The Candice Malcolm Show - December 16, 2022


Fake News Friday ｜ Elon Musk triggers the Canadian left

Hosted by
Candice Malcolm
Guests
Sue Ann Levy
Mentioned
Elon Musk Jagmeet Singh Donald Trump Charlie Angus Brian Lilly Jack Layton Hanukkah Jordan Peterson Vladimir Putin Kurt Petrovich Brad Redekop George Soros Brad Wheeler Lisa Hefner Bill C-63 Switch Teslas Shonda Kona Evil
Fake News Friday ｜ Journalist compares her work to…performing surgery？？ Fake News Friday ｜ The Fake News Awards

Episode Stats


Length

21 minutes

Words per minute

166.97

Word count

3,601

Sentence count

277

Harmful content

Misogyny

3

sentences flagged

Toxicity

9

sentences flagged

Hate speech

2

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Sue Ann Levy and Andrew Lawton discuss the growing problem of anti-Semitism on social media and in politics, and how to deal with it. Plus, the RBC Avion Visa, a gift that keeps on giving for Fake News Friday.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 With the RBC Avion Visa, you can book any airline, any flight, any time.
00:00:06.000 So start ticking off your travel list.
00:00:09.000 Grand Canyon? Grand.
00:00:11.000 Great Barrier Reef? Great.
00:00:13.000 Galapagos? Galapago?
00:00:16.000 Switch and get up to 55,000 Avion points that never expire.
00:00:20.000 Your idea of never missing out happens here.
00:00:23.000 Conditions apply. Visit rbc.com slash avion.
00:00:30.000 Hello and welcome to you all.
00:00:41.000 This is another edition of Fake News Friday
00:00:44.000 as we try to find warmth and comfort and serenity in the midst of the blizzard of lies
00:00:49.000 that is coming at us in all directions, from all directions in this day and age.
00:00:55.000 And I assure you it has nothing to do with Elon Musk taking over Twitter.
00:00:58.000 I am Andrew Lawton, joined by Sue Ann Levy, who I believe is,
00:01:03.000 unless you are actually sitting on a beach right now, a purveyor of fake news with that background of yours.
00:01:09.000 It's very fake. I thought it was appropriate.
00:01:12.000 Fake news. Sue Ann, there you go with the fake news again. 0.95
00:01:16.000 You are sowing discord in our fragile society.
00:01:20.000 I hope I don't trigger a few people.
00:01:23.000 Actually, you're just making me jealous.
00:01:25.000 I would take a fake beach over where I am in Canada right now with the weather that's been coming down.
00:01:30.000 In any case, speaking of Elon Musk, this has been, I think, the gift that keeps on giving for Fake News Friday.
00:01:37.000 So Elon Musk, a few weeks back, takes over Twitter.
00:01:40.000 There's been this perpetual frenzy by a lot of people in media and in politics.
00:01:45.000 And yesterday, they spoke about on Daily Brief and this I spoke about on the Andrew Lawton Show.
00:01:50.000 Elon Musk responded to a tweet of mine and said that he didn't like how it sounded like some of these policies the government is putting forward here are muzzling the voice of Canadians,
00:02:03.000 which I think was a very astute and accurate analysis on this.
00:02:07.000 But it's been interesting just to see some of the backlash.
00:02:10.000 Like here was one was one tweet from Brad Redikop and he posted this video of Charlie Angus blaming Elon Musk for anti-Semitism.
00:02:22.000 Take a look.
00:02:23.000 Elon Musk's recent purchase of Twitter has shaken up Silicon Valley and the status quo in big tech quite a bit and perhaps breathed some fresh air into what was becoming a stale industry.
00:02:33.000 His commitment to free speech and his willingness to stand up to the powers that be show how big tech can directly influence elections or stay neutral as they should.
00:02:42.000 Of course, in Canada, this legislation has the potential to tip the scales towards the NDP Liberals during elections.
00:02:49.000 Big tech recognizes that and they don't want to be the tools of censorship in Canada or anywhere else.
00:02:54.000 How about Elon Musk? What a great breath of fresh air.
00:02:58.000 I mean, the guy's almost crashed one of the biggest platforms in the world in the space of two weeks.
00:03:04.000 But what's so fresh about Elon Musk?
00:03:06.000 Well, the rise of anti-Semitism.
00:03:08.000 Oh, well, geez, that's a breath of fresh air.
00:03:11.000 Vladimir Putin's troll armies against the people of Ukraine.
00:03:14.000 What a breath of fresh air for backbench conservatives.
00:03:17.000 And then, of course, Elon Musk wants to jail the United States most illustrious doctor for the work he did preventing the pandemic.
00:03:27.000 I bet conservatives just love that.
00:03:30.000 What a breath of fresh air.
00:03:31.000 If only we could go after medical science.
00:03:34.000 But then, on the other hand, we have the big bad CBC running everything.
00:03:38.000 You know, I thought it was George Soros.
00:03:41.000 I thought it was Klaus Schwabe.
00:03:43.000 Now, I should have thought, you know, when the leader of the Conservative Party said he was going to go after cryptocurrency,
00:03:48.000 replace the Bank of Canada and shut down the CBC.
00:03:51.000 I didn't know it was because of their conspiracy to control everything.
00:03:55.000 The Honourable Member for Saskatoon West.
00:03:58.000 This reminds me of a very simple thing.
00:04:01.000 Dad jokes.
00:04:03.000 You hear a dad joke, one person likes it, the next person doesn't even find it funny.
00:04:07.000 Which is my point here, that we cannot allow one person or one group of people to control what we see on the internet.
00:04:14.000 We have to allow a broad cross-section.
00:04:16.000 Some people will like one thing, some people will like another.
00:04:19.000 Some things might be true, some things might not.
00:04:21.000 But as soon as we try to arbitrate those things, we're going to get ourselves into trouble. Thank you.
00:04:25.000 Now, I know you, Sue Ann, are very well aware of anti-Semitism.
00:04:29.000 I'm a Gentile.
00:04:30.000 You're a Jewish woman. 0.99
00:04:31.000 You've seen this firsthand.
00:04:33.000 This didn't start when Elon Musk took over Twitter.
00:04:36.000 I don't think we can lay anti-Semitism at his feet, can we?
00:04:39.000 Absolutely not.
00:04:40.000 You know, it's funny because anti-Semitism, you know, the left would like to portray it as coming from the far right neo-Nazis.
00:04:50.000 You know, that has waned and it's increased, certainly in Europe.
00:04:57.000 But the bulk of anti-Semitism currently is coming from the far left.
00:05:03.000 So what I see on Twitter are people who are, for example, proponents of critical race theory and things like that.
00:05:12.000 Anti-Semitism is coming from the radical fringe left.
00:05:16.000 And Elon Musk certainly isn't that.
00:05:19.000 So you can call him a lot of things, but not that.
00:05:22.000 No, and that's the thing.
00:05:23.000 And I've never liked when people cheapen what are very serious concepts, whether it's racism or anti-Semitism.
00:05:29.000 And they do exactly that when they try to just like shove these things into whatever political point they're trying to make here.
00:05:36.000 So Charlie Angus doesn't like Elon Musk.
00:05:38.000 OK, that's fine.
00:05:39.000 I don't really care.
00:05:40.000 He can debate that as much as he wants.
00:05:42.000 But then to just say we have to just shove an anti-Semitism narrative into this is I find very disingenuous.
00:05:48.000 Well, the word anti-Semitism, the word racist, the word Islamophobic, bigot, bigotry.
00:05:56.000 I mean, those words are so overused these days.
00:05:59.000 And I don't know how many times you've been called a racist or a bigot. 0.70
00:06:03.000 But I find it hard to believe that a Jewish lesbian, although the, you know, the far left people who are going absolutely berserk, I think, on Twitter, would call me racist or call me a bigot. 0.95
00:06:17.000 Oh, come on. 0.87
00:06:18.000 You know, I fit into a couple of oppressed groups.
00:06:23.000 I'm also a woman.
00:06:24.000 Yeah.
00:06:25.000 You're the one.
00:06:26.000 You're the one that we need.
00:06:27.000 You're the victim of the bigotry in that sense.
00:06:29.000 Yes.
00:06:30.000 So, I mean, it's just crazy the way and it's become so tiresome.
00:06:34.000 I don't know if you find that, Andrew, but I find it really tiresome when I'm these labels are thrown at me.
00:06:40.000 They mean nothing.
00:06:41.000 They cheapen it, as you said.
00:06:42.000 Yeah, very much so.
00:06:43.000 And, I mean, some of the reaction to Elon Musk as well, it's just not even clever.
00:06:50.000 It's not witty.
00:06:51.000 It's not intelligent.
00:06:53.000 In 22 minutes, which is this bizarre attempt at Canadian comedy, has tweeted out a couple of Elon Musk observations.
00:07:01.000 One of them, Elon Musk has dissolved Twitter's trust and safety council.
00:07:06.000 He's hoping this will make things safer and restore trust in Twitter.
00:07:10.000 So, a bit of a poor attempt at wordplay there.
00:07:12.000 Another one, Elon Musk has revealed that you can now play video games off the screen in your Tesla,
00:07:17.000 which is a great way to keep your mind off your car driving itself into a gorge.
00:07:22.000 Okay.
00:07:23.000 A little bit more pointed than the trust and safety one, but still nothing I would say is comedy here.
00:07:29.000 And I'm wondering if everyone is just going to tire themselves out on this or if Elon Musk is just the new Donald Trump in the sense that he lives rent-free in all of his critics' brains.
00:07:38.000 Well, he seems to be.
00:07:40.000 And there are those who have left Twitter and then come back.
00:07:43.000 And, you know, it's actually quite funny there.
00:07:48.000 And Donald Trump, of course, he announced his reelection and he's not getting the airtime that Elon Musk is.
00:07:56.000 Look, the guy is very, very successful.
00:07:59.000 I see more and more Teslas on the street.
00:08:02.000 I'm not going to buy an electric vehicle at this point, but he's done very well.
00:08:06.000 He has a very successful model.
00:08:09.000 And he bought Twitter.
00:08:10.000 And I think that he's let some people back on Twitter, for example, Jordan Peterson, and he's let, you know, Donald Trump back on Twitter.
00:08:18.000 And I think that's a good thing.
00:08:20.000 Free speech.
00:08:21.000 And from what I've read and heard and seen of the people who ran Twitter beforehand, I mean, it was, as we say in Yiddish Shonda, it was disgraceful how they behaved and how they canceled people that they didn't agree with.
00:08:37.000 And it's sort of indicative of society today, isn't it?
00:08:41.000 But, you know, I find it very refreshing that he's back.
00:08:45.000 And let the people's leftist heads explode.
00:08:48.000 I really don't care.
00:08:49.000 I think, by the way, I learn a new Yiddish word every time I co-host this show with you, Sue Ann, so thank you for that.
00:08:56.000 Yeah, a couple of the reactions here.
00:08:59.000 Kurt Petrovich, who I had never heard of, but apparently he works for CBC, has said he bought an electric nearly three years ago and had test-driven a Tesla.
00:09:09.000 But Musk then was already known as a COVID-denying, union-busting, narcissistic, ego-driven, fabulist.
00:09:15.000 So he bought a Hyundai Kona electric vehicle instead, saved money, great service, and nearly 500-kilometer range.
00:09:22.000 Brad Wheeler, who is with the Globe and Mail, he tweeted out that Elon Musk is effectively like Dr. Evil.
00:09:30.000 So Elon Musk, just because he was tweeting about how the Branch Covidians were getting under his nerves, he's now the sinister cat-petting villain in the Austin Powers movies.
00:09:44.000 So, you know, maybe they'll tire themselves out and, you know, we can have a reset in New Year on this, but I'm not optimistic of that happening.
00:09:52.000 Well, and all I would say to these people who are tweeting, leave Twitter if you don't like it.
00:09:57.000 Number one, nobody's forcing you, you know, pulling your arm to be part of it, pulling your laptop fingers.
00:10:04.000 And the guy is, you got to respect him.
00:10:07.000 He's a really successful entrepreneur.
00:10:09.000 And I just laugh at some of these people. 0.99
00:10:13.000 I mean, they obviously have, well, I don't want to say no life, but my goodness, to get yourself all bent out of shit. 0.99
00:10:21.000 All bent out of shape over Elon Musk. 0.98
00:10:24.000 Surely, to goodness, this time of year, there are better things to do.
00:10:27.000 Like, you know, putting up a Christmas tree, whatever.
00:10:31.000 Yeah, exactly.
00:10:32.000 It's like this time of year, the last thing I want to do is start getting into Twitter fights about billionaires whose lives are very different than my own, but to each their own, I guess.
00:10:42.000 And, you know, if that's what gives them joy in the holiday season, who am I to rob them of that?
00:10:47.000 Let's talk about a little bit of a news development this week.
00:10:50.000 If the House of Commons passed Bill C-18, which is the bill that if it goes through the Senate and gets royal assent and all that, will force social media companies to subsidize news companies in Canada.
00:11:03.000 So it'll force social media companies to pay news companies for the privilege of letting news companies post their content to promote it on social media.
00:11:15.000 It's a very bizarre, convoluted bill.
00:11:17.000 I talked about it on my show yesterday.
00:11:18.000 It's basically trying to get the government to offload subsidizing journalists to tech companies instead of using taxpayer money.
00:11:26.000 But what was interesting is a Liberal MP tweeted a thread about how proud she was of this bill passing.
00:11:34.000 And she completely, it seemed like, doesn't understand what her bill is.
00:11:39.000 So this is from Lisa Hefner, who's an Ontario Liberal Member of Parliament.
00:11:43.000 She says, as a former journalist, I've always understood and appreciated the importance of local community news.
00:11:49.000 I've consistently been a champion of journalism, which is why I'm so pleased to have worked on a piece of legislation that will ensure more revenue for news outlets, more transparency and the protection of independent of journalistic independence.
00:12:02.000 She goes on and says, our government will always support quality fact-based Canadian journalism in a fair digital marketplace.
00:12:12.000 This bill makes it harder for big digital platforms like Facebook and Google to steal local journalist articles and repost them without credit on one of their networks.
00:12:24.000 Nowhere has the government even talked about this being a bill to prevent the theft of content, which is already covered by copyright laws.
00:12:34.000 This is about content that news outlets are voluntarily posting on Facebook and Twitter because they want people to see it.
00:12:42.000 So they're using social media to promote it.
00:12:44.000 This is now theft?
00:12:46.000 It's bizarre.
00:12:47.000 I mean, but is this the first time that an MP has not understood a bill, a piece of legislation, a budget?
00:12:55.000 That's true.
00:12:56.000 And a former journalist, no doubt.
00:12:57.000 I don't think, you know, the industry is happy or sad to have lost her.
00:13:01.000 But, you know, she's got everything reversed in our upside-down world.
00:13:08.000 Okay, so it's going to protect the independence of journalism?
00:13:12.000 Give me a break.
00:13:13.000 Journalism, I mean, once the mainstream media started being bailed out and started getting grants and bailouts and monies, they lost all their independence.
00:13:24.000 I mean, that's the value of independent journalism like True North.
00:13:28.000 I mean, we're not getting government bailouts.
00:13:31.000 I mean, we've seen it in real time.
00:13:34.000 And transparency?
00:13:36.000 Please.
00:13:37.000 I've never seen an era so lacking in transparency as currently in Canada.
00:13:44.000 And at all levels of government.
00:13:46.000 And journalistic independence?
00:13:48.000 Well, I already referred to that.
00:13:51.000 So, you know, we use these digital platforms, you do, I do, extensively to promote.
00:13:58.000 Because we're a digital platform, we use social media to promote.
00:14:02.000 That's where we promote our, you know, our reports.
00:14:06.000 So, I don't know what this woman is talking about. 0.99
00:14:09.000 And as you said, thank goodness she's out of the journalism field.
00:14:12.000 Yeah, although we're stuck with her as the seat of government instead. 1.00
00:14:16.000 But, you know, it's weird to me because what's happening is government is, well, journalists are.
00:14:23.000 Let's go back to this.
00:14:24.000 Journalists have this inflated sense of self-importance, as you and I both know.
00:14:28.000 And the media industry thinks it's a lot more relevant than it is to a lot of Canadians.
00:14:34.000 And anytime these fights have come up between the media companies and the tech companies, the tech companies have said, listen, like, sharing news is 5-10% of the content on our platform.
00:14:46.000 It's all cat gifs and memes and all of that that people care more about than they care about journalism.
00:14:51.000 Which is why Facebook played hardball when Australia was trying to do something like this and said, fine, we're just going to ban links to Australia news stories.
00:14:59.000 And they did this in a bit of brinksmanship.
00:15:02.000 And I actually, not that I'm a big fan of Facebook and Google and all these companies, but I hope they continue to push back against this.
00:15:09.000 Because if news outlets want to use social media platforms to promote their work, that is a service that they are voluntarily engaging in and getting a benefit from.
00:15:20.000 It's not something they can then turn around and extort these social media companies over.
00:15:25.000 And I can give you an unscientific experiment.
00:15:29.000 When I post my stories, as brilliant as they are or your stories or whatever, I get far less clicks on Facebook than when I post a picture of Frida playing my new little puppy or playing with Mr. Mom, Monty.
00:15:45.000 People, this is what people follow Facebook for.
00:15:48.000 Twitter's a little different, but my goodness, you're right about journalists having this inflated view.
00:15:54.000 And I am, you know, very, very self-deprecating it.
00:15:59.000 I realize that my story is not nearly as important as my little puppy on Facebook at least.
00:16:04.000 Brian Lilly does that as well.
00:16:06.000 He started using his work page to share pictures of his dog and pictures of the various types of scotch he's drinking.
00:16:13.000 And I'm like, wow, why is Brian not doing any journalism?
00:16:15.000 And then I go to his page and I realize, no, he's sharing all his work as well.
00:16:18.000 But the Facebook algorithm is promoting the dog pictures and the scotch pictures more than it's promoting the journalism.
00:16:25.000 Exactly. And that's what people and you know what? It speaks to what I just said before.
00:16:30.000 Our colleagues take themselves far too seriously.
00:16:35.000 And certainly, instead of tweeting about Elon Musk this time of year, he probably has a gazillion dollars to spend on Christmas presents.
00:16:43.000 Enjoy the season. My goodness.
00:16:46.000 Well, we always try to end things on a bit of a lighter note here.
00:16:50.000 And sometimes I think a video is worth, I mean, a picture is worth a thousand words.
00:16:54.000 A video is worth a thousand pictures.
00:16:56.000 Here is Jagmeet Singh, the leader of the NDP in the House of Commons this week.
00:17:01.000 Remember for Burnaby South.
00:17:03.000 When I'm Prime Minister, I will keep my promises.
00:17:07.000 Now, another promise. Let me try again.
00:17:12.000 You know, I criticize the 22 Minutes Twitter account for not knowing real comedy.
00:17:28.000 That was real comedy. Jagmeet Singh starting a sentence with when I'm Prime Minister.
00:17:33.000 If CBC could produce that level of comedy, we'd be in a great position as a country.
00:17:38.000 Exactly. He'll be Prime Minister when the world is flat.
00:17:42.000 He'll be Prime Minister when the media gets over itself.
00:17:46.000 That's about as likely as that is.
00:17:48.000 I love that now, like, the pretense is gone.
00:17:50.000 Everyone in the House of Commons just bursts into this, like, uproar when he says this.
00:17:54.000 Because they all know just how absurd it is.
00:17:56.000 Well, you know, and again, it speaks to the disconnectedness of politicians like him and a good number of the members of the NDP caucus.
00:18:07.000 They actually think they are going to govern one day.
00:18:10.000 Please.
00:18:11.000 He has none of the charm and charisma of Jack Layton.
00:18:14.000 I was not a fan of Jack Layton when he was at City Hall.
00:18:18.000 But at least he had charisma and at least he knew how to bring people together and make a statement. 0.99
00:18:23.000 This guy has been absolutely useless. 0.97
00:18:26.000 He is, you know, he wears nice suits. 1.00
00:18:30.000 I like his different color turbans, but he's been useless. 0.98
00:18:34.000 Yeah. And it was an odd sort of like you and I, I think, have talked about this in the past.
00:18:38.000 I certainly have on my show as well that he's given away everything for nothing when it comes to this non coalition coalition agreement,
00:18:46.000 the supply and confidence agreement he has with the liberals, where he jumps up and down all the time and talks about how terrible the liberals are.
00:18:52.000 And but he doesn't say the quiet part out loud, which is that he's the one keeping the liberals in power right now.
00:18:58.000 And he could actually cause the government to topple at any moment if he wanted to.
00:19:02.000 Yeah, that's the great irony.
00:19:04.000 And yes, exactly.
00:19:06.000 So you can't kvetch.
00:19:07.000 I'm giving you another Yiddish word.
00:19:08.000 You can't come.
00:19:09.000 No, kvetch. I knew that was like that was like three lessons ago.
00:19:12.000 OK, excuse me.
00:19:14.000 But you can't kvetch and about how the liberals are doing it for you.
00:19:20.000 You haven't really made that many demands.
00:19:22.000 You just sort of make these token press conferences and then continue to prop them up.
00:19:27.000 So what are you getting from this sort of arranged marriage?
00:19:30.000 What are you actually getting?
00:19:32.000 I have no idea.
00:19:34.000 It's so bizarre.
00:19:36.000 Well, you know what?
00:19:37.000 Like I said earlier, at the very least, that was a nice bit of levity.
00:19:40.000 I think Jagmeet Singh should start all speeches with, you know, with that boilerplate when I'm prime minister.
00:19:46.000 It's a lot funnier than anything else we get from politics.
00:19:50.000 And it's less insufferable than the never ending land acknowledgements that are done in such a disingenuous way.
00:19:56.000 So that's how all NDP speeches should start.
00:19:58.000 When I'm prime minister, then we can all have a laugh and forget that they exist.
00:20:02.000 It was a simpler time when that was the case.
00:20:04.000 Sue Ann Levy, I hope you are enjoying the beach, even if it is fake.
00:20:09.000 We can all just live in that fantasy there.
00:20:11.000 It's so hot here.
00:20:12.000 It's just so hot.
00:20:13.000 Is it a humid fake beach or is it a non-humid fake beach?
00:20:17.000 It's a fake.
00:20:19.000 It's a real beach, but it's, you know, it's a fake.
00:20:23.000 I'm not really sitting on a beach, of course, because you would be hearing the roar of the waves.
00:20:29.000 But anyway, it's making me feel hot.
00:20:32.000 OK, well, instead, I have like a tree and freezing rain coming out outside so I can live in the fantasy as well as you can.
00:20:39.000 We will be back next week with a very special fake news Friday that you won't want to miss.
00:20:44.000 Sue Ann Levy, thank you so much as always.
00:20:46.000 Have a great weekend and happy Hanukkah as well.
00:20:49.000 I know that's coming up.
00:20:50.000 Hanukkah starts on Sunday and I'm going out to get my Hanukkah bush right now.
00:20:57.000 All right.
00:20:58.000 Well, safe, safe travels and happy shopping and we will talk to you all next week.
00:21:09.000 Thank you.