's the thing. When it ended in
fifty three, there was no real defining winner, and it
didn't technically end, yeah, an armistice, right exactly. They just decided, okay,
we're going to stop actively attacking each other. And South
(06:38):
Korea then shifted after this time back and forth between
military then democratic rule, then back and forth, back and
forth over the decades. Right. And during this time from
the end or from the I guess cessation of large
scale warfare to the modern day, South Koreas struggled more
(06:58):
or less continually again widespread corruption in the highest government
and business offices. Part of this is, of course due
to nepotism, and that's no different from any other country.
And part is due to the existence of gigantic corporations
with their fingers in every single pie. These things are huge, Yeah,
they're They're called the chabole, which I may be mispronouncing,
(07:21):
their massive family controlled conglomerates with international reach. So you
can think of businesses like LG or Samsung, or maybe
Hyundai or Hyundai yet like Christmas in July. These are
examples of these chabole and the amount of influence that
(07:42):
these conglomerates wield in South Korea. It would astonish you.
You your jaw would drop to truly understand it. It
would probably confuse you too, especially if you live in
let's say, the western world. Right. The one example in
twenty fourteen, Samsung alone comprised it is about seventeen percent
of South Korea's entire economy. And here's the thing, don't
(08:06):
you know, don't get up on your high horse like,
oh well, we would never allow that to happen in
here land. Well, they exist all over the place in
the US, the UK, France, all these places of conglomerates.
And here is a perfect example. This is a fun one.
Lay it on me. This is new to me. Man,
The Louis Dreyfuss Company. Have you ever heard of that
(08:29):
Louis Dreyfuss Company? Like a lane from Seinfeld? Yeah, it
sounds familiar, right, Julia Louis Dreyfuss is the great great
granddaughter of the founder of Quote, the world's largest cotton
and rice trader. Hey. And also it's considered to be
the second largest player in the world sugar market. And
very soon it's going to capture officially the third place
(08:52):
ranking of the largest trader of copper, zinc and lead concentrate. Jeez.
In twenty fifteen, this conglomerate post did a revenue of
over fifty five billion dollars. I guess we know how
Julia paid for all those acting classes. But nothing against Julia.
Yeahs and Seinfeld's a great showy. But does this company
(09:14):
have a podcast? There we go. It's just crazy to
think of how like I think about that, right, And
in those different like agriculture and medals, there are companies
like that. They're you know, they're largely out of the
public eye. You won't hear the news reporting on them
as much. But yeah, a lot of the world's wealth
(09:36):
and resource extraction does come from companies like this, and
they have international reach. Can I fast forward back to
the modern day? Please? Please? Do? We're in the modern day? Perfect.
The current government of South Korea is the sixth Republic.
It began in nineteen eighty seven and continues at least
(09:57):
as we record this episode. It's so funny to think
of it like a country forming in nineteen eighty seven. Yeah,
you know, we were, we were all alive. Then it's yeah,
I don't I don't know why that's that's remarkable to me.
I just listen Yeah, it's kind of like a government too,
you know, it's more I guess it's more a government
because they didn't change the borders of the country. But yeah,
(10:19):
it also reminds me of Italy, which has had um
a historic problem in Germany too, right, like there we go. Yeah,
it's not that remarkable, but for some reason, I just
it strikes me. It's like, whoa a country that formed
in my lifetime? Yeah, yeah, large enough scope, just so
I can do the accent again. There are a lot
of people in this world that at a time said,
(10:42):
forming your country in seventeen seventy six. Congratulations, that's true
today he is? Were you watching BBC or something. It's
just the Hamilton soundtrack, That's what it is in my head.
They don't have British. It's when I when I sing
(11:02):
it back, it's all British. King George does. That's tough.
That's true. That's that's a good song too, That's like
probably that's a great run. You got to have a
you've got to have a large range for that one,
you know. Um, But the here's another one. Um. South
Sudan formed quite recently in or within our lifetime. It's okay,
it's not remarkable. It's just no, it's I think it's
super remarkable. It's weird. I collect I stand by it
(11:25):
feeling weird. I stand with you in the fact that
that is incredibly weird. Yeah, you know what I mean.
Imagine being born in earlier generations before the fall of
the USSR, and all of a sudden you're like, oh, well,
we had all these new countries now yea, many of
which I probably can't visit. And I have to remark
on the sinister nature of your coffee cup. It has
(11:45):
a like a Christmas reindeer cartoon on it, but the
top is like blacked out, like it's been spray painted over,
and it's like half of the reindeer's head is shrouded
in shadow. It's it's incredible. It's a gift. Well, these
are burn marks. I was actually on fire when I
was drinking from it. No, this is inact, this is
(12:07):
a great um. This is a gift, as Matt said,
from our friends Joe and Linda. And if you look
really closely, you can read the writing under the black
part says happy holidays to conspiracy stuff. This is a
coffee cup that is heat sensitive, so it's so it's
all black unless you pour something hot in it, like
(12:28):
coffee reveals the picture and reveals the picture. Well, I'm
just tickled by all kinds of simple stuff today. No,
I think it's remarkable too. And thanks again to Joe
and Lindau. I hope you're listening, and I hope that
Joe and Linda, along with the rest of you find
folks forgive me for butchering Korean names throughout this episode.
(12:50):
So there's a person named Park Gunhi was born in
nineteen fifty two. That was pretty good. Well, we'll see
we never know that the emails come in right now,
that's fair Park. Miss Park is the eldest child of
South Korea's third president, Park Chung he. She was elected
(13:11):
president of South Korea in twenty thirteen and served until
twenty seventeen. Wait record, scratch, pump, yeah, pump the brakes.
I know, I know how it sounds. It sounds pretty
freaking insane for a democracy to elect the child of
a former president to the same position, right, I mean,
(13:31):
what are the odds You'd have to be a pretty
corrupt country to ever allow that to happen, especially if
you purport to be a meritocracy, right, sarcastic. Then I
just think it's ridiculous for any democracy to do. We
know how you feel about political dynasties. Yeah, thank you, Okay,
all right, all right, let me you're right it is.
It is my opinion, but technically it's unsound anyway. Yeah,
(13:56):
whenever your vote matters. In South Korea, president is elected
for a five year term, meaning President Park was set
to hold office from twenty thirteen to twenty eighteen. But
as we said, she left office in twenty seventeen. So
what happened? Scandal, that's what happened. Yes, long story short,
(14:17):
the first female president of South Korea was impeached this year.
But that's only the beginning of the rabbit hole. And
we're going to go down that rabbit hole right after
a quick word from our sponsor. Here's where it gets crazy.
So President Park had a very close friend, a woman
(14:39):
named Chu Soucil. That's what we're going to pronounce it as.
But it's ccho O s O D S I L.
How else would you pronounce that? That's how I would
do it. So Choo is the daughter of this cult
leader Shamanesque, if you will, named Choi Ta Men and
Choi was a former Buddhist. He formed a religious group
(15:03):
called Eternal Life Church. Doesn't that sound wonderful right now?
This thing in itself is relatively innocuous. It's it's a
religious organization that he founded. Sure, great, going on, you
you can do that. South Korea has no laws barring
religious practice of any kind. And again you have to
take our word for it here. But despite the absolutely
(15:25):
cartoonish practice, like Ben said, of making a former family
you know, a family member of a former president president,
it's pretty ridiculous. South Korea functions democratically, which means citizens
have freedom of religion, they have the ability to vote
for you know, people going up for president what they
(15:45):
call a sham democracy. He totally he could totally tell
what mudo is. Some of this research look good. The
problem is if you try applying that across the board
and you start to realize any relative the holes in
everybody's tomocracy. But anyway, that's what I'm saying. Democracy is
a bit of a magical loaded term. But no, I
(16:09):
don't know. Cake, Yeah, coffee's coffee. You know, sometimes what
if it's gluten free cake. That's a good point. So
the Church of Eternal Life or the Eternal Life Church
saw Joy as a messianic figure, a self described future
boot like a prophet, a prophet becoming a demi god.
(16:31):
Oh so it's like a step up. Yeah, like the
bad guy in Lord of Illusions. I love that. It
was so great. It holds up too. It holds up
better than you would think. You know, what was his name, Nicks? Yeah?
What I think it might have been Nick? It was Nick.
Swan was the magician. We're getting knock Wrecker. But y
all check out Lord of Illusions. That's an underappreciated Clive
(16:53):
Barker movie. He gets him aligned quite a bit. And
does I think he I think he's worthy. His short
fiction is great Books of Blood, and that's a nice one. Anyhow,
CHOI was a close associate of miss Park's father until
and here's the murder, most foul my friend, until her
father was assassinated by Korea's Central Intelligence agency, most foully.
(17:15):
And admittedly that's what's different with this case versus a
lot of other cases of an intelligence agency assassinating their
elected leader. Not to say that happens a lot, just
to say that this is not the only example members,
officials or former officials from Korea's CIA said, yeah, we
(17:38):
shot him because we thought he was super corrupt and
we were doing the right thing for the country. It's bold,
it's bold. During the younger Park's childhood, Miss Park's childhood
and political ascendency, Choi, the leader of the Eternal Life Church,
was a mentor figure. And this much is acknowledged by
(17:58):
everybody in the conversation station Miss parks supporters, miss Park's opponents,
everybody knows he was somewhere like a father figure, somewhere
an advisor, you know. And this is an isolated person
who has lost their parents. However, leaked diplomatic cables from
the American Embassy and Seoul, the capital of South Korea,
(18:21):
they came to. These cables come to us via the
wiki Leaks Enterprise, which we should also probably check back
up on. Is Julian Assange still there, still in London
hanging out? Okay? All right? Every so often I asked
Matt on air off air, what's happening with Julians? Usually, yeah,
(18:44):
he's still there. He's still there. Uh So. Anyway, these
leaked cables report a bunch of rumors flying around Seoul
that mister Choi was a Korean Russ sputant and had
complete control roll over Park's body and soul during her
formative years, and then his children accumulated enormous wealth as
(19:05):
a result. I love how the idea of like Rasputin
conjures the images of like magical powers almost you know,
or like mind control abilities. Absolutely yeah, And just using
the phrase control over Park's body and soul. Yeah though,
and he's a puppeteer of sorts. Well, you know, the
historical Rasputin is pretty fascinating character, and I wonder what
(19:33):
it means, you know, like Tonol's point, calling someone a
Rasputin definitely does have this tinge of occult nature, right
or a cult power. All I know is that Resputin
makes a fine dark beer, is it true? It's called
old Resputin and it's delicious. You know, I'm so skeptical
dark beer. Somebody told me that Gainnis is actually a
(19:54):
people go on at Gainnis diet, and I thought it
was a joke because dark beers always seem really heavy
to me. It's like, you know, I want my loaf
of bread and a glass. But apparently I was wrong
on that. Then you hear about an olden time where
people would drink a dark ale with their breakfast. Yeah,
come on, because the water would kill them. That's true.
(20:14):
That's a great way to start your day. Did you
ever hear that theory that the Dark Ages it could
be chalked up the Dark Ages being the period of
stagnation and education in Western Europe can apparently be chalked
up to fundamentalist religious practices and booze. There are a
couple of historians to say everybody was just pissed drunk
(20:38):
for like several centuries. Wow, I think that's an oversimplification.
And speaking of oversimplifications, let's continue with some of the
backgrounds here. So after becoming fast forward, as we said,
after becoming President of South Korea, Miss Park and her
friend Miss Chew continue to have a close relationship. So
the timeline of Miss parks fall from grace began in
(21:04):
October of twenty sixteen, which was about a year ago
from now. So here's the rundown. On October seventeenth, students
protested at the prestigious Ewaha Women's University in Seoul, which
sparked a much wider investigation into corruption and influence pedaling
(21:25):
in parks Inner Circle. And then specifically we had protesters
arguing that miss Choi's daughter was unfairly admitted to the
school due to potential influence, shall we say, from the
administration from Park's office. And then we've got one of
the weirdest little bits from this scandal, which was the
Choi's daughter was able to list her champion dressage performance
(21:50):
on her application. And so anyone doesn't know, that's like
where the horse just kind of steps right like it's
almost like a little prancing. The horse and the rider
perform a series of predetermined move moves. It's not like jumping,
it's not racing. It's like kind of trotting in a
circle or tapping and like racing. Your okay for every
(22:10):
I literally a show pony, Yeah, yeah, exactly for everyone
who doesn't have some weirdly specific version of synaesthesia, clairvoyance
or telepathy. What Nolan I were doing when we were
trying to explain, we were both using a right hands
like like the front hooves of a horse. Um, I
hope that doesn't come back to hunters. So yeah, yeah, dressage, dressage, dressage.
(22:34):
I think it's dressage sounds more fancy let's let's go
with Yeah, I was gonna say that is something I
would associate with wealth, opulence. Yeah, here we go, affluence
and influence. As it turns out, yes, because this training
was apparently paid for by the South Korean government, So
taxpayer money essentially sent this kid to a horse school. Yeah,
(22:57):
well they would. I'm sure they call it at that level.
I'm sure they don't call it horse school the Grsage Academy. Yes,
and we continue, right, Oh boy do we ever? We
have October twenty fourth, wherein the South Korean broadcaster JTBC
broke open the scandal wide open by uncovering a tablet
(23:17):
computer belonging to Choi Soon. Still. Yeah, the friend was
a friend of miss Park, who had no official government
post whatsoever, and documents found on this device suggests that
miss Joy had received confidential presidential documents and edited key speeches.
So yeah, she's editing speeches for the president who's not
(23:40):
officially a part of anything. And again, I'm not one
hundred percent, you know, clear on the particulars of the
you know, chain of command and levels of clearance I
guess in this government, but I would imagine people would
have to be vetted and assigned some kind of clearance
to get these documents. Oh sure, it's obviously might not happen.
(24:01):
We'll imagine President Obama or imagine President Trump saying saying, well,
you know, these might be confidential, but I don't keep
any secrets from a boy jelly Roll. Yea jelly jelly
Roll has got all these documents on his tablet and
he's just editing speeches. He got me into that Floyd concert.
This is a man who understands the world, and I
(24:22):
want him working with these secrets. Jelly Roll. Yeah. Well,
it'd be one thing if jelly Roll was an accomplished
speech writer who just wasn't officially working on the thing,
but was a friend and was like helping him out.
But if it's somebody even though dude, can't you I mean,
in our government at least you know he had just
(24:42):
like slip people that kind of stuff. I mean, you
get big trouble for that, like at the highest levels.
I mean I would think of sure, I mean confidential
documents though, that's that's a huge problem. I guess the
president has the agency to just kind of do whatever
and listen. I don't know, Ye, it seems like in
our government, we have situations where the president, by virtue
(25:03):
of his own office can just kind of like say, yeah, no,
it's cool, We're just gonna do this today, right, like
when we had that discussion in Zone of Death about
whether a president can pardon themselves, you know. October twenty fifth,
Miss Park admits to the country. She says, yes, I
have close ties to Miss Choi, who has at this
(25:26):
time been nicknamed the Shaman Advisor already because her father
was a cult leader. And she apologizes for causing the
nation grief, Like, my bad, I'm friends with her. That's crazy,
all right. So then October a little bit later, like
right at the end October twenty third and the thirtieth,
hundreds of thousands of people began protesting and gathering in
(25:47):
Soul for the first of six giant rallies about this scandal,
protesting against the administration, and Miss Park accepts the resignations
of several key aids who have gotten caught up in
this whole affair, which probably means they knew about it
and didn't say anything, yeah exactly, so they got cut first.
(26:08):
Then on November first, Miss Choi returns from Germany. She's
been in Germany, kind of escaping the situation in a way,
and she comes back and she gets questioned and even
detained by prosecutors to figure out what the heck is
going on. So then on November eighth, we have investigators
raiding the headquarters of Samsung Electronics for the very first time.
(26:30):
What Yeah, and the company was believed to have come
under pressure to make donations to Miss Choi. That's weird. Samsung,
all right? Fourteen was seventeen percent of the economy. Yeah, huh,
So what next? Then on November twentieth, Miss Park gets
(26:50):
accused by prosecutors of being a conspirator of the criminal
variety in Miss Choi's alleged scheme. So Miss Choi is
kind of in this version like they accused her of before,
being a puppet master of sorts, and the president is
just one of the puppets that she's manipulating. And then
on the twenty ninth of the same month, Miss Park
(27:15):
offers to resign but does not say when in her proposal,
then is dismissed by the opposition and the protesters as
a stalling tactic of sorts. On December sixth, the heads
of the country's largest companies. Those tribal we mentioned earlier
are interrogated by lawmakers in the National Assembly, and on
(27:39):
December ninth, lawmakers vote to impeach Miss Park. So what
kinds of things are being whispered into President Park's ear
Here's where it gets kind of spooky too, you know.
According to the BBC, critics believe Choi perpetuated her father's habits,
Choi's father being, of course, the leader of the Eternal
(28:02):
Life Church. Uh. Some media reports suggested that Miss Park
held shamanistic rituals at the presidential compound under choice influence.
Miss Park, for the record, denied this. Yeah, the president
holding shamanistic rituals in and if we apply it to
(28:24):
the United States president, just in our recurrent situation, President
Trump performing rituals in the White House with other people around.
You know, maybe they're not so creepy, but but the
rituals were we talking about, well, first, you know, for
another example, Ronald Reagan consulted an astrologer. Yeah, it's true,
leader of the free world, the most dangerous nukes at
(28:46):
the time, and presidents do hang out at the Bohemian
Grove right at the time of our recording, Park continues
to deny any allegations of participating in cult rituals at
the Blue House. Think of it as the South Korea
White House is the president's home. Specifically, to answer your question, Noel,
these rituals included, but we're not limited to acts of
(29:07):
alleged clairvoyance, fortune telling, and channeling. Yes, Miss Choi is
rumored to have told Miss Park she was capable of
channeling the spirit of the president's dead mother. Additionally, she
gave the President amulets that had purported abilities to provide
magical protection. She also listening devices. Quite possibly, she also
(29:33):
advised the president on which sorts of colors to wear
and when, for example, red and white clothing. I want
to stop here before we're before we get too far,
and note that one thing I really liked about the
question you asked Nol when you said, well, shamanistic rituals.
What type of these things for someone who you know,
(29:56):
historically all the US presidents have outward at least if
only for the votes, said that they were Christians. Well,
I was kind of getting at you. I mean, like,
is it that bizarre and another culture to perform these
kind of quote unquote rituals is it any more bizarre
than presidents holding prayer meetings or something like right, or
(30:16):
a prayer breakfast or something. Yeah, exactly, And you know,
I really appreciate that point because I think it's it's
a fantastic points when we need to make because there
there are there are shamanistic religious practices in Korean and
they're a part of the culture, you know, And so
it's it's not necessarily it doesn't necessarily mean that this
(30:42):
is stuff that Choi and her father just made up. However,
it does seem that it does seem that the daughter
took up the father's mentor role and definitely put the
kid in horse school. That's what that thinks for sure.
So opponents a Park allege that their friend Choi was
(31:03):
actually less like a friend and more like a behind
the scenes puppet master, picking up where her father left
off and directing the president in matters of state policy.
We know the choy ad access to secret government documents.
We also know that she edited the president's speeches. But
that leads us to a couple of questions. Right, Yeah,
we don't know exactly what types of edits were made
(31:25):
to the speeches. On one hand, it could be as
simple as proofreading. Maybe she's just fixing some typos, right sure,
just going through right clicking in the word document and
or whatever document and then fixing the red saying that's
actually further not farther, Yeah, for sure. But on the
other hand, CHOI could have been altering the content of
(31:45):
these speeches, like meaning, somebody with absolutely zero official government
position was creating public policy through the words of the
president and possibly even swaying these things like whatever is
happening in either the favor of the church or in
personally you choice favor me because we know, like I mean,
(32:06):
speeches don't necessarily dictate policy directly, but they can certainly
shape perception. And you know, the give the impression of
support of certain things, and that matters. We know words matter,
and that can make a big difference in you know,
the way things move in terms of actual policy. Yeah,
(32:27):
you're you're sending signals to the rest of your government
by saying things in public. That's just it signaling, Yeah,
and it is. It is very important. It's a crucial
component of foreign policy. So somebody with no qualifications other
than being someone's friend and or manipulator had their hands
(32:48):
at the wheel in one of the most um I
would say, one of the top three most fragile geopolitical areas.
Sure time, you know, what if? What if? Kim Jong
un here's his speech that he or his advisors don't like.
You know, I have a feeling that happens all the time.
(33:12):
Probably does it, Probably does. So this is an ongoing situation,
and where does it leave us in the modern day.
We'll draw some conclusions after a word from our sponsor, Well,
we're back, and it doesn't look good, right, Miss Park
(33:37):
certainly did seem to be under the sway of choice
influence as well as choice fathers and heads of the
corporation involved are saying, you know, it's fairly it's incredibly
uncommon for these very powerful business leaders to be called
into a member version of Congress. They're saying they were
(33:59):
a core into donating millions of dollars to choice organizations. Wow,
South Korea already elected a new president, Like, how do
you I'm just wondering about being coerced into donating millions
of dollars to this stuff because I guess you couldn't.
You could threaten to impose sanction or you know, new taxes,
(34:20):
or you know, things that would make operating your giant
conglomerate unfeasible. I can't imagine how much pressure, but there
must have been something there, some triggers to pull. Well,
there's also the yeah, they're they're definitely triggers. There. There
are hard triggers and there are soft triggers that might
not ever legally be personal stuff you're right, or legally
(34:46):
recognized as a threat too. Yeah, there might be personal stuff,
but it might also be something as simple as we
have new complications on building codes, right, yeah, or tariffs
or something, you know. Yeah, I wonder if Choy threatened
to summon the dead relatives of some of the leaders
(35:06):
of the conglomerates. That's an interesting idea, Matt. At this point,
we don't At this point, we don't know. Yeh sure,
if it's anything like that, and most likely as not,
it would just be interesting. Well, that's the thing. Without
knowing what was happening, right, it's it's very difficult for
people to form concrete opinion or sort of chronological chain
(35:30):
of events. We do know that since the tenth of
May twenty seventeen, there's been a new president in South Korea,
Moonji In, who as far as we know, is not
under the sway of a cult. As a former human
rights lawyer and chief of staff to another former president,
(35:55):
Romo hun he was he was elected with a with
an okay, okay share of the of the vote. It
seems like in all honesty, they just had to have
a snap election to get this other person out. So
that's that's the case. So far as this is a
(36:18):
developing situation, we'll probably hear more about it. Um it
does not come at the best time of course, geopolitically,
we are this. This is going to come out after
we record it, so some of the events may seem
a little bit older or changed even slightly, but not
much hopefully right like we are currently recording this the
(36:42):
day before the DPRK is set to launch another ICBM,
and they'll be launching it on Saturday, September ninth, yep
eehaw right, And we can do an entire episode about
North Korea's purported nuclear capabil these plus versus their actual
(37:03):
nuclear capabilities. But at this time the region is under
intense global scrutiny and the powers that be are are
flocking there. This is a this is going to be
Asnell said, interest a series of interesting times for South
Korean president and for the people of the region. Just
(37:27):
as a side note, I know a few people, multiple people,
who are in the navy, and they have been snapped
up from being on leave to go on an adventure
somewhere that they cannot discuss. So it always makes me think, Oh,
I wonder if they're heading that way. Who knows. At
(37:47):
the same time, we have signals from officials in the
Russian and US governments talking about that are indicating arms
build up, training exercises. What a time to be alive.
I hope that the streak of being alive continues not
(38:09):
and of course we hope that everyone hearing this is
in a safe place, and we are sending our thoughts
and support to the innocent people of the world because
you know, as they say, what's that old quote, when
elephants go to war, only the grass suffers. Oh geez,
(38:29):
trampling on all. Now, just one last thing here before
we you know, end of this episode. Per se, are
you doing the voice? Do the voice of work? We
just have to remember in our own country, if we
look at ourselves. The United States has a long tradition
(38:52):
of secret societies among the upper echelons of our government. Yeah, heah,
including Freemasonry, let's say, the illuminosis perhaps of Bavaria, and
you know, the Bohemian grove, skull and Bones, all of
these other secret societies that the United States voter just
(39:14):
has to either not know about or completely ignore when
they make their decision on who they're going to vote for,
because most of the people that get up to that
level have been a part of one or more of these.
You know, that's a great point, Matt, and I'm glad
you made it, because it goes so it's in the
great interest of people who profit from a status quo
(39:37):
to enforce disunity amongst the bottom part of society, right,
or any lower part of society. So often you'll see
this false dichotomy hinging on a political position or a
(39:57):
I mean, the best is when there's blind loyalty to
a party, because when the parties are both fingers on
the same hand, then everybody gets to have a little
bit of bread and circuses, a little bit of Facebook liking,
a little bit of clicktivism or whatever, and feel that
they've done their part for reproduction or gun ownership or
(40:21):
whatever whatever their issue is, and Honestly, just saying it
on a podcast that I know goes out to a
number of people makes me feel good. But ultimately, what
does it do? What does it do? R right? And
the groups who are participating in the just buffoonish, buffoonish
(40:46):
summer camp that is Bohemian Grove or the dumb fraternity
that has skull and bones. I mean, look, here's the
thing with tradition. I've never been in them, just I
don't have an opinion because well, it's a very powerful
organization with very powerful people in it, and hopefully those
(41:10):
people are using their power to keep this species alive
and push it toward its ultimate destiny, which is expanding
beyond this planet before we destroy it one way or another. However,
I think that it is a lapse in critical thinking
to assume that because something has existed for a long time,
(41:34):
or that because powerful people like it, it is therefore
somehow correct or superior. I mean, look at sadly, there's
so many examples of times where people said, well, that's
tradition or that's how we've done it, and those turned
out to be terrible, terrible, incredibly stupid things. And we're
(41:58):
still doing a lot of them, and we can't we
as individuals, we as groups, whatever group you align yourself
with have to be have to take great pains to
note that the problems we so easily spy or so
we easily perceive in other organizations, whether that's a religion,
(42:20):
a state, or a business or a family, whatever, a
fan club for Christopher Walkin. Groups of humans tend to
have some of the same root problems, you know, and
the same rotten tooth of corruption in the mouth of
the South Korean government and still exists. Right, the president
(42:44):
was corrupt, But we can't act like the US doesn't
have its own cavities in this terrible analogy. Dude, Hey,
I feel that the big thing for me is loyalty.
If you if you are swearing an oath to serve
as a democratically elected official, especially and in the executive
(43:04):
office as the president for the people, you are you
are acting as an executor of the people's will essentially
and also you know in a way, and that's at
least what it says. But what if you've already sworn
an oath to one of these secret societies prior to
swearing that oath? Do they exist simultaneously? Do you know
(43:27):
who do you serve? If you are a public public figure,
if you're a government official, should you be required to
disclose all all the ins and outs of those businesses
or you know, swear like break that oath in some
way officially? Well, then is it a violation of because
a government official is still a citizen, is a violation
(43:49):
at least in the US of their right to privacy?
Oh my god? You know what do you think? I
don't know. I just I support the right to you know,
for a high level government to have a guru of
some sort they just keep around, you know, I think
that's that's cool. Yeah, what's the point of having a
stressful job like that if you can't have some sort
(44:09):
of weird magician that you hung around with all the time? Merlin,
there should always be a resputant a choice and still
there you go. You know, that's interesting because we do
know that there are advisors in different countries that would
they're doing things that would be considered magical acts, right
(44:30):
like Myanmar were also aka Burma had the military powers
there for a long time, took the advice of astrologers
and actually relocated the capital for that and even magical beliefs,
aside just having a trusted confidant or an advisor, especially
(44:51):
if you're in a series, if you're in a position
where several million, several hundred million people in case of
any US president past nineteen fifty probably would like to
kill you. You know, it's good to have friends. Are
sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name. Yeah,
(45:14):
you know, you know, I haven't learned much from TV
and movies, but one thing I have learned is that
the bad guy is almost always the close trusted advisor.
Oh like Scar almost always in the Lion King or Iago,
there's so many A lot of times it's the magician.
(45:36):
A lot of times, you know, it's the religious leader.
Just saying yeah, you know, that makes me think. Leads
and gentlemen, if you were in a position of immense power,
or if you are now, do you practice having gurus?
Do you have a trusted advisor? Do you have even
(45:57):
if you are not in a position of quote unquote
immense power? Now, do you have a spiritual advisor? Do
you have someone that has a connection to things unseen
and little understood, and if so, do you follow their lead?
Have you met with success or have you been burned
in the shamanistic rituals? We'd like to Yeah, whatever the
(46:20):
belief system, maybe we'd like to hear from you. And
speaking of which reminds us it's time for first shout
out Today comes from Simon Hey from Australia. Says, Simon
love the show, so I thought i'd give you a
story I heard from a friend's grandpapa. I inserted the
(46:42):
extra papa. He was in the navy in Al Salvador
or the US, and after this encounter, he and his
shipmates have never set foot back on a boat. When
they were out in the Atlantic one night, massive swells
began to form out of nowhere, and he said something
came out of the water that was so big that
its eyes were the size of a semi trailer. It
looked directly at the boat and went back under water.
(47:04):
So Simon says that when they reported this to the command,
they were basically dressed down by their commanders or whatever
and basically accused of being drunk. So he swears to
the story, and it doesn't go into too much more detail,
but he hates talking about him. Also, have you ever
heard about the westall Ufo sighting. I highly recommend you
sus it out as Australia is known for weird things
(47:26):
like UFO sightings. Keep up the good work and skadooche
nice Simon. That's a cool story. You know, the size
of a semi I like that. Yeah, that's a tough one.
You gotta really believe that, friends Grandpa, but you know,
I believe him, but I want to learn more. Also,
(47:48):
if there's a massive storm, maybe it's possible that something
that typically would be in the lower levels of the
ocean was pulled up to the surface momentarily or just
came to check it out, or just came to check
it out, just to see what the HAPs were. The
Westall UFO Encounter is a UFO story from nineteen sixty
(48:13):
six where more than two hundred students and teachers at
these two schools witnessed in UFO descending on a field.
And it's an interesting case because I remember this, you know,
over two hundred people. Yeah, so there's a lot of corroboration.
That's a really good point, Simon. That's a really good
idea too. Thank you so much for writing in And
(48:35):
I hope your friend's grandfather talks about it more. Often
that's you'd be surprised what people can remember when they
try the size of a semi that keeps yelp and
keeps baffling me. I don't want to see that. Thanks,
Writing in Simon, who's next next? Shout out goes to Cameron. Cameron,
that's your shout out, Cameron says, I was listening to
(48:55):
the Lucky Yates episode, and you pondered why aliens would
analyze the ethics of abducting humans and come to the
conclusion that they must return us to Earth after abducting us,
but that they do not have to ask permission in
the first place. It stands to reason that, by our morality,
the most ethical way to approach an abduction would be
to ask permission first and return the abductee to their
(49:16):
original state afterwards. This is a primary tenet of the
American justice system, after all. Cameron says, However, what if
alien morality does not parallel our own? Consider a man,
a human man who's sitting on a boat on a
lake with a pole attached to that pole as a
string with a hook on the end. This man is fishing.
(49:36):
I like, how You're right, Cameron. He will not ask
the fish for their permission before catching them. But there
stands a good chance that if he will not eat
the fish, he will throw it back into the lake.
Why does the man do this Well, because humans have
an ethical standard that they apply to fishing, whereby the
fish is returned to the water if it will not
be eaten. We call this catch and release. We do
(49:59):
this because we do not assign enough value to the
lives of the fish to require their permission. Oh wow, right,
good point. So is it possible that the aliens operate
with the same ethical dichotomy? Could they see us as
fish hiding underneath the surface of Earth's atmosphere and reason
that their ethics do not require them to ask permission
of us fish human folk, but do require them to
(50:23):
return us to Earth if they don't plan to eat
us and or to you know, do something that would
end our lives. Hmm, you know, I really I really
appreciate that point. To me, probably the stranger thing is
just how one would traverse the gulfs of time and space. Sure,
I really love the catch and release comparison. The reasoning
(50:48):
here is yaiful. What do you think, Matt? What do
you think? Though? I love this Cameron. If there are
in fact species of some sort that are advanced enough
to want to study humans and this is in fact
what they're doing, this makes so much sense to me.
M hmm. And that that one line in particular, we
do this because we do not assign enough value to
(51:09):
the lives of fish to require their permission. WHOA isn't
it funny to how even people that are like a
lot of you know, non meat eaters are okay with
eating fish like pesketarians because they aren't cuddly, they don't
seem to have you know, anthropomorphic type of traits. Yeah.
I wonder if anyone's out there, like I'm interested actually
to hear what your reasoning is behind it. Is it
(51:31):
like a health thing or is it in fact a
kind of more of an emotional thing. It's because their
water breathers. Man, they ain't breathe in air. Now, an
octopus is capable of experiencing emotion and recognition, right, So
so if that's if it's an ethical concern about like
the ability to suffer or have experience experience emotions, then
(51:56):
I guess a pescetarium shouldn't eat an octopus. I have
known pesket arians that will not eat cephalopods. So yeah,
I think it's different for different people, but let us know. Yeah,
that's a great idea. And how can you prove if
a fish feels emotion or not because they're always just
going oh sorry, I'm so sorry. Oh man, no, I
(52:19):
respect that we're working live. Yeah, all right, Nolan, I
did a horse dance earlier. So now now the three
of us are back on even keel, we have time
one more shout out today from riconomed name assumed name.
Ricon says, I just listened to the Pyramid podcast and
(52:42):
the part at the end where you said your conversations
normally continue at a bar somewhere. I'd love if you
all did an after hours podcast where you were drinking
at a bar and continuing the conversation from a normal podcast.
Thanks so much, Ricon um drunk conspiracy see or I
mean even just like conspira drunk, the ambiance of a bar,
(53:06):
hanging out and having just maybe even if it's just
a beer or something with the cameo from the bartender.
Well yeah, and then just have we could have special
guests come over and just hang out with us. You say,
all kinds of weird stuff once you've had a logger
or two. Well, yeah, look, we're still will still listen
back and Tristan will do his magic on whatever it is.
But I can imagine something really cool being there Tristan.
(53:28):
You have to edit sober though, right, that's that's the
rule he's given the no like not possible. Tristan will
be there with us, and he'll edit real time as
we're going, just like cut and then keep going. I
love this. I like the idea too. And we have
you know, we have a couple of regular spots maybe
sometime in like October later in the year. Yeah, I've
(53:50):
been off the sauce this month. Yeah, we both have. Yeah,
that's true. You can have a cranberry. I didn't want
to talk out of school, but yeah, it's been pretty great. Actually,
I'm I might. I might never go back. Oh well, hey,
if that's what you want to do, man, more power
to you. Thanks buddy. Yeah, then I gotta tell you, hey,
(54:11):
you out a bar is not drinking. It is actually
really interesting and a lot of fun. I went to
a show the other night at a concert, saw this
amazing band, the Ocs. If anyone's ever heard of them,
or check them out there like this m LA kind
of garage e psychedelic punk kind of I don't know,
it's hard to even describe, but the dude that plays
guitar just blows it up. He's amazing and he's it's
(54:33):
it's really really cool music. But it was one of
the first times I've been to a concert like that
and not had a drink. And I felt so undistracted,
Like I watched the whole show, never moved, never worried
about getting back the bar, you're getting in line whatever.
I felt like it was a much more full experience.
I really enjoyed it. Not to nice, sound preachy or anything.
(54:55):
I really have been kind of digging. It's not more
of your money's worth. Just try too, you know. Yeah,
I went to a I went to one of our
local bars in the area here and I hung out
for a couple hours and my bar tap was seven dollars. Yeah,
we got a hot dog from fries. Wow. It was great.
(55:17):
So we were obviously into this idea. Ricon and fellow listeners,
let us know if you would want us to take
a recording out and about in the world where it
would be believe it or not, probably even more casual.
My thought is we could incorporate the Lucky Yates style
of hanging out and discussing multiple topics. I think we
(55:40):
might be able to make this work. Gentleman, I'm game,
and hopefully you are. To let us know. For now,
that concludes ours but not our show. We will be
back next week with something weird, fast snating, perhaps disturbing.
(56:02):
There's one way to find out. Tune in when we've published. However,
before then, if you would like to learn more stuff
than want you to know, you can find Matt, Noel
and I on Instagram. You can find us on Facebook.
You can find us on Twitter. If you are a
long time listener, you've heard the names of all those.
If it's your first time listening, let's make it interesting
and just search see what you find. Right it's conspiracy stuff,
(56:27):
And then with Instagram, just add show to the end
of it and that's the end of this classic episode.
If you have any thoughts or questions about this episode,
you can get into contact with us in a number
of different ways. One of the best is to give
us a call. Our number is one eight three three
stdwy TK. If you don't want to do that, you
(56:48):
can send us a good old fashioned email. We are
conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com. Stuff they don't want you
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Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
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