The Charlie Kirk Show - September 28, 2020


Ask Charlie Anything 36: Netflix’s Social Dilemma, SCOTUS Term Limits? Is the Executive Branch Too Powerful? Does Democracy Move Too Slowly? And So Much More…


Episode Stats


Length

47 minutes

Words per minute

172.25807

Word count

8,099

Sentence count

585


Summary

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

Transcript

Transcripts from "The Charlie Kirk Show" are sourced from the Knowledge Fight Interactive Search Tool. Explore them interactively here.
00:00:00.000 Thank you for listening to this podcast one production.
00:00:02.000 Now available on Apple Podcasts, Podcast One, Spotify, and anywhere else you get your podcasts.
00:00:08.000 Hey, everybody, it's Monday, so I take your questions.
00:00:11.000 We dive into the Democrats' court packing scheme, Amy Coney Barrett, the political implications, and I give you my feedback on the film on Netflix social dilemma.
00:00:21.000 Is social media hurting our kids?
00:00:23.000 What should we do about the tech companies?
00:00:25.000 And also, interestingly, how are we supposed to analyze the quasi-addictive qualities of Instagram, Facebook, Google, and more?
00:00:33.000 We get into that, the questions that you emailed me, freedom at charliekirk.com.
00:00:37.000 And if I selected your question, you get a signed copy of the MAGA doctrine.
00:00:41.000 You guys can email us all throughout the week.
00:00:43.000 We review the questions and we select a couple every week when we do our ask me anything.
00:00:49.000 If you guys want to get involved with Turning Point USA, go to tpusa.com.
00:00:53.000 If you want an Amy Coney Barrett shirt, ACB, Justice League, tpusa.com slash shop, tpusa.com slash shop.
00:01:02.000 Email us your questions, freedom at charliekirk.com.
00:01:04.000 Please consider supporting us at charliekirk.com slash support, charliekirk.com slash support.
00:01:10.000 And we're actually going to give away a couple Amy Coney Barrett shirts.
00:01:13.000 I'm going to give away 15 Amy Coney Barrett shirts for 15 people that can show us that you're subscribed to our podcast.
00:01:20.000 Type in Charlie Kirk, show to your podcast provider, hit subscribe, give us a five-star review, write a nice thing and email it to us, and then we'll send you an ACB shirt.
00:01:29.000 I take your questions.
00:01:30.000 It's Monday.
00:01:31.000 Time to win.
00:01:33.000 Buckle up, everybody.
00:01:34.000 Here we go.
00:01:36.000 Charlie, what you've done is incredible here.
00:01:37.000 Maybe Charlie Kirk is on the college campus.
00:01:39.000 I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk.
00:01:43.000 Charlie Kirk's running the White House, folks.
00:01:46.000 I want to thank Charlie.
00:01:47.000 He's an incredible guy.
00:01:48.000 His spirit, his love of this country, he's done an amazing job building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created, Turning Point USA.
00:01:57.000 We will not embrace the ideas that have destroyed countries, destroyed lives, and we are going to fight for freedom on campuses across the country.
00:02:05.000 That's why we are here.
00:02:08.000 Happy Monday, everybody.
00:02:09.000 As you know, on Mondays, I take your questions, ask me anything.
00:02:13.000 And you guys emailed me, freedom at charliekirk.com.
00:02:16.000 Freedom at CharlieKirk.com.
00:02:18.000 And if I select your question, you know how it works.
00:02:21.000 You guys get a signed copy of the New York Times bestseller, The MAGA Doctrine.
00:02:27.000 So let's take some questions here.
00:02:29.000 I love hearing from you guys.
00:02:30.000 You guys can always send me notes and thoughts and news clippings and more.
00:02:36.000 Let's get to this question right here from Danica.
00:02:39.000 Hi, Danica.
00:02:40.000 You win a signed copy of the MAGA doctrine.
00:02:41.000 Hello, Charlie.
00:02:42.000 I listen to your show every day and I'm a huge fan.
00:02:44.000 Thank you.
00:02:45.000 I'm learning a lot from you.
00:02:46.000 If I'm understanding you, it seems to me at this point in history, the Supreme Court is even more important than the presidency.
00:02:53.000 So here's my question.
00:02:54.000 How likely is it the Democrats will succeed in pushing through this bill to place term limits on justices?
00:03:01.000 Or will it be successful in packing the court, adding states to the union, et cetera?
00:03:06.000 Thanks so much.
00:03:07.000 God bless Danica.
00:03:08.000 This ties into another question that we got where someone was confused about the idea of packing the courts.
00:03:14.000 So first and foremost, in the United States Constitution, it, of course, establishes the legislative and the executive and the judicial branch.
00:03:23.000 Each one of those branches are there for a very specific reason and to have checks and balances against the other branch.
00:03:30.000 This is an idea that was first written by Montesquieu and before that by Cicero.
00:03:34.000 We take this idea of checks and balances for granted in our country.
00:03:38.000 And it is very easy to do so when you live under a system that has checks and balances.
00:03:43.000 The Founding Fathers guiding belief was that man was flawed by nature.
00:03:47.000 You can't really trust human beings too much.
00:03:49.000 Therefore, you must have a system to be able to make sure that the worst impulses of human behavior do not go unchecked, that there must be security mechanisms for human beings.
00:04:00.000 And as Lord Acton used to say, absolute power corrupts absolutely.
00:04:05.000 And so I don't know if I necessarily agree, Danica, that the Supreme Court is more important than the presidency.
00:04:13.000 However, I think at this period of time, an argument could be made that a majority on the Supreme Court for the coming years can be an insurance policy against Joe Biden possibly becoming president.
00:04:24.000 We built that out in our previous Ask Me Anything episode.
00:04:27.000 However, in the United States Constitution, it says clearly what congressional representation looks like, what presidential representation looks like.
00:04:36.000 It does not say clearly what Supreme Court representation looks like.
00:04:41.000 Nowhere in the United States Constitution does it say how many U.S. Supreme Court justices should there be.
00:04:50.000 It does say how many senators each state should have.
00:04:53.000 It does say how House of Representatives members should be selected.
00:04:56.000 And eventually it did come to say how long a president can serve.
00:05:01.000 But the number of justices is something that started small, eventually grew to nine.
00:05:07.000 Franklin Delano Roosevelt tried to pack the courts back in the 1930s and was unsuccessful in trying to do so.
00:05:14.000 And that number nine kind of stayed as the standard.
00:05:19.000 Now, I want to play tape from Ken Starr.
00:05:21.000 Ken Starr is on our honorary board here at Turning Point USA.
00:05:25.000 He made a phenomenal point.
00:05:26.000 Now, Ken Starr kind of rose to fame when he was the Bob Mueller of the Clinton era.
00:05:33.000 He was the special prosecutor against Bill Clinton's shady real estate dealings and eventually, let's say, unearthed Bill Clinton's adultery in the White House with intern Monica Lewinsky.
00:05:48.000 Ken Starr has argued cases before the U.S. Supreme Court.
00:05:51.000 Ken Starr himself was a federal judge.
00:05:54.000 Ken Starr was the president of Baylor University.
00:05:56.000 Ken Starr was also a lawyer for President Trump, very reputable guy.
00:06:00.000 And so he was on Fox News and he made a really good point.
00:06:03.000 Why nine justices in practices has worked and that should continue to be the case.
00:06:07.000 Play tape.
00:06:08.000 Okay, I'm looking at the Reuters wire right crossing right now from the White House.
00:06:13.000 The president apparently said a moment ago he thinks the election will end up at the Supreme Court.
00:06:19.000 And that's why it's important, he says, to have nine justices.
00:06:23.000 Your reaction on that?
00:06:25.000 I completely agree with the president.
00:06:28.000 And I also agree completely with Justice Sotomayor, who agrees with the president.
00:06:33.000 She said back in 2016 when there was a vacancy that, and I'm paraphrasing Bill, we don't do well as a court.
00:06:40.000 And she was talking, of course, as a general matter, a four to four court, an equally divided court, is a recipe for mischief.
00:06:49.000 The court needs to be at full strength all of the time, but especially with perhaps a serious election contest coming up.
00:06:56.000 Well, two more quick ones then, Ken.
00:06:59.000 He went on to say that the judiciary chair, Senator Graham, would not even have to hold a hearing for the nominee, says the process will go quickly.
00:07:07.000 React on that, and do you believe Senator Dianne Feinstein, the age of 87, will chair this committee, the hearings for the Democratic side?
00:07:16.000 Yes or no?
00:07:17.000 I don't know about Senator Feinstein.
00:07:19.000 I appreciated, by the way, her comment that she was not in favor of packing the court in terms of the filibuster and so forth.
00:07:28.000 But no, there has to be a hearing with all due respect to the president.
00:07:31.000 This is too important for there not to be a confirmation hearing where all of the senators get to ask questions and then the nation gets to assess the nominee.
00:07:41.000 Thank you, Ken.
00:07:42.000 Ken Starr juggling a couple stories right now.
00:07:44.000 Appreciate you coming on.
00:07:46.000 As you heard there, Ken Starr made the argument that nine was enough to be able to have differences of opinion, but it wasn't too much where all of a sudden people couldn't sit around a table and deliberate.
00:07:57.000 Ken Starr made a very good point that I had not heard previously, that being able to sit around a table and have a discussion with nine people, it's just a pretty good number.
00:08:08.000 Where if you get to 11 or 13, when you sit around a table, all of a sudden you kind of have factions and people break into different beliefs at that point.
00:08:16.000 And so what packing the courts means, we got a separate question about this that wasn't completely related, Danica, to your question, where someone said, what does packing the courts even mean?
00:08:25.000 It would mean that whomever then controls the United States Senate and the houses of Congress, they would vote to expand the number of Supreme Court justices from 9 to 11 to 13 or 15.
00:08:38.000 Basically, the Democrat approach is: if you do not give us what we want, we will change the rules of engagement.
00:08:46.000 We will pack the courts and we will make it increasingly difficult for you to be able to ever get back to a position of power.
00:08:54.000 Now, that's not a good reason not to confirm President Trump's nominee to the Supreme Court.
00:09:00.000 In fact, that's a really bad reason to reward that kind of quasi-extortionist behavior from the Democrats as they are plainly threatening the fabric of the Constitution if they do not get what they want.
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00:10:46.000 Congress, in a lot of different ways, has abdicated its responsibilities to the executive branch, and therefore it has made the Supreme Court more important.
00:10:57.000 I think the executive Executive branch actually has too much power.
00:11:01.000 There are over 140 agencies that work in some form of a quasi-lawmaking capacity where they almost make their own rules and their own regulations outside of the acts of Congress.
00:11:15.000 Because of this, you need an independent arbiter to decide whether or not the EPA, which is the Environmental Protection Agency, or as I call it, the Employment Prevention Agency, as to whether or not the water acts that they're putting forward are constitutional,
00:11:31.000 or the Federal Trade Commission, or the FDIC, all of these different sub-agencies within our government have been given more and more power because Congress has been at an impasse or Congress has been serving the interests of the rich, the wealthy, the few, the elites, and the lobbyists.
00:11:50.000 A lot of the power has concentrated within the executive.
00:11:54.000 Therefore, the Supreme Court has only been elevated in its importance of adjudicating these differences.
00:12:01.000 A great example is DACA.
00:12:03.000 Congress was not able to come to any form of deal with DACA.
00:12:06.000 I think that was probably a good thing generally.
00:12:09.000 I don't think a deal for DACA should be established.
00:12:12.000 I think that if people come into our country illegally, they should leave.
00:12:15.000 I don't think it's that controversial of an opinion to say that.
00:12:18.000 However, the fact of the matter is that Congress could not come to a conclusive opinion or decision, I should say, on how to move forward legislatively.
00:12:30.000 So Barack Obama moved forward with DACA, and then that puts the Supreme Court in primary focus to figure out whether or not that order by the Obama administration was constitutional or not.
00:12:44.000 And so, Danica, you make a great point that the Supreme Court actually plays a bigger role because Congress has not done their job to oversee the actions of the executive branch with their unconstitutional executive power from these federal agencies.
00:13:00.000 By the way, President Trump has actually deregulated a lot of that authority.
00:13:04.000 President Trump has relaxed a lot of the rulemaking flexibility of the executive branch, which I think is one of his least talked about accomplishments in the time that he has been president.
00:13:19.000 And so we have to understand that the construction of our Constitution, the executive, the legislative, and the judicial branch, they all have checks and balances against each other.
00:13:32.000 For example, if a Supreme Court justice acts incorrectly, that Supreme Court justice can be impeached by the United States Senate.
00:13:40.000 If a president acts incorrectly, they can be impeached by the United States Senate.
00:13:45.000 If the Senate or the House passes a bill that is unconstitutional, the Supreme Court can strike down that bill.
00:13:52.000 The architect of the United States Constitution, Madison, argued in many different Federalist papers, which I encourage all of you to check out the Federalist papers.
00:14:03.000 You guys can do that at thinker.org, thinker.org slash Charlie.
00:14:06.000 I encourage you guys to check it out.
00:14:08.000 He argued that we must have a system that is deliberative in nature, that tries to prevent the worst instincts of human nature from being able to abuse power.
00:14:24.000 In the 63rd Federalist, Madison argues that the United States Constitution was the first purely representative body in human history.
00:14:36.000 Now, what did he mean by that?
00:14:38.000 See, when they lived under British rule, the sovereign was King George.
00:14:45.000 The sovereign prior to the creation of the United States of America and the United States Constitution was never the people.
00:14:52.000 But the sovereign, according to the United States Constitution, is the constitutional majority.
00:15:00.000 Madison also argued in the Federalist Papers that we must have a longer process to try to effectuate change.
00:15:13.000 Madison in Federalist 49 argued that there must be a premium on deeply held opinions for a long time.
00:15:21.000 So if you actually play this out, in order for your particular opinion to really be enacted, it takes six years of advocacy and successful elections.
00:15:33.000 You have to win the House, you have to win the presidency, and you have to win back the Senate over a period of six times without a reaction or response from the opposing opinion.
00:15:43.000 This is how civil rights legislation was passed in the 1960s.
00:15:48.000 And I'm going to be very clear.
00:15:50.000 We are not a democracy.
00:15:52.000 We are a republic.
00:15:54.000 We are a representative country.
00:15:57.000 We do have a Democrat means of electing leaders.
00:16:00.000 But a democracy would mean that your God-given rights could be put on referendum by the will of the majority next election.
00:16:07.000 That is not the way this works in our country.
00:16:10.000 Instead, we have the courts that interpret the law under a prism of natural God-given rights that can strike down unconstitutional measures even from 51 plus percent of the voters.
00:16:25.000 And now, some people say the critics of our system say that this moves too slow, that it's wrong, it's too deliberative.
00:16:34.000 Madison thought that was an attribute of our system, and I completely agree.
00:16:39.000 For people that want immediate change, for people that want things to happen instantaneously, we want Medicare for all right now.
00:16:46.000 They get frustrated that our system has so many checks and balances to be able to have that long march of the institutions, almost a Hegelian way to go about effectuating change in the Western world.
00:17:00.000 I think the Founding Fathers were brilliant.
00:17:03.000 They were ahead of their time, and Madison agreed that this was not a weakness in the system.
00:17:13.000 Instead, it was a strength of the system.
00:17:16.000 And he talks about this in Federalist 49 and the 63rd Federalist.
00:17:20.000 The question also goes: how do we elect our leaders?
00:17:25.000 You see, if we just elected our leaders through the will of the majority, and we are going to do an in-depth episode on the Electoral College, so I'm just going to tease that right here, right now, that's coming up in the next couple weeks.
00:17:40.000 It's very important that all of you understand the Electoral College, how to defend the Electoral College, the need for the Electoral College, the moral case for the Electoral College, the utilitarian case for the Electoral College.
00:17:53.000 If we just had straight-up democracy, you would not have a representative government.
00:17:58.000 Remember, the states created the federal government.
00:18:00.000 The federal government did not create the states.
00:18:03.000 I think we need to give actually more power back to the states.
00:18:08.000 We, the people, have the power through our representatives.
00:18:12.000 And if our representatives do not do our job, they should be recalled and they should be held accountable.
00:18:20.000 So going to this question that you have, Danica, do I think the Democrats will be successful in packing the court, adding states to the Union?
00:18:28.000 Probably not.
00:18:30.000 Our system does not allow for a quick, radical insertion of new ideas just because one side gets too angry.
00:18:41.000 It doesn't.
00:18:42.000 It takes long, drawn out, thoughtful, convincing, persuasive political movements to be able to have this kind of massive change, such as packing the court or adding states to the union.
00:18:55.000 Even Franklin Delano Roosevelt, with the mandate that he had, was unable to pack the courts.
00:19:01.000 Even FDR was unable to add justices to the Supreme Court.
00:19:05.000 It is unlikely, in fact, it is almost inconceivable that Joe Biden and Senate Democrats will have that sort of political power behind them.
00:19:14.000 Remember, Madison said it takes six years of persuasive activism.
00:19:20.000 And he argued: if you have a very good contribution that you want to bring to the American system and you can persuade people for six years, then you deserve that contribution.
00:19:33.000 For example, women's suffrage, Civil Rights Act.
00:19:37.000 It took many years of activism and of deliberation, and they won.
00:19:43.000 It was a good thing.
00:19:44.000 By the way, those were Republican-led efforts and the abolition of slavery.
00:19:47.000 But do you want to know a bad legislative effort that was killed?
00:19:53.000 Equal Rights Amendment.
00:19:55.000 ERA, they called it.
00:19:56.000 And they almost passed it.
00:19:58.000 It was on its way towards passage.
00:19:59.000 And it was Phyllis Schlafly and her incredible activism.
00:20:04.000 And we're going to do a whole podcast on Phyllis Schlafly at some point.
00:20:06.000 I don't know if we'll get to it before the election, but we're going to do a whole podcast on it.
00:20:10.000 Where she argued, why do we need a new amendment to the Constitution that singles out just women?
00:20:17.000 She made the brilliant constitutional argument and completely changed all the momentum that the ERA had by saying the Constitution is a gender-neutral document and it should stay a gender-neutral document.
00:20:28.000 As soon as you start to select women versus men or black versus white, it destroys the brilliance of the U.S. Constitution as being an equally applicable document.
00:20:38.000 Of course, the 14th Amendment later clarified equal protection under the law, which again, Madison argued that those sorts of amendments should be allowed for.
00:20:48.000 You just have to have really good reasoning.
00:20:49.000 I have to win people over for a long period of time.
00:20:52.000 It's almost the system that the founders argued for was you can't get really excited for one election under a bunch of promises without a counter argument happening.
00:21:02.000 The system's not built for that.
00:21:04.000 This makes us fundamentally different than the French and the Spanish and the Portuguese and the Greeks and the Italians.
00:21:10.000 That if you get really excited in those elections and you win in a parliamentary system, you can change the country in one election cycle there.
00:21:17.000 You can.
00:21:18.000 There's very little countermeasure because as soon as you win those elections, let's just use in the United Kingdom, you actually control when the next election is.
00:21:27.000 You control when the next election actually gets to be called.
00:21:30.000 And you can then push forward government-run health care, gun confiscation.
00:21:35.000 In our system, there is a higher standard to change everything.
00:21:42.000 So, no, I don't think they'll be able to do that.
00:21:44.000 You know why?
00:21:45.000 Because there will be a response to it.
00:21:47.000 There will be.
00:21:48.000 There will be a, and we use this word a lot, and I don't mind using it, I just think it's overused, a backlash, where if they try to pack the courts, these Democrat senators in West Virginia, in Arizona, in Montana will hear from us.
00:22:04.000 There will be marching in the streets, good marching in the streets.
00:22:10.000 And I think that's part of the brilliance of the United States Constitution that we don't talk about enough.
00:22:14.000 That this thing is not easy to change overnight, nor should it be.
00:22:18.000 Because, look, the Founding Fathers were very ambitious people, incredibly ambitious.
00:22:25.000 But even what we have been able to do in our country over the last 200 plus years would have blown the Founding Fathers away.
00:22:36.000 Our economic success, our charitable success, scientific progress, what we've done for the world, military might, the standard for human rights all across the planet would have blown them away.
00:22:51.000 And so I think we need to do a better job of clearly communicating the difference between a republic and a democracy and why our government should be deliberative in nature.
00:23:07.000 And again, you guys can check out thinker.org/slash Charlie to do a great job of that.
00:23:10.000 We talk about that quite often through the Federalist Papers.
00:23:14.000 But, Danica, it's a great question.
00:23:16.000 Happy to be able to answer it.
00:23:17.000 Thank you for emailing us, freedom at charliekirk.com, freedom at charliekirk.com.
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00:25:09.000 Charlie, can you talk about the movie Social Dilemma if you've seen it?
00:25:09.000 Next question here.
00:25:12.000 I watched it and was left confused about where I stand.
00:25:14.000 Can you clear up for me and give me some thoughts if you've watched it?
00:25:17.000 Marianne from Reno.
00:25:17.000 Thank you, Marianne.
00:25:18.000 You win a signed copy of the MAGA Doctrine.
00:25:20.000 I did see Social Dilemma, and I'm really glad I watched it.
00:25:23.000 I actually deleted my Netflix account, so I wanted to watch it because I got so many emails from listeners and from all of you that listen to us and support us saying, Charlie, can you watch this?
00:25:32.000 I want your breakdown of it.
00:25:33.000 So I said, okay, so I used the Friends Netflix login.
00:25:35.000 I refused to support a pedophile network that is Netflix.
00:25:38.000 And so I watched The Social Dilemma.
00:25:42.000 So spoil alert, if you haven't seen Social Dilemma, what's going to happen in the next couple minutes here?
00:25:46.000 I will just be forthright and I'm not going to kind of disguise that I've watched it or what happens in the movie.
00:25:54.000 It's not exactly anything worthy of spoilers, but just want to give that kind of disclaimer.
00:25:58.000 Okay, so The Social Dilemma is a terrific movie for 80% of the film.
00:26:04.000 It's one of the most effective documentaries that I have seen.
00:26:08.000 So I'm going to walk through this for people that haven't seen it because I think it's really helpful.
00:26:11.000 Okay, it starts with a phenomenal quote.
00:26:14.000 I've never heard this quote before, but I loved it.
00:26:16.000 It said, Nothing vast enters the life of mortals without its curses.
00:26:22.000 It's phenomenal.
00:26:24.000 There's an argument made at the beginning that I sympathize with that these tech companies, Facebook in particular, Google, Twitter, TikTok, they are benefiting from a form of surveillance capitalism.
00:26:36.000 They make an argument that I've long said that they are selling their users.
00:26:40.000 There's another great quote in the film that I thought was so brilliant, which is: only social media and illegal drugs call the people that use their products users.
00:26:56.000 Pretty incredible when you think about it.
00:26:59.000 And so, if you are not paying for the product, the movie The Social Dilemma argues that you are the product.
00:27:07.000 They had some very fascinating firsthand testimony from the programmers that built these social media applications, from Pinterest to Instagram, Facebook, and Google, where they argue that within their experiences in these tech companies, they went through daily and deliberative meetings on how they could gradually, slightly,
00:27:31.000 but eventually dramatically change your behavior.
00:27:38.000 Tristan Harris, who is in the movie, very compelling story.
00:27:42.000 He worked for Google.
00:27:44.000 He argued that the social media apps and these phones are making us less human.
00:27:50.000 He argued that they sell a form of almost slot machine certainty, that if you use these devices, it almost guarantees a dopamine rush the minute that you open up your phone.
00:28:03.000 The entire premise of the first part of the film is the amount of data that they collect from you.
00:28:09.000 Tristan Harris argues in the film that it gives you a positive intermittent reinforcement.
00:28:16.000 I thought this was a really clever way to put it.
00:28:18.000 In Silicon Valley, we went from a place that created hardware, almost tools-based technology, computers, servers, phones, to now manipulation and addiction-based technology.
00:28:33.000 The film then transitions to almost a docudrama style, where there's a family that deals with addiction to social media.
00:28:43.000 Social Dilemma makes no qualms whatsoever saying that social media is a drug.
00:28:50.000 They profile an 11-year-old girl that is addicted to probably something that could be Snapchat or TikTok.
00:28:56.000 They don't use the exact companies in this kind of docudrama lens for obvious reasons.
00:29:00.000 They don't want to be sued.
00:29:01.000 And then a young man who is 16 years old, 17 years old, that is very into an equivalent of Instagram or YouTube.
00:29:11.000 The most powerful part of the film, where I have to tell you, of all the documentaries I've ever watched, and I've watched hundreds of documentaries, I have to say this is the very best.
00:29:21.000 They win the gold medal in the way that they portrayed the tech companies monitoring and monetizing their users.
00:29:31.000 The best I have ever seen.
00:29:34.000 Where they show a young man that is using his Instagram feed, and on the back end of the screen, they show three individuals that are dressed in all black, that are monitoring everything he's doing and programming the screen time, the content, and trying to make it more addictive for him.
00:29:55.000 Incredibly well done.
00:29:58.000 There's some statistics that were shared by Jonathan Height from the Heterodox Academy that said since mobile social media use began in 2010, we've seen 189% increase in hospitalizations with pre-teen women in self-harm, 62% increase in hospitalizations for self-harm with late teenagers.
00:30:19.000 Driver's licenses are dropping for 16-year-olds.
00:30:22.000 Romantic relationships are dropping.
00:30:24.000 Jonathan Haidt calls this a digital pacifier.
00:30:28.000 Tristan Harris agrees.
00:30:29.000 I love that comparison.
00:30:32.000 One of the most telling parts of the entire film is when they had a engineer say that since 1960, planes go basically the same speed, cars might go twice as fast.
00:30:45.000 However, the processing power for a computer is up one trillion percent.
00:30:54.000 Another woman engineer argued that algorithms are not agnostic.
00:30:58.000 She called them opinions that are written in code.
00:31:01.000 So that's a short overview.
00:31:03.000 So the thesis of the movie changed about 80% of the way through.
00:31:07.000 It started as a very well-documented, thoughtful, empirically backed indictment of the social media tech companies of how they are chemically addictive, how they are selling our children, how they are pushing forth content that does not make us wiser, smarter, or more likely to pursue truth.
00:31:28.000 All of that was phenomenal.
00:31:30.000 In fact, I was on board with, let's regulate the tech companies, let's break them up.
00:31:35.000 I was buying it all the way through.
00:31:37.000 Not 80% of the way of the film, though, they started into an extended dramatization of this young man, I think his name was Ben, where he was spending too much time on YouTube.
00:31:48.000 And all of a sudden, they made this entire argument.
00:31:50.000 It was so obvious that if these young men, white men, spend too much time on YouTube, they're going to get radicalized down the rabbit hole.
00:31:57.000 Then he gets involved in protesting and social isolation and bad political movements.
00:32:02.000 It was very obvious all of a sudden where this film was going, that somehow YouTube and the content that's being put out there is sowing the seeds of political division.
00:32:11.000 Now, I have to give the social dilemma credit.
00:32:14.000 They never used Trump.
00:32:15.000 Conservatives, they were very, very disciplined in that capacity.
00:32:19.000 But they lost me at that point.
00:32:21.000 I said, wait a second, that is not the biggest issue here.
00:32:24.000 Let me tell you what was not in the social dilemma.
00:32:27.000 Not one piece, not one sentence about censorship, about opposing ideas being taken down by tech companies.
00:32:35.000 Nothing whatsoever at all.
00:32:39.000 There is nothing in the film about how opposing ideas from mainstream doctrine were being stunted, were being suppressed, were being demonetized.
00:32:50.000 We have been through that at length with the terrific work from Alam Bakari from Breitbart.com.
00:32:55.000 We've had him on our podcast here before, and we're going to have him on again.
00:32:59.000 Not even to mention.
00:33:02.000 Instead, Social Dilemma should have been a longer film with more concrete criticisms from every perspective.
00:33:11.000 The film also did not talk about the massive amount of economic monopolization that these companies control.
00:33:19.000 Instead, it took a different approach towards the end.
00:33:23.000 Instead, Tristan Harris was saying, I actually don't mind these companies.
00:33:26.000 I just want them to work for the benefit of humanity.
00:33:29.000 And this really kind of fun guy who I enjoyed throughout the film, don't remember his name, long braided hair, he totally lost me towards the end.
00:33:38.000 Towards the end of the film, he's talking about all these things I completely agree with about how these apps are destroying humanity, how they're making young people less likely to mature, less likely to interact with other human beings.
00:33:49.000 And then he says, and because of all this, we're never going to be able to fight climate change.
00:33:53.000 I'm like, what?
00:33:55.000 All of a sudden, he hit the whole kind of crescendo of the film was, we can't make America in our socialist image because of these tech companies.
00:34:05.000 And I said, you completely lost me.
00:34:06.000 Maybe I don't hate these companies as much as I thought they do.
00:34:09.000 And it was at this moment I thought, we got to be really careful how we approach this tech issue.
00:34:16.000 Because if you give this regulatory power to some of these people, they're going to shut us all up.
00:34:22.000 And so while I agree with the criticism, and I think it's completely correct, that these tech companies are actually making us less likely to engage in meaningful dialogue, more likely to be outraged, more tribal, I think it is a timeout and it's a non-starter if all of a sudden you make the argument that we must now shut down the tech companies so we can now have Medicare for all.
00:34:49.000 We take the guns away, shut down the churches, and put forth some sort of radical environmentalist agenda.
00:34:56.000 So I actually really enjoyed the film.
00:34:58.000 I just think that there was definitely a slippage towards the end.
00:35:02.000 But if I were to say, if I were to give a piece of feedback to the social dilemma people, I would say they should cut off the last part of the film.
00:35:09.000 They should condense it down to 40 minutes, either make it longer and make the criticism more broad and more fair, because they did not talk at all about the censorship or the monopolization issue.
00:35:18.000 They talked a little bit about how wealthy these companies are, but they really didn't get into it enough.
00:35:22.000 But the part that is so powerful and the reason why this film has been viewed so many times, for good reason, by the way, they did a great job here, was when they deliberately walked through how that smartphone that your 12-year-old has or your 14-year-old has is no different than giving them cocaine.
00:35:42.000 That they will become addicted and they will become a worse person because of it.
00:35:47.000 And I thought there was actually a really good part at the end where they said, delete these apps, turn off notifications.
00:35:52.000 I have done that, just so you know.
00:35:54.000 My team manages all my social media.
00:35:57.000 I have deleted Instagram, Twitter, Facebook.
00:35:59.000 The only app I have is YouTube because I actually get benefit from watching some videos out there.
00:36:04.000 I think that it can be helpful in exploring big ideas.
00:36:08.000 Again, I have my criticism with Google.
00:36:09.000 Trust me, I've been on the record about that.
00:36:12.000 That's the only one of the social media apps that I have.
00:36:15.000 Therefore, I receive no incoming of people that are just out there to criticize or troll.
00:36:20.000 I couldn't care less what they're saying.
00:36:22.000 Somebody came up the other day.
00:36:23.000 They said, Charlie, you're trending on Twitter.
00:36:25.000 I said, heh, feels the same like when I wasn't trending on Twitter.
00:36:28.000 It's not real life.
00:36:29.000 It's like a video game.
00:36:30.000 Who cares?
00:36:31.000 It's completely, it's actually my day is exactly the same when I wasn't trending on Twitter.
00:36:36.000 I'm not connected to some sort of cyborg external matrix.
00:36:39.000 It's actually really freeing to know I think the same things I thought whether I knew I was trending on Twitter or I wasn't trending on Twitter.
00:36:47.000 It's actually one of the most liberating feelings ever.
00:36:49.000 And I think that so many people are no different than Neo or Morpheus in the Matrix.
00:36:54.000 They're living in this unreal world.
00:36:57.000 Once you disconnect from that, and all I care about is what I push out into Twitter, not what I get in from Twitter, I have thought more clearly.
00:37:05.000 I've been more articulate.
00:37:06.000 I've done more podcasts.
00:37:07.000 It's been one of the greatest experiences.
00:37:09.000 I'm never going to read down those applications.
00:37:11.000 So in general, I encourage people to check out the social dilemma.
00:37:14.000 It pains me because it's on Netflix, which is on the pedophile network, where they have cuties.
00:37:18.000 So I don't enjoy having to support that.
00:37:23.000 With that being said, I do actually encourage you to watch it.
00:37:26.000 I encourage all parents to watch it with the disclaimers that I said.
00:37:29.000 I want to make something very clear.
00:37:30.000 While I was disappointed in the ending of the social dilemma, it was not enough for me to say that it's a disqualifier.
00:37:36.000 It took a trained eye.
00:37:38.000 It took someone who is more likely to see this kind of bias to kind of see that.
00:37:43.000 So I do encourage all parents to see that.
00:37:45.000 And just kind of one piece of advice.
00:37:48.000 If you are not willing to give your child a firearm, do not give them a smartphone.
00:37:56.000 I equate the potential damage that a young person can do with a firearm, the same that they could do with a smartphone.
00:38:03.000 I do believe in firearm ownership once someone is mature enough to understand what it can do, how it can be used, and how dangerous it is, and why you must always treat a firearm in a certain way.
00:38:16.000 Treat it as if the gun is loaded.
00:38:18.000 Treat the smartphone as if it's ready to ruin your life because it could.
00:38:22.000 And for young parents out there, I hold this belief, and I am not trying to condemn you at all whatsoever if you did not do this.
00:38:30.000 So please understand this is rooted in compassion and in love, truly.
00:38:35.000 Your child should not have a smartphone until they're at least 16 or 17 or 18 years old.
00:38:39.000 Buy your child a flip phone with basic texting capacity that they can text you and make phone calls.
00:38:45.000 A younger a child has a smartphone, the more likely they are to engage in social isolation, depression, and non-human behavior.
00:38:55.000 Be very careful giving a young person a smartphone, especially with the over-deluge of applications that are out there.
00:39:03.000 Thank you, Marianne, for your question.
00:39:05.000 You guys can email us your questions, freedom at charliekirk.com, freedom at charliekirk.com.
00:39:13.000 You may not be aware, but we are in a season of change, and how we respond will have lasting impact.
00:39:18.000 For example, in December, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac plan on implementing a 0.5% fee on their loans, driving up the cost.
00:39:24.000 Meanwhile, if you're considering a home purchase or refinance, it's time.
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00:39:31.000 Mike, Brian, and the entire fellowship team have helped thousands with their home finance needs, and they're ready to serve you.
00:39:36.000 So call our special number, 800-837-Kirk, 800-837-5475, or online at homefellowship loans slash Charlie to get started.
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00:40:03.000 Let's get to the next question here.
00:40:05.000 And I first just want to say thank you for all of you that support us at CharlieKirk.com/slash support.
00:40:10.000 When you guys support us at charliekirk.com/slash support, you allow us to hire more staff to do more podcasts.
00:40:17.000 If this podcast has touched you in any way, please consider supporting us at charliekirk.com slash support.
00:40:22.000 Hi, Charlie.
00:40:23.000 My name is Ben H.
00:40:24.000 And I am from Washington State.
00:40:25.000 I was wondering what your predictions are for the House and Senate races.
00:40:28.000 Can you go state by state through some of the battlegrounds?
00:40:31.000 Are there any House races we should be focusing on?
00:40:33.000 Big fan of your podcast.
00:40:35.000 So great question, Ben.
00:40:36.000 So look, I don't try to talk about the polls too often.
00:40:39.000 I think that polling can be very misleading.
00:40:41.000 I think the horse race is something that we should kind of stray away from.
00:40:45.000 I think that it is generally kind of a distraction issue.
00:40:49.000 But look, let me go through some of the recent polls that I find to be very promising.
00:40:52.000 An ABC News poll has President Trump up four points in Florida, also one point up in Arizona.
00:41:01.000 These are very positive trends done by two polling agencies, ABC News, Washington Post, that would not be talking about positive trends for the president unless it was true.
00:41:10.000 Some of the most important Senate races, Susan Collins in Maine, Corey Gardner in Colorado, Tom Tillis in North Carolina, Martha McSally in Arizona, amongst many others.
00:41:20.000 With the new announcement of Amy Coney Barrett, I'm literally wearing an ACB shirt right now, and you guys can check out that shirt at tpusa.com.
00:41:29.000 If you go to tpusa.com and you want an ACB shirt, you guys can go to tpusa.com, tpusa.com.
00:41:35.000 I believe that the Amy Coney Barrett nomination and appointment by President Trump and hopefully confirmation by the Senate will help Martha McSally in Arizona, will help Tom Tillis in North Carolina.
00:41:47.000 I think it will hurt Corey Gardner in Colorado, amongst other people at risk.
00:41:51.000 I think it will help Steve Daines in Montana as well.
00:41:54.000 And so while I don't want to get too much into the polls, I think that it doesn't factor in enthusiasm, doesn't factor in turnout, I will say this.
00:42:01.000 I am hearing from a lot of people on the ground that Democrats are growing increasingly nervous and uneasy that they are not having the absentee ballot requests, the early voting turnout, or the enthusiasm that they would have thought.
00:42:15.000 Now, the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett could change all of that, and we should be ready for that fight.
00:42:20.000 We should be prepared for that fight.
00:42:21.000 We should gear up for that fight.
00:42:23.000 But I actually think that it will disperse and win out a lot of the forces.
00:42:27.000 And Amy Coney Barrett will be a phenomenal replacement for Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
00:42:33.000 If you care about freedom of speech, if you care about the lives of the unborn, if you care about the lives of the pre-born, if you care about the sanctity of those that cannot protect themselves, if you care about the Constitution and our country, get involved in the confirmation fight for Amy Coney Barrett.
00:42:55.000 So thrilled to be able to say that.
00:42:56.000 It was a dream to have her be nominated.
00:42:59.000 To see her on the Supreme Court, praise God, if she gets this done.
00:43:05.000 We have to have her back.
00:43:06.000 We have to fight.
00:43:08.000 So, some of the other battleground states that really has come down to three states right now.
00:43:12.000 It's come down to Arizona, Florida, Pennsylvania.
00:43:14.000 If Trump goes three for three in those three states, he wins the White House.
00:43:17.000 He will win North Carolina.
00:43:18.000 President Trump will win Ohio.
00:43:20.000 President Trump will win Iowa.
00:43:23.000 Thanks so much for your question, Ben.
00:43:25.000 You got a signed copy of the MAGA Doctrine.
00:43:27.000 Really appreciate it.
00:43:27.000 Next question.
00:43:28.000 Hi, my name is Grace, and I really love studying history, especially the 20th century.
00:43:32.000 As I've been watching the recent events in Belarus unfold, riots against a fake election, Russia on one side of the EU and the United States on the other hand.
00:43:39.000 And now Russian troops have actually moved into Belarus.
00:43:41.000 This seems eerily similar to the events that started around World War I. Do you think there's much of a chance for war to break out in Europe?
00:43:47.000 Thanks so much, and God bless.
00:43:48.000 Congrats you in a signed copy.
00:43:49.000 No, I do not.
00:43:50.000 I do not think that war will break out in Europe anytime soon.
00:43:52.000 I think that Europe is much more homogenized than people realize or recognize.
00:43:56.000 And also, there really isn't the standing force army out there.
00:43:59.000 The United States military is so powerful.
00:44:01.000 We are the superpower of the continent and of the world, I should say, of the hemisphere.
00:44:06.000 Nothing's going to break out in Europe anytime soon.
00:44:08.000 In fact, if there's any place where conflict will break out, it'll be in Southeast Asia and some sort of turf war over China.
00:44:14.000 I am not worried about Poland or Hungary or Eastern European countries warring against each other.
00:44:19.000 We hold all the cards for good reason.
00:44:21.000 And there are populist movements in Poland and Hungary.
00:44:24.000 Terrific.
00:44:24.000 That's a good thing.
00:44:25.000 The European Union should break up.
00:44:27.000 But no, I don't think that'll break into war anytime soon.
00:44:29.000 In fact, I think that the over-deification of the European Union actually brought the Europeans closer to war than not.
00:44:36.000 I don't think any of what's happening in Belarus, of which I am not an expert in by any means.
00:44:41.000 Some people say it's a color revolution that is being done.
00:44:43.000 Not getting into any of that.
00:44:45.000 Kind of indifferent.
00:44:46.000 We have so much going on in our country.
00:44:47.000 We talked about all of this last episode with Darren Beattie here on the Charlie Kirk show.
00:44:53.000 But let me just say, I do not think that Europe is headed to war anytime soon.
00:44:57.000 I think it is much more likely that we had in some sort of conflict with the Chinese Communist Party than Europe tears itself apart.
00:45:03.000 Russia, we could put Russia in its place at any time.
00:45:06.000 Let me just be perfectly clear.
00:45:07.000 Russia is kind of the annoying mosquito that keeps on showing up at a barbecue.
00:45:11.000 Meanwhile, you have a legitimate threat of China.
00:45:15.000 China is the real threat.
00:45:17.000 Russia has a declining population.
00:45:19.000 They're completely dependent on the petrodollar.
00:45:23.000 Their military is antiquated.
00:45:25.000 They play a good game.
00:45:27.000 Putin is not a good person.
00:45:29.000 I'm not actually a Russian apologist like some people are.
00:45:32.000 I think we should intensify sanctions against them.
00:45:34.000 But I just, I'm kind of indifferent to Russia.
00:45:36.000 I just, I think that they have big ambitions, big aspirations, but very little sting to their punch.
00:45:43.000 They're a regional player.
00:45:45.000 They're not an ambitious world player.
00:45:46.000 Russia sows discord around the world.
00:45:48.000 Let's leave it at that.
00:45:49.000 China is the threat.
00:45:52.000 Thank you guys so much for listening today.
00:45:53.000 Thank you guys for emailing us all your questions, freedom at charliekirk.com.
00:45:57.000 Please get involved at TurningPointUSA at tpusa.com, tpusa.com.
00:46:02.000 Please consider supporting our program at charliekirk.com slash support, charliekirk.com slash support.
00:46:09.000 Buy your Amy Coney Barrett shirt at tpusa.com slash shop.
00:46:14.000 And also check out charliekirk.com for updates.
00:46:17.000 And as you guys know, we are going live on radio October 5th.
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00:46:33.000 We are the hardest working podcast on the planet so that you guys have the information that you need to fight and win America's culture where it's time to win, everybody.
00:46:41.000 We have an opportunity to take back the Supreme Court, win an election.
00:46:46.000 The generations that have sacrificed before us have given so much.
00:46:49.000 Time to get in this fight.
00:46:51.000 Thank you for supporting us at charliekirk.com slash support.
00:46:55.000 And thank you as always for emailing us your questions.
00:46:57.000 God bless, everybody.
00:46:59.000 Talk to you soon.
00:47:00.000 Thanks so much.