The Culture War - Tim Pool - August 18, 2025


NFL Is DOUBLING DOWN on Woke Messaging ft. James Klüg


Episode Stats

Length

15 minutes

Words per Minute

222.55707

Word Count

3,471

Sentence Count

3

Hate Speech Sentences

3


Summary

James Kwug joins Jemele to discuss why the NFL is still doubling down on racism in the end zone and why it s still a thing, and why we should be mad at the NFL for it. Plus, why is the NFL still doing this?


Transcript

00:00:00.640 what are we doing what are they still doing i mean maybe at this point they're just looking
00:00:04.320 for any little bit of attention trying to make headlines like oh my maybe maybe the goal is
00:00:08.720 trying to get the headline oh they're still doing this kind of thing you know what i mean like maybe
00:00:13.120 that's the goal um for a lot of these a lot of these organizations you know they are run by
00:00:17.600 professional business people and they're looking to be in the headlines so maybe this is just one
00:00:22.480 last hurrah trying to get into those headlines at least for the next four years you know what i mean
00:00:27.280 tate brown here holding it down for tim pool uh we got an interview coming up here with
00:00:31.760 james klug bringing him on to discuss all things nfl and figure out why are they still doubling down on
00:00:38.400 the woke agenda in 2025 i shouldn't even have to say woke agenda anymore why is it still a thing
00:00:44.240 well we'll get to the bottom of it this is from abc news nfl teams will again stencil messages in
00:00:48.800 the end zone the nfl is considering his on-field social so you know you love it you know we all
00:00:54.160 love this the woke crap going on in the pain here so 32 teams you get to choose from one of these
00:01:00.160 four options and racism stop hate choose love or inspire change and it takes all of us will be
00:01:07.440 stenciled in the opposite end zone for all games so i what are we doing i mean is the nfl really they're
00:01:14.080 they're doubling down on on this i mean it just feels so so juvenile and weird that we still have to
00:01:19.520 do this trump won this loss of the ballot box yeah i wanted your thoughts on uh on the nfl situation
00:01:24.800 yeah they're they're letting you choose from four great options um to put in the end zone and racism
00:01:30.320 being one of them um you know there's a lot of racists out there that are watching the nfl
00:01:34.320 and they see the paint on the end zone and they think wow i could be so much better i you know i
00:01:39.680 shouldn't i shouldn't continue down this path so um let's see here we go we got full screen that
00:01:45.200 looks good i gotta reframe this one second so anyway so i was curious yeah what your thoughts
00:01:50.000 are the options what are the i'm playing a little bit of catch up here but what are the options right
00:01:55.040 now these end racism i mean that's going to be disappointing a lot of fans you know that's
00:01:58.800 really going against kind of what they're looking for uh you know there's a lot of people on the
00:02:02.480 other side of that issue right so in this kind of national debate that we're having what are the
00:02:07.200 other options do we know yeah it was uh end racism stop hate choose love or inspire change so you have
00:02:15.840 four great options there what is this man's minor change i mean i i don't know maybe the fourth one
00:02:22.000 i i'm not really sure are people allowed to vote on this stuff the craziest thing like why are we still
00:02:27.760 doing this you know i thought project 2025 was supposed to eliminate all this like nonsense yeah
00:02:32.240 we're dealing with yeah um you know what i mean like we voted for that we voted for that change
00:02:36.880 but um yeah i dude the fact that this is still going on kind of blows my mind i think that they're
00:02:42.640 just looking for like national attention at this point because it's everything has become so much
00:02:47.440 more conservative the pendulum has has swung so much that i think they're just looking for like
00:02:52.560 donald trump's attention the attention from the the administration you know what i mean but uh
00:02:58.480 yeah i i don't know i mean i i know that um when i was going to uh philadelphia eagles game shout
00:03:03.600 out to the eagles i saw that they had like end racism on you know kind of whatever i'm not the
00:03:09.520 biggest sports expert here but um in the touchdown area basically and dude at this point like everyone
00:03:16.240 just just ignores this stuff right like i don't even know who are they doing this for right like who's
00:03:21.280 actually concerned about this stuff who actually is interested in seeing that in the uh on the field
00:03:27.360 nobody cares about this stuff i don't know what we're still doing like i i thought i thought we were
00:03:31.360 done with this apparently we're not yeah yeah there's something to uh specifically targeting
00:03:36.560 the nfl because i mean you know love it or hate it obviously there's a lot of people very critical of
00:03:40.960 americans uh fascination with professional sports and a lot of those concerns are justified but again
00:03:47.440 like i said for better for worse the nfl is an institution it is distinctly american and it is
00:03:52.720 something that is really important to like a large number of men across this country it's something
00:03:58.400 they look forward to on sundays and monday nights right there kind of seems to be a kind of a more
00:04:03.760 of a demoralization tactic but and that used to work like i remember like when the nfl first started
00:04:09.280 doing this stuff and they had like the black national anthem and stuff like that you did feel
00:04:13.840 a bit like helpless to some degree because you're like oh they're really doing this and there's like
00:04:18.320 they're gonna shove this down my throat now but now it's almost like kind of embarrassing
00:04:21.680 you're like dude why no one else is still doing this i mean like we saw pride month where none of these
00:04:26.640 you know companies change their logos or very few of them change their logos so now i don't feel
00:04:31.040 helpless i'm just kind of confused i'm like this point they're just looking for any little bit of
00:04:34.960 attention trying to make headlines like oh my maybe maybe the goal is trying to get the headline oh
00:04:39.920 they're still doing this kind of thing you know what i mean like maybe that's the goal um for a lot of
00:04:44.560 these a lot of these organizations you know they are run by professional business people and they're
00:04:49.120 looking to be in the headlines so maybe this is just one last hurrah trying to get into those
00:04:53.920 headlines at least for the next four years you know what i mean uh like that's their big focus
00:04:58.800 that's their big goal i know there's like a male cheerleader and whatnot everyone's thinking hey
00:05:03.600 we're done with that well people are also talking about it right sure so maybe that's just kind of
00:05:08.480 this last woke hurrah bs trying to be like hey we're not done with it just yet you know as they're
00:05:14.320 like fizzling out but um yeah i i don't know i mean certainly like gen z's not putting up with it they
00:05:20.560 don't they don't tolerate that that nonsense in sports and i think a lot of it's just being ignored
00:05:24.720 but uh the us one thing i will say we are a lot further ahead than a lot of other places like
00:05:31.120 dude in canada they're still doing like land recognition right they might be doing it in uk as
00:05:35.120 well i mean that stuff is so over the top and so occupied roman land oh it's just so gross dude it's
00:05:41.600 like what do you guys you're like this is ridiculous yeah but um so at least we're further ahead on that
00:05:46.560 stuff but yeah i don't know i it's a mixture of me wanting to say everyone's ignoring it like the
00:05:52.640 people at home and that go to the games are ignoring it but it's still right now making headlines
00:05:58.320 just because everything's swinging so much more to the right you know what i mean yeah yeah i mean
00:06:03.280 that's i think that's a big aspect of what's going on is the nfl is so big and it takes a lot for
00:06:10.320 uh the average nfl fan to be dissuaded to not tune in to watch and the nfl knows that and so i think
00:06:16.160 that's why they feel like they can push the envelope a little more like you said to grab headlines
00:06:20.000 because they know that that audience isn't going anywhere because they can i mean the amount of
00:06:23.800 crap they put their audience through during covid and they didn't shake them so it's one of those
00:06:29.680 things like there are certain um companies with certain audiences that you can put pressure on and
00:06:36.000 you can actually cancel right we saw that with bob bud light like who was their clientele right it was
00:06:40.480 college students they didn't want to do this whole trans woke gross stuff that was a successful boycott
00:06:45.440 because they were out of their realm right their their audience said absolutely not well nfl is super
00:06:51.040 mixed and people are so dedicated to it like i have a ton of friends dude um what's the sunday red zone
00:06:57.040 right yeah uh red zone is like a religious experience to them right and i know that sounds kind of
00:07:02.640 pathetic but like you know they they're obsessed with it they love it they absolutely it's every
00:07:07.200 single sunday they look forward to it right and so kind of going on what you were saying nfl's basically
00:07:14.000 at a point where they could just smack somebody across the face over and over again calling fat
00:07:18.480 calling ugly and they're still gonna be like well i'm still gonna watch the games dude i don't even
00:07:21.920 care people do not care at this point they will literally tolerate anything nfl knows that but within
00:07:28.000 reason right like maybe they have one last hurrah of a lot of woke nonsense over the next three years
00:07:34.560 or so if i were to guess i think it's going to be calming down because people really just don't care
00:07:39.520 about it mm-hmm yeah i mean that really is the thing is the national environment has changed so much
00:07:44.240 but yeah like i remember during code i mean we had the kaepernick thing and nfl fans didn't really
00:07:49.200 know how to react so they were just like oh he's not a good quarterback like that was their problem with
00:07:53.840 them um and then you had like even like nascar like i remember nascar was getting crazy during uh
00:08:00.960 like covid where they had like the guy you know larping like there was like the 50s like there was
00:08:05.360 a noose in his garage or whatever and like that was like a whole thing and it was the garage pull down
00:08:11.360 dude they were looking for it anywhere they were looking for it anywhere so we've definitely gone away
00:08:15.840 from that right we've definitely gone away from that we're like didn't kaepernick just have his uh
00:08:20.480 his new docu-series for everyone that doesn't know his story which is like three people maybe
00:08:25.600 tops uh they had that canceled you know it's just like nobody cares bro yeah you know yeah yeah the
00:08:33.040 national i mean another indication you can tell the national environment has changed because college
00:08:36.400 football is getting so popular and it's like i to a degree i think a lot of football fans have i mean
00:08:42.080 i don't know what the tv numbers look like but a lot of at least anecdotally a lot of guys i know
00:08:46.160 younger guys prefer college football to the nfl because college football seems to celebrate um
00:08:52.560 a lot of aspects of american culture that make us great that the nfl's abandoned i mean for one it's
00:08:57.040 just like vitality and youthfulness and and just like love for the game because like the nfl it's
00:09:03.360 there's just kind of a degree of coldness because there's so much money involved and everything i
00:09:07.040 know college football is getting pretty bad at the nil stuff but um college football it still feels
00:09:11.840 like to a degree the players actually care about the program that they're playing for it means a
00:09:15.840 little bit more um so i think that's a really interesting there's this like hardcore uh
00:09:21.440 meritocratic aspect of it as well where it's like who's gonna get into the nfl you know what i mean
00:09:26.480 like there's that energy as well there's you representing your tribe your school your college
00:09:31.760 that's a really big deal too i know there's similarities there with nfl and whatnot but yeah
00:09:35.360 i think to a certain degree when it comes to or probably an extreme degree when it comes to
00:09:39.840 college football as well i mean dude it's it's do or die for a lot of these kids like they've worked
00:09:44.240 their entire lives they're going for the nfl and that's all that matters you know all that other
00:09:48.480 nonsense doesn't freaking matter that they're not safe you know they're not safe in their job or
00:09:54.240 anything it's it's hey you get injured you lose that possibility of getting in the nfl there's none
00:09:59.840 of that you know nonsense there's no room for nonsense when it comes to that you know yeah yeah
00:10:05.440 exactly um so i think overall like and we're seeing with the cheerleader obviously people are
00:10:10.080 really angry um but there's this general sense of the culture and america moving to the right
00:10:14.320 because you are seeing some there are still some holdovers people especially around the immigration
00:10:19.360 thing get spooked pretty easily um you're seeing a lot of podcasters come out and like uh basically
00:10:24.720 counter signal the trump administration's immigration policy so it's like okay yes i mean we should be happy
00:10:32.080 that the overton window has moved to the right like sydney sweeney is literally going on tv and he's like
00:10:36.240 i have blonde hair and blue eyes it's the best and that's like normal now and it's like okay wow this
00:10:40.400 really is this really is trump's america it's getting wacky and wild out here um you know no
00:10:45.040 we knew we were back when white people started showing up back in in ads we were we knew there
00:10:49.760 was a change going on you know like actually attracted people as well just in general yeah
00:10:54.480 are back in ads we knew we were back as for the as for the uh male cheerleader thing i mean like
00:10:59.280 haven't there always been there's always been male cheerleaders but they're there for like a supportive kind
00:11:04.720 of uh position in cheerleading right they do the lifting they do all that stuff they're pretty big
00:11:09.600 guys yeah usually i'm pretty sure they're straight dudes too like they're just big guys that yeah that
00:11:15.120 uh that throw up the flyers and uh in this case we have a guy like dancing like a girl again project
00:11:21.040 2025 we voted against this stuff go hit the oil rigs get out of here you know so we're not tolerating
00:11:27.040 that uh but i think that is another thing where it's like you know people are doing these little
00:11:31.120 things here and there for okay well this is the dominant kind of culture right now not saying that
00:11:37.120 you know the woke people are saying oh woke is dead oh it's totally gone no like you know these
00:11:41.520 psychopaths still control every single major institution in the united states but culturally
00:11:45.920 there has been a pretty significant shift especially with you know gen z gen alpha like they don't really
00:11:51.920 put up with this stuff so i still think like i said they're doing a lot of that stuff for to grasp
00:11:56.720 fond of those headlines but um yeah what were you saying about the immigration aspect uh podcasters
00:12:02.240 going back on oh my gosh mass deportations are actually happening this is spooky let's give the
00:12:07.200 left everything they want is that what you're talking about yeah yeah yeah i mean i don't want to name
00:12:10.480 names per se but yeah you're seeing people uh yeah they're like wait what about my gardener no no i
00:12:15.440 needed him oh my god yeah yeah dude what are we going to do without exploiting the cheap illegal
00:12:22.320 labor uh i i have these conversations on the street all the time with people because like that's
00:12:26.880 obviously the biggest thing that stands out for the trump administration and when people are like
00:12:30.560 criticizing it that's the thing that they bring up right oh my god masked dangerous guys kidnapping
00:12:35.920 people but we kind of figured this would be the case uh going into the election like you know
00:12:41.360 everyone knew that holy crap we we just opened the floodgates we allow millions of people in uh
00:12:47.040 americans get killed you have a record-breaking human trafficking crisis sex trafficking crisis
00:12:52.000 child trafficking crisis i mean the list goes on and on there's no positives to this we knew though
00:12:57.200 once the mass deportations would start the only goal for the media right now basically is hey capture
00:13:03.040 everything bad that is happening with ice and we need to make it every single little instance a
00:13:08.080 headline so if somebody's resisting arrest that goes cnn mainstream news oh my god look they're being
00:13:13.760 aggressive with this illegal immigrant you know and so that constant footage is getting a lot of
00:13:18.160 people to kind of buckle similar to the pressure that people were facing maybe in like 2020 with posting
00:13:23.680 a black square it's kind of that similar vibe where it's like oh we need to keep bombarding you with
00:13:28.880 look at this poor little you know jose he's being apprehended turns out he like you know played
00:13:34.400 around with children and none of us knew that but you figure that out three days later
00:13:37.600 nobody follows up and understands it so you end up with a bunch of ignorant people that are just
00:13:42.240 super upset and that includes podcasters you know like i'm not intelligent just because you put a
00:13:46.960 mic up to my mouth yeah well i mean i i agree with the sentiment we do need to uh start putting tariffs
00:13:52.960 on podcasting equipment this is getting a little out of control exhibit a right here i mean what like
00:13:57.920 you know but uh well dude thanks for jumping in it was the last second hot swap but i really
00:14:02.080 appreciate it where can uh people find you at yeah you guys can find me at youtube.com
00:14:06.240 slash james klug or james klug on instagram real james klug on everything else awesome dude well
00:14:11.520 i appreciate it well uh hopefully we can get an extended chat sometimes we get a full full interview
00:14:15.200 in so appreciate it man have a good rest of your day let's do it thanks yep all righty guys well uh
00:14:21.920 that was james klug he uh came in saved the day held it down gave us some really good correct takes
00:14:28.160 on the nfl uh just want to thank you guys for uh joining me for this hour of the rumble live show
00:14:34.800 um i don't know do it it's been a little up in the air recently with the uh rumble
00:14:39.520 um lineup whoever comes after us i'm not entirely sure um maybe surge i'm not sure now no yeah we don't
00:14:45.200 know so we would love to raid but we don't know we don't know who we don't know what to do so uh
00:14:50.000 anyway yeah thank you for uh hanging out hopefully we can get tim back soon really hope so um
00:14:55.440 you tim yeah we need tim he's the goat i mean his name's in the channel name i mean what do we
00:14:59.600 it's not take cast it's tim cast so uh yeah we need tim back uh just pray for him you know he's
00:15:04.160 he's worked a lot he's you know grinding so we'll get him back here soon i'm optimistic
00:15:08.080 thanks to producer surge for holding it down yo uh you can find me on x and instagram at real tape brown
00:15:15.440 uh come hang out maybe send me what you think should be in the nfl end zone uh i think there should
00:15:20.480 be an other option they should let you vote and we can put whatever we want in the end zone i think
00:15:23.920 that'd be a lot of fun um we can have some naughty words so uh anyway yeah thank you for hanging out
00:15:30.080 uh enjoy the rest of your day and we'll see you tonight for tim cast irl at 8 p.m bye