January 29, 2021 • 45 mins
With the recent anniversary of Roe v Wade and the violence at the US Capitol, guest Bridget Todd examines the link between the riot at the Capitol, the anti-abortion movement and disinformation.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome to Steph.
I never told you a production of I Heart Radio. Today,
we are once again joined by our good friend and
colleague Bridget Todd. Hello, Bridget, Hello, I'm so excited to
(00:25):
be here again. Yes, always a pleasure to have you.
And Wow, I think we recorded in early December was
the last time we met up in this virtual podcasting space.
And a lot has happened since. A lot has happened.
Doesn't that feel like it was years ago? It really does.
(00:46):
It feels so far. And I feels like I have
slept a minia nights. There's been a mini a moon
set of things have happened. I feel like I've already
aged ten years. Yeah, so there's a lot like I
feel like it's it was a lot, yes, And so
we wanted to ask you because the topic you're bringing
us today is related both to past topics you've talked about,
(01:08):
but also too what happened in the capital of the
violence at the Capitol, and since you're in Washington, d C.
We wanted to ask you about it. What was that like?
Thank you for asking. It was very odd, as you
might imagine. So when I woke up on January six,
before I went to bed, I had been watching the
numbers come in from the Georgia Senate runoffs, and I
(01:29):
was feeling very good. I put on my lucky shirt
that has a shirtly Chisholm look quote on it, and
so like you know, I woke up beaming. I remember
waking up like good morning. I was so excited, and
I think it was because I had not felt that
kind of hope and a long time. So I was
like feeling very very hopeful that morning, and it was
(01:49):
like a like a power and a hope that I
had not felt in I guess the last four years.
And how quickly that feeling of hopefulness turned in to
just powerlessness as I watched, you know, this insurrection happened,
and I think that like I was watching, it happened
on television kind of in real time, and so it
(02:11):
really got so dark and so serious. So quickly it
went from of course, there's just gonna be these Trump supporters,
you know, standing outside the Capitol protesting sure to like,
oh my god, this is bad. You know, we got
you know those things that you get on your phone
and there's an amber alert, those like things on your phone.
We everybody who was in my household got one of
(02:32):
those at the same time from the mayor of DC
saying that there was a state of emergency order, there
was a curfew, we couldn't go out. It happened very quickly.
And yeah, when I watched it, I'm always making this point,
but DC is my home. I was raised here, this
is my community. I've lived here. This is like what
I consider home. And I think that because it's where
so much of our federal government stuff happens and where
(02:53):
the you know, the capital is, people forget that just
regular folks live here, Like this is where people live.
And so I was really heartbroken by thinking about this
as not just an attack on our democracy and on
our capitol, but also on my community. You know, d
C is largely black and brown, and so when these
people were storming the capitol, I saw videos where after
(03:15):
they were storming the capitol, where did they go, Oh,
to our restaurants, to our hotels, to our institutions, And
just the idea that these people would be kind of
unleashed on my community really hurt. And so, you know,
I always just got to like make sure that that
point gets included that it's not just lawmakers who live
in d C. It's real people, some of which who
(03:36):
have no connection to the government, and so it was
not just an attack on our democracy and our capital
was also attack on these people are our home, you know. Yeah, remember,
because we were all watching closely and knowing that you
were my one of my connections in DC, definitely like
follow you on Twitter. You actually mentioned like, hey, thanks
a lot for bringing in the corona, like not wearing
a mask and infecting our city and we were trying
(03:58):
to control it, and you just made the bigger disaster
because they were not only in your community, at your restaurants,
at your hotels, at your places of service, as if
this was a free for all, as if nothing were happening,
and of course no one was arrested, so therefore they
were just out and about doing their thing. I just
saw a report saying like a thirty something in Capital
police officers tested positives for corona just recently. But yeah,
(04:19):
I saw you tweeting that. I was like, oh my god,
she's so right. I didn't even think of that that
part because I'm just looking at the violence. The holy
crap is a pandemic y'all, it's a pandemic, and it's like,
we just don't need this, and it totally I think
that residents of DC have been pretty compliant when it
comes to socially distancing and masking and all that kind
of stuff, but just we have enough stuff going on
(04:39):
as a city, you know, on top of the pandemic
and everything else. This is just like one more big
thing that we don't need. And I think it's also
really hard the fact that d C is not really
a state. I think that people just forget, like people
don't understand that we don't have the same kind of
protections or support that states have because we're not a state.
And so you know, when the mayor was trying to
(05:00):
get the National Guard to come in, that was delayed
because she said, a mayor, she doesn't have that authority,
and so she had to get special permission. You know.
I think it really illustrated to me how important it
is that DC becomes a state at some point, because
it just doesn't work. And yeah, every other place right
now is being ravaged by the pandemic as is DC,
and yeah, it just doesn't help. We didn't need this.
(05:21):
We're already having a tough time, the realities of when
people decided to do stupid things exactly. Yeah, and so
glad you're okay. And in the wake of all of this,
there's of course been a lot of looking into what
happened and what led up to it and the people
(05:41):
that were there. And I just remember so clearly you've
come on here and spoken a lot about disinformation and misinformation,
and you said, like, people forget that these online things
have real world consequences, and this was like one of
the most I couldn't think of a better example. And
(06:02):
we were also been talking about women and Q and
On and this very specific kind of like fear around children.
And one of the things you wanted to talk about
today is the anti abortion movement and how that was
a part of this whole thing of what happened at
the Capitol. Right. Absolutely, I'm grateful that folks like yourself
(06:23):
are continuing to pull apart all the different aspects of
how we got here, whether it's Q and On targeting
women who are concerned about children, and so I think
that the connection between the violence that we saw at
the capital and the anti abortion movement is just one
more of those kind of nuggets that I think we should,
you know, not ignore, because there are so many different
(06:44):
aspects that got us to January six at the Capitol,
and I think that we should be talking about all
of them. And I think some of them are easier
to go sort of overlooked or a race, and I
think the connections to the anti abortion movement is one
of them. And so I really have to start by
shouting out a couple of people. There is a great
piece by Lauren Rankin and Refinery twenty nine called how
anti abortion terrorism field the MAGA attack on the Capitol
(07:06):
really great? Peace cannot recommend it enough. And then another
investigation by Carter Sherman at Vice called anti abortion activists
were all over the Capital riots. So a lot of
the information that I have found have come from those
two pieces. And I also just have to shout out
my friend Renny Bracy Sherman of the organization We Testify.
We Testifies an organization that tries to increase representation for
(07:26):
people who had abortions, and so they were doing a
lot of that work of saying, oh, hey, some of
the people who were at the Capitol, they are very
known to you know, abortion providers and abortion activists, and
so I really just have to shout out the people
who are doing the work to make sure that that
conversation s would have we get to have it, and
that we don't let stigma or whatever keep us from
(07:47):
having this conversation that can really help us understand how
we got to the insurrection on the six. And then yeah,
also just the fact that last week was the forty
eight anniversary of Row versus Wade, you know, the landmark
Supreme Court decision legalized abortion in the US, and so
on that day, I really was sitting with the fact
that the same kind of tactics that abortion advocates have
(08:07):
been warning about and screaming about and you know, pointing
to for the longest time, those are the same tactics
that got us to January six with these people all
storming the capital. I think they're very, very similar, and
they have a lot of overlap. Can you break down
this information that led up to this one, but also
some of that overlap, because this isn't like a new
(08:29):
occurrence violence within anti abortion movements. Absolutely, it is not
a new occurrence. So just like the insurrection was kind
of fueled by what they're now calling the Big lie
that Trump won the election and that it was being
stolen from him. The anti abortion movement has similarly trafficked
in just straight lies about abortion, about people who have them,
(08:51):
about abortion providers, and I think it really illustrates what
happens when those lines go more or less unchallenged. And so,
you know, when putting the other my information of this episode,
I was like, oh, yeah, some abortion disinformation and misinformation
and in accuracies are so common that you don't even
really think about it anymore. And actually, just last week,
the University of California Berkeley School of Public Health put
(09:13):
out a study that found that four of the five
most presented web pages in response to a search for
abortion pill on Google were less than accurate. Right. And
so just the idea that on our biggest search engine,
when you Google for information about abortion, it is likely
that information is a lie, is not true, and it's
like misleading, right. And so I think that a big
(09:35):
thing to point out here is what happens when fabrications
are just tolerated. That that's just like the state of
play when it comes to misinformation. And I think also
when you look at, you know, the lead up to
the election, we saw so much inaccurate information being flooded
on social media about Biden and Harris and their positions
on abortion. And the thing that's like really sad, but
(09:57):
also shows how savvy these disinformers can be, is that
disinformers know that there is a lack of good news
and media sources that are in Spanish, and so they
then fill that gap with inaccurate information that is in Spanish.
And so you saw the Latin X community being really
targeted and inundated by inaccurate, distorted information about abortion meant
(10:20):
to impact the outcome of the election. And so another
point is that these often are happening in what's App
groups that are private, so like unlike Facebook where you
can kind of get a sense of like what's happening,
or Twitter, where it's happening mostly in public. It's a
close platform to have, you know, your private what's App
group with your aunts and uncles and cousins, right, And
so we saw lots of really horrific anti abortion messaging
(10:45):
targeting the Latin X community in Spanish speaking communities on
these platforms. And so yeah, I think that much like
with the insurrection, when you have just an accepted baseline
of inaccurate information about people who have abortions, about abortion providers,
about underrepresented our marginalized communities. It can actually translate to
(11:06):
real world violence, real world danger, real world threats. This
is not something that this is happening online. Researchers have
been very clear about that. You know, one of the
(11:27):
things that I just read and we just know that
happened in Kentucky is they passed the born alive abortion ban,
which is nothing more than a political statement trying to
do some fearmongering saying this is what's happening, this is
what the Democrats are doing. You see, they're killing the
babies after they're born, which is absolutely false. But then
we have a narrative where they actually put it into law,
(11:48):
so it seems like it's real because like here's in
a moment, that's attitude state law. We have to address
it as making it illegal because it's happening so much,
which is a part of that misinformation that is being
thrown out there. But it's so scary, and which is
also why this back and forth about this unity and
letting people go because you know, they didn't know what
(12:09):
they were doing. Trump told them to do it all this,
it's this level of giving some kind of meat to
this rumor which is completely unfounded, but because it's a
political move it's so scary to see because once again,
here we go with this misinformation, not just being a rumor,
not just being an outright lie, which obviously people are
(12:30):
believing anyway. How do you see with all of that,
with that type of strategy, with that type of fear
mongering that's actually a part of our government structure, how
do you see that bleeding into things like these riots?
Oh my gosh, it's so incredibly frustrating, Like what you
just described. I have worked in the feminist movement and
you know, spaces like that for most of my adult life,
(12:53):
and it's not new, but it is sure. It's frustrating,
you know, when we spend actual resources and time and
energy on things that are not true. Things are just
like fabrications, And I I understand the sentiment. You know.
A good example is when Project Veritas put out those
(13:13):
videos purporting to show Planned Parenthood staffers talking about selling
body parts and this and that. That was a fabrication,
but yet we still had to spend time and resources
combating something that was a lie. And I think that
you're exactly right that, yes, it's annoying that like taxpayer
money and resources gets spent on making laws or legislation
(13:34):
about things that just aren't happening. But even more than that,
it's like it takes up so much oxygen in the room,
Like what meaningful policies could we be discussing or getting past?
What kind of progress are we not able to get
to because we were too busy spitting in a circle
about something that was a lie. So I think that
as much as what you just described is horrible, it's
(13:55):
also just it's such a waste because it just takes
up so much in ergy. People have to spend their
time combating against things that are just lies. And I
think that we really have to get to a place
in this country where I'm not gonna say it started
with Trump, but he certainly didn't help. I feel we've
gotten to a place where people don't understand that there's
lies and there's true and you can have your opinion.
(14:17):
There are things where you're like, oh, well, I'm not
so sure, of course, but at the end of the day,
some things are just live. But we have a lot
facing us as a country we don't have time or
resources to spend on things that are just lies, and
we got to get back to a place where we
can all agree like some things are just not true
and not worth taking the oxygen out of the room
to combat them, you know what I mean. So with that,
(14:38):
because of stuff like that, it as another additional need
of protection for women specifically, but even men. And of
course we can go into the conversation about how anti
abortion movement is actually a misogynistic movement in order to
control women's bodies. That's the whole conversation we've had before,
probably need to have all the times. But when we
look at things like this riot, when we look at
(14:58):
the people who are actually involved with it, like you said,
they were able to pinpoint, Hey, that dude is known
for coming to threatened women, that dude is known for
harassing women trying to get to an abortion clinic just
to have a conversation, or even supporting planned parenthood. How
do things like legislation like this feed into movements like
this that causes this like violent rhetoric and almost a
(15:20):
mob lynching mentality. Yeah, it's a great question. I think
it legitimizes them. I think when we treat movements that
are not above threatening violent tactics, agitation, things like that.
Of course, I am a protester, you know, I've been
protesting since I've been a child. So I completely a
thousand percent support anyone's free speech and ability to assemble
(15:44):
and protests, even if it's person thing I don't agree with.
That is a protected thing, and I find it to
be quite sacred. However, harassing people trying to get to
a clinic so that they can't get into the door,
that's different. Right, threatening violence, that's different. And so I
think that when lawmakers, public policy officials, folks like that,
when they create policy that says, oh, what you're saying,
(16:08):
that's okay, Like, okay, we'll put out a law that
says this thing that hasn't that is not happening, it's
against the law. Now, it's like, I feel like it's
just legitimizes and emboldens people that they can use these
kinds of tactics to get what they want, right, and
that's to go back to the insurrection for a moment.
I think that's one of the things that's been so
frustrating in the aftermath of this conversation, people saying things like, well,
(16:29):
you know, if you vote to impeach Trump, that's just
going to make them more angry. And it's like we
can't have this. It's like like we can't live in
a country where we are afraid to do what's needed
to be done because people think that it's okay to
respond with violence when they don't get their way. It's
like that, like we can't have that. A country can't
be built on that. And going back to this anti
(16:53):
abortion movement and its relation to to the insurrection, it's
something we've been talking about a lot lately, and I've
been on my mind a lot lately, is how kind
of new it is, Like in a lot of ways
it's old, but like the strength with the Republican Party
with conservatism and women are people just voting on abortion?
(17:14):
And then how like emotional an issue that is for people?
And then like you said, all of this like these
false facts and disinformation and misinformation, and people who were
watching this and who were listening to Trump and watching
this like, well, I guess like we didn't know it
(17:35):
was gonna be a right then, but this thing he
was holding and they were saying like, no, this is
the anti abortion movement is going to be involved in it.
And it turns out, yes, um, can you talk about that? So, yes,
that's exactly right. So here's what Aaron Matson, the executive
director of Reproaction, which they tracked anti abortion activists, here's
(17:55):
what she said. She says, anti abortion agitators have been
calling and supporting the president. I guess the then president.
The President's called the store Washington for some time. I know,
and I am confident that as time goes on and
more and more these photos are analyzed, but we'll see
more overleapt between the anti abortion movement and the white
supremacists who tried to overthrow the United States of America.
(18:17):
And she was completely right. A number of very prominent
anti abortion voices were president at the Capitol in June six.
And this is not a coincidence. There has been this
long standing crossover between the two movements, the anti abortion
movement and white supremacist terror movements. Like that is not
a new thing. It's gives you all have done such
a great job of talking about there's so much to
untangle when it comes to, you know, white supremacist movements,
(18:40):
anti abortion movements, anti women movements. They are all kind
of in the same stuff mixed bag, I guess you
would say. And Vice had a really great rundown of
all of the different prominent anti abortion voices who were
at the Capitol that day. Abby Johnson, she's one of
the nation's highest profile anti abortion activist um and she
(19:00):
was in d C. She tweeted an image of herself
at a Trump rally that preceded uh the invasion of
the capital, and she wrote, front row with the most
pro life president of our country. John Broke Coved, who
was a convicted abortion clinic bomber, live streamed himself at
the Capitol on January six, as he put it, quote
fighting for our beloved President Donald J. Trump. Taylor Hanson,
who you might know he got very popular by putting
(19:23):
these murals up all over the country that said baby
lives matter. He was there. And also Derek Evans, a
member of the West Virginia House of Delicates, live streamed
a video of himself in a helmet urging rioters to
break into the building. And two years earlier, a court
forbid Evans from having any contact with a woman who
helped escort patients at West Virginia's Lone abortion clinic after
she accused him of regularly standing outside and harassing her.
(19:46):
So these are people who have documented histories of a
either being very prominent anti abortion voices or b I
just showing themselves to not be above threats and violence
to push their extreme anti abortion agenda. So it's not
a coincidence that these folks also felt that that kind
of extremism was an appropriate response to be used in
(20:09):
the capital, you know, and you know, as you're talking
about specifically Evans, and of course he actually resigned because
of people actually be like, hey, oh, this is not good.
Let's not have him represent us, which is nice to see,
I guess, but he being a violent person who came
yelling after and harassed to the point that women were scared.
That was one of the other conversations they were having
(20:30):
with the anti abortion was many of the people are like, hey,
that dude and he has so much domestic violence if
you look at his rap sheet, that dude is known
as being violent towards women. Like all of these things
that had showed obvious. Oh, these are the dudes who
end up being shooters, Like that's kind of that match
shooter conversation, Like these are the same people who are
going after people, going to harass and trying to assassinate candidates.
(20:55):
And we also saw many who were obviously like the
Proud Boys, who were very racist and knew they were racist,
and we knew they were white supremasts, and they're proud
to be white supremacist. Like you see all of these
people like, oh, those are the violent who are racist
and sexist. How do you think that this type of
disinformation led to them being the ones that led the riots?
I mean, it's a great question. I'm not at all surprised.
(21:17):
You know, we know that disinformation largely impacts underrepresented people.
So it largely is fueled by these horrible distortions about
who we are, whether it's women, black folks, other communities
of color. Disinformation is fueled by racist, sexist like the
worst racist sexist imagining of who we are, right, that's
(21:38):
complete caricatures. And so it is not surprising to me
that these people would be fueled by this kind of
hateful content and really truly believe it. And I think,
you know, to your point, the fact of the matter is,
I'm happy that Evans resigned. That I'm to the point
where whenever there's some sort of like accountability or consequence.
I'm like, oh wow, look at that someone faced a consequence.
(22:00):
They still have those, but these are people who have
scary backgrounds, right, people who have shown themselves to not
be above using violence to get what they want. And
you're exactly right that because we don't take violence against
women very seriously. Most times, when there's a mass shooter
or some sort of mass scale violence behind that, there
(22:21):
is a trail of people who tried to sound the alarm,
usually women. You know, I think it was on Christmas
Eve that guy who he set off a bomb in
I wanna say, Tennessee, Nashville, thank you come to find
out his girlfriend previously was like I think he's making
a bomb, right, like like pretty clearly, you know what.
It's like. I wish we could get to a place
(22:43):
where violence against women was disqualifying, that like people just
didn't let it slide because it's so often is an
indicator that something else bad is going to happen. And
I just wish that we lived in a world where
these kinds of warnings were taken seriously instead of being ignored.
Right when we talk about this information happening and we
see it being targeted towards women specifically. I was kind
(23:05):
of shocked to see how many women really really dug
into Q and on and the whole, like I have
to protect my babies. I have to protect my babies.
But when it comes down to the violence, more often
than not, it's the men. And again, of course we've
had this conversation again how misogyny plays a bigger part
of anti abortion movements than we know. How do we
see that men end up taking these kinds of initiatives
(23:26):
and owning them. I guess it's the word and then
taking it into such a route that it becomes a volatile,
bigger movement than what is online. So as what I'm
saying is like we see a lot of Q and misinformation,
and we found out that Instagram was one of the
biggest of connections for women and she using like influencers
(23:47):
to talk to these women who feel like they need
to do all these things. But when it comes down
to like parlor and when it comes down to read
it in Furtune, it's the men and who initiate these
like kind of responses of it. We have to do something,
let's get armed, And we see that in misinformation being
bled into anti abortion movements into the only person who
can say by country is former President Trump. How do
(24:10):
we see this information being played out where it becomes
such a bigger conspiracy theory that it does lead to violence. Wow,
that's a long winded question. I'm sorry. I mean it's
a big question. I think that we know that if
you hear something enough times that people eventually believe it.
And so the more times that you hear something, the
more times that you hear a false claim go completely unchecked,
(24:32):
people are likely to believe it. I hope that this
is understood in the spirits which I mean it. People
who are out to disiniform, out to cause chaos and confusion.
They're very smart, and they're very savvy, and they're very
good at it. And I think that the dynamic that
you just described where they're sort of a softer version
of it for women to get them involved, and then
(24:53):
a lot of the violence is led by men, I
think that is a really smart, sav you way to
structure a movement. And somebody once told me, whatever the
movement is, there's never any kind of movement without women, right,
And so I do think that we have to have
some tough conversations about the role that women played, because
one of the first people to die in the interaction
(25:15):
was Astley bad At, a woman who had been completely
completely just like consumed by Q and On conspiracy theories.
And so I think that you see women sort of
being indoctrinated to be sort of like the foot soldiers
of this movement where men are largely the ones who
are pushing for violence, like your boogaloo boys and things
(25:37):
of that nature. That serves a very important function because
I think that if women are feeling like, well, I
need to support this because it's going to keep me
feeling safe, it's going to keep my position in society intact.
It's a very smart way to have these kinds of
conspiracy theories be gendered in the way that they are,
(25:58):
because I think it does ensure that, you know, if
you're a woman who maybe isn't so into the whole
politics thing, but you know you don't like the idea
of children being targeted, so you get wrapped up in
Q and On. I think that the idea that the
men storming the capital are going to create safety for
you and your children, I can understand why that's a
(26:20):
seductive message. You know, look at the way that Trump
message to white suburban women all throughout the election, saying
things like, oh, if you vote for Biden, quote, antipa
is going to be at your front door. You know
you're gonna have riots and your in your streets. You
know your kids aren't safe. I think that he messaged
that way because I think it's effective. Everybody wants to
be safe, and I think it's a really smart way
(26:42):
to ensure that everybody is bought in. Even if you're
not like a violent person and you're not going to
be the one breaking windows and trying to like hunt
down members of Congress with zip ties, you might be
supportive of it if you feel that, like that's what
the men have to do quote unquote to restore order
and keep you and your family safe. It's very savvy,
and part of me kind of is not surprised that
(27:04):
it works on so many women, right. It was interesting
to see also, like the mothers with their sons. We
had at least two examples of those, and I was like, which,
I know there's been articles about that as well, including
the fact that one of the young men who actually
is from Georgia Blue Ridge near Mina hometown blamed his
mother in the testimony. He actually blamed his mother. What
(27:28):
an ass? I mean, this was poor woman and she
was what I'm saying, like, that really does tell you
all you need to know, right that you know if
you get caught storming the capital, that like, oh my
mom didn't raise me right, that that would be your
first excuse. Honestly, this mom should be like, wow, I
(27:51):
really didn't do such a hot job. I have to
wonder what her response was, because all I read was
his testimony in which he was like, yeah, my mom
told me to do this, My mom told me to
pick those up. My mom did this. And it was
quite funny because I was like, dude, you come in
here trying to be big masculine. I'm going to kidnap
these people and then be like, my mama did it right,
(28:12):
throwing your own mother under the bus. And it's funny
that you say this because I have noticed a lot
of these people are being released to their parents or
in the care of a family members and things of
that nature. Your point is such a good one, where
it's like what happened to like, Oh, we're storming the
capital and we're you know, big and bad and blah
blah blah. And now when you get caught, you're like, oh, well,
I gotta release me to my mommy. I was like,
(28:34):
which is it. If you're gonna be an insurrectionist, at
least I do it with your childs. But don't you
know well, and just coming back to because I think
this is just a simple question I do and I
don't understand. This is how did the anti abortion movement
become the center of this riot? Almost? I think that
there's so much overlap between the two that I think
a lot of these people saw Donald Trump as the
(28:56):
person who was going to, in their eyes, restore the
rights of children to the unborn right. And so it's
it's not even the question of like, how did it become?
I think it was always there. I think so many
of the people at the forefront of the insurrection also
did have this history with the anti abortion movement. I
think it's like the same way that you cannot unpack
(29:17):
their white supremacist leanings, their anti women leadings, their anti
immigrant leanings. I think it's all one big ball of
yarn that led us here. And the fact of the
matter is, you even saw anti abortion groups spreading this
complete lie that quote Antifa was responsible, even though we
know that's not true, and though we know many of
these people live streamed their crimes. You know, Kristen Hawkins,
(29:39):
who is the head of Students for Life of America,
which is the nation's biggest anti abortion student group, she
blamed ANTIFA members and other writers for storming the capital.
And so you already have the mainstream anti abortion movement
circling the wagons to protect the violent actions of these people,
some of whom are probably doing this in support, aren't
(30:00):
of their anti abortion ideology. Yeah, it's so frustrating. I
hate that when you're like, but it's this video here
if they can still be like no, no. So we
did see just so much racism and sexism on display
at this riot, and that there were a lot of
conversations afterwards, rightfully so, comparing the police and like public's
(30:23):
reaction to Black Lives Matter protest versus this riot. And
then also you have in in this handy outline, you
gave us the history between abortion clinic violence and how
that kind of overlaps with what happened. Absolutely, so one
of the things I think is really interesting about what
(30:43):
some of these abortion activists and advocates are saying, is
that the same way that many of us, myself included,
were disgusted watching the police take selfies with the rioters
and shake their hands and just generally seem very buddy
buddy with the rioters. That is very similar to what
abortion shouldn advocates and clinic workers have reported when they
try to engage the police to report violence or threats
(31:05):
happening at their clinics. And so there's a little piece
from refinding between nine, she says. In August ninety four,
wyn Indiana abortion clinic received a bomb threat. The city
refused to dispatch either police or fire officials, forcing clinic
staff to search for the bomb themselves. Nearly forty years later,
Becca Balinger, a clinic escort of New York City, called
it a complaint about protesters violating the fifteen foot buffer
(31:27):
zone at the clinic. When he arrived, she told her
nine she watched the responding officer approached the violator, shake
his hand and give him a hug. He then turned
to the group of clinic escorts and said, what are
you doing to restrict their First Amendment rights? Today? And
I think that one it enraged me. It was like, fine,
this guy, But I do think it shows the level
(31:48):
to which the police can sort of not always be
counted on to be, you know, restoring public order, the
same way that we saw police be buddy buddy with
the rioters at the Capital. Abortion rights activists have said
that this is not surprising. This is exactly how it
is when we have called to report threats or violence
at clinics. And the fact of the matter is the
Associated Press found that law enforcement agencies nationwide have said
(32:12):
that at least thirty one officers in twelve states are
being scrutinized by their supervisors for their behavior at the Capitol. Right.
And so we know that the same way that we
definitely have a problem with needing to root out people
that have white supremacist ties who are serving in police forces,
it is not a stretch to imagine that that it's
also a problem when it comes to anti abortion ideology,
(32:33):
that police officers they might feel sympathetic to people who
would be threatening violence at a clinic. Right. And so
these abortion advocates have been saying, yes, we have been
ringing the alarm about the fact that the police have
seemed to be buddy buddy with agitators at our clinics
for years. Again, it's just one of those things. It's
a tough conversation to have. But we do need to
talk about the ways that some of these darker forces
(32:56):
have infiltrated our police, but people who are meant to
be restoring order, you know. And so I do think
we have to have these kinds of tough conversations that
put these things at the forefront. Yeah, And there's such
a like we've been talking about with this like ball
of yarn or these Vinn diagrams and all this overlap
because if you do look at the history of abortion
(33:18):
clinics like this is this violence and threatening of violence
has been there for a long time, like since the beginning, right, Yeah.
I mean, anybody who has worked in the abortion or
reproductive rights space can tell you this is not a
new problem. And I just think we really have to
grapple with the fact that so many people who work
in these spaces have been warning that the unchecked spread
(33:41):
of distortions and lies on social media about abortion and
about clinics and about abortion providers will lead to real
world violence. And so I just think it's important to
note how much overlap there was with the violence at
the capital and the kind of violence that these abortion
advocates have been warning of for years. It's so much,
(34:02):
it's so much too untangle as we continue to have
these conversations, and certainly disinformation is a huge part of it.
Is there anything you want to shout out, any resources
you want to shout out, or I guess what people
can be looking for. Yeah, I'm sure I've said this
on the show before, but the never one thing we
can all do to curb disinformation is not amplify it,
(34:24):
even if you're trying to dunk on it, even if
you've got a great joke. Sometimes it can be hard
to resist. I know it, But don't amplify it. If
you focus instead on kind of creating your own little
pocket of the Internet that can be known for trustworthy information,
that it's such a better way to spend your time.
I think that we all have to really understand the
way that like this is not just something that's happening online.
(34:45):
You know, I referenced this great or in rank in
piece that or finding between that and folction all read that.
But she points out that conspiracy theories and outlandish rhetoric
aren't without consequences, particularly when encouraged by those in power,
and anti abortion extremists launched highly visible smear campaign against
Planned Parenthood, featuring doctored videos that accused the organization of
(35:05):
illegally selling fetal body parts. It was absurding, completely untrue,
but that didn't stop Congressional Republicans from embracing the conspiracy
theory to crying Planned Parenthood and opening an investigation into
the organization. Just a few months later, Robert Dear opened
fire on a Planned Planarenthood clinic in Colorado Springs, killing
three people, including a security guard. He confessed that he
(35:25):
was quote upset with them performing abortions and selling baby parts,
a direct reference to the cooked up anti abortion smear campaign,
a conspiracy theory that certainly has echoes, and other far
right conspiracies like Q and on and so again. These
are not just things people are saying online. They can
have real world consequences, just like the continued repeated lie
(35:47):
that Trump won the election and that it was being
stolen led to violence with the capital. The more that
we tolerate just unchecked conspiracy theories and allow them to
seep into our mainstream institutions like our Congress and our government,
the higher the risk for real world danger and real
world violence. And so do not think this is just
happening online. This is a real thing that has real
(36:09):
consequences for all of us. So with that, because as
we talked about, they were already putting in laws that
don't makes us, that are just political games in order
to continue this rhetoric of lies for anti abortion reasons.
As well as the fact that even though Trump is gone,
there's still the lie of voter suppression is very well
in play. As in fact, you know, in the state
(36:29):
of Georgia, and I think I saw it in the
state of North Carolina, they're already vamping up new ways
to suppress votes. We've got a Republican state lawmakers here
in Georgia doing new laws to try to take away
from absentee voting, shutting down all the polls. So all
of this disinformation, like even though it's kind of like, okay,
we can kind of push it aside because Biden is
finally in office, this anti abortion rhetoric is not gone.
(36:52):
Just because we have an actual pro abortion probably choice
people in office doesn't mean this fight is not over
What can we do as a listener, What can we
do as the people behind here? As we see it's
not just online. What can we do in real life
to help a start of the spread? But be also
be an advocate. I think the fact that I forget
the numbers, but there are a lot of Republicans lawmakers
(37:15):
right now who to this day will not say that
the election was not stolen. You know, we have kind
of like the idea of quote legal votes has made
it into our lexicon as if there is a widespread,
documented pattern of voting our regularities in this country. There
just is not. There are in every election, you have
(37:36):
people where it's like, oh, I was voting for my
son who's at college, or this or that. There's always
a smattering of sketchiness here or there, but there is
not any kind of documented widespread voting our regularities in
this election or in any of our last recent elections.
Right And so the fact that things like oh, well,
I think we should count legal votes has become part
(37:57):
of our lexicon and has been sort of mean to
be kind of a moderate thing. I think has done
such a great disservice to our democracy. I don't think
we will know how bad it is for many years.
You know, I think it planted a seed in a
lot of people that maybe we'll never go away. And honestly,
(38:17):
I think one thing that we could all do is
just being willing to push back on the echoes of
these fabrications. So whether you know, if someone says, well,
I think we should count every legal vote, being willing
to say, like, well, you know, what do you mean
by that? You know, tell me, do you think there's
a lot of illegal votes out there? Like? What do
they look like? How often are they happening? I think
being willing to interrogate these claims so that they cannot
(38:39):
become part of our fabric of understanding the world because
they're based on lies. The same way that when people say, like, oh,
did you know that Joe Biden supports abortion up until
five minutes before delivery and saying that's not true, that
is incorrect. If someone was trying to do a abortion
five minutes before you were meant to be in labor,
that will be a crime. That's not happening, And that's
(38:59):
in act this being willing to push back on these
ideas that are based on nothing in ways that are
going to actually prevent them from becoming part of the
fabric of how we understand the world because they're based
on lies. I know that it's a tall order, but
we have enough in this world to contend with. We
don't need more, right, That's that's fair. You know. I
(39:37):
just have to see you one last thing, because you
have been in it, and you have been in it,
whether physically because you're in d C or because you're
part of things like Ultra Violet and and talking about
this information. What have you been doing for yourself for
self care? Because we haven't asked this question a long time,
but that's been a part of our m O. So
what is your self care? Oh my god, I'm so
excited to talk about this. It's funny. It was my
(40:01):
mantra the last few because just like I gotta get
to inauguration, I gotta get to inauguration, I gotta get
to an I had not been doing a great job
of taking care of myself because there was so much
after the insurrection on the six I think that everybody
in my little community here in d C was just
we had just had enough. We had just had it.
But you know, one of the things that I do
to really keep myself grounded and restore myself. This really
(40:24):
is being outside. And so this weekend I went on
a lovely hike in George Washington National Forest and it
was a very restorative, even though it was cold as balls.
So just trying to spend time outside, trying to remember
that I can only I can only consume so much.
I can only do so much. You know, if I
read every new take from what happened in the insurrection
(40:46):
or every new horrible thing that's going on, I won't
necessarily be any better informed or be any better poise
to like make a difference. And something I can really
do to make sure that I'm better poised to make
a difference is like sleep, take care of myself, take breaks,
And I encourage aybody to do that. You know, it
can be enticing to want to refresh Twitter a million
times a day and get every new update of every
(41:08):
new detail of every new story, but that does not
necessarily translate to you being better informed or a better
ally or a better fighter in this movement. So I
appreciate you guys making that space to talk about that,
because I think it does get erased in the movement
that like taking care of yourself is very important. I
encourage everybody too, it's important. What are you doing drinking
(41:29):
a lot of coffee? I'm writing fan fiction and I
got a walking treadmill desk, like a really cheap one,
really cheap. I don't want anyone to be like, wow, no,
it's very cheap and small. But it's I like it
is it under your desk right now? No, this is
my podcast disc it's under my research Okay, yes, space
(41:54):
it sounds like you're so rich, My God doesn't space
and even if it is a small Okay, Well, I
was trying to help you out there. Yes, that's what
I'm doing. Yeah, I honestly I don't know. Look, and
that's not because I'm not doing things. It's mainly because
(42:16):
I am so just organized with my time, because I
am at the worst of keeping things separate. So I'll
work all the time and then just sit all the
time too, So it's like one or the other, but
for me a lot of like I am a comfort person,
so I'll rewatch things that I love and know how
it's going to turn out, and then bask in that
and then also a long cuddle times with my dog.
(42:38):
Why does it feel so good to like rewatch the
Office for the hundred times, like, like, what is it
about it that's so comforting? It feels like friends, And
because you know it's coming, you're not gonna be shocked
or disappointed, or if you're going to be disappointed, you
already know it's going to be disappointing, and sometimes you
can fast forward through that. Yeah, what's your comfort show? Oh?
I have a few. Supernatural has become one, thank you Annie,
(42:59):
and I'd like, I don't know why, but it has
become one. But also a new Girl, Parks and rec
have become a few of them. I watched the weird
things like The Flash. I really loved that show, and
I just love how genuinely sweet it is. So I
watched really silly things like that, and then I'll rewatch movies.
You know Body's business. I love this. It's like a
prescription for self care and comfort. Yeah, and also I
(43:22):
just wear soft pants. That's my other comfort, soft pants,
dog cuddles and the television shows you've seen a million
times before us sounds great, Well, Bridget what else do
you think if we left anything out or if there's
more that you resources that you want to provide. Is
there anything else you want to add? Well, I would say, um,
if you want to have more conversations about disinformation and
(43:44):
how it pertains to women and folks of color. My
podcast There Are No Girls on the Internet just released
a brand new series all about disinformation called Disinformed. You
can check it out on this very network. I heart
radio Awesome. Yeah, and definitely do that listeners, Bridget, you
want to shout out any any other pleases that the
good listeners can find you. Yes, I'm on Twitter at
Bridget Murray and I'm on Instagram at Bridget Murray in
(44:05):
d C. Well, thank you as always for being here.
You managed to make it a delight even though we're
talking about things that are not so delightful. It's a skill.
Thank you, I hope so you know you can. There's
always room for humor, even if it's gallows humor. There's
always room for humors. Yes, yes, and we very much
(44:25):
appreciate it. Can't wait till your back again, listeners. If
you would like to email as you can or email
Stuff Media Mom Stuff at i heeart media dot com.
You can find us on Instagram at stuff I've Never
Told You are on Twitter at mom Stuff Podcast. Thanks
as always too, I'm super producer, Christina. Hey Christina, and
thanks to you for listening Stuff. I never told you
the protection of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from
(44:47):
I Heart Radio, visit that I Heard You at Apple
Podcast or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome to Steph.
I never told you a production of I Heart Radio. Today,
we are once again joined by our good friend and
colleague Bridget Todd. Hello, Bridget, Hello, I'm so excited to
(00:25):
be here again. Yes, always a pleasure to have you.
And Wow, I think we recorded in early December was
the last time we met up in this virtual podcasting space.
And a lot has happened since. A lot has happened.
Doesn't that feel like it was years ago? It really does.
(00:46):
It feels so far. And I feels like I have
slept a minia nights. There's been a mini a moon
set of things have happened. I feel like I've already
aged ten years. Yeah, so there's a lot like I
feel like it's it was a lot, yes, And so
we wanted to ask you because the topic you're bringing
us today is related both to past topics you've talked about,
(01:08):
but also too what happened in the capital of the
violence at the Capitol, and since you're in Washington, d C.
We wanted to ask you about it. What was that like?
Thank you for asking. It was very odd, as you
might imagine. So when I woke up on January six,
before I went to bed, I had been watching the
numbers come in from the Georgia Senate runoffs, and I
(01:29):
was feeling very good. I put on my lucky shirt
that has a shirtly Chisholm look quote on it, and
so like you know, I woke up beaming. I remember
waking up like good morning. I was so excited, and
I think it was because I had not felt that
kind of hope and a long time. So I was
like feeling very very hopeful that morning, and it was
(01:49):
like a like a power and a hope that I
had not felt in I guess the last four years.
And how quickly that feeling of hopefulness turned in to
just powerlessness as I watched, you know, this insurrection happened,
and I think that like I was watching, it happened
on television kind of in real time, and so it
(02:11):
really got so dark and so serious. So quickly it
went from of course, there's just gonna be these Trump supporters,
you know, standing outside the Capitol protesting sure to like,
oh my god, this is bad. You know, we got
you know those things that you get on your phone
and there's an amber alert, those like things on your phone.
We everybody who was in my household got one of
(02:32):
those at the same time from the mayor of DC
saying that there was a state of emergency order, there
was a curfew, we couldn't go out. It happened very quickly.
And yeah, when I watched it, I'm always making this point,
but DC is my home. I was raised here, this
is my community. I've lived here. This is like what
I consider home. And I think that because it's where
so much of our federal government stuff happens and where
(02:53):
the you know, the capital is, people forget that just
regular folks live here, Like this is where people live.
And so I was really heartbroken by thinking about this
as not just an attack on our democracy and on
our capitol, but also on my community. You know, d
C is largely black and brown, and so when these
people were storming the capitol, I saw videos where after
(03:15):
they were storming the capitol, where did they go, Oh,
to our restaurants, to our hotels, to our institutions, And
just the idea that these people would be kind of
unleashed on my community really hurt. And so, you know,
I always just got to like make sure that that
point gets included that it's not just lawmakers who live
in d C. It's real people, some of which who
(03:36):
have no connection to the government, and so it was
not just an attack on our democracy and our capital
was also attack on these people are our home, you know. Yeah, remember,
because we were all watching closely and knowing that you
were my one of my connections in DC, definitely like
follow you on Twitter. You actually mentioned like, hey, thanks
a lot for bringing in the corona, like not wearing
a mask and infecting our city and we were trying
(03:58):
to control it, and you just made the bigger disaster
because they were not only in your community, at your restaurants,
at your hotels, at your places of service, as if
this was a free for all, as if nothing were happening,
and of course no one was arrested, so therefore they
were just out and about doing their thing. I just
saw a report saying like a thirty something in Capital
police officers tested positives for corona just recently. But yeah,
(04:19):
I saw you tweeting that. I was like, oh my god,
she's so right. I didn't even think of that that
part because I'm just looking at the violence. The holy
crap is a pandemic y'all, it's a pandemic, and it's like,
we just don't need this, and it totally I think
that residents of DC have been pretty compliant when it
comes to socially distancing and masking and all that kind
of stuff, but just we have enough stuff going on
(04:39):
as a city, you know, on top of the pandemic
and everything else. This is just like one more big
thing that we don't need. And I think it's also
really hard the fact that d C is not really
a state. I think that people just forget, like people
don't understand that we don't have the same kind of
protections or support that states have because we're not a state.
And so you know, when the mayor was trying to
(05:00):
get the National Guard to come in, that was delayed
because she said, a mayor, she doesn't have that authority,
and so she had to get special permission. You know.
I think it really illustrated to me how important it
is that DC becomes a state at some point, because
it just doesn't work. And yeah, every other place right
now is being ravaged by the pandemic as is DC,
and yeah, it just doesn't help. We didn't need this.
(05:21):
We're already having a tough time, the realities of when
people decided to do stupid things exactly. Yeah, and so
glad you're okay. And in the wake of all of this,
there's of course been a lot of looking into what
happened and what led up to it and the people
(05:41):
that were there. And I just remember so clearly you've
come on here and spoken a lot about disinformation and misinformation,
and you said, like, people forget that these online things
have real world consequences, and this was like one of
the most I couldn't think of a better example. And
(06:02):
we were also been talking about women and Q and
On and this very specific kind of like fear around children.
And one of the things you wanted to talk about
today is the anti abortion movement and how that was
a part of this whole thing of what happened at
the Capitol. Right. Absolutely, I'm grateful that folks like yourself
(06:23):
are continuing to pull apart all the different aspects of
how we got here, whether it's Q and On targeting
women who are concerned about children, and so I think
that the connection between the violence that we saw at
the capital and the anti abortion movement is just one
more of those kind of nuggets that I think we should,
you know, not ignore, because there are so many different
(06:44):
aspects that got us to January six at the Capitol,
and I think that we should be talking about all
of them. And I think some of them are easier
to go sort of overlooked or a race, and I
think the connections to the anti abortion movement is one
of them. And so I really have to start by
shouting out a couple of people. There is a great
piece by Lauren Rankin and Refinery twenty nine called how
anti abortion terrorism field the MAGA attack on the Capitol
(07:06):
really great? Peace cannot recommend it enough. And then another
investigation by Carter Sherman at Vice called anti abortion activists
were all over the Capital riots. So a lot of
the information that I have found have come from those
two pieces. And I also just have to shout out
my friend Renny Bracy Sherman of the organization We Testify.
We Testifies an organization that tries to increase representation for
(07:26):
people who had abortions, and so they were doing a
lot of that work of saying, oh, hey, some of
the people who were at the Capitol, they are very
known to you know, abortion providers and abortion activists, and
so I really just have to shout out the people
who are doing the work to make sure that that
conversation s would have we get to have it, and
that we don't let stigma or whatever keep us from
(07:47):
having this conversation that can really help us understand how
we got to the insurrection on the six. And then yeah,
also just the fact that last week was the forty
eight anniversary of Row versus Wade, you know, the landmark
Supreme Court decision legalized abortion in the US, and so
on that day, I really was sitting with the fact
that the same kind of tactics that abortion advocates have
(08:07):
been warning about and screaming about and you know, pointing
to for the longest time, those are the same tactics
that got us to January six with these people all
storming the capital. I think they're very, very similar, and
they have a lot of overlap. Can you break down
this information that led up to this one, but also
some of that overlap, because this isn't like a new
(08:29):
occurrence violence within anti abortion movements. Absolutely, it is not
a new occurrence. So just like the insurrection was kind
of fueled by what they're now calling the Big lie
that Trump won the election and that it was being
stolen from him. The anti abortion movement has similarly trafficked
in just straight lies about abortion, about people who have them,
(08:51):
about abortion providers, and I think it really illustrates what
happens when those lines go more or less unchallenged. And so,
you know, when putting the other my information of this episode,
I was like, oh, yeah, some abortion disinformation and misinformation
and in accuracies are so common that you don't even
really think about it anymore. And actually, just last week,
the University of California Berkeley School of Public Health put
(09:13):
out a study that found that four of the five
most presented web pages in response to a search for
abortion pill on Google were less than accurate. Right. And
so just the idea that on our biggest search engine,
when you Google for information about abortion, it is likely
that information is a lie, is not true, and it's
like misleading, right. And so I think that a big
(09:35):
thing to point out here is what happens when fabrications
are just tolerated. That that's just like the state of
play when it comes to misinformation. And I think also
when you look at, you know, the lead up to
the election, we saw so much inaccurate information being flooded
on social media about Biden and Harris and their positions
on abortion. And the thing that's like really sad, but
(09:57):
also shows how savvy these disinformers can be, is that
disinformers know that there is a lack of good news
and media sources that are in Spanish, and so they
then fill that gap with inaccurate information that is in Spanish.
And so you saw the Latin X community being really
targeted and inundated by inaccurate, distorted information about abortion meant
(10:20):
to impact the outcome of the election. And so another
point is that these often are happening in what's App
groups that are private, so like unlike Facebook where you
can kind of get a sense of like what's happening,
or Twitter, where it's happening mostly in public. It's a
close platform to have, you know, your private what's App
group with your aunts and uncles and cousins, right, And
so we saw lots of really horrific anti abortion messaging
(10:45):
targeting the Latin X community in Spanish speaking communities on
these platforms. And so yeah, I think that much like
with the insurrection, when you have just an accepted baseline
of inaccurate information about people who have abortions, about abortion providers,
about underrepresented our marginalized communities. It can actually translate to
(11:06):
real world violence, real world danger, real world threats. This
is not something that this is happening online. Researchers have
been very clear about that. You know, one of the
(11:27):
things that I just read and we just know that
happened in Kentucky is they passed the born alive abortion ban,
which is nothing more than a political statement trying to
do some fearmongering saying this is what's happening, this is
what the Democrats are doing. You see, they're killing the
babies after they're born, which is absolutely false. But then
we have a narrative where they actually put it into law,
(11:48):
so it seems like it's real because like here's in
a moment, that's attitude state law. We have to address
it as making it illegal because it's happening so much,
which is a part of that misinformation that is being
thrown out there. But it's so scary, and which is
also why this back and forth about this unity and
letting people go because you know, they didn't know what
(12:09):
they were doing. Trump told them to do it all this,
it's this level of giving some kind of meat to
this rumor which is completely unfounded, but because it's a
political move it's so scary to see because once again,
here we go with this misinformation, not just being a rumor,
not just being an outright lie, which obviously people are
(12:30):
believing anyway. How do you see with all of that,
with that type of strategy, with that type of fear
mongering that's actually a part of our government structure, how
do you see that bleeding into things like these riots?
Oh my gosh, it's so incredibly frustrating, Like what you
just described. I have worked in the feminist movement and
you know, spaces like that for most of my adult life,
(12:53):
and it's not new, but it is sure. It's frustrating,
you know, when we spend actual resources and time and
energy on things that are not true. Things are just
like fabrications, And I I understand the sentiment. You know.
A good example is when Project Veritas put out those
(13:13):
videos purporting to show Planned Parenthood staffers talking about selling
body parts and this and that. That was a fabrication,
but yet we still had to spend time and resources
combating something that was a lie. And I think that
you're exactly right that, yes, it's annoying that like taxpayer
money and resources gets spent on making laws or legislation
(13:34):
about things that just aren't happening. But even more than that,
it's like it takes up so much oxygen in the room,
Like what meaningful policies could we be discussing or getting past?
What kind of progress are we not able to get
to because we were too busy spitting in a circle
about something that was a lie. So I think that
as much as what you just described is horrible, it's
(13:55):
also just it's such a waste because it just takes
up so much in ergy. People have to spend their
time combating against things that are just lies. And I
think that we really have to get to a place
in this country where I'm not gonna say it started
with Trump, but he certainly didn't help. I feel we've
gotten to a place where people don't understand that there's
lies and there's true and you can have your opinion.
(14:17):
There are things where you're like, oh, well, I'm not
so sure, of course, but at the end of the day,
some things are just live. But we have a lot
facing us as a country we don't have time or
resources to spend on things that are just lies, and
we got to get back to a place where we
can all agree like some things are just not true
and not worth taking the oxygen out of the room
to combat them, you know what I mean. So with that,
(14:38):
because of stuff like that, it as another additional need
of protection for women specifically, but even men. And of
course we can go into the conversation about how anti
abortion movement is actually a misogynistic movement in order to
control women's bodies. That's the whole conversation we've had before,
probably need to have all the times. But when we
look at things like this riot, when we look at
(14:58):
the people who are actually involved with it, like you said,
they were able to pinpoint, Hey, that dude is known
for coming to threatened women, that dude is known for
harassing women trying to get to an abortion clinic just
to have a conversation, or even supporting planned parenthood. How
do things like legislation like this feed into movements like
this that causes this like violent rhetoric and almost a
(15:20):
mob lynching mentality. Yeah, it's a great question. I think
it legitimizes them. I think when we treat movements that
are not above threatening violent tactics, agitation, things like that.
Of course, I am a protester, you know, I've been
protesting since I've been a child. So I completely a
thousand percent support anyone's free speech and ability to assemble
(15:44):
and protests, even if it's person thing I don't agree with.
That is a protected thing, and I find it to
be quite sacred. However, harassing people trying to get to
a clinic so that they can't get into the door,
that's different. Right, threatening violence, that's different. And so I
think that when lawmakers, public policy officials, folks like that,
when they create policy that says, oh, what you're saying,
(16:08):
that's okay, Like, okay, we'll put out a law that
says this thing that hasn't that is not happening, it's
against the law. Now, it's like, I feel like it's
just legitimizes and emboldens people that they can use these
kinds of tactics to get what they want, right, and
that's to go back to the insurrection for a moment.
I think that's one of the things that's been so
frustrating in the aftermath of this conversation, people saying things like, well,
(16:29):
you know, if you vote to impeach Trump, that's just
going to make them more angry. And it's like we
can't have this. It's like like we can't live in
a country where we are afraid to do what's needed
to be done because people think that it's okay to
respond with violence when they don't get their way. It's
like that, like we can't have that. A country can't
be built on that. And going back to this anti
(16:53):
abortion movement and its relation to to the insurrection, it's
something we've been talking about a lot lately, and I've
been on my mind a lot lately, is how kind
of new it is, Like in a lot of ways
it's old, but like the strength with the Republican Party
with conservatism and women are people just voting on abortion?
(17:14):
And then how like emotional an issue that is for people?
And then like you said, all of this like these
false facts and disinformation and misinformation, and people who were
watching this and who were listening to Trump and watching
this like, well, I guess like we didn't know it
(17:35):
was gonna be a right then, but this thing he
was holding and they were saying like, no, this is
the anti abortion movement is going to be involved in it.
And it turns out, yes, um, can you talk about that? So, yes,
that's exactly right. So here's what Aaron Matson, the executive
director of Reproaction, which they tracked anti abortion activists, here's
(17:55):
what she said. She says, anti abortion agitators have been
calling and supporting the president. I guess the then president.
The President's called the store Washington for some time. I know,
and I am confident that as time goes on and
more and more these photos are analyzed, but we'll see
more overleapt between the anti abortion movement and the white
supremacists who tried to overthrow the United States of America.
(18:17):
And she was completely right. A number of very prominent
anti abortion voices were president at the Capitol in June six.
And this is not a coincidence. There has been this
long standing crossover between the two movements, the anti abortion
movement and white supremacist terror movements. Like that is not
a new thing. It's gives you all have done such
a great job of talking about there's so much to
untangle when it comes to, you know, white supremacist movements,
(18:40):
anti abortion movements, anti women movements. They are all kind
of in the same stuff mixed bag, I guess you
would say. And Vice had a really great rundown of
all of the different prominent anti abortion voices who were
at the Capitol that day. Abby Johnson, she's one of
the nation's highest profile anti abortion activist um and she
(19:00):
was in d C. She tweeted an image of herself
at a Trump rally that preceded uh the invasion of
the capital, and she wrote, front row with the most
pro life president of our country. John Broke Coved, who
was a convicted abortion clinic bomber, live streamed himself at
the Capitol on January six, as he put it, quote
fighting for our beloved President Donald J. Trump. Taylor Hanson,
who you might know he got very popular by putting
(19:23):
these murals up all over the country that said baby
lives matter. He was there. And also Derek Evans, a
member of the West Virginia House of Delicates, live streamed
a video of himself in a helmet urging rioters to
break into the building. And two years earlier, a court
forbid Evans from having any contact with a woman who
helped escort patients at West Virginia's Lone abortion clinic after
she accused him of regularly standing outside and harassing her.
(19:46):
So these are people who have documented histories of a
either being very prominent anti abortion voices or b I
just showing themselves to not be above threats and violence
to push their extreme anti abortion agenda. So it's not
a coincidence that these folks also felt that that kind
of extremism was an appropriate response to be used in
(20:09):
the capital, you know, and you know, as you're talking
about specifically Evans, and of course he actually resigned because
of people actually be like, hey, oh, this is not good.
Let's not have him represent us, which is nice to see,
I guess, but he being a violent person who came
yelling after and harassed to the point that women were scared.
That was one of the other conversations they were having
(20:30):
with the anti abortion was many of the people are like, hey,
that dude and he has so much domestic violence if
you look at his rap sheet, that dude is known
as being violent towards women. Like all of these things
that had showed obvious. Oh, these are the dudes who
end up being shooters, Like that's kind of that match
shooter conversation, Like these are the same people who are
going after people, going to harass and trying to assassinate candidates.
(20:55):
And we also saw many who were obviously like the
Proud Boys, who were very racist and knew they were racist,
and we knew they were white supremasts, and they're proud
to be white supremacist. Like you see all of these
people like, oh, those are the violent who are racist
and sexist. How do you think that this type of
disinformation led to them being the ones that led the riots?
I mean, it's a great question. I'm not at all surprised.
(21:17):
You know, we know that disinformation largely impacts underrepresented people.
So it largely is fueled by these horrible distortions about
who we are, whether it's women, black folks, other communities
of color. Disinformation is fueled by racist, sexist like the
worst racist sexist imagining of who we are, right, that's
(21:38):
complete caricatures. And so it is not surprising to me
that these people would be fueled by this kind of
hateful content and really truly believe it. And I think,
you know, to your point, the fact of the matter is,
I'm happy that Evans resigned. That I'm to the point
where whenever there's some sort of like accountability or consequence.
I'm like, oh wow, look at that someone faced a consequence.
(22:00):
They still have those, but these are people who have
scary backgrounds, right, people who have shown themselves to not
be above using violence to get what they want. And
you're exactly right that because we don't take violence against
women very seriously. Most times, when there's a mass shooter
or some sort of mass scale violence behind that, there
(22:21):
is a trail of people who tried to sound the alarm,
usually women. You know, I think it was on Christmas
Eve that guy who he set off a bomb in
I wanna say, Tennessee, Nashville, thank you come to find
out his girlfriend previously was like I think he's making
a bomb, right, like like pretty clearly, you know what.
It's like. I wish we could get to a place
(22:43):
where violence against women was disqualifying, that like people just
didn't let it slide because it's so often is an
indicator that something else bad is going to happen. And
I just wish that we lived in a world where
these kinds of warnings were taken seriously instead of being ignored.
Right when we talk about this information happening and we
see it being targeted towards women specifically. I was kind
(23:05):
of shocked to see how many women really really dug
into Q and on and the whole, like I have
to protect my babies. I have to protect my babies.
But when it comes down to the violence, more often
than not, it's the men. And again, of course we've
had this conversation again how misogyny plays a bigger part
of anti abortion movements than we know. How do we
see that men end up taking these kinds of initiatives
(23:26):
and owning them. I guess it's the word and then
taking it into such a route that it becomes a volatile,
bigger movement than what is online. So as what I'm
saying is like we see a lot of Q and misinformation,
and we found out that Instagram was one of the
biggest of connections for women and she using like influencers
(23:47):
to talk to these women who feel like they need
to do all these things. But when it comes down
to like parlor and when it comes down to read
it in Furtune, it's the men and who initiate these
like kind of responses of it. We have to do something,
let's get armed, And we see that in misinformation being
bled into anti abortion movements into the only person who
can say by country is former President Trump. How do
(24:10):
we see this information being played out where it becomes
such a bigger conspiracy theory that it does lead to violence. Wow,
that's a long winded question. I'm sorry. I mean it's
a big question. I think that we know that if
you hear something enough times that people eventually believe it.
And so the more times that you hear something, the
more times that you hear a false claim go completely unchecked,
(24:32):
people are likely to believe it. I hope that this
is understood in the spirits which I mean it. People
who are out to disiniform, out to cause chaos and confusion.
They're very smart, and they're very savvy, and they're very
good at it. And I think that the dynamic that
you just described where they're sort of a softer version
of it for women to get them involved, and then
(24:53):
a lot of the violence is led by men, I
think that is a really smart, sav you way to
structure a movement. And somebody once told me, whatever the
movement is, there's never any kind of movement without women, right,
And so I do think that we have to have
some tough conversations about the role that women played, because
one of the first people to die in the interaction
(25:15):
was Astley bad At, a woman who had been completely
completely just like consumed by Q and On conspiracy theories.
And so I think that you see women sort of
being indoctrinated to be sort of like the foot soldiers
of this movement where men are largely the ones who
are pushing for violence, like your boogaloo boys and things
(25:37):
of that nature. That serves a very important function because
I think that if women are feeling like, well, I
need to support this because it's going to keep me
feeling safe, it's going to keep my position in society intact.
It's a very smart way to have these kinds of
conspiracy theories be gendered in the way that they are,
(25:58):
because I think it does ensure that, you know, if
you're a woman who maybe isn't so into the whole
politics thing, but you know you don't like the idea
of children being targeted, so you get wrapped up in
Q and On. I think that the idea that the
men storming the capital are going to create safety for
you and your children, I can understand why that's a
(26:20):
seductive message. You know, look at the way that Trump
message to white suburban women all throughout the election, saying
things like, oh, if you vote for Biden, quote, antipa
is going to be at your front door. You know
you're gonna have riots and your in your streets. You
know your kids aren't safe. I think that he messaged
that way because I think it's effective. Everybody wants to
be safe, and I think it's a really smart way
(26:42):
to ensure that everybody is bought in. Even if you're
not like a violent person and you're not going to
be the one breaking windows and trying to like hunt
down members of Congress with zip ties, you might be
supportive of it if you feel that, like that's what
the men have to do quote unquote to restore order
and keep you and your family safe. It's very savvy,
and part of me kind of is not surprised that
(27:04):
it works on so many women, right. It was interesting
to see also, like the mothers with their sons. We
had at least two examples of those, and I was like, which,
I know there's been articles about that as well, including
the fact that one of the young men who actually
is from Georgia Blue Ridge near Mina hometown blamed his
mother in the testimony. He actually blamed his mother. What
(27:28):
an ass? I mean, this was poor woman and she
was what I'm saying, like, that really does tell you
all you need to know, right that you know if
you get caught storming the capital, that like, oh my
mom didn't raise me right, that that would be your
first excuse. Honestly, this mom should be like, wow, I
(27:51):
really didn't do such a hot job. I have to
wonder what her response was, because all I read was
his testimony in which he was like, yeah, my mom
told me to do this, My mom told me to
pick those up. My mom did this. And it was
quite funny because I was like, dude, you come in
here trying to be big masculine. I'm going to kidnap
these people and then be like, my mama did it right,
(28:12):
throwing your own mother under the bus. And it's funny
that you say this because I have noticed a lot
of these people are being released to their parents or
in the care of a family members and things of
that nature. Your point is such a good one, where
it's like what happened to like, Oh, we're storming the
capital and we're you know, big and bad and blah
blah blah. And now when you get caught, you're like, oh, well,
I gotta release me to my mommy. I was like,
(28:34):
which is it. If you're gonna be an insurrectionist, at
least I do it with your childs. But don't you
know well, and just coming back to because I think
this is just a simple question I do and I
don't understand. This is how did the anti abortion movement
become the center of this riot? Almost? I think that
there's so much overlap between the two that I think
a lot of these people saw Donald Trump as the
(28:56):
person who was going to, in their eyes, restore the
rights of children to the unborn right. And so it's
it's not even the question of like, how did it become?
I think it was always there. I think so many
of the people at the forefront of the insurrection also
did have this history with the anti abortion movement. I
think it's like the same way that you cannot unpack
(29:17):
their white supremacist leanings, their anti women leadings, their anti
immigrant leanings. I think it's all one big ball of
yarn that led us here. And the fact of the
matter is, you even saw anti abortion groups spreading this
complete lie that quote Antifa was responsible, even though we
know that's not true, and though we know many of
these people live streamed their crimes. You know, Kristen Hawkins,
(29:39):
who is the head of Students for Life of America,
which is the nation's biggest anti abortion student group, she
blamed ANTIFA members and other writers for storming the capital.
And so you already have the mainstream anti abortion movement
circling the wagons to protect the violent actions of these people,
some of whom are probably doing this in support, aren't
(30:00):
of their anti abortion ideology. Yeah, it's so frustrating. I
hate that when you're like, but it's this video here
if they can still be like no, no. So we
did see just so much racism and sexism on display
at this riot, and that there were a lot of
conversations afterwards, rightfully so, comparing the police and like public's
(30:23):
reaction to Black Lives Matter protest versus this riot. And
then also you have in in this handy outline, you
gave us the history between abortion clinic violence and how
that kind of overlaps with what happened. Absolutely, so one
of the things I think is really interesting about what
(30:43):
some of these abortion activists and advocates are saying, is
that the same way that many of us, myself included,
were disgusted watching the police take selfies with the rioters
and shake their hands and just generally seem very buddy
buddy with the rioters. That is very similar to what
abortion shouldn advocates and clinic workers have reported when they
try to engage the police to report violence or threats
(31:05):
happening at their clinics. And so there's a little piece
from refinding between nine, she says. In August ninety four,
wyn Indiana abortion clinic received a bomb threat. The city
refused to dispatch either police or fire officials, forcing clinic
staff to search for the bomb themselves. Nearly forty years later,
Becca Balinger, a clinic escort of New York City, called
it a complaint about protesters violating the fifteen foot buffer
(31:27):
zone at the clinic. When he arrived, she told her
nine she watched the responding officer approached the violator, shake
his hand and give him a hug. He then turned
to the group of clinic escorts and said, what are
you doing to restrict their First Amendment rights? Today? And
I think that one it enraged me. It was like, fine,
this guy, But I do think it shows the level
(31:48):
to which the police can sort of not always be
counted on to be, you know, restoring public order, the
same way that we saw police be buddy buddy with
the rioters at the Capital. Abortion rights activists have said
that this is not surprising. This is exactly how it
is when we have called to report threats or violence
at clinics. And the fact of the matter is the
Associated Press found that law enforcement agencies nationwide have said
(32:12):
that at least thirty one officers in twelve states are
being scrutinized by their supervisors for their behavior at the Capitol. Right.
And so we know that the same way that we
definitely have a problem with needing to root out people
that have white supremacist ties who are serving in police forces,
it is not a stretch to imagine that that it's
also a problem when it comes to anti abortion ideology,
(32:33):
that police officers they might feel sympathetic to people who
would be threatening violence at a clinic. Right. And so
these abortion advocates have been saying, yes, we have been
ringing the alarm about the fact that the police have
seemed to be buddy buddy with agitators at our clinics
for years. Again, it's just one of those things. It's
a tough conversation to have. But we do need to
talk about the ways that some of these darker forces
(32:56):
have infiltrated our police, but people who are meant to
be restoring order, you know. And so I do think
we have to have these kinds of tough conversations that
put these things at the forefront. Yeah, And there's such
a like we've been talking about with this like ball
of yarn or these Vinn diagrams and all this overlap
because if you do look at the history of abortion
(33:18):
clinics like this is this violence and threatening of violence
has been there for a long time, like since the beginning, right, Yeah.
I mean, anybody who has worked in the abortion or
reproductive rights space can tell you this is not a
new problem. And I just think we really have to
grapple with the fact that so many people who work
in these spaces have been warning that the unchecked spread
(33:41):
of distortions and lies on social media about abortion and
about clinics and about abortion providers will lead to real
world violence. And so I just think it's important to
note how much overlap there was with the violence at
the capital and the kind of violence that these abortion
advocates have been warning of for years. It's so much,
(34:02):
it's so much too untangle as we continue to have
these conversations, and certainly disinformation is a huge part of it.
Is there anything you want to shout out, any resources
you want to shout out, or I guess what people
can be looking for. Yeah, I'm sure I've said this
on the show before, but the never one thing we
can all do to curb disinformation is not amplify it,
(34:24):
even if you're trying to dunk on it, even if
you've got a great joke. Sometimes it can be hard
to resist. I know it, But don't amplify it. If
you focus instead on kind of creating your own little
pocket of the Internet that can be known for trustworthy information,
that it's such a better way to spend your time.
I think that we all have to really understand the
way that like this is not just something that's happening online.
(34:45):
You know, I referenced this great or in rank in
piece that or finding between that and folction all read that.
But she points out that conspiracy theories and outlandish rhetoric
aren't without consequences, particularly when encouraged by those in power,
and anti abortion extremists launched highly visible smear campaign against
Planned Parenthood, featuring doctored videos that accused the organization of
(35:05):
illegally selling fetal body parts. It was absurding, completely untrue,
but that didn't stop Congressional Republicans from embracing the conspiracy
theory to crying Planned Parenthood and opening an investigation into
the organization. Just a few months later, Robert Dear opened
fire on a Planned Planarenthood clinic in Colorado Springs, killing
three people, including a security guard. He confessed that he
(35:25):
was quote upset with them performing abortions and selling baby parts,
a direct reference to the cooked up anti abortion smear campaign,
a conspiracy theory that certainly has echoes, and other far
right conspiracies like Q and on and so again. These
are not just things people are saying online. They can
have real world consequences, just like the continued repeated lie
(35:47):
that Trump won the election and that it was being
stolen led to violence with the capital. The more that
we tolerate just unchecked conspiracy theories and allow them to
seep into our mainstream institutions like our Congress and our government,
the higher the risk for real world danger and real
world violence. And so do not think this is just
happening online. This is a real thing that has real
(36:09):
consequences for all of us. So with that, because as
we talked about, they were already putting in laws that
don't makes us, that are just political games in order
to continue this rhetoric of lies for anti abortion reasons.
As well as the fact that even though Trump is gone,
there's still the lie of voter suppression is very well
in play. As in fact, you know, in the state
(36:29):
of Georgia, and I think I saw it in the
state of North Carolina, they're already vamping up new ways
to suppress votes. We've got a Republican state lawmakers here
in Georgia doing new laws to try to take away
from absentee voting, shutting down all the polls. So all
of this disinformation, like even though it's kind of like, okay,
we can kind of push it aside because Biden is
finally in office, this anti abortion rhetoric is not gone.
(36:52):
Just because we have an actual pro abortion probably choice
people in office doesn't mean this fight is not over
What can we do as a listener, What can we
do as the people behind here? As we see it's
not just online. What can we do in real life
to help a start of the spread? But be also
be an advocate. I think the fact that I forget
the numbers, but there are a lot of Republicans lawmakers
(37:15):
right now who to this day will not say that
the election was not stolen. You know, we have kind
of like the idea of quote legal votes has made
it into our lexicon as if there is a widespread,
documented pattern of voting our regularities in this country. There
just is not. There are in every election, you have
(37:36):
people where it's like, oh, I was voting for my
son who's at college, or this or that. There's always
a smattering of sketchiness here or there, but there is
not any kind of documented widespread voting our regularities in
this election or in any of our last recent elections.
Right And so the fact that things like oh, well,
I think we should count legal votes has become part
(37:57):
of our lexicon and has been sort of mean to
be kind of a moderate thing. I think has done
such a great disservice to our democracy. I don't think
we will know how bad it is for many years.
You know, I think it planted a seed in a
lot of people that maybe we'll never go away. And honestly,
(38:17):
I think one thing that we could all do is
just being willing to push back on the echoes of
these fabrications. So whether you know, if someone says, well,
I think we should count every legal vote, being willing
to say, like, well, you know, what do you mean
by that? You know, tell me, do you think there's
a lot of illegal votes out there? Like? What do
they look like? How often are they happening? I think
being willing to interrogate these claims so that they cannot
(38:39):
become part of our fabric of understanding the world because
they're based on lies. The same way that when people say, like, oh,
did you know that Joe Biden supports abortion up until
five minutes before delivery and saying that's not true, that
is incorrect. If someone was trying to do a abortion
five minutes before you were meant to be in labor,
that will be a crime. That's not happening, And that's
(38:59):
in act this being willing to push back on these
ideas that are based on nothing in ways that are
going to actually prevent them from becoming part of the
fabric of how we understand the world because they're based
on lies. I know that it's a tall order, but
we have enough in this world to contend with. We
don't need more, right, That's that's fair. You know. I
(39:37):
just have to see you one last thing, because you
have been in it, and you have been in it,
whether physically because you're in d C or because you're
part of things like Ultra Violet and and talking about
this information. What have you been doing for yourself for
self care? Because we haven't asked this question a long time,
but that's been a part of our m O. So
what is your self care? Oh my god, I'm so
excited to talk about this. It's funny. It was my
(40:01):
mantra the last few because just like I gotta get
to inauguration, I gotta get to inauguration, I gotta get
to an I had not been doing a great job
of taking care of myself because there was so much
after the insurrection on the six I think that everybody
in my little community here in d C was just
we had just had enough. We had just had it.
But you know, one of the things that I do
to really keep myself grounded and restore myself. This really
(40:24):
is being outside. And so this weekend I went on
a lovely hike in George Washington National Forest and it
was a very restorative, even though it was cold as balls.
So just trying to spend time outside, trying to remember
that I can only I can only consume so much.
I can only do so much. You know, if I
read every new take from what happened in the insurrection
(40:46):
or every new horrible thing that's going on, I won't
necessarily be any better informed or be any better poise
to like make a difference. And something I can really
do to make sure that I'm better poised to make
a difference is like sleep, take care of myself, take breaks,
And I encourage aybody to do that. You know, it
can be enticing to want to refresh Twitter a million
times a day and get every new update of every
(41:08):
new detail of every new story, but that does not
necessarily translate to you being better informed or a better
ally or a better fighter in this movement. So I
appreciate you guys making that space to talk about that,
because I think it does get erased in the movement
that like taking care of yourself is very important. I
encourage everybody too, it's important. What are you doing drinking
(41:29):
a lot of coffee? I'm writing fan fiction and I
got a walking treadmill desk, like a really cheap one,
really cheap. I don't want anyone to be like, wow, no,
it's very cheap and small. But it's I like it
is it under your desk right now? No, this is
my podcast disc it's under my research Okay, yes, space
(41:54):
it sounds like you're so rich, My God doesn't space
and even if it is a small Okay, Well, I
was trying to help you out there. Yes, that's what
I'm doing. Yeah, I honestly I don't know. Look, and
that's not because I'm not doing things. It's mainly because
(42:16):
I am so just organized with my time, because I
am at the worst of keeping things separate. So I'll
work all the time and then just sit all the
time too, So it's like one or the other, but
for me a lot of like I am a comfort person,
so I'll rewatch things that I love and know how
it's going to turn out, and then bask in that
and then also a long cuddle times with my dog.
(42:38):
Why does it feel so good to like rewatch the
Office for the hundred times, like, like, what is it
about it that's so comforting? It feels like friends, And
because you know it's coming, you're not gonna be shocked
or disappointed, or if you're going to be disappointed, you
already know it's going to be disappointing, and sometimes you
can fast forward through that. Yeah, what's your comfort show? Oh?
I have a few. Supernatural has become one, thank you Annie,
(42:59):
and I'd like, I don't know why, but it has
become one. But also a new Girl, Parks and rec
have become a few of them. I watched the weird
things like The Flash. I really loved that show, and
I just love how genuinely sweet it is. So I
watched really silly things like that, and then I'll rewatch movies.
You know Body's business. I love this. It's like a
prescription for self care and comfort. Yeah, and also I
(43:22):
just wear soft pants. That's my other comfort, soft pants,
dog cuddles and the television shows you've seen a million
times before us sounds great, Well, Bridget what else do
you think if we left anything out or if there's
more that you resources that you want to provide. Is
there anything else you want to add? Well, I would say, um,
if you want to have more conversations about disinformation and
(43:44):
how it pertains to women and folks of color. My
podcast There Are No Girls on the Internet just released
a brand new series all about disinformation called Disinformed. You
can check it out on this very network. I heart
radio Awesome. Yeah, and definitely do that listeners, Bridget, you
want to shout out any any other pleases that the
good listeners can find you. Yes, I'm on Twitter at
Bridget Murray and I'm on Instagram at Bridget Murray in
(44:05):
d C. Well, thank you as always for being here.
You managed to make it a delight even though we're
talking about things that are not so delightful. It's a skill.
Thank you, I hope so you know you can. There's
always room for humor, even if it's gallows humor. There's
always room for humors. Yes, yes, and we very much
(44:25):
appreciate it. Can't wait till your back again, listeners. If
you would like to email as you can or email
Stuff Media Mom Stuff at i heeart media dot com.
You can find us on Instagram at stuff I've Never
Told You are on Twitter at mom Stuff Podcast. Thanks
as always too, I'm super producer, Christina. Hey Christina, and
thanks to you for listening Stuff. I never told you
the protection of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from
(44:47):
I Heart Radio, visit that I Heard You at Apple
Podcast or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
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