The Critical Compass Podcast - Trump, Free Speech, & Right Wing Cancel Culture ｜ A Critical Compass Discussion

00:00:00.000 We already have laws in place regarding calls to violence. Most Western societies do. I mean, if we want to take the you can't shout fire in a crowded theater kind of thing, like calls to violence or calls to panic or whatever it is are classified under a special, I suppose, subheading of free speech.

00:00:21.020 So in this case, however, I think what perhaps people would say is that, well, they're not actually calling for violence. They are lamenting the lack of a violent actions.

00:00:35.380 Trump has been painted as the next Hitler, basically, like somehow he's going to end democracy if he's getting elected. He's going to be it's going to be a dictatorship like he had his chance for four years to end democracy, but he didn't take it.

00:00:51.020 You don't have to like him, but either he's incompetent at ending democracy because he couldn't do it in four years and he needs another four years.

00:00:58.520 So people are going to vote him in so he can end democracy from now on, like for good now.

00:01:03.960 If people truly believe what has been said about him, they feel like it's somewhat morally justified, like if it's preventing a greater evil, if it's framed to be a similar, if the risk, if the threat level is just as high.

00:01:18.360 And I think if you measure it based on that and not by actions, people can believe that quite easily.

00:01:23.360 And welcome back to the Critical Compass.

00:01:43.360 I'm James and this is Mike.

00:01:44.660 And today we're going to talk about the attempted assassination on Donald Trump and the results of that, both from the media and also the right wing cancel culture that we've seen pop up in response to some of the events that have unfolded.

00:02:01.300 Mike, you've got a few a few notes already lined up and that you want to share.

00:02:06.600 How about you start us off?

00:02:07.920 Yeah, well, yeah, I wanted to kind of do this episode on what we're seeing, sort of an interesting development of this, what I guess is being called right wing counter right wing cancel culture, because cancel culture is something we normally associate with leftist politics, at least, you know, in the last half dozen years.

00:02:30.080 But it's sort of been absent from the right because it's been the right has somewhat been unified in its response of the right and libertarians and just generally people who are, you know, present themselves as being against cancel culture and against kind of woke ideology that that generates that.

00:02:50.660 But what we're seeing now, but what we're seeing now in the wake of the attempt at assassination is a really interesting divide, and it's brought up some, I think it's brought up some emotions that have been kind of sitting pretty heavy in a lot of people.

00:03:06.880 I've got a few tweets just kind of lined up.

00:03:09.760 I don't know all these people, I know a couple of them, but it's an interesting, there's sort of a loud, maybe it's a loud minority saying, hey, you know what, this has been something that the left has been doing to us for years.

00:03:27.440 Anytime we step out of whatever they've determined, you know, the Overton window is for any given topic, they've been slamming us with, you know, getting us fired from jobs and, you know, you know, getting our social media accounts pulled and stuff.

00:03:40.180 So I don't feel any remorse for the people who are getting fired for saying that they wish the shooter didn't miss.

00:03:47.020 And then there's a couple what I would, and we were talking about this off the recording, and I would say that, like, my inherent kind of response to that is agreement.

00:03:59.360 I kind of, a primal part of me sort of agrees with that, like, you know, that it's the just desserts.

00:04:05.120 But then there's a couple writers, and Dave Smith will end on a clip from his Part of the Problem podcast, that kind of are, I feel are probably a little bit more measured and a little bit more of a mature response.

00:04:21.140 But anyway, let me, let's pull the first one up here.

00:04:23.960 I will pull this live here.

00:04:28.820 So this is I Am Leah on X.

00:04:32.600 Quote, OMG, y'all went after a grandma and got her fired from Home Depot. 1.00

00:04:38.440 Y'all made us watch our grandmas die scared alone and in the hospital, so get effed.

00:04:44.640 It's very resentful slash you deserve, you deserve this kind of attitude.

00:04:51.000 Yeah, like, it's sort of, yeah, you can see here that there's a, there's an implication that, you know, one is,

00:05:01.080 one is more of a serious, one is, like, actually a cancellation and the other was, was not justified.

00:05:08.600 She followed, this was from, uh, 11 a.m. a few days ago.

00:05:14.340 Then she followed it up with this one.

00:05:16.640 Uh, if you've ever watched a rabid liberal salivating over the thought of kicking your family out of the grocery store while you try to buy milk maskless,

00:05:23.060 uh, not exactly sure how you have one single F left in your field of F's upon the spinning rock we call Earth to have sympathy for them

00:05:32.280 because they think assassination is how to deal with differing opinions.

00:05:36.600 So, I, beyond the fact that I love how that sentence is crafted, um, it's, uh, I don't know, what do you, what do you think of her point here?

00:05:48.300 It's, it is tricky because anything that calls for, like, we, we do make exceptions with free speech with, like, calls to violence or calling for somebody's head.

00:06:05.280 Um, it, it gets tricky when it's, like, is that the way to actually deal with these?

00:06:13.000 Is pushing for somebody to get fired is, like, the mob mentality, is that the healthy way to approach that?

00:06:22.600 Or is that just us playing by the same rules as the leftist kind of cancel culture played for however many years?

00:06:32.540 So, are, what principles are we going to fall back onto and how much of this mob mentality is, is healthy?

00:06:41.000 Yeah, yeah, and that's, that's a good point you raise with, um, we, we already have laws in place regarding calls to violence.

00:06:49.620 Most, most, uh, Western societies do.

00:06:51.880 I mean, if, if we want to take, I suppose we can probably take American, um, you know, the, the, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights of the U.S. here

00:06:59.460 because this is centered on, you know, around U.S. commentators and it was a U.S. event.

00:07:04.300 They specifically have, uh, you know, you know, that, uh, I don't know what the, the term for it is, but, you know, like the, you can't shout fire in a, in a crowded theater kind of thing.

00:07:14.880 Like, calls to violence or calls to panic or whatever it is, um, are classified under a special, uh, I suppose, subheading of, of free speech.

00:07:24.940 So, in this case, however, I think what perhaps people would say is that, well, they're not actually calling for violence.

00:07:34.580 They are, uh, lamenting the lack of a violent action.

00:07:38.920 So, is that, is this the same thing or is there any difference there in your estimation?

00:07:44.500 Uh, it's a little bit different, but it's, it's very tasteless.

00:07:50.040 It's, it's not ideal.

00:07:52.380 Um, you do sometimes find this on, even, I've seen some notable, like, Canadian commenters or people mentioning, well, if certain Canadian politicians broke these laws and those laws are treason, that should result in whatever corporal punishment and or end in a noose.

00:08:14.340 So, I've seen these things be mentioned where if you take it at face value, like, oh, is that, is that calling for direct action or is that saying, is there more nuance behind that?

00:08:26.280 And people don't really operate in nuance when there's only a certain number of characters when you can blast out to the internet.

00:08:31.920 So, um, my, my issue with anything like that is like, the worst interpretation is always going to be taken if you, if you're pushing that line.

00:08:44.840 Uh, so that gets difficult to find where that line is.

00:08:49.060 I personally wouldn't say, say that, but I don't think it's, it's crim, like, it doesn't fit that line of criminality, but I don't think the mob should call for somebody to be fired over those comments.

00:09:08.660 But there's nothing stopping an employer being like, well, this makes you a disgusting human and we don't want to associate, but how much of that is just the employer and how much of that is the mob?

00:09:20.100 That's where I would maybe make a distinction of like the mob mentality of advocating for somebody's livelihood to be removed from like that.

00:09:33.120 That's different than somebody being affected by their own actions under their employer, just observing what they said.

00:09:41.880 So, yeah, we saw a lot of this.

00:09:44.560 Yeah.

00:09:45.040 Yeah.

00:09:45.520 I tend to agree.

00:09:46.200 I think we, we saw a lot of this during COVID where, uh, you know, we had people being, um, you know, people being let go from their jobs for, you know, esposing certain viewpoints about, you know, vaccines or whatever the case may be, all the associated, uh, contentious issues that came up around that vaccine passports, things like that.

00:10:07.460 And maybe, you know, we're almost 10 minutes into this and we should probably reference.

00:10:11.300 There was, uh, all this is referring to, I believe, uh, one particular elderly woman who worked at a home Depot in the U S who, who posted, you know, something of a very similar sentiment to what lots of people were saying about how, you know, they wish that, uh, the shooter didn't miss.

00:10:28.600 Um, we'll get into a little bit more detail about that later with, um, with Lauren Southern's tweet.

00:10:33.660 But, uh, yeah, I was going to say there's, there's kind of a, kind of a distinction to be made.

00:10:41.380 I think between, uh, like what you say about if an employer wants to distance themselves from somebody based on the things that they said and whether or not they're doing that out of, uh, you know, the, the values that that company claims to, uh, promote.

00:11:00.440 Or if they're doing it just to avoid, uh, you know, public backlash, you know, against their, against the company name.

00:11:08.820 So is there any sort of, do you, do you distinguish there at all?

00:11:14.500 Do you think that there's any sort of, um, I don't know if there's enough pressure from the company without the mob mentality, because ultimately the only reason the company's caring is because there's enough of a online backlash.

00:11:30.440 And people are like, let it be sending emails or like, there's that activism component, which is exactly what the left did on all these issues.

00:11:41.360 So in the case where it's not criminal, it's, I think you should be able to call it out.

00:11:46.160 And they're like, this is like, this is not cool.

00:11:50.480 Like this is hypocritical look compared to what people have been fired for or what, what has been said on the right, which has had consequences that the left mobbed over and, um, pursued, pursued employers to, to damage.

00:12:07.660 So I think, I think if left to their own devices, a company would only do that if it, if it like really affected their image and they don't want to be associated.

00:12:22.200 So if the right doesn't mob together and call for that, I don't think some of these people will be fired.

00:12:31.100 It also depends on the position because, uh, Home Depot employee, that's somebody who said like, that's a little bit better than the case you had in BC here in Canada.

00:12:41.800 Like the, was it a professor who was basically say the same thing that the, there's upset that, well, the bullet didn't miss.

00:12:52.100 And in that case, a public profile and a, well, now you're, now we're getting in the case of like, well, how much should a practitioner or, or is somebody's social media an extension of their professional identity?

00:13:05.380 And, or, um, as a professor, are they, is that how interwoven is that to their, like to their identity with that particular school or their tenureship?

00:13:16.860 Or so in that case, I can see that not reflecting the values of a university.

00:13:22.980 Um, so what are your thoughts on that?

00:13:27.320 Well, yeah, I, I, I don't, I don't think I disagree with that either.

00:13:30.580 I just, it's kind of one of those things where it's like, if we, if we, you know, took this exact situation and we just subtracted like 50 years, 40 years, even you would have, um, you know, there, there would be a situation where there was probably a very similar level of discourse happening around any sort of event like this, that an employer or a, uh, you know, an institution would, would, you would never have, like, they would never know.

00:13:55.820 They would never have any cause to know that, you know, what people talk about in their own homes, but because we, we, you know, of the age we live in, you put the stuff online and, you know, there becomes a viral kind of movement around it.

00:14:07.240 And before you know it, it's, you know, it's a, it's a very, even though, yes, you're, you're, you're posting it publicly, but most of these people, especially elderly people, you could probably assume, believe that what their public posts are mostly just circulated around their friends or followers that they,

00:14:24.340 they're a small group of people that they have online. And then before you know it, it becomes an, an international scandal. You know, you just, the, just the technology didn't exist for such things, you know, until very recently.

00:14:35.980 The amplifications there. So it's like, you, you think you're just sending a message to a small group, but if something goes viral, it gets amplified outside of your circle.

00:14:44.880 And now it has unlimited reach in a way. So it can get very loud, very quickly for somebody who does not think that it'll be seen by that many people, which maybe they would have worded it differently if they knew that it was, it was going to be passed around.

00:15:01.520 Um, I, so the rhetoric, I'm not surprised though. Um, because if you, if you look at the, everything that's been said up to this point through the media and through the institutions, and even with the, the convictions and the, like the court cases going on,

00:15:26.940 Trump has been painted as a, the next Hitler, basically like that. Somehow he's going to end democracy. If he's getting elected, he's going to be, it's going to be a dictatorship. Like he had his chance for four years to end democracy, but he didn't take it. Um, you don't have to like him, but either he's incompetent at ending democracy. Cause he couldn't do it in four years.

00:15:52.280 And he needs another four years. So people are going to vote him in so he can end democracy from now on, like for good now. Um, but if, if people truly believe what has been said about him, I, I think people's things like, well, if you have a chance to like time machine, you go back in time. Like, would you, would you, uh, put a pillow over the little, little baby Hitler's. 0.91

00:16:22.280 Crib like the adult. Yeah. It's that same kind of scenario. They feel like it's somewhat morally justified. Like if it's a preventing a greater evil, if it's framed to be a similar degree of, uh, if the risk, if the threat level is just as high.

00:16:41.060 And I think the threat level is only measured through your perceived number of mentions and like how vitriolic the messaging is behind it. So if you measure it based on that and not by actions, people can believe that quite easily.

00:16:55.700 Yeah. Well, and I mean, um, Dave Smith, who we'll, we'll hear from a little bit here, had a, had a tweet right away, uh, after it happened where, you know, you, you know, the, the attempt happens and then you hear uniform messaging from the media of like, you know, uh, this is not, uh, you know, this is not how we do things in America.

00:17:16.740 You know, we, we're a, we're a peaceful nation. We can't be resorting to violence, et cetera, et cetera. Right. And he's like, well, how are you going to like, exactly like you said, how are you going to be the, the media government apparatus that for the last eight years has been shouting from the rooftops about how, you know, Trump is a threat to democracy.

00:17:35.740 He's in collusion with Russia. He's going to, uh, you know, turn the country into a dictatorship. He's, he's in some cases, as in the case of that, wasn't it there a time time magazine cover that had him like photoshopped next to Hitler and like talking about like you cannot do that. 0.60

00:17:53.520 And at the same time act shocked and, and, and righteously indignant when someone goes, you know, you get into somebody's head and they go, Oh, well, you know, I'm, I'm going to be that hero. That's good. Uh, you know, stop this, the evil orange man. Right.

00:18:07.620 Yeah. And, and it's one thing for that attempted assassination, regardless of everything that's that underpins that it's the people's response to it being, Oh, I wish the shot, I wish the wind was a little bit.

00:18:23.520 different. So the shot would have landed like people. And you could see these, the people saying this are likely just the average person and likely kind individuals in normal respects, but like in this one case that feels morally justified because of the rhetoric, which is exactly a strange thing to like, well, it means it shows that the rhetoric is powerful.

00:18:51.520 If the messages are said over and over and over again. And I do remember a time, maybe like it was within the first year of Donald getting elected.

00:19:02.920 I remember how much I didn't like him. And then a couple of things came out. I'm like, well, he didn't actually say that. And they're hammering home on like the very fine people or some of these other common tropes where the media took him to task on something.

00:19:19.920 He didn't actually say. And if you play the full clip, he gave context and he gave a very clear distinction. The media is like, well, why didn't he, why didn't he denounce the Nazis? And like, well, he literally did right after the clip you showed.

00:19:33.720 If you played more than 20 seconds. So yeah, well, that happened recently too. If you remember, do you remember with, uh, when he was talking about, um, how he would, he would, um, bring back auto manufacturing to the U S instead of giving so much of it away to the Mexicans. Cause a lot of, maybe people don't know a lot of vehicle, North American vehicle manufacturing happens in Mexico.

00:19:56.720 And it's been increasing over, you know, recent years. And the term that he used was, um, he said, it'll be a bloodbath if we don't do this. And what the media, this even on, um, I was really disappointed to see this because even on, um, Joe Rogan, when Jonathan Haidt was on and they, they played this clip and they played the edited version of the clip where he sort of, it sort of cut out a little bit more lead up to before he says the word bloodbath.

00:20:23.200 They even played the proper clip afterwards. And even then Jonathan Haidt like did not accept that this was, you know, he, he thought that it was, Oh yeah, this, see, this is very dangerous rhetoric, but that's, that's only dangerous rhetoric. If you don't understand economics and you don't know the proper economic usage of the word bloodbath, which refers to a, uh, you know, I don't know the exact definition, but it refers to like a large disparity of like an economic loss and gain. You know, that's a, uh, it would be the, the American economy would

00:20:53.080 suffer, suffer, suffer a bloodbath in comparison to the, what the gains that the Mexican economy is having because of the, the infrastructure that it has.

00:20:59.840 That was part of the definition as well. Like, and, um, I just see if, I don't know if I have the paper trail, but I believe Webster's or they updated their definition shortly after to like hide or diminish the other.

00:21:16.640 Oh, the other definition. Yeah. Yeah. The other definition is a period of disastrous loss or reversal. And the example, they use a few mutual funds performed well in the general bloodbath of the stock market. So a completely reasonable term to use in the context.

00:21:33.560 So there's also compilations of CNN and all the other media using that term and other politicians using that term. So it's like, well, again, this is the crux of the issue is like, if the underlying principle is like, well, we demand the same type of speech to be treated the same way.

00:21:54.320 It doesn't matter who's saying it. And we want unbiased reporting and we want unbiased rules on either side. That's the underlying principle. So if somebody on CNN can say bloodbath or some democratic Senator can say bloodbath, and it doesn't have the same consequence, then like it should just be a level playing field that way.

00:22:17.880 In the same thing of like, well, if we decide what is proper, like what is criminal speech and what is not, we should be applying rules equally across the board. So what these examples show is that we do not have a unbiased media apparatus that just tells events, just showcases events and lets people decide for themselves the meaning behind it.

00:22:43.220 It is a narrative driven, it's a conclusion first apparatus. And we have example over example. And somebody doesn't have to like Trump at all. Like, there's plenty of things that I think you could do better, articulate better. And like, there's certainly better potential leaders, but I do feel like the media attacks on him are completely unfair.

00:23:13.220 And it's very clear. And as long as they continue to be unfair, Trump's base will just double down. And that's the thing is like, it's bolstering him because it's proving him right. And it's actually giving him more credibility than he would have got otherwise to the people that see the, the attacks happen in real time.

00:23:35.460 Now, I can't remember who said it years ago, but they were like, you know what, this would be, this tactic would be way more effective if they ever reported on any of his successes during his presidency, of which he had a number.

00:23:49.080 You know, if they ever reported on any tiny success, then the criticisms, pardon me, the criticisms would ring much truer and would be, it would look much less forced and much less propagandistic, right?

00:24:03.700 But they just, they don't get it. They, they, they can't do it. They can't like intellectually, emotionally, morally bring themselves to do it.

00:24:12.720 And their credibility, credibility suffers for it.

00:24:15.720 Well, and the one last little point on this, the fact that he's speaking up and standing up against these constant attacks is, I think, the reason why a lot of people will vote for him.

00:24:28.920 Where a leftist, their perception is that, well, the people on the right, well, look at how many racists there are who just don't like immigrants or just don't like this.

00:24:40.580 And they think it's the, a bunch of racists or hateful people found somebody just as racist and hateful as them.

00:24:47.880 Therefore, that's why they're voting. They're not seeing this other side to it because they have, these leftists have complete trust in the media.

00:24:58.920 Therefore, it doesn't even pop into their head that people would have a major issue and vote for somebody or support somebody who's standing up against the unbiased coverage.

00:25:12.240 Yeah, it's a, it's a very simplistic way of, uh, analyzing politics, but that's a, that's a plague on both sides.

00:25:21.620 Um, okay, I'm going to bring up our, uh, another tweet here from our, uh, uh, future friend of the channel as well.

00:25:28.820 I love Josie, the, the redheaded libertarian, uh, often seen on, uh, Tim cast.

00:25:34.880 Uh, she says, uh, the same people outraged over those getting fired from their jobs for celebrating the death of a firefighter

00:25:41.420 and lamenting a failed assassination, wanted you fired from your job for being unvaccinated three years ago

00:25:46.880 and also wanted your children taken away. So I'm fresh out of F's.

00:25:51.420 I'm not making an effort to get anyone fired, but I'm also not going to cry about it.

00:25:55.000 If a business no longer wants to associate with an employee who publicly and brazenly and without empathy,

00:25:59.900 wishes death on another human being.

00:26:01.440 Um, and I think that kind of, the way I structured these tweets is not by accident.

00:26:08.620 I think this is a moderation of the, the previous, uh, posters tweets where I, I, I'm more empathetic to this

00:26:16.540 for somebody who has a, um, you know, who's somebody who may have had to potentially suffer the, the fear of having

00:26:24.600 their kids taken from them for not vaccinating them or not being vaccinated themselves.

00:26:28.620 Like I get, I get the impulse to feel, uh, um, I can't think of the word, but like vengeful, you know, to, to,

00:26:38.760 to somebody and, and not feel any remorse for, for the same thing.

00:26:42.040 And it's natural to feel a little bit of that vengeance or a little bit of that, like, um, last four years,

00:26:48.620 like COVID wasn't that long ago.

00:26:51.320 So like we were in the thick of it, not like just a couple of years ago.

00:26:55.780 So some of these feelings are very, still very raw.

00:26:59.240 And when this comes up, it's going to, I think people aren't in the emotional space to have full

00:27:06.600 sympathy and full empathy, but she also balances it out a little bit of like, um, she's not actively

00:27:13.280 participating in the mob.

00:27:16.460 Yeah.

00:27:16.860 But she's not going to, she's not going to lose any sleep over it.

00:27:19.120 Yeah.

00:27:19.480 Yeah.

00:27:19.720 And I, and I kind of get that.

00:27:21.620 Um, okay.

00:27:23.000 We'll switch it over to, this is the big one.

00:27:24.760 So this is, um, this is Lauren Southern.

00:27:29.300 I think she's an independent, uh, journalist now that used to work for, uh, rebel news back

00:27:34.120 in the day.

00:27:34.420 This is a big one, but I'm going to read it because it's good.

00:27:37.560 Uh, okay.

00:27:38.320 If conservatives spent one 10th of the time they're spending doxing random minimum wage workers

00:27:42.860 on actually reading policy door knocking or holding actual people in power.

00:27:46.920 Accountable.

00:27:47.480 We'd be living in a very different world.

00:27:49.760 Instead, we get this deranged.

00:27:51.460 Well, they did it to me.

00:27:52.780 So it's revenge time nonsense, which quite frankly is only politically useful for like

00:27:56.940 10 seconds until the tables turn and the exact same revenge fantasies are played out against

00:28:00.640 you. 0.92

00:28:00.920 Also is entirely useless when a bunch, uh, when it's just a bunch of working class dolts 1.00

00:28:06.100 doing it to each other while their country gets raped by politicians who love that they're 0.99

00:28:09.700 not paying attention.

00:28:10.400 I also hate that there's this assumption, uh, she's not struggling because she's elderly

00:28:15.360 and working there.

00:28:16.120 The average cashier position at home Depot is what?

00:28:18.040 Like 14 to $16 an hour.

00:28:19.780 We don't know her life or who she's caring for, what her debts are, et cetera.

00:28:23.420 Um, she says she's not an educator.

00:28:27.460 She's not a lawmaker. 1.00

00:28:28.500 She's not a doctor.

00:28:29.500 She's just a random Facebook commentator. 0.99

00:28:32.580 This section, she says, uh, she kind of, uh, you know, compares her to her grandmother

00:28:36.620 who was very, uh, anti-Bush and would, would have said some, you know, potentially similar

00:28:41.100 things and how that would, uh, how she would, uh, you know, definitely freak out if that 0.82

00:28:45.400 happened to her grandmother, um, who otherwise was a very, you know, loving woman.

00:28:51.480 She says, I could even see a teenage version of me thinking it was funny to post something

00:28:54.900 like that about Obama.

00:28:56.120 Although I doubt libs of TikTok would go after my university applications job or anything like

00:29:01.000 that because I would have been politically on side.

00:29:03.160 Once again, unless you're in a position of any sort of authority in society, blowing 1.00

00:29:07.960 off steam by saying stupid shit online should be none of our concern. 1.00

00:29:11.480 That should be a yelling match you have with your family and Thanksgiving dinner, the way 1.00

00:29:14.980 my family would argue about Bush when I was growing up.

00:29:17.680 The second they're an educator or a lawmaker, for sure that's a different story and hell of

00:29:21.840 a lot more useful to focus on these people.

00:29:23.960 I'm sick of this weird IRL doxing of randos though. 0.98

00:29:26.900 It's sick in the head and useless. 0.97

00:29:30.780 Thoughts? 0.98

00:29:31.180 That's a very well articulated and makes the distinctions, especially of like, is working

00:29:40.160 class people our target and especially, well, how well informed is this, is this grandmother

00:29:46.880 working at Home Depot as well?

00:29:48.980 And, and it's not like she's somebody teaching a bunch of kids or in a position of great

00:29:56.320 responsibility and power.

00:29:57.380 So yeah, I think that's a completely different scenario than like the professor representing

00:30:03.860 their, representing UBC.

00:30:07.540 Yeah.

00:30:07.920 That's a case where somebody, you know, a prospective student might want to know that because they

00:30:11.700 would have a, you know, pretty good idea if they're, uh, you know, it used to be the

00:30:16.800 case of when, like when I was in school, it used to be the case that the professor would

00:30:19.920 just sort of have to like suck it up and, you know, mark your papers, their merit rather

00:30:23.560 than, and I, and I did definitely have some professors that did that better than others,

00:30:28.580 but, uh, it doesn't feel like that's really the case anymore.

00:30:31.680 I mean, it's been, you know, a decade plus since I've been out of university.

00:30:35.360 So that's, uh, it just feels, it just feels now that like you, maybe it's sort of an unspoken

00:30:41.240 thing that like, you know, if you're taking a class from a progressive professor, you,

00:30:45.140 you better be writing progressive papers, right?

00:30:48.660 Yeah.

00:30:49.880 One other thought on, uh, Lauren Sutherland is she's been put through the ringer and

00:30:55.440 canceled more times than pretty much anybody else.

00:30:59.780 And she was even denied entry into Australia.

00:31:02.200 So for her, the process of being attacked and canceled like that is a, I don't think

00:31:09.580 she, she doesn't take that lightly.

00:31:11.200 And yeah, I guess she, she does have the, uh, the firsthand experience.

00:31:16.360 Yeah.

00:31:16.900 Well, that, that's the thing.

00:31:18.460 How many of the people advocating or going out and trying, like reaching out to this,

00:31:24.400 to Home Depot to try to get this grandmother fired, how many of them have actually have 1.00

00:31:29.880 fully had the docs?

00:31:30.940 So in one way, if somebody was fired for a job for something else, then they're doing

00:31:35.920 the revenge.

00:31:37.300 But even for Lauren, she's like, well, I'm not going to do that.

00:31:41.200 Like revenge is, it's short-lived.

00:31:43.560 It's not helpful.

00:31:44.860 Like it's, it's not going to get us to a higher trust society or a place where we can sort

00:31:52.260 out differences between us.

00:31:54.160 So ideally, like you would, you would highlight the shitty thing and then we'd have a conversation

00:32:02.140 around why that's not a ideal thing to say.

00:32:07.120 Like that can still happen without like running to the employer and trying to affect somebody's

00:32:12.700 livelihood.

00:32:13.800 Yeah.

00:32:14.480 Yeah.

00:32:15.940 Yeah.

00:32:16.500 Agreed.

00:32:17.500 Um, okay.

00:32:19.740 I'm going to, uh, this might be a short one.

00:32:21.920 I think today, I don't think we need to go for a full hour.

00:32:23.960 This is a, but a four minute clip or so from, uh, uh, the, uh, Dave Smith, uh, part of the

00:32:31.900 problem podcast and I'm going to screen it if I can.

00:32:37.320 So this is his kind of thoughts on the matter.

00:32:39.220 And I thought it was a good, uh, kind of, um, succinct, uh, way of, of putting it.

00:32:44.500 And, uh, yeah, we'll just listen to a few minutes here.

00:32:46.420 Like, look, what just happened was an assassination attempt against the guy who has been in the

00:32:58.360 crosshairs of the most powerful secretive organizations in the world.

00:33:04.100 Um, they've been attempting to take him out in many different ways, but we don't know all

00:33:08.700 the details about what just happened here, but it's pretty clear already that the official 0.88

00:33:13.260 story is bullshit and it is, let's just say where we're at right now is at least it is 0.84

00:33:19.280 shocking that this was allowed to happen. 0.99

00:33:23.700 And there's a lot of different signs that like, this was kind of allowed to happen.

00:33:29.880 Every inch, everything in life is a finite resource.

00:33:33.180 You only have so much breath in your lungs.

00:33:35.160 You only have so much, so many hours in a day.

00:33:37.140 You only have so much energy that you can put into anything.

00:33:40.220 And if you're putting that energy rather than, than adding pressure to get some type of, of

00:33:48.300 explanation to get to the truth, which we have a much better shot of getting at than say

00:33:53.440 in the JFK assassination or something like that, we got lots of different camera angles and lots of

00:33:59.140 different brilliant people on online who can start piecing things together.

00:34:02.460 But instead you're using that energy to go after a wage worker to get their life ruined

00:34:08.700 because they said something that offended you.

00:34:11.500 I just, I, I just hate that stuff. 0.96

00:34:13.540 I think it's, it's, it's gross and horrible.

00:34:16.000 It, uh, it feeds into the worst instincts in people to start celebrating, ruining somebody's

00:34:22.900 life over what, who, who even knows what the situation is with this person.

00:34:27.400 Somebody a little bit unbalanced who said a crazy thing who works at home Depot.

00:34:31.680 You want to get them ruined.

00:34:33.500 And you don't think that's like bad for you.

00:34:36.060 You don't think that's bad for your soul to be doing that to other people.

00:34:39.020 And you can, you can sit here and rationalize all day about how the left would do this to

00:34:45.240 you.

00:34:46.120 And so therefore it's okay to go do this to other people. 1.00

00:34:50.000 Bullshit. 1.00

00:34:50.640 You're rationalizing away this, this nonsense, and you're not doing it to the left. 1.00

00:34:55.780 You're doing it to some lady who worked at home Depot. 1.00

00:34:58.880 It's just, I, I hate it. 1.00

00:35:00.660 It's stupid. 1.00

00:35:01.760 It's, it's, it's you becoming everything that you claimed you hated and you claimed you 1.00

00:35:07.340 were like rising up against.

00:35:09.960 I just think it's terrible.

00:35:11.420 And it's, uh, I don't, I don't care.

00:35:13.520 Like I don't support anybody losing their social media over anything.

00:35:17.320 I don't care what it was. 0.97

00:35:18.240 I don't care how fucked up the, the comment was, even if it's something like celebrating 0.98

00:35:24.460 after somebody dies or something like that, you, you're either on the side of free speech 0.99

00:35:29.940 or you're not.

00:35:30.520 Uh, and I, I'm going to myself be on that side.

00:35:34.320 So I don't care.

00:35:35.460 I'm not for tech censorship when it was, uh, right wingers who I disagreed with.

00:35:39.580 I'm not for tech censorship when it's left wingers who I disagree with. 0.98

00:35:42.220 And I'm not for getting people fired from wage hourly wage jobs for having a fucked up 0.90

00:35:49.440 political take. 0.99

00:35:50.560 Screw all that, man.

00:35:51.920 Just awful.

00:35:52.860 So, yeah, I think that, uh, I think that, uh, sums it up pretty, pretty eloquently, pretty

00:36:02.160 succinctly.

00:36:02.720 What are your, what's your take on that?

00:36:05.120 Well, if cancel culture is bad, if it's wrong and right wingers have felt it, then it's wrong

00:36:12.560 no matter where it happens and who it happens to.

00:36:15.980 So if we're changing the culture, then we shouldn't be participating in the thing we want to change.

00:36:26.880 If you don't want to happen to agree, like it's that simple.

00:36:31.660 I agree.

00:36:32.540 And I'm going to put on, maybe this will be the, uh, contentious, uh, little last, uh, topic.

00:36:40.300 We, we end this on could, could take a while.

00:36:42.640 I don't know.

00:36:42.960 Um, I'm going to put my Christopher Rufo hat on and say, now, remember, I don't, I agree

00:36:49.320 with you.

00:36:49.700 I agree with this myth here.

00:36:50.600 I think cancel culture is wrong regardless.

00:36:54.680 However, if you're a, and we aren't this, but if you are a right wing, um, think tank or

00:37:04.380 organization or politician, and you see, uh, the, the left having done this and gotten

00:37:11.260 away with it for years and having pretty stunningly successful results in, uh, you know, establishing

00:37:17.620 control over many, uh, political, social, corporate institutions, do you not sit back

00:37:24.740 and say, well, you know what, if this is the game and this is how you win, then even though

00:37:31.860 it's, it goes against our principles, this is, this is what we have to do.

00:37:35.060 The, the, uh, the fact that we could win and reestablish control of these institutions

00:37:41.880 that we lost and start to run them better and more in line with our principles, you

00:37:45.400 know, does, do the ends justify the means basically thought, well, you can, and I love

00:37:52.760 Christopher Rufo, but I'm just, you know, that's how he would approach it.

00:37:56.200 I kind of justify it, but depending on how you word it, it, it sounds more logical than

00:38:01.060 others.

00:38:01.280 Like, well, to create a society without cancel culture, we must first cancel those who are 1.00

00:38:07.340 propagating the cancel culture so we can establish a cancel free culture under our own terms.

00:38:14.740 So it's like, if you word it like that, then it's not a savory, but in the same way, I, I

00:38:23.960 I've seen a few, few commenters mentioned that since the institution control, institutional

00:38:33.940 control is in the left's hands right now until the institutions are revised and or reestablished

00:38:44.740 with more of a mix of more than a single ideology and more than a single, like there's more

00:38:53.200 representation of people on all stripes of political leanings until that happens.

00:38:58.820 And they have the means to play dirty.

00:39:03.900 They're saying that you'll keep, you, you will keep on losing.

00:39:07.380 They, the amount of power that they wield is disproportionate and they will maintain that

00:39:11.840 power unless you fight with whatever extra power you have to be able to, um, to fight

00:39:20.640 with.

00:39:20.960 So I can understand the balance, right?

00:39:24.000 Yeah.

00:39:25.500 But yeah, I think there's merit to it, but it's, it's sort of like, it's sort of like

00:39:29.520 what Smith said where he's like, you know, this, like, this isn't good for your soul,

00:39:35.520 you know, like maybe, maybe it's effective, but as a long-term strategy, I don't think it

00:39:39.600 is.

00:39:39.940 And this is where you, this is where you shift.

00:39:43.460 I think we're, you know, ethically you have to shift from a, uh, you know, utilitarian mindset

00:39:48.300 to more of a deontological one where you say, listen, like, just like you said, do you want

00:39:53.540 to establish a society where, um, where a high trust society, we, we believe in our institutions.

00:39:59.580 We, we believe that people act, you know, people in, uh, positions of power act generally in

00:40:05.120 good faith.

00:40:05.680 Uh, well then it's, it's pretty hard to go back from, okay, but how did you get here?

00:40:12.360 You know, that old, there's a, there's a saying in the, uh, in the dating scene, James, where

00:40:19.000 they say if, and this applies to he or her, but in our case, if she'll cheat with you, she'll 0.98

00:40:24.800 cheat on you.

00:40:26.800 And so maybe that's a similar thing here.

00:40:29.140 How do you, you know, if you have a bunch of politicians or a bunch of, you know, political

00:40:33.120 influencers who have gotten there through unsavory means, can you ever really trust

00:40:38.940 that, you know, if they, if they won and they got, they got into the positions of power that

00:40:43.160 they wanted, can you trust that now, no, actually now we are working in, you know, we are being

00:40:48.860 forthright and we are working in everyone's best interest now.

00:40:51.680 We're not lying anymore.

00:40:52.640 We're not canceling anymore.

00:40:54.680 Yeah.

00:40:55.100 Where does the checks and balance exist in this scenario of like, this is where, if you go

00:40:59.580 to first principles of like, well, cancel culture is fundamentally a corrosive force that dissolves

00:41:06.440 trust and erodes away at, um, at free speech and erodes away at our democracy.

00:41:11.380 If that's the underlying principle, then that would be the balance.

00:41:16.000 But if you say, we must use whatever we can to establish, to win, so we can establish that.

00:41:22.780 And if you're already playing with those tools and you, you truly believe that you are correct

00:41:29.340 and your ideas are the correct ones and they, they must be implemented, then why would you

00:41:36.620 stop using the tools?

00:41:38.220 Where is the self-correction going to happen, uh, in this case?

00:41:41.460 So this is where like the checks and balances have to be woven in at a principle level or it

00:41:50.120 just gets thrown out along the way.

00:41:51.860 Yeah.

00:41:52.860 Yeah.

00:41:53.860 Yeah.

00:41:54.860 Like a, uh, you know, uh, a true winner, you know, like a real winner, isn't afraid of

00:41:59.400 a fair fight basically.

00:42:01.540 Yeah.

00:42:02.040 And truth should like, it should rise to the top no matter what, like if you have to force

00:42:09.620 a truth and it's not, it's not the truth.

00:42:13.620 Like it should be able to shine through and you should be able to like point at it and it

00:42:18.400 should be able to defend itself, uh, along the way.

00:42:21.180 So, um, I'm skeptical of anything that anytime, if somebody plays dirty for the right reason,

00:42:30.320 ultimately that's going to undermine, maybe not now, maybe it's a little bit later.

00:42:36.640 It's going to undermine either somebody's values or somebody's perception of your values if

00:42:43.500 you're playing that game.

00:42:45.080 Um, so ultimately it's not, it's not ideal.

00:42:51.580 I think that's a, that's a nice tidy little thought to end on.

00:42:56.380 What about you?

00:42:56.840 So I think, I think we've covered that pretty well.

00:43:00.160 I'm curious how that unfolds as well.

00:43:03.520 Yeah.

00:43:04.020 If, if we'll see more of this, um, if, because right now the temperatures are high enough that

00:43:11.380 I imagine that this one lady at Home Depot is not the only person who will say something 0.87

00:43:17.060 similar.

00:43:17.480 Or, yeah, it'll be interesting to see if it's a, um, if this is a tipping point or if

00:43:23.860 it's a, you know how people, you know how quickly people forget things online these days.

00:43:28.740 So we'll see, but, uh, yeah, this is a, this is a great one.

00:43:33.680 Yeah.

00:43:34.120 Thanks a lot for your, for your insights and for, for going along with me through this.

00:43:37.980 Yeah.

00:43:38.340 Thanks for finding those, those links.

00:43:40.700 Yeah.

00:43:41.380 Yeah.

00:43:42.640 Yeah.

00:43:43.020 Right on.

00:43:43.480 Okay.

00:43:43.720 Well, um, I've just, I've just taken over the hosting duty for me from this episode.

00:43:49.160 So I guess I will say, uh, thanks for your time.

00:43:52.300 We are co-hosts.

00:43:53.600 They, they, they, it ebbs and flows.

00:43:56.300 So, well, thanks again.

00:43:59.000 And, uh, thanks for, for everyone for listening.

00:44:01.400 Um, appreciate, uh, appreciate your time and attention and, uh, follow us on, uh, we

00:44:07.100 now have a, uh, uh, presence on Spotify.

00:44:10.600 We are slowly uploading our, uh, episodes from YouTube onto Spotify.

00:44:14.580 So I think, I think we are on Apple podcast too.

00:44:18.320 I tried to, uh, link it the other day and I think it worked, but we'll, we'll see.

00:44:22.940 It takes a little bit of time to upload on the backend, but yeah, we'll be on the,

00:44:26.300 uh, on the streaming platforms, uh, YouTube rumble, everything else.

00:44:30.840 Yeah.

00:44:30.860 Rum rumble for anytime we, we, we talk about medical misinformation will be on rumble for

00:44:36.760 those, for those episodes.

00:44:39.060 Anytime we, we fail to recall our, uh, our reeducation.

00:44:43.600 Yep.

00:44:45.280 All right.

00:44:45.820 Thanks James.

00:44:46.380 Appreciate us.

00:44:46.900 Always there.

00:44:48.220 Thank you.

00:44:48.920 Take care.

00:44:49.280 We'll see you in the next one.

00:44:56.300 Take care.

00:44:57.320 Bye.

00:44:57.720 Bye.

00:44:58.520 Bye.

00:44:59.040 Bye.

00:44:59.100 Bye.

00:44:59.720 Bye.

00:45:00.420 Bye.

00:45:01.560 Bye.

00:45:01.880 Bye.

00:45:13.940 Bye.

00:45:14.860 Bye.

00:45:21.980 Bye.

00:45:23.080 Bye.

00:45:23.700 Bye.

The Critical Compass Podcast - August 02, 2024

Trump, Free Speech, & Right Wing Cancel Culture ｜ A Critical Compass Discussion

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