Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 478 ｜ Vaccine Passports, Mandates, and the French Resistance

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Thursday. Hope everyone has had a wonderful week. You've

00:00:14.160 almost made it to Friday, so congratulations. Good job. Pat yourself on the back. You did it.

00:00:20.420 We're going to talk about a variety of things today. Today is the Relatable Variety Show.

00:00:25.620 Some things are going to be serious and sad. Some things are going to be happy and uplifting.

00:00:31.500 Hopefully, maybe a couple things even make you laugh, so you're going to have to bear with me

00:00:36.400 as we transition through some of those things. Might have to be a sharp turn sometimes,

00:00:40.780 but we're going to get through it. First thing I need to say off the bat that I don't have all

00:00:46.180 the details of. When I am recording this, it is Thursday morning, so by the time you're listening

00:00:51.360 to this, there may be some developments that I'm not able to tell you right now, but as I said,

00:00:57.640 as I am recording this, there have been two explosions outside of the Kabul airport in

00:01:02.720 Afghanistan, and I just wanted to let you know that I'm watching that. I'm watching the development of

00:01:07.360 that. Maybe I will share more information about it on Instagram this afternoon. Let me tell you

00:01:12.620 what I know right now. I literally, just as I was walking in, happened to look off to the side

00:01:18.020 and see a chyron on Fox News talking about some explosion outside of the Kabul airport.

00:01:25.640 I didn't know about it, and then I walked in, and my team said, oh yeah, there was another

00:01:30.680 explosion. I didn't even know about the first explosion. It's very hard to keep up with all

00:01:34.200 of this, so if you didn't know about it, that's okay. That's part of why I'm here.

00:01:39.080 So let me read you a little bit from The Federalist. They reported this morning, quote,

00:01:44.140 an explosion rocked the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul on Thursday as thousands of people

00:01:50.040 were waiting for evacuation flights out of the Taliban-controlled country. If you haven't,

00:01:54.180 this is me talking. If you haven't listened to yesterday's episode of Relatable, we gave you

00:01:59.020 an update on everything that is happening in Afghanistan, why what's happening is happening,

00:02:05.080 the policy decisions made by this administration that led to what's happening, and then what I had

00:02:11.180 an expert on, Rebecca Heinrichs, and what she believes is going to happen in the future,

00:02:15.280 the things that we need to watch out for, and she made a couple predictions about what is to come

00:02:20.080 and how things are going to devolve. So go listen to that episode if you have not already. This is

00:02:26.460 what's happening right now. Several outlets, The Federalist says, reported that the blast occurred

00:02:31.580 at one of the airport's main entrances, Abbey Gate, and was triggered by at least one suicide

00:02:36.980 bomber. The Pentagon confirmed there was an explosion and said there are, quote, an unknown

00:02:42.600 number of casualties. We can confirm an explosion happened outside Kabul airport. This is a tweet by

00:02:49.600 the Pentagon. Casualties are unclear at this time. We will provide additional details when we can. Fox

00:02:55.380 News reported that at least three U.S. troops were wounded in the blast. As of Wednesday, approximately

00:03:01.020 1,500 Americans were still waiting to be rescued from Afghanistan. There are probably a lot more than that,

00:03:06.880 I also saw a New York Times news alert that said that there's a plan to get 500 of them out,

00:03:11.140 but not the 1,000 that I guess are still going to be left. The Biden administration has succeeded in

00:03:18.560 getting tens of thousands of people out of Afghanistan, but only 5% of those thousands of

00:03:24.520 people have actually been American. So the vast majority of those people have been Afghans, and not

00:03:30.480 necessarily Afghan allies, but just Afghans in general. I believe that we should be taking refugees.

00:03:36.720 I want to take refugees. I believe absolutely, once they're here, that we as Christians have

00:03:42.240 an obligation to help them with our time and our energy and our resources and our donations as we

00:03:47.920 can. But I believe that the American government should be prioritizing American citizens. That's

00:03:52.960 what a government does. That's why you see governments of other countries actually sending

00:03:57.260 their military into Afghanistan, not just waiting at the airport to rescue their citizens from Afghanistan.

00:04:03.120 Unfortunately, the Biden administration has stopped our troops from doing that. They're just kind of

00:04:08.160 waiting at the airport and then telling American citizens to go to the airport to hopefully get on

00:04:15.520 a plane and get out. But unfortunately, the Taliban is making that difficult. And then this terrorist

00:04:19.860 attack, of course, is making it even more difficult. That is just one of the many reasons why the Biden

00:04:24.660 administration has botched this and has caused unprecedented, at least as far as our foreign

00:04:31.860 policy goes, probably unprecedented chaos. And so it's just the disaster. These two bombings,

00:04:39.380 these two explosions just add to the disaster that could have been quite probably curtailed by better

00:04:47.960 decision making by the U.S. government. The Federalist goes on to say just one day before

00:04:54.680 the explosion, the U.S. embassy cautioned Americans against traveling to the airport for evacuation until

00:04:59.160 they were specifically told to do so. So it is likely that the United States saw this coming. And actually,

00:05:05.800 we have heard that one fear was that ISIS would capitalize on the chaos at Kabul airport and possibly

00:05:15.160 and possibly perpetuate one of these attacks. We don't know beyond that who is responsible

00:05:22.380 for it. Very, very sad, very tragic. There's just there's just no way. I don't think that Biden lives

00:05:31.000 this down. There's no way to spin it like he can try to give as many press conferences as he wants to.

00:05:36.140 He can be as defiant and as defensive as he wants to. He can run away from the press as much as he wants

00:05:41.520 to. He can try to pivot to talking about COVID and attacking governors like Ron DeSantis for their

00:05:47.460 policy for his policymaking. He's not going to be able to run from it because like we talked about

00:05:53.140 yesterday, this is a rare instance in which we do have a lot of members of the media actually being

00:05:57.740 honest and trying to literally speak truth to power rather than just say that they're speaking truth

00:06:05.260 to power. As we know, the liberal media often gives a pass to Democratic politicians. But in this case,

00:06:11.520 they seem to be holding his feet to the fire, which they should be doing for every single

00:06:16.140 politician at all times. That is the responsibility of the press to do that for politicians on both

00:06:23.340 sides of the aisle. So I woke up this morning praying about the situation in Afghanistan. I shared

00:06:30.700 on social media. I'll share again. There are a variety of organizations that are helping in very

00:06:36.160 tangible and very effective ways. Glenn Beck has sent a team over to Afghanistan or is helping fund

00:06:45.060 a team in Afghanistan that is actively rescuing Christians. And so they're going over there with

00:06:50.380 their large planes and they're getting Christians out of Afghanistan. Praise God for that. God is using

00:06:56.080 many people to do the same thing. This is just another example that private citizens, that the private

00:07:02.180 sector typically, the vast majority of times, does a better job at doing things effectively than the

00:07:10.100 government does. And even though we are seeing such a failure of leadership, a dereliction of duty

00:07:15.860 by our country's leaders, when I see something like what Glenn Beck is doing or what other organizations

00:07:21.820 are doing to help those in need and to get American citizens out and to get American allies out in

00:07:27.360 Afghanistan, it reminds me of why I am proud to be an American. Because even when our leadership fails,

00:07:33.120 this is the character of our country. This is who we are. In the midst of all of our disagreements,

00:07:38.300 this is the character of the United States, sacrificing everything to ensure the safety of our fellow

00:07:46.900 Americans and of our fellow Christians if we are Christians. So I also, we, Youth with a,

00:07:56.700 Youth with a Mission is an organization that we decided to donate to. There was actually a specific

00:08:01.740 couple that are friends of a friend that we wanted to support financially that are, they're going over

00:08:08.400 there. I don't know that I'm actually allowed to disclose their names. They're going over there and

00:08:12.120 trying to help Christians in Afghanistan. We also donated to No One Left Behind, who was trying to

00:08:18.460 rescue Afghan allies there. And then one other organization, Houston Welcomes Refugees. Houston, Texas has

00:08:26.140 a huge refugee population and they create welcome kits for refugees of all different kinds that

00:08:32.740 arrive in Houston and they are doing that also for Afghan refugees. No matter what you think about the

00:08:38.200 politics of refugee acceptance, the fact of the matter is, is that once they're here, they're here

00:08:43.360 and it is the obligation, I believe, of Christians to help them as we can. That doesn't mean that we help

00:08:50.160 them instead of helping American citizens, but in addition to. And so those are three organizations

00:08:57.320 that I think that are doing good work. There are other organizations that are doing good work as well.

00:09:03.860 I'm not affiliated with any of those organizations that I just promoted, just giving you some options

00:09:09.580 to look into on your own. All right. I want to transition to some other things. And it can be

00:09:17.000 difficult, like I said, to make this transition into some lighthearted stuff. And then also we're

00:09:22.060 going to get back into some serious stuff. But let us remember that even in the midst of chaos,

00:09:26.320 even in the midst of really hard things going on, that we can't feel guilty for seeking lightheartedness

00:09:32.180 and seeking alleviation from those burdens. We do what we can. We trust God as we pray without ceasing

00:09:40.060 for those in need. But we also have to focus on what's in front of us. And God does give us joy as a gift.

00:09:45.560 Proverbs 17.22 says, A joyful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.

00:09:52.240 And I also love this from Proverbs 14.13, that even in laughter, the heart may ache and the end of joy

00:09:59.280 may be grief. And so even as we laugh, even as we show joy, if you are, say, watching a show or

00:10:09.620 watching a movie or watching a video that makes you laugh, brings you joy, you're laughing at something

00:10:14.720 that your friend or your child said, don't feel guilty for that just because there is also sorrow.

00:10:19.840 We actually, the human heart is very complex and multifaceted. We can carry sadness and sorrow at

00:10:24.720 the same time that we are expressing joy. And we actually see that very much depicted throughout

00:10:30.880 scripture that we are to rejoice in trials of many kinds, as the book of James tells us to do,

00:10:37.000 even as we are sad and maybe even fearful in some ways in those trials. And so let's transition into

00:10:47.600 some other things, because I do want to talk about some good things that are going on and some things

00:10:52.400 that I see around the world where people are pushing back against what they see as tyrannical policy.

00:10:59.780 And as I was writing, as I was writing, so let me, let me tell you first, let me tell you some wins

00:11:04.680 and failures of, of Ali Stuckey first, before I get into some global wins and failures that I think

00:11:11.240 that I see. First of all, a win for me this morning, sometimes I write verbatim what I want to say,

00:11:18.620 even if I don't follow my script. Sometimes I follow my script to the T because I know exactly what

00:11:22.680 I want to say. And it's better if I write it in the morning. Sometimes I don't write a script like

00:11:26.860 right now. I don't have a script that I am looking at. Sometimes I write a script and then I go off

00:11:30.580 script. This morning, I just started kind of typing things out. I'm an external processor. So sometimes

00:11:36.000 I have to start writing and it gets my brain going. This morning, I started out typing that there was

00:11:42.740 a smorgasbord of things that I wanted to talk about today. And I was very proud of myself because

00:11:48.000 I spelled smorgasbord correctly on the first try. Now, some of you, you might need to just pause it for a

00:11:54.220 second, pause relatable for a second, and see if you can spell smorgasbord the right way the first

00:11:58.780 time. Because I asked my husband if he could, he's a good speller. Now, granted, I'm a pretty good

00:12:04.020 speller anyway, but still, that's a difficult word because I think we typically say smorgasbord.

00:12:09.460 And that's how my husband spelled it. It's actually smorgasbord. I don't know if you knew that or not,

00:12:13.780 but I was pretty proud of myself that on the first time, I mean, I pat myself on the back

00:12:19.820 about that because that's not easy. Smorgasbord, if you did not know, is actually like a market

00:12:25.700 in Brooklyn. Smorgasbord is a Scandinavian word that is, it describes some kind of like meal,

00:12:35.780 not just like a cheese board, but it has all kinds of different like meats and cheeses and

00:12:40.500 things like that. That's a smorgasbord because it's a variety, a mishmash of things. So I was pretty

00:12:46.420 proud of myself. That's a win for Allie's Ducky that happened this morning. Now, let me tell you

00:12:49.580 about my, let me tell you about my loss. And this, I'm going to try to tie it into the other

00:12:54.080 things that we're talking about, but we'll see. It's just, maybe it's just story time because this

00:12:58.680 is called relatable. And I don't, because there's so much going on in the world, I don't often tell

00:13:03.020 stories. So some of you know, if you follow me on Instagram, that my husband and I have been trying

00:13:07.960 to do Whole30. We're about two and a half weeks in and I've cheated here and there, but I've done a

00:13:14.560 pretty good job. And if you don't know what Whole30 is, it's basically that you try to eat

00:13:18.080 whole foods for 30 days. And so no processed food, you can't eat dairy, you can't eat legumes. So

00:13:24.620 that means like you can't eat beans, you can't eat peanut butter because a peanut is actually not

00:13:30.280 a nut, it's a legume. And so it's difficult. I've done keto. I did keto a little over a year ago,

00:13:36.240 it was effective, but you can eat, I think a lot more on keto because you can eat dairy and sour

00:13:42.260 cream, which is dairy. So you can eat dairy and you can eat some, some other things that I think

00:13:48.180 gives you a little bit more latitude and is a little bit easier. You can't eat any of that on

00:13:52.600 Whole30, but I didn't want to wait like I did after my last pregnancy a whole year to start eating

00:13:56.860 healthy. And so that's why we decided to do it. So if you've done a Whole30 before, you know that

00:14:01.600 there is a day where you feel, and I'm sorry if you're listening with kids, this is a little bit of

00:14:06.600 an inappropriate, where it's not a cuss word, it's an inappropriate word because it speaks to maybe,

00:14:10.880 I don't know, a mature idea, but you feel hungover one of the days on Whole30 because your body is

00:14:17.060 detoxing all of the bad stuff that you've been eating, all of the processed food and all of that.

00:14:21.760 And you just feel bad. And everyone knows that you're supposed to push through that day and you're

00:14:26.820 just supposed to get on with it. But yesterday I woke up, but like, I think I was still like half

00:14:32.440 asleep waking up thinking about how bad my head hurt. And I woke up, had a full night of sleep,

00:14:37.900 but was so tired, so nauseous. And I just, I did not feel good. And I didn't even want coffee. No,

00:14:45.400 I'm not pregnant. So don't ask me about that. I didn't want coffee. I didn't want anything. I felt

00:14:50.660 awful. And you could probably, you could go back and look at yesterday's YouTube video and how tired

00:14:56.700 I looked. I didn't do my hair. I hardly did my makeup. Was not feeling good. But I was like,

00:15:02.160 Allie, you got to push, you got to push through this. You got, it's only, you know,

00:15:05.240 two and a half more weeks. Like my husband and my anniversary is at the end of Whole30. So we are

00:15:10.520 already excited about what we're going to eat. And so I was like, you got to push through it. Well,

00:15:15.400 your girl is not very disciplined when she passes by In-N-Out. And that is what I did. So I went,

00:15:26.020 I drove by In-N-Out and I actually drove past it. So this is how bad it is. I drove past In-N-Out

00:15:31.940 and I made a U-turn because I could not, I couldn't do it. I couldn't do it. My resolve just

00:15:39.260 totally, it totally fell through. And I circled back around and I got myself a hamburger and fries

00:15:47.060 and a Diet Coke. And I wish I could say, like, if I had any semblance of integrity when it comes to

00:15:53.760 Whole30, I would feel bad about that. I would have some regret. And I would say, oh, you know, I really

00:16:00.180 wish that I hadn't done that. I should have just, I should have just pushed through and I would feel

00:16:05.220 better today. And I, my body feels bad and I just regret it. And I could have, you know, gone to my

00:16:10.980 husband with all of this guilt and I didn't, I still don't feel bad about it. I felt so good

00:16:16.540 afterwards. I was like, I think my body needed that. I think my body needed the fries and the

00:16:22.020 hamburger. I still feel good about it today. I probably won't do it again because I'm going to try

00:16:27.800 to re-implement my discipline, but I'm just going to be honest. Like I went home and I told my husband

00:16:34.080 about it and I was like, I don't, I don't feel bad. I don't feel bad. I thought, I felt honestly

00:16:38.800 like my body needed in and out. So that is, if you consider that a failure, win, smelled,

00:16:46.520 dispelled smorgasbord correctly on the first try this morning, fail, loss, yesterday on Whole30,

00:16:54.360 completely gave in and just ate in and out, which is even just like weird for me. I'm not really a

00:17:00.520 fast food person. But that's what, that, that's, that's my story. I just wanted to tell you that

00:17:06.420 because maybe you can relate to it. You win some and you lose some. Won today, lost yesterday. That's,

00:17:13.420 that's life. That's life. And I just, I just, I don't know. I wanted to share that with you and

00:17:19.500 maybe it'll tie into what we're talking about next. Some wins and some losses, some goods and

00:17:24.480 some bats. We're going to talk about Kristi Noem and we're going to talk about vaccine mandates and

00:17:29.180 we're going to talk about France. And so there are some winners there and then there are some

00:17:33.320 not so winners there. So maybe that ties into what I just said. All right. So like I said,

00:17:42.460 some winners and some losers. Um, I don't, I don't want to call governor of South Dakota,

00:17:49.580 uh, Kristi Noem a loser because I don't, I really don't think that she is, but she has taken some

00:17:55.440 tactics on Twitter that I just don't think are wise. And because I think that she's done a lot

00:18:01.420 of good things as the South Dakota governor, like I want to give some friendly advice. So let me tell

00:18:05.780 you some drama that went on on Twitter yesterday with Kristi Noem and Nat Walsh. Now this is like the

00:18:11.080 third week in a row that we're talking about Matt Walsh. We talked about Matt, Matt Walsh on,

00:18:15.760 uh, an episode about Carrie Underwood. And then we had him on, I think the week before. And so he

00:18:21.500 isn't, he's a newsmaker. And so we're going to talk about him again in relation to Kristi Noem. So,

00:18:27.820 uh, he said on his podcast that the only reason that Kristi Noem, it has the attention that she has

00:18:35.700 again, governor of South Dakota is because she is a very attractive woman. He said, you know,

00:18:40.820 add, I think he said 20 years and 40 pounds to her or something like that. Uh, then she doesn't

00:18:46.500 get the attention that she does. Now we know that that is like, that's Matt Walsh's brand. He says

00:18:53.060 stuff like that. Well, Kristi Noem decided that she was going to, um, post that clip, which she

00:19:00.780 apparently got from media matters and say that Matt Walsh is a misogynist. And then she tweeted

00:19:09.580 something again saying, um, actually tagging Ben Shapiro, I guess, kind of like telling on Matt

00:19:15.840 Walsh and saying like, you know, I've roped steers bigger than Matt Walsh when I was a teenager or

00:19:23.000 something like that. And the reason why this all started is, um, because governor Noem, she's gotten

00:19:30.740 a lot of conservatives frustrated. I think understandably so because she refuses to tell

00:19:35.560 corporations that they can't mandate vaccines. Whereas in somewhere like Florida, governor Ron

00:19:41.500 DeSantis has tried to make it impossible for businesses to mandate vaccines. Now there are

00:19:49.680 conservatives typically on the anti Trump side, I would say that don't like that kind of thing.

00:19:56.180 Um, and I'm not saying that necessarily they're only characterized by being against Donald Trump.

00:20:01.220 They just typically tend to be in that camp who say that it's not conservative. Like I saw Joe Walsh,

00:20:06.760 for example, he, I think said that he was going to run against Trump last time, but, uh, and the

00:20:11.720 Republican primary, but, um, he said, you know, what's conservative about, uh, Republican governor

00:20:19.240 telling businesses that they can't mandate something or telling school districts that they can't mandate

00:20:24.220 something. And I replied and I said, well, they're protecting individual choice. I am on that side.

00:20:30.860 I am okay with a politician telling a business what they can and can't do when it comes to protecting

00:20:38.980 the rights of individuals, uh, to make particular choices. I think now I could maybe be persuaded by

00:20:46.580 a good argument to the contrary of that, but I like that Ron DeSantis is stepping up and saying, look,

00:20:53.400 no, you can't trample on a parent's right to decide what is best for their kid. And you can't trample

00:20:58.540 on an individual's right, or try to manipulate them into doing something with their body that

00:21:02.760 they don't want to do, uh, talking to a business, um, and basically give them an ultimatum. It's

00:21:09.800 either this or you're fired. Maybe there are some other restrictions that you can put on them. Maybe

00:21:14.100 you can make them test. Maybe you can try to make them wear a mask, but you can't force them or you

00:21:19.520 can't fire them if they refuse this vaccine. I don't know the ins and outs of Ron DeSantis's

00:21:24.540 particular policy, but I know that he's trying to protect individual choice by basically saying,

00:21:29.340 no, you can't mandate this kind of thing. Whereas, cause you know, I'm a saying, look,

00:21:33.100 I don't have the power to do that. And I don't want to do that. I don't want to coerce businesses

00:21:38.480 into not mandating something that they want to mandate. And I get that, but I do think it's

00:21:43.760 different. The government saying, look, the company, you can't force your employees to do that

00:21:50.480 versus saying, um, uh, versus, uh, uh, a governor or an elected official, uh, official telling a

00:21:59.520 company that they have to do something. If that makes sense. I think that there is a difference

00:22:04.380 because on the one hand, the former situation, you are protecting individual choice. I would say

00:22:10.580 that is the role of a conservative politician to try to protect individual choice as much as possible.

00:22:16.160 You are representing individuals. You are not primarily representing corporations. And so

00:22:21.400 this is another, another thing that a lot of conservatives consider a blunder on the part

00:22:27.300 of Kristi Noem after she refused to, um, to protect girls sports. Now she did explain her decision not to

00:22:36.160 sign the bill that was said to protect girls sports, but a lot of people think that she has conflicting

00:22:42.440 interests, corporate interests, um, and that she is not representing, uh, people in a conservative way.

00:22:50.180 So that's what people have beef about. That is why Matt Walsh was criticizing her. If you look at his

00:22:56.740 podcast in general or the episode in general, you'll see he actually did lay out some specific complaints

00:23:02.460 about, uh, Kristi Noem and the policy positions that she has decided to hold. And it wasn't just about

00:23:10.040 her looks, but this is the clip that was kind of taken out that she tweeted and she had a problem

00:23:15.120 about. Here's the thing, Kristi Noem. First of all, I do disagree with you when it comes to

00:23:20.920 the businesses, when it comes to protecting individual choice. I would not say what Matt

00:23:26.920 Walsh said. I am a woman. I wouldn't like someone to say that about me. I wouldn't. And so I understand

00:23:32.080 her being offended by that. I'd be offended by that. I think it's offensive. I'm sure that Matt Walsh

00:23:36.500 doesn't think it's inoffensive. It's, but it's fine for him to say whatever. Uh, he has the,

00:23:41.740 the freedom to do that. And there is some truth to it. Like there is some truth to it. She is a

00:23:46.460 beautiful person and beauty has privilege. There are privileges that come with beauty. That is just

00:23:52.780 true. That's true. No matter what party you're in, that's true. Uh, no matter, no matter what your

00:23:58.540 background is, there is such thing as pretty privilege. You will get a more prominent platform

00:24:03.660 if you are appealing to the eyes. Now in her defense, she was the only governor that decided

00:24:12.380 not to shut down any businesses or shut down any churches for any amount of time. And that is

00:24:18.920 actually why she rose to the position that she did because she was such a staunch defender of

00:24:25.300 liberty from the get go at the beginning of COVID. So we do have to give her credit in that. I think

00:24:31.240 that she signed some good abortion legislation as well, anti-abortion legislation. And so we have

00:24:38.180 to give her credit there. But I mean, you have to also realize that some of it has to do with your

00:24:44.840 beauty. Some of it does have to do with your beauty and maybe that is a double standard, but that's also

00:24:52.080 because men and women are different. There are other female governors and I'm not knocking those female

00:24:57.500 governors. They're saying that they're not pretty. Maybe they are pretty. I don't even know. We don't

00:25:01.740 even know. We don't even know what they look like because they don't have necessarily the same, um,

00:25:08.440 the same attractiveness as governor Noem does. So here's the thing. Here's the why governor Noem ends

00:25:15.580 up losing in this situation. And I'm not calling her a loser, but in this situation, she loses. Okay.

00:25:22.040 Okay. Christine Noem, you don't troll the trolls. You don't troll the trolls. Okay. It might be

00:25:28.480 annoying that Matt Walsh said that to you. And I understand totally being offended by that,

00:25:34.360 but you win nothing by fighting these fights. Okay. You win nothing. The internet will take the side

00:25:41.740 of Matt Walsh and coming on the heels of you deciding something that a lot of conservatives are

00:25:47.080 mad at you are not going to win. There is no good target audience for this particular fight. Like

00:25:53.500 people really like the daily wire. They like the podcasters there for good reason. I like them all

00:25:59.140 too. I think that they're hilarious and awesome and insightful and millions of other people do too.

00:26:05.520 And it just makes you look bad. It makes you look petty. And I understand the offensiveness,

00:26:11.760 but you lose in this situation. And so if I were your political advisor, which you have no reason to

00:26:16.840 listen to me, I would advise you not to tweet anything like that ever again, because there's

00:26:22.480 no winning side of it. There's no winning side of it. And I also recommend you not take implied

00:26:28.820 shots at Ron DeSantis, like you did in your CPAC speech. Because again, even if you feel like you've

00:26:36.500 done a better job, he is super popular and people, conservatives really like the job that he did.

00:26:42.120 And so it's just the whole thing, the pettiness doesn't work. And maybe it's a double standard.

00:26:48.640 It probably is a double standard. But I think especially when women engage in that kind of

00:26:52.380 thing, people assume that you're insecure and that you're petty and that you're jealous. And I'm not

00:26:56.200 saying that you are, but people are going to assume that. And so the loser in this particular

00:27:01.100 situation, like I said, Christine Allm, about my in and out and smorgasbord thing, you win some,

00:27:06.780 some days, you lose some, some days. So focus on continuing to be a good governor for South Dakota,

00:27:13.560 focus on continuing to pass and to tout conservative policies. And, you know, the game is changing,

00:27:22.780 the game is changing a little bit. And maybe you need to realize that there are Republicans who want

00:27:27.840 their Republican representatives, their governors, their elected officials to wield power in the same

00:27:33.420 way that Democrats wield power for the advancement of individual liberty. That's kind of where we are

00:27:40.140 right now. Love it or hate it. Now, speaking of all of this stuff, this does kind of transition us

00:27:46.220 into what I want to talk about next. And that is fighting for your individual liberty when it comes

00:27:55.180 to things like your kids' school mandating masks. Or maybe you're someone who, maybe you're someone

00:28:03.180 who doesn't want to take the vaccine and yet you're the organization that you work for is forcing you

00:28:09.180 to. This is not a stance, as I've said many times, on the vaccine itself. I haven't given that stance and

00:28:14.620 I'm not going to give that stance. I haven't disclosed my status because I think we just normalized

00:28:18.580 not disclosing that. I don't judge you if you got it or if you didn't get it. But I am unequivocally

00:28:26.040 against mandates and coercion and manipulation. And so I want to talk about what can you do if you

00:28:33.900 are in that position where maybe you've chosen not to take it or maybe you've chosen to take it,

00:28:37.400 but you don't want to engage in the show your papers, please culture that we are seeing growing

00:28:43.940 at a rapid pace around the world. So I want to talk a little bit about that in just a second.

00:28:48.580 Okay, so the biggest question that I get that I do try to answer every now and then, although it's

00:28:57.900 difficult to do, the biggest question is, how do I push back against policies that you don't like?

00:29:04.320 Mask mandates in your kids' schools, like we already listed vaccine mandates and passports.

00:29:09.740 I don't have the answer to all of those questions because there may or may not be a variety of

00:29:14.600 strategies that work. So I asked some of you about this on Instagram, if you've effectively

00:29:19.900 gotten a policy to change at work or in a school district or a school, and I asked you,

00:29:27.020 okay, what did you do? And I got several messages. I got several messages from you guys basically telling

00:29:35.240 me kind of what you did. And the thing that I heard from a lot of you was that you collectivized. So

00:29:44.520 that was the first thing that I heard that you rallied some other parents that agreed with you

00:29:48.960 on something. And I keep thinking about specifically mask mandates in schools, because there really is

00:29:53.940 no data whatsoever that supports having mask mandates in schools. And there's plenty of data

00:29:58.440 to the contrary. I'll link the past episode in which we broke that all down. And I'll link my blog

00:30:04.120 post that links all of the studies that show that there's really no effectiveness to most masks and

00:30:14.200 how most people wear masks in general, no matter what your age is. But especially when it comes with

00:30:18.720 kids, especially when they're wearing wet cloth masks all day, there's no effectiveness and there's

00:30:24.560 actually potential for developmental delays and also pathogens to be created and spread. But

00:30:30.500 we'll link to those past episodes. And so I'm thinking of that when I'm thinking about people

00:30:35.720 who have actually changed policies. A lot of these policies that are being pushed back on right now

00:30:41.180 have to do with children. And I care about mask mandates for adults too, and that we're actually

00:30:45.880 following the science on that. But I care more about kids because kids are being forced to do this.

00:30:52.780 And I get a lot of people saying, well, my kid loves to wear a mask. My two-year-old loves to

00:30:56.580 wear a mask. Okay, that doesn't mean that it's good for them. At one point, they were made to wear

00:31:01.900 a mask. They probably didn't voluntarily just say, hey, mom and dad, like, can I wear a mask? I'd love

00:31:07.640 to wear a mask. They probably either saw their friends doing it, they saw someone doing it,

00:31:10.780 or you told them that they had to do it. So at some point, they were made to wear a mask.

00:31:15.120 And that means that we're making kids do something that has no proven scientific benefit

00:31:19.620 and may cause psychological harm in not being able to communicate how we are used to communicating,

00:31:27.560 how God made us to communicate. Like, he gave us the half of our face that we are covering up. And

00:31:33.040 like, who are we? With, again, no scientific benefit proven, especially for kids, who are we

00:31:38.820 to say that that is good and right and effective? And that's not going to add some kind of psychological

00:31:47.000 harm, especially for kids with special needs, especially for kids who are still learning to

00:31:52.060 speak and enunciate their words and things like that. Other countries understand this. The UK

00:31:58.820 understands this. All of Scandinavia understands this. Even Australia, the police state of Australia

00:32:03.220 understands this. They do not make kids wear masks. In some countries, 12 and up, but not younger than

00:32:10.920 that. America is very draconian and unscientific when it comes to the recommendation of masks at

00:32:16.380 two years old. There's no science. And so most parents who have decided, OK, I'm going to push

00:32:21.100 back against this when it comes to my kids' daycare, when it comes to my kids' public school or private

00:32:24.920 school, what you have said that you have done is you have collectivized. So you've rallied together

00:32:29.720 with like-minded parents and you have taken your complaints either in a letter or in an email. Some of you

00:32:36.460 have gone to your school board meetings and you have stated your facts and you have continued to

00:32:40.880 contact the members of your school board or members of your city council in other cases with the facts

00:32:46.860 and with your persuasive, logical, respectful arguments for why you don't believe it actually

00:32:52.580 makes sense to mandate masks in this particular age group or in this particular setting. So those of

00:32:58.320 you who have been effective have first you found like-minded people and then you took your complaints

00:33:03.720 in a very professional and respectful and persuasive way, linking to the studies, linking to the facts,

00:33:11.040 and continued to pressure the people who make these decisions into making decisions that are based on

00:33:17.060 science and compassion. And one person specifically said the route that you took was every time,

00:33:24.220 I think it was an email that you would get from your child's school, every time that you got an email

00:33:29.520 saying, you know, this is, we're thinking about mandating masks based on, you know, this criteria

00:33:35.440 or whatever, you would reply. And you would very strongly state your opposition and state your

00:33:43.060 reasoning for your opposition. Every time that you would get an email saying, hey, we're actually

00:33:47.660 thinking about making masks optional or not doing masks, you would respond with very strong support.

00:33:53.300 And so you kept on showing how passionate you were about your position and how passionate you were

00:34:00.340 against a particular, you know, mandated position. And that actually worked. You showing strong

00:34:07.280 communication and strong feelings and strong support towards one position actually put pressure

00:34:14.140 on the people that you were communicating with to go the way that you wanted it to go. We see people

00:34:20.640 on the left doing this all the time to try to push their policies. And you have to be just as if not

00:34:26.640 stronger in voicing your position. So find like-minded people in your workplace, in your school district,

00:34:35.560 at your kid's school, and formulate a concise and factual argument. Present it to the people who make

00:34:43.120 the decisions. It might even be local health officials. Present it to the people who make the decisions.

00:34:49.760 Try to get business owners involved. People in other positions of power locally who have

00:34:56.180 influence, who have influence in your community, in your school. Get them to sign on to some kind of

00:35:02.340 petition, some kind of letter. Get them to show up to a school board meeting. Peaceful protest.

00:35:09.080 Raising your voice about these things. Showing that you're paying attention and that you're putting

00:35:13.960 pressure. Again, respectful pressure. We're not talking about any kind of threats in any way.

00:35:18.640 Respectful pressure on the people who make these decisions to make the right choice.

00:35:25.460 Again, based on science and compassion that can absolutely be effective. I want to show you a video

00:35:31.180 of what I think is a very peaceful protest. A form of protest that is allegedly, and I say allegedly

00:35:38.540 because the person on Twitter who tweeted this video says this is what's happening in France.

00:35:44.320 And I'll tell you what's happening before I show it. There are people sitting on the street in France

00:35:50.840 eating basically at picnics. It looks like hundreds of people outside of the restaurants that are

00:35:56.440 requiring the vaccine passport in order to eat there. Those businesses are suffering because some

00:36:03.340 people don't, either they don't want the vaccine or they don't want to play a part in the tyranny that

00:36:08.300 they believe is represented by vaccine passports. And so they're all eating their dinner in front of

00:36:14.480 these French restaurants rather than going into them as these French restaurants are suffering

00:36:19.900 economically. And so here's a video of that happening.

00:36:23.400 Talk about winners and losers. Those are, those are winners. Again, I bet you some of those people,

00:36:37.960 I bet you a lot of those people are probably vaccinated, but it's possible to be for something

00:36:44.420 and be against the, the, um, that something being mandatory. And so I'm very proud of the

00:36:53.300 French, you know, this, I was just telling my team before this, that I've kind of got a Ron

00:36:57.560 Swanson view of Europe and Europeans and especially the French. I think a lot of Americans do, but way

00:37:04.040 to be united and to peacefully protest in a way that I think makes a really good statement. And people

00:37:10.660 were saying underneath this tweet that this could never happen in America because we couldn't unify

00:37:14.660 long enough to do this. Now, I do think that there's a lot of unity and parents and local

00:37:18.900 communities that are peacefully protesting, but we kind of, I mean, things are so divided and we're

00:37:24.460 so divided even on each side on small issues that it actually is very hard for people in America to

00:37:29.580 unite. Our foreign enemies love that by the way. Um, and it's, so it's hard for us to, I think,

00:37:35.000 unify and do a demonstration like this. Also, we've got a lot of crazy people, like both sides have a lot

00:37:40.160 of crazy people that end up ruining these kinds of peaceful demonstrations because they're going to roll

00:37:44.560 in with their, like, I don't know, crazy symbol and yell and things like that. And so it's hard for

00:37:50.460 this kind of thing to happen in America, but I'm playing that and watch this on YouTube. If you're

00:37:54.440 listening and you didn't get to see it, um, I am encouraging Americans to think of, uh, these kinds

00:38:01.300 of ways to do what we say on this podcast, raise a respectful ruckus, make a difference in that way.

00:38:08.900 It might not be immediately successful, but let's exercise our privileges and our rights that we have

00:38:15.380 to freedom of assembly, to freedom of speech, uh, freedom to petition the government while we still

00:38:22.360 can. We don't know how long these freedoms are, are going to last. If the 20th century tells us

00:38:26.640 everything, um, it does tell us a lot of things, maybe not everything, but if it tells us anything,

00:38:31.980 we know that like these freedoms, these rights aren't guaranteed forever. So let us exercise our right to

00:38:37.920 free speech while we can by respectfully, by peacefully raising our voice. It can make a

00:38:43.700 difference. I love the messages from you guys that say that you took information from this podcast and

00:38:48.780 you were able to persuade either one person or a group of people or people in power to change, um,

00:38:54.880 change a bad policy into a good one. I want to talk about a little bit of the fallacies that I see

00:39:01.000 going around that I've kind of alluded to them, um, already, but I saw this social media post going

00:39:07.200 around basically saying that your right to safety trumps people's right to liberty. And therefore

00:39:12.380 you shouldn't be speaking up about vaccine passports. You shouldn't be pushing back against,

00:39:17.080 um, any kind of mandate that I guess people in Australia and people in the United States

00:39:22.860 and people in France that are pushing back against this stuff, that they're doing the wrong thing

00:39:27.120 because they're prioritizing rights over people's lives. And I just think that that is a totally

00:39:31.780 erroneous way to think about this. For some reason, we've got this crazy idea going around

00:39:37.700 that the absolute guarantee of safety trumps people's liberty. And it just doesn't like there's

00:39:44.100 no such thing as the absolute guarantee of safety, nor is their constitutional right to not be offended

00:39:49.360 or to not catch a virus or to not be around someone who is armed with a gun. But there is a right to

00:39:54.800 free speech, even offensive speech, especially offensive speech. Like that's why the first amendment

00:39:59.540 exists, it doesn't exist for speech that no one wants to silence. There is a right to gather to

00:40:06.460 worship. There is a right to own a firearm. People also have a right to life, which is why murder and

00:40:12.000 manslaughter are punishable by law, but accidentally spreading a virus doesn't actually fall into either

00:40:17.580 of those categories. That doesn't mean that we don't sometimes give up some liberty for some

00:40:23.280 restrictions that we hope will encourage safety because we do, like seatbelts, speed limits,

00:40:28.380 security checkpoints, checkpoints in airports. But anytime we make these decisions, our policymakers

00:40:36.240 should be weighing the risks and the benefits and considering just how much freedom of particular

00:40:41.900 policy denies and if that denial is worth it. And this should be decided also with the opinions of

00:40:51.440 the constituents that they represent. I mean, that's why something like the Patriot Act, which was signed

00:40:56.500 into law by George W. Bush after 9-11, is so controversial because in the name of safety and

00:41:04.000 protection against terrorism, it has made surveillance of American citizens much easier and

00:41:09.300 more common. So on the one hand, we want to curb terrorism, yes. But on the other hand, you don't

00:41:14.100 want the government spying on civilians like we live in communist China. So policies like this have to

00:41:19.480 be carefully weighed and debated. And unfortunately, they're often not. Usually those in power opt to give

00:41:24.940 themselves more power. And one of the questions that should be asked is not just, is this good

00:41:31.000 policy, but also what power does this give the government or corporation or school board to do

00:41:37.800 in the future? What's the logical conclusion of this kind of authority? We have to be thinking

00:41:43.140 that we have to be thinking that way. Now, sometimes that's a slippery slope fallacy. Sometimes like power

00:41:49.600 has to be taken and put into the hands of the government to do certain things. It's kind of

00:41:55.140 what we talked about in the whole Kristi Nolom debate. But in general, asking about what authority

00:42:02.380 this gives the government and what will this allow them to do in the future, that in itself is not a

00:42:07.280 slippery slope fallacy. That's just understanding how bureaucracy works. That's understanding how power

00:42:11.940 works. Once given, it's not easily taken away or diminished. That's true of both Republicans and Democrats.

00:42:17.080 So we just have to be careful in all cases what power we give the government, especially,

00:42:22.480 I would say, not even, but especially in the name of safety. I find that leftism often thinks of its

00:42:29.760 preferences as rights and anything that violates those preferences as a violation of rights.

00:42:35.260 And I see the mentality, too, that everything they like should be mandatory. Everything that they

00:42:39.320 don't like should be banned, which leads them to this erroneous conclusion that if you're against

00:42:43.660 something being forced or banned, then you are against that thing. And that's not true.

00:42:47.280 So there's no room for discussion of liberty and choices, except strangely, when it comes to things

00:42:51.420 like abortion, which is actually literally killing a human being. I mean, I think some things should be

00:42:56.260 banned, too, namely murder. And yet on that, for the left side, there's nuance. But on things like

00:43:01.800 vaccines, there's no nuance. You should absolutely enforce someone to do something with their body because

00:43:08.160 it affects other people. But how do you not see that abortion directly affects someone else and

00:43:12.120 someone not getting a vaccine only maybe has the potential to affect someone else? And we take risks

00:43:17.880 every day that may or may not affect the safety of someone else. So this is all this to say, I'm not

00:43:25.320 even coming to some kind of like conclusive answer. All I'm saying is that there is a debate about this and

00:43:30.180 that you have a right to speak up about this. We do have a right to discuss these things. In every single

00:43:36.180 policy, when we are weighing safety versus liberty, there has to be a conversation about it. People just

00:43:41.100 trying to cudgel you and saying safety, safety, safety, and not caring about liberty at all.

00:43:45.760 Like I've said before, you want to see what it looks like to not have rights? Look at the 20th

00:43:51.300 century. Rights do matter. Liberty does matter. That is a way to love your neighbor. We are not

00:43:58.080 just vectors of viruses. We're not just physical bodies. Yes, of course, trying to protect as much

00:44:03.300 as you can. Other people from sickness may be important, but people's rights are important,

00:44:07.300 too. People's livelihoods are important, too. People's development and communication and

00:44:12.340 neurological development when they're children from seeing the expressions on people's faces

00:44:16.520 also matters. And other countries seem to be able in some ways to do this better than America

00:44:24.200 has, at least in some states. So that's just my encouragement to you to keep trying and keep

00:44:31.660 going and keep pushing. Quickly, we're about to end. I just want to play this quick clip of Joe

00:44:38.140 Rogan, because I think that this is what he says is so true. And he's not necessarily conservative.

00:44:45.240 He's certainly not a Christian. But this shows me that people that aren't necessarily on our side

00:44:51.720 of everything are also seeing how this is tyranny. And maybe this will motivate you to speak up about

00:44:56.260 some of these things that I really think matters. So here's here's a clip from his show.

00:45:00.900 Can't do what you want to do unless you do what I want you to do.

00:45:06.340 I mean, Don Lemon was talking about that openly on CNN. Yeah.

00:45:09.940 Don't have a vaccine. Can't go to a supermarket. Don't have a vaccine. Can't go to work.

00:45:15.080 Like, it's so strange that people want to say things like that. Like, that's the thing that blows

00:45:19.660 me away. Why do you why do people want to? Because they're dumb. They're dumb.

00:45:23.760 They don't understand history. They don't understand human beings. They don't understand

00:45:27.280 human nature. They don't understand the history of every single country that's ever existed

00:45:33.740 other than the United States. Up until 1776, every country that has ever existed was run

00:45:42.360 by dictators. Right.

00:45:43.800 All of them. This is the first one where you had elected officials. This is the first experiment

00:45:49.680 in self-government that actually worked. And it created the greatest superpower of the world's

00:45:53.740 ever known. It created the greatest cultural machine, the greatest machine of art and creativity

00:45:59.620 and innovation right here. And how did it do that? It did it through freedom. Because when you give

00:46:05.520 people freedom, you let people do whatever they want to do. They actually find ways to succeed

00:46:10.660 and grow and thrive. But as soon as you put the boots to them, as soon as you tell them you have

00:46:15.660 to do this or you can't do that. You have to listen to me. Now you have a mini dictator.

00:46:20.660 You have one step away from a king. You have one step closer. You're moving one step closer

00:46:26.800 to dictatorship. That's what the fuck is happening. That's what's going to happen with a vaccine

00:46:30.580 passport. That's what's going to happen if they close borders. You can't enter New York

00:46:35.180 City unless you have your papers. You can't go to here unless you have that. You can't get

00:46:38.900 on a plane unless you do what I say. And people say, whoa, it's all about protecting people

00:46:43.140 from the... No, it's not. It's not because we've shown this is a fact. Just a couple of

00:46:48.200 months ago, the idea of a breakthrough case was unheard of. Nobody heard of anybody catching

00:46:53.960 COVID that had a vaccine, right? That was the whole idea. You get a vaccine, you don't

00:46:57.720 have to worry about it. Now we know not only do you get it, but you can spread it. And some

00:47:02.760 people have died. Apparently, it's a small number. I don't know what the numbers are, but

00:47:08.140 I know that most people who get vaccinated, when they do have the disease, they have a

00:47:12.240 better time of it than the people who are unvaccinated. But where are the people out

00:47:16.440 there calling for people to get healthy? Where are the people out there calling for

00:47:19.460 people to lose weight? Okay. So he, I don't think, I'm sure, I bet he's vaccinated. I don't

00:47:25.500 think he's against vaccines at all. I think that he communicates a position that a lot of

00:47:31.700 us really feel that independent of your view of the vaccine, that when you start mandating

00:47:38.700 things and when you start limiting people's movement and their access to basic services,

00:47:43.320 you don't actually convince them of the efficacy and the safety of something. You do not convince

00:47:50.620 them that you are interested in their well-being. Actually, I think this makes people dig their

00:47:56.540 heels in even more. It's not an effective strategy. And he's right. It leads to a dictatorship

00:48:01.440 America and the freedom that it represents is absolutely worth standing up for. Like, if

00:48:07.520 you don't see how this creates the infrastructure for much worse things, then I need you, I need

00:48:15.380 you to do some, I need you to do some, some searching online about the gulags, the gulag

00:48:23.120 archipelago or about Mao's China or about communism in Cambodia. Like, I need you to read about some

00:48:31.200 totalitarianism that obviously didn't have the same things that we're talking about now, but some

00:48:36.280 of the same principles that we are seeing now. I don't necessarily think that's the intent of

00:48:41.840 everyone who is trying to mandate vaccines. I don't. Or trying to have vaccine passports. But I do

00:48:47.980 think it can absolutely be the impact and it's important that we think about that. And if someone

00:48:52.660 like Joe Rogan, who I don't think, I know a lot of people on the left think he's like alt-right or

00:48:56.840 something, but the guy is at the very least a liberal or a social liberal, if not a political

00:49:03.420 liberal in general. So if other people see that and it's not just this right-wing thing, then maybe

00:49:08.820 it's time for us who do espouse conservative values to stand up for the freedoms that matter.

00:49:16.220 That is a way, as I say, to love your neighbor. All right. That was a smorgasbord of things. I hope

00:49:22.900 that that rallies you. I hope that that was a little bit of a positive episode for you, even

00:49:28.360 as we're talking about very serious things. Next week, we've got a lot of good guests, a lot of

00:49:33.160 good episodes coming down the pipeline. Super excited about it. But for now, I hope you guys

00:49:37.420 have a great rest of your day and a great weekend. See you guys on Monday.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - August 26, 2021

Ep 478 ｜ Vaccine Passports, Mandates, and the French Resistance

Episode Stats

Length

Words per Minute

Word Count

Sentence Count

Misogynist Sentences

Hate Speech Sentences

Summary

Transcript