Tik Tok "Ban" and Galaxy Fold 4 Woes | 275

The U.S. Tik Tok "Ban" is just a thinly veiled attempt at a money grab. Your free speech doesn't matter if there's money to be made. https://www.geektherapyradio.com/

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
I misspeak a little bit in thisepisode. I say Senate when I mean
House of Representatives, and I sayCongress when I mean House of Representatives.
You'll see what I'm talking about.Welcome to Geek Therapy Radio. You've got
your mental curator, Johnny Hemberger.Let's talk about TikTok and the TikTok ban.
It is currently March of twenty twentyfour. Normally I like to try

(00:25):
to keep these episodes somewhat ever green, but anyways, let's jump right into
it. So, the TikTok banlawmakers, in a thus far Senate supported
bipartisan issue, lawmakers are saying,get that filthy word ban out of your
mouth. This isn't a ban onTikTok. We're not trying to They're saying,

(00:47):
we're not trying to ban TikTok.We're not trying to take away TikTok.
We're just giving them the choice.We are giving TikTok the choice to
sell to another company or sell toother companies so that it is not owned
by a company called byte Dance,which is a Chinese company and therefore falls
on the umbrella of the Chinese Communistgovernment. But that's the guys at least,

(01:11):
that's that the lawmakers are projecting tous. That's the guys. We're
not trying to ban this. Wejust want TikTok to sell to other companies.
You know, other companies, ispreferably American. So why is this
important? Why has this gotten traction? What is what is the argument here
that lawmakers are coming up with,which is why they would ban TikTok and

(01:36):
not Facebook or any other social mediaplatform. Well, it's what I mentioned
before. Since the parent company thatowns TikTok, it's called byte Dance byte
d a n C. Byte Dance, is owned by a Chinese company.
Therefore, under the communist umbrella ofthe Chinese government. They're saying that it's

(01:57):
risky for Americans, that that compromisesour national security, that a Chinese company
have access to American users' data,that it can be used in the various
ways, or soulds iran or donethis or that whatever, that it is
controlled by a quote in their terms, a foreign adversary, sorry, foreign

(02:19):
adversary. So it's a risk.They don't want Americans data being accessed willy
nilly by the Chinese government. That'sthe guys, now let me kind of
now, this is my commentary onit. Now, this is inform that's
important for me to distinguish here becauseyou won't listen to a lot of talk
radio and hear the hosts say,you know, mention out loud that the

(02:42):
following is only their commentary. Nowthey'll preach it like the gospel truth.
And I'll get off of that sidetrackthere. But here is my commentary in
the situation, and it is commoncommentary that is shared by lots of people
that basically, in my opinion,this is a very thinly veiled guys to

(03:05):
allow American companies access to billions,if not trillions of dollars worth of Yes,
American data, use it statistics andthings like that, cookies and all
that whole thing about tracking Americans data, what they're looking at, what they're
buying, what they're what they're sayingabout, so and so, what's going
on, you know, just justaccess to American data. And the truth

(03:30):
is, again in my opinion,that access to American data one hundred over
one hundred and seventy million US TikTokusers in this country, and that data
is worth billions, if not trillions, of dollars. That's what's really happening
here is that the US government andthey are cronies and lobbyists and possibly people

(03:53):
like Mark Zuckerbert. I don't know. That's just my that's my conspiracy theory
there, that there's no way youcan basically give another government, be it
the Chinese government or whatever, unrestrictedaccess to billions, if not trillions of
dollars worth of valuable data. Wewant an American company. We want this

(04:16):
is the US government. We wantan American company to have control of TikTok
and therefore have control to that justwell, this never ending spring of billions
of dollars worth of US data.So it's not that the Chinese government is
selling your data. It's really thatthe US government is not able to sell

(04:42):
that data. They want access tothe data. An American company should quote
unquote have access to that data.That's the real issue here. That's why
TikTok is on the chopping block.That's why it's under the umbrella of this
purported ban, even though they wantdon't want us to use the word ban.
It's sell to an American company orelse we won't list your your app.

(05:05):
TikTok on American app stores, theGoogle Play Store, the Apple App
Store. That's all it is.It's a money play. Like anything else.
It's a money play. And itshould be kind of alarming that,
at least in the Senate so far, that it's such a bipartisan issue.
Our politics in this country, inthe United States, are more divided than

(05:28):
ever. And then lickety split,they're all agreed. Other than sixty two
of them in the about sixty ofthem in the House of in the Senate,
not the House of Senate. Justin the Senate, they bipartisan agreed
on this bill to passion, passit on to Congress, and have it
voted on from there. That's kindof alarming. We can't agree on anything

(05:50):
but TikTok all of a sudden bipartisansupport for this. Yes, that's much.
And they need to sell to anothercompany. There's no way that the
Chinese should that the information, thatuser data should be streaming to somebody else
without going through our hands first,without us profiting on it first. That's
the real play here. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook meta, a lot of y'all

(06:14):
around meta. They sell your datato other companies. It doesn't have to
just be American companies selling your datato companies around the world. What's the
difference, Oh, one is theChinese government. That's not that's the scare
tactic. That's that's the play.They're hoping that it catches on as a
national security issue. But it's notan issue. It's a money issue.
Only American companies should have access tothose billions and tillions dollars worth of user

(06:39):
data AI. The amount of materialyou can feed into American AI companies with
you should with with user data fromTikTok alone is worth billions, if not
trillions of dollars. That is thereason behind this bill it is. It
is not some national security issue.It's just that the US government wants to

(07:02):
make sure that only US companies cansell your data to other people. That's
what's already happening with Facebook and allthe other meta based American companies. They're
already selling your data to the Chinese. They can't just allow the data to
have allow the Chinese to have unrestrictedaccess to that data without paying the US

(07:23):
government first. That's what this isall about. That's the only thing that
this is all about. So it'snot some virtuous national security issue and oh,
or it's the Chinese government and everythinglike that, and they're just propagating
propaganda and all sorts of things.Not for one thing, there's TikTok whatever.
I won't get into it. It'sjust it's not that it's simply about

(07:46):
the money. It's simply about TikToksitting on billions, if not chillions of
dollars worth the user data that theAmerican company should have access to selling.
It can't go. It has togo through us. We the middleman.
First. More Geek they p Radio, don't go anywhere. Welcome back to
Geek Therapy Radio. You've got yourmental curator Johnny Hamburger and segment one.

(08:07):
The previous segment, I was talkingabout the actual truth in my opinion and
many many other people's opinions because aboutTikTok. The TikTok ban, the proposed
legislation that's now going to move onto Congress eventually and be voted on.
It moved out of the Senate fullbipartisan support. About sixty senators, didn't
you know it, did not agree. They voted in nay, But the

(08:28):
vast majority got of senators bipartisan votedto move this proposed TikTok ban quote unquote
to Congress to be voted on furtherand made a law. In my opinion
and in many other people's opinion,it's not about it's not a national security
issue. They towed it as anational security issue so that the Chinese want

(08:48):
to have access to American data.But what it's really about is that the
user data on TikTok is worth billions, if not trillions of dollars, and
the US needs their cutup it first. It can't be that the Chinese sell
your data to other companies. Americancompanies have to sell American data to other
companies, and they're just going tosell it right back to China. That's

(09:09):
already what Meta does. That's alreadywhat Facebook does. They're not going after
meta Facebook. They're not going afterInstagram, which is under the umbrella of
Meta. They're only going after TikTokbecause it has one hundred and seventy American
users, one hundred and seventy millionAmerican users and user data of over half
of about half of the population ofthe United States. That's billions and trillions

(09:31):
of dollars worth of data that theycan feed into American AI companies to track
your usage to see what they cansell you, to see how much quickly,
or they can suggest to you thingson Jeff Bezos, part of Amazon
and everything. It's just that TikTokhas user data for one hundred and seventy
million Americans and nobody is paying theAmerican government or an American company for that

(09:54):
user data. Yet this is allthe TikTok proposed TikTok ban is. It's
not about somebody please think about thechildren. It's not about that. It's
about the money grab. If Americandata is going to be sold, American
companies need to be the ones sellingthat American data. So the ban on
TikTok, to propose ban of TikTokis not really a ban. They don't

(10:18):
want you to say that. Thelawmakers don't want you to use that quote
unquote filthy word. It's not aban. We're just saying that TikTok has
to sell to an American company oranother company that's not owned by the communist
Chinese government or another quote unquote foreignadversary. That's not what it is.
It's a money grab. Billions andjillions of dollars worth of American userser data

(10:41):
up for grabs, and they don'twant it funneling just to the Chinese.
They need to tap into that firstto feed their AI algorithms and everything like
that. One hundred and seventy millionAmerican users on TikTok, that's what it's
about. That's all it's about.It's nothing virtuous. It's not about American

(11:01):
safety. It's about money, honey, as it always is. Let's move
on to another topic that's been I'vebeen all. I've been very hot under
the collar about the TikTok thing becauseI don't have a huge TikTok following.
I mean on my personal account.Yeah, it is my personal account geek
Therapy Radio. I do have aTikTok. I have a one hundred or

(11:24):
so followers. I don't even known. I don't put a whole lot of
effort into TikTok, and maybe Ishould, so I don't have any sort
of like vested interest in the successof TikTok, you know, necessarily.
But it's just when they say it'snot a ban, it's basically just sell
it to another company or else wewill ban it. That's like and has

(11:46):
such bipartisans support. There's lobbyists onall sides and benefactors to these lawmakers on
all sides that are going to profitrichly off of the treasure trove of billions
and two millions of dollars worth ofof tiktoks. I'm American user data next
object for real though, as youcan see, not that you would know

(12:07):
necessarily, but I'm holding my SamsungGalaxy S twenty four Ultra right here,
my z fold four. I mailedthat off to Samsung to get an estimate
on fixing its issues. I've talkedabout, you know, on the past
episode or two of Geek Therapy Radiothat my z fold four had developed this

(12:30):
malfunction where the spen could only bedetected sometimes under the middle part of the
right side of the screen, andas soon as you go past that to
the left side of the screen,the cursor will disappear. That the cursor
for the spen will only appear underthe middle of the right side of the
screen, and that the screen rotationwouldn't work anymore. You turn on the
phone, screen rotation would work fora minute, not even for a minute,

(12:54):
a couple of rotates, and thenit would stop working. So there
was something wrong with that chip,that processor which also controls the s pen
and all sorts of other orientation featuresof the phone. So I sent it
off to z to Samsung, andI'm hoping still that it's kind of maybe
a firmware update like the new UIsix point one might come to the z

(13:18):
Fold four. I haven't heard officiallythat it will come to the z Fold
four, but I'm kind of hopingthat a firmware update will will fix these
issues. I sent it to Samsunganyways, because the last few little security
patches didn't fix anything. Not thatI really thought they would, but the
way the sensor's throwing false I'd beyou know, I'd be I'd be pleasantly

(13:41):
surprised if it was just a firmwareupdate. But everything told me also,
I was fifty to fifty on this. I was like, well, maybe
the sensor is throwing airs. Itis displaying like malfunctions that are consistent with
an actual air on the chip.So let me just send to Samsung and

(14:01):
see what they say. Well,they got back to me and they said,
hey, your warranty expired on thez Fold four on January of twenty
twenty four, which is very convenientfor problems to be showing up right after
the warranty expires. So I sentit in and from their description they said

(14:24):
you needed a new screen, likea new motherboard. A knew this and
that, and their estimate was drumroll, da da da da da da
da da eleven hundred dollars one thyone hundred and six dollars or whatever it
was going to be to repair aphone that I did not spend that much
money the repair. I didn't spendeleven hundred dollars on the Z fold four.
I think I spent just under that, like around one thousand dollars for

(14:46):
it. Maybe it was eleven hundred, But the fact is like either way,
it wasn't eleven hundred dollars to repaira phone that's not worth eleven hundred
dollars anymore, and that I probablyonly spent eleven hundred dollars on in the
first place. I responded with,cancel, send it back to me.
I am not spending that much money. Again, if you caught what I
said earlier, I'm on the Stwenty four Ultra right now, my Note

(15:09):
nine, which I do still havein front of me right here was for
the kind of work that I doon it. It was getting long in
the tooth and in the battery issues. It was getting hot all the time,
just running constantly all the time,just getting warm. Had to constantly
keep my Note nine on the charger. My wife's Note nine is just fine.

(15:31):
She's not having any issues with it. But again, I think my
use case scenario is a bit different. I'm editing videos a lot of times.
I'm working with a lot of videofootage. I am constantly on Microsoft
teams. It's constantly going, constantlygetting push up. It's constantly da da
da da noe. And I wasn'thacking it. My z fold four was
broken. So I said, youknow, I'm just gonna upgrade a year

(15:54):
earlier, six months earlier than Itypically even consider phone upgrading. Upgraded to
the twenty four Ultra. I doa lot of video work, record a
lot of video. I wanted tohave the best kind of mainstream camera available
right now on my phone, andit is wonderful. I'm not really if
you're watching this on YouTube right now, I'm obviously not using my smartphone to

(16:15):
record this. There's too much background, blur, narrow depth of field here.
Actually, I want to say so, I'm the camera you're looking at
right Here is the first generation PanasonicLumix S five and I have the fifty
millimeter one point eight Lumix S lenson it, and it's a very nice
looking lens and I'm just using naturallighting there is. I'm upstairs in the

(16:38):
new Geek Therapy radio studios. SinceI'm expecting baby boy number two this spring,
i have given up that room tobe my oldest son's new room.
Either way, Daddy doesn't have anoffice anymore. I'm out here in the
play area upstairs, the upstairs livingin whatever you want to call. It's

(17:00):
not very big. It is prettytight around here, but I'm using natural
lighting. This is the lighting comingout of the windows downstairs in the living
room. So anyways, LUMIXS five, that's the camera I'm using with the
one point eight fifty millimeter Lumix Slens on it. And this is kind
of the first video that I'm uploadingusing this lens, and I'm only recording

(17:21):
ten ADP right now, so itstill should look pretty good if you're noticing
any focusing issues. And this iskind of even for radio listener, podcast
listener. The first generation Samsung LumoxAS five does not have the betest does
not have a class leading auto focus. So if you're watching this right now

(17:42):
twenty four frames a second, tenADP, the autofocus isn't probably going to
be as perfect as the new sMark two or s Mark two X,
or any Cannon cameras or Sony Camerafirst generation Pantys five. More Geek Therapy
Radio coming up, don't go anywhere. Welcome to the third segment of Geek

(18:07):
Therapy Radio. You've got your mentalcurator, Johnny Hamburger, and I guess
now I'll do the plugs geek TherapyRadio dot com. You can visit there
chat with me there. You canalso email me directly Johnny j O h
n n y at geek Therapy radiodot com. Follow me across all the
socials. I was talking about TikTokerearlier. I do have Geek Therapy Radio
on TikTok, so you can followme there. I have bload videos from

(18:30):
time to time. I don't Ishould pay, I should do more work
on my Geek Therapy Radio TikTok account. But yeah, I've got a geek
Thera Paradio on TikTok and of courseYouTube. If you're watching this already on
YouTube, that's a little redundant.But for those of you driving around listening
on the radio or listening to thepodcast, Geek Therapy Radio podcast on YouTube

(18:52):
and of course Instagram and x andFacebook, it's all geek Therapy Radio.
If you're just listening to this broadcaston the am radio or on the radio
right now, you can download thepodcast. Of course, the iHeartRadio app,
Pocket Casts, i Eate, theApple Podcasts app, Spotify, all
the good stuff. Just search forgeek Therapy Radio podcast and that's me.

(19:15):
It should come up pretty quick.But just in case it's me, you're
seeing me and somebody else on thereor whatever. I'm the red, white
and black color scheme. So ifyou type in geek Therapy Radio podcast into
anything, I'm the red and whiteblack color scheme. You know, in
the Geek Therapy Radio logo and whatnot. That's just the scheme of Geek Therapy
Radio is red and black. Really, that's when people ask me, oh,

(19:40):
what's your favorite color? I rememberRiiker, my three year old son,
as what's your favorite color? Daddyis like complicated because I don't know
if I have a single favorite color, but my favorite color scheme is red
and black and for some reason,for some reason, I completely did not
plan on going off on this tangent. But let's talk cars for a second.

(20:00):
So back in twenty twenty, meand sorry, I keep bumping the
microphone er me and the high techTexan. A fellow host here on KPRC
nine to fifty am, my homeradio station for geek Therapy Radio, he
got access to the twenty twenty corvettethe news at the time. C eight
corvette has a blue stingray. Itwas awesome and I went on a ride

(20:25):
along with him. I even madea video for geek Therapy Radio on YouTube
about my kind of impressions of theC twenty twenty twenty Corvette. The C
eight Sorry, the C eight twentytwenty corvettech DEW stands for Corvette eight.
It's the eighth generation of corvette.My nephew, by the way, speaking
and we're talking about corvettes a littlebit here, and red and black color

(20:48):
scheme is what reminded me of it. My nephew, Spencer. We'll have
to talk to him. I haveto get Spencer on the show and talk
to him about it. His firstcar he just bought. He just bought
his first car. He was drivingaround in his grandma's pt Cruiser for a
while and he had that thing pippedout. Pretty cool. But nah,

(21:08):
he's finally got his first like acool car. It's his DeLorean moment.
I like to call it, likewhen I got my DeLorean. Bought my
DeLorean. He got a Corvette.He got a C four Corvette, which
is cool. I think it's aneighty I want to say it's an eighty
six or an eighty five. I'llat the double chap. I'll have to

(21:30):
get them on the show. Butit's red red with black trim and everything.
That's my color scheme. It's awesome. He's going to fix it up
a little bit. That's the ruleis that he's not allowed to drive it
until he's I think eighteen years old, which I kind of that's probably okay.
You know, there's a reason whyto kids. First cars aren't sports

(21:57):
cars. They aren't typically a sportscar. You gotta you need to learn,
you need to get comfortable with justthe safe operation. It would be
a cool period first in respect forengine power and fuel wheels slipping. If
you can drive a PT Cruiser Cruiserpretty safely, you know if you are
if you've spun the wheels in aPT Cruiser, you're gonna spin the wheels

(22:19):
in an old Corvette. Just what'sgonna happen. So it's good to have
a few years of PT Cruiser underthe belt before you step up to basically
any generation of a Corvette, especiallyolder generations of Corvette that don't have the
anti lock breaks. I'm not sayingthe c Ford doesn't have anti lock brakes.
I does it. I don't knowoff the top of my head here,

(22:40):
but uh, the DeLorean doesn't haveanti lock breaks, although it's not
a powerful car. I remember astory my friend told me at the time.
I'm gonna throw them under the bushere a little bit, Corbin.
He told me back when we werein high school, he used to go
through cars like trade through cars.He would have a new car every two
weeks. It seemed like he justkeep trading around, trading up, trading

(23:02):
down for other cars. And atthis particular moment in time, he had
what was it, It was likea seventy something Camaro, Chevy Camaro that
was completely geared for drag racing.Had like I swear it had slicks on
the back. It was had theroll bars underneath that the cage built into
the chassis. I think the passenger'sseat didn't exist, and so he has

(23:26):
that. He's traded his way.I think previously had a Nissan to forty
SX, which he should have kept. I told him at the time in
the late nineties, like, dude, keep this Nissan. This is gonna
be worth something one day. Thisis it's already an excellent car. It's
a five speed manual Nissan two fortySX. It was just awesome. It
was like, Corbyn, stay withthis one, keep this one for a

(23:48):
long time. He didn't. Soafter that Nissan too forty, he got
that nineteen seventy whatever Camaro that wasgeared for drag racing, had the cage
built in on the inside was primehad red primer paint orange. It was
dingy and whatever, had some patina. And he pulled it up to the
house and I was like, oh, sweet man, it was really stupidly

(24:08):
loud. I was like, yeah, can I take it around the block?
Like I was eighteen years old seventeeneighteen years old at the time.
Maybe we were a little younger sixteen, I had been my dad had taught
me manual transmission. I had ayear or two under the belt of driving
manual transmission and everything like that.It's like, yeah, let me let
me drive this old Camaro Corman.He push his arm over the wheels like

(24:30):
he's a I'll just say bad ass, and he's like, you couldn't handle
the torque, bro, And Ilaughed, I'm gonna say ass again.
I laughed my ass off because youcouldn't handle the torqu where. I was
like, okay, dude, allright, whatever, love your man,
have fun. He drove away.Next day, he wrapped it around a
tree. He's fine, he's okay. He did not get seriously injured in

(24:55):
that accident, if I recall,I think he hurt his leg, but
he yeah, he wrapped it aroundthe tree, like less than a mile
from our house, from my houseat least. And I just he called
me the next day, I sawhim the next day or Whatever's like,
glad, you're okay, but UHcouldn't handle the torque, bro, could
you? So I don't know.So back to the black and white,

(25:15):
black and red color scheme being myscheme and why reminded me of corvettes.
And I was riding around in theyear twenty twenty with Michael Garfield had to
text in a blue Sting Ray Corvette, Sea Corvette I have, I said
back then, you know, intwenty twenty, I was like, if
I if the if I had thiskind of money to spend and the Corvette

(25:36):
was really gonna be sixty two sixtythree thousand dollars for the base model,
if that was ever gonna be true, then I would and I could afford
it. Then I want a Corvette. This would be the first Corvette I
want. Mid engine looks fantastic.It still looks fantastic. But here's a
weird thing that I've kind of noticednow. I no longer am interested in

(25:59):
a sea Corvette, like even ifI had the space in the driveway and
the money for it, Like mymy zest for the C eight Corvette has
has dwindled a little bit. Now. If someone came along CA Corvette thirty
thousand miles, uh, and Isaw it on there on Auto Trader for
like thirty five grand forty something likethat, you know, there may be

(26:22):
some increased sleepless nights where I'm scrollingthrough auto Trader, like doing the mental
math, like how can I makethis work? How financially could I What
would I have to sell? Howcould I could this be the Daddy Cruiser?
How many child seats could I putit? It would be would I
be willing to put a child seatin? And now like I'd be,
There'd be several sleepless nights of that. If it was at a low enough
price point, I'd at least gothrough that phase of kind of scrolling through

(26:47):
auto Trader, in Facebook, Marketplaceand all that if there was a C
eight Corvette for between thirty and fortygrand. But right now I'm not.
I don't my zeal, my myinterest in the Cia Corvette has come and
gone because there's just flat out there'sjust too many of them now, I
see them all over the place.It's not it's no longer kind of a

(27:10):
unique thing, a cool thing tosee a Cate Corvette, because I don't
know where you know, wherever you'relistening to this in the world. I
live in Missouri City, outskirts ofHouston, Texas, and just driving around
Houston, driving around the Galleria,driving around Montros, driving around Kingwood,
driving around Humble, driving around sugarLand, everywhere they're CATE Corvettes. They're

(27:30):
no longer kind of like this uniquerare thing to have. They certainly don't
justify the price tag anymore. Itis asinine, asinine that anyone would pay
twenty thirty thousand dollars over sticker fora C eight Corvette for twenty twenty,
twenty twenty one, twenty twenty two, twenty three, twenty four Ate corvette.
It's ridiculous, Like, yeah,they should be around fifty grand right

(27:53):
now all day long. But evenstill, like it's the fact that there's
even a is there still a waitinglist for CA Corvettes for new ones?
Maybe think? I think there?Last I heard there was the last I
heard. I went to Elite Chevyhere in sugar Land fifty nine in Highway

(28:14):
ninety. I got that battery replacementin my bolt, and I just talking
about CA corvettes. And at thattime, this was just a few months
ago, there were still waiting listson CA corvettes. The service guy was
telling me, Yeah, there's probablya handful of few Stonians here that could
just call us up right now andget a Corvette. They would still have
to pay, you know, wellover the sticker and talk to the previous
person in line about buying their spot. Whatever that was a few months ago.

(28:37):
I don't know if there's a waitinglist for CA Corvettes now, but
I see them everywhere. I seethem often enough now that I'm just like,
it's not unique anymore. It's notI'd be driving it around and see
two or three or four just onthat drive within five miles. So whatever,
I'm kind of off the CA Corvette. Kick more Geek Therapy Radio coming
up. Don't go anywhere, allright, and welcome back to geek Therapy

(29:08):
Radio. You've got your mental curator, Johnny Hamburger. We are now in
the fourth segments of Geek Therapy Radio, and I spent the bulk of the
show already talking about the proposed TikTokban. What it really means, in
my opinion, what the real motivationbehind it is that it's not about protecting
your American data from foreign adversaries.It's about letting American companies tap into the

(29:32):
user data of one hundred and seventymillion Americans so that they can sell it
to the Chinese so that at leastAmerican companies are the ones able to sell
your data to the Chinese and toother people, just like Zuck does.
That's the real motive behind it,and it's so thinly veiled. And then
just how kind of shocking putting ona conspiracy hat for a second, how
kind of very eye opening it isthat it has such bipartisan support in our

(29:57):
country, in our divice political landscape, that this proposed TikTok band has by
part overwhelming bipartisan support so far,Yet in the in the Senate, is
it past the Senate? Uh?That should be an eyebrow raiser. I
don't care where you are on thepolitical spectrum, whether you are conservative or
liberal or any sort of mix.I think most Americans actually, if you

(30:21):
were just sit around a barbecue andeating chicken and steak and throwing water balloons
and whatever, you'd find that mostAmericans are pretty center. They just kind
of tip a little bit this wayor that on on specific subjects. This
narrative that basically that we're so dividedthat it's just it's your it's your Trumpken
neighbor versus your your let's go Brandonneighbor, and against your Joe Biden supporting

(30:47):
and Trump supporting a da da dada just old old men, basically old
men running our government. Don't getme started that it's not so divided that
this narrative in the media I callit mainstream mst are, mainstream talk radio,
and Fox News and all sorts isbasically and on the liberal channels too.

(31:07):
C Span, I almost said,c Span, MSNBC, DA da
da d the liberal outlets kind ofkeep driving this narrative that we're so divided
that we just we Americans don't agreeon anything, We are at each other's
throats, we hate each other.That the reality is that most of us
are just kind of in the middle, that we even the most conservative person

(31:30):
labeled person actually has a few alot of socialist ideas or things that they
actually agree with, And a lotof liberals actually are very much more conservative
than you might think, too.And the only way you find out about
that is bonding over hobbies. That'swhy geek Therapy Radio exists, so that
we can come together all different spectrumsof life and politics and religion and whatever

(31:51):
and just bond over star wars andstar trek and acting figures and legos and
video games and computers and audio engineers. That that's what most of Americans are.
That's where most Americans exist, isthat we are pretty pretty moderate in
our political views one way or theother. We're just we just don't have
anybody representing us like that. Wedon't have anybody who's like, yeah,

(32:14):
this, but also this we canhave both things here, Like yeah we
could. I don't. I'm nottrying to get super duper political on here,
but it's like, yeah, wecan keep our guns but also do
better things to make sure that childrencan come home from school. You know,
Like that's where American why can't wedo? But like, most liberals

(32:34):
own guns. That's just a straightup fact in the United States. You
would think that it's the people whodon't own guns being the biggest lobbyist to
be anti gun, take the gunsaway, whatever, Like that's not true.
Democrats have guns. Liberals have tonsof guns. They don't wear on
their sleeve like you know, Ithink like most gunner, even if you're
conservative gun or most gun owners,don't wear their gun politics on their sleeves

(33:00):
or the fact that they have gunson their sleeves. There's most Democrats own
guns. Most liberals for in theUnited States own guns. Straight up fact,
most liberals own guns. So it'snot about taking guns away. It's
like, hey, can we youwill? Y'all were so bipartisan on the
TikTok thing, just out of nowhere, like whoa, we got everyone almost

(33:22):
everybody in government agreed, crumbing acrossthe aisle to agree to sell TikTok to
an American company so the Americans cantap into that money well of American user
data. Y'all agreed on that,really real licketty split. But like you
know, twenty kids don't come homefrom school there. I don't want to

(33:42):
get too graphic with it, butthey are at rest in a school room
right there. Somebody blew them allaway. We can get pipe partisan on
that that. Like dead, y'allcan't come together three hundred and sixty or
whatever to sixty or whatever the Idon't know the full full count here,
but y'all can't come together that unanimouslyto make sure that kids don't have to

(34:06):
uh die in the classroom. Really, like TikTok is the thing that that
you got y'all together lickety split toagree on something TikTok did TikTok like craziness,
absolute craziness. But again I say, it's just follow the money.
That's the real answer there. Butuh, anyways, we are not We're

(34:28):
just not that divided. This narrativethat we are so divided. It's just
it's just not true. Most ofus are we We we agree on ninety
nine percent of things in our life. I've mentioned this on Geek Therapy Radio
before, that each human being isa totem pole. You know, a
total pole has different figures and differentkind of depicted animals, and different scenes
and things like that, and verycomplicated, very ornate. That each person

(34:51):
is an individual kind of totem pole. What makes them them, their family,
their job, their ethnicity, theirculture, whatever. We have all
this, We have all these differingtotem poles of people, and then only
one of the totems, only oneof Let's say we're each person is a
totem pole of one hundred different tiles, or a hundred different segments of a

(35:14):
tone pole. One of those segments. Only one of those one hundred segments
is our political identity. Only one. The other ninety nine of those segments
are things that we both have incommon that we celebrate about each other is
some people have the tone pole,Star Wars Geek and a lot of other
people have on the tone pole,Star Wars Geek and all the other pieces
of the totem pole, that theyjust want safety for their family. They

(35:37):
just want to be able to providefor their family, provide for the children,
provide for themselves. That they justthey're these very basic human desires that
it does that are that we haveregardless of politics. We want the same
thing, we want a lot ofthe same thing. Some argue that that's
why I don't. I think thereal reason TikTok is being you know,

(36:01):
the discussion of banning it is isso unanimously supported within our government. One
reason is that TikTok was broadly appealingto a very wide group of people.
You could fall you could see somebodywith a million views talking about pro conservative
values. You could see somebody witha million views that are talking pro liberal

(36:22):
values or whatever. There's this kindof equal melting pot, and you saw
people of all ages. They're elderlypeople that are very popular in TikTok.
Younger people are popular in TikTok.It's the tailor swift of social media.
It appeals to just every generation,and every generation is on TikTok, and
every walk of life is on TikTok. Every ethnicity, every race, every
religion, every sexual identity, whateveror our contrary to to those things that

(36:47):
are also on TikTok. Like it'sit's truly a platform where it doesn't seem
to be squashing anybody over somebody else. It's basically if you're if you meet
the algorithm right as far as havinga hook and happy the watch time I
can do. Y'all want me totell you in a separate episode kind of
how the algorithm works. And it'snot just the TikTok algorithm, it's it's

(37:07):
Instagram reels algorithm and it's YouTube shortsalgorithm. You could say whatever you want
as long as it kind of hitsthe algorithm right as in watch time and
people swiping away versus how many peoplehave viewed it, like, it doesn't
matter what you're saying. The algorithmwill pick you up despite what you were
saying, as long as it's you'rekeeping people watching and listening to it.

(37:31):
So you saw at least I doon TikTok, a very wide ranging different
views and opinions and things coming fromall different walks of life. I don't
see one thing getting squashed over theother thing. And basically, as one
TikToker put it again, I putthat caveat TikTok or on TikTok put it
is that the government is also afraid. It's not just a money grab,

(37:53):
but the government is afraid because they'reseeing people, Americans bonding on TikTok.
They're seeing Americans from all different walksof life coming to TikTok and bonding and
having discussions, and they're kind ofrealizing the common enemy. It's not each
other, it's the people trying tocontrol us. You are worthy of love
this and every show of geek,Derrick Prido. You are worthy of love.

(38:14):
You're worthy of giving love, youare worthy of receiving love, and
you're worthy of your own self respect. Thank you for spending some time with
me today. We got any neighborsout there in Missouri City, Texas,
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(38:36):
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