The Glenn Beck Program - Best of The Program ｜ Guests： Tristan Harris & Danielle Rabkin ｜ 9⧸11⧸20

00:00:00.000 Hello America and welcome to the Glenn Beck Program. Today, a lot on our plate. It revolves

00:00:04.580 around 9-11, who we were and who we are. What are the problems? Why are we so divided? We look

00:00:12.280 at a new documentary that is out, The Social Dilemma. It's a movie that you should watch

00:00:18.500 with your kids from Netflix this weekend. It's a powerful, powerful documentary with the people

00:00:25.620 who invented the thumbs up button on Facebook, the people who brought advertising to the

00:00:33.560 internet, and they explain how you're being watched, monitored, how the numbers are being

00:00:39.000 crunched, and how we're actually being divided intentionally, no matter what Zuckerberg or

00:00:46.180 anybody says, oh no, we're trying to stop it. No, you're not. No, you're not. Because your

00:00:49.800 whole model is built on that. We have that and so much more. You don't want to miss a

00:00:55.320 second of today's show, the Glenn Beck Program.

00:01:04.440 You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck Program.

00:01:11.940 I want to make a small correction. Earlier, I was telling you about the words of Osama bin

00:01:17.780 Laden's I said sister, it's actually niece. She wrote an open letter to America. And I

00:01:24.280 want to read more of it because I find this amazing. Now, this is Osama bin Laden's niece.

00:01:31.560 The bin Laden family, you know, they are very successful. Osama bin Laden was really the black 1.00

00:01:39.940 sheep of the family. I don't know if I would still carry around the bin Laden name myself,

00:01:47.100 but that's such a Western perspective. But she's written this letter and she lives in Switzerland.

00:01:54.000 She is known in Switzerland as somebody who wears a MAGA hat all the time. So she's wearing really

00:02:02.460 yeah, this letter says in full with President Trump at America's helm. She stands a chance of

00:02:10.040 restoring her principles, pride, independence and true place in the world as a beacon for liberty and

00:02:15.860 hope for all. To me, this is what makes America great again. Looking back at your country's foundation

00:02:23.160 and preserving what truly made it great, but also knowing that the best is yet to come.

00:02:28.660 All of the achievements will be torpedoed with a bin Laden Harris presidency and the dream of 1.00

00:02:36.540 America's enemies to see her weak and on her knees will be fulfilled. Probably a Biden Harris 0.94

00:02:42.100 presidency, right? Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. Yeah. Biden Harris. She said, stand for your flag and your

00:02:49.740 anthem. Defend your fist, your history. Don't relent in the face of those who seek to rewrite it and serve

00:02:55.040 their narrative and justify the destruction of your nation. You have so much to cherish and protect

00:03:00.700 for your sake and ours. She said, Trump has made the world a safer place since taking office.

00:03:07.640 I'm quoting to name a few achievements. He stood up to China. He's kept us out of new wars, 0.93

00:03:13.600 made Europe comply with their NATO requirements, solidified ties with Israel, overturned the disastrous 0.80

00:03:20.420 Iran deal, obliterated ISIS, took down other key terrorists and facilitated a historic peace deal

00:03:28.160 between Israel and the UAE. Now, if anybody in the media would ever report this story, they'd say,

00:03:34.420 yeah, well, look, of course, Osama bin Laden's niece, his family is all for Donald Trump. What is she 0.81

00:03:41.220 saying here? She's saying obliterated ISIS, got out of the Iran deal, has ties with Israel,

00:03:48.980 made historic peace with Israel. And that doesn't sound like her brother at all. I mean, her uncle.

00:03:58.000 She said his administration has also made Christian persecution worldwide a top priority with the

00:04:03.160 State Department instituting the ministerial to advance religious freedom, the first of its kind.

00:04:11.260 Trump shows that he protects America and us in Europe by extension from foreign threats by

00:04:17.980 obliterating the terrorists at the root before they get a chance to strike.

00:04:23.280 Wow. I mean, it's amazing. That could have come from Kayleigh McEnany.

00:04:26.220 Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:04:27.360 It's a, it's bin Laden's niece.

00:04:30.440 Yeah. Amazing. Yeah. It's really amazing. And I, I honestly, I, I, I want to try to reach out to,

00:04:37.480 to, you know, liberals and Democrats, not progressive Marxists, but liberals,

00:04:45.200 people who, who believe in the constitution. They just may believe in a bigger welfare state than,

00:04:52.540 you know, a typical conservative. Um, somebody that feels the country is in trouble and you don't

00:04:59.240 like Donald Trump. I get it. I get it. And even if we vote differently, I get it, but I, I, we,

00:05:06.380 we have to have conversations, uh, with liberals and with Democrats and, and just say, how are we

00:05:15.520 missing each other on this one? How are we? Because the, the, the country is, is being sold down the

00:05:23.460 river. I can't believe it's only conservatives that still believe in the flag and the military.

00:05:31.860 Did, did you hear what happened in California? In California? I think this is, this is who we are.

00:05:40.840 300 campers were out in one of the state parks and they were trapped by the fire and the California

00:05:49.320 fire said, there's no hope. We can't get in. It's way too dangerous. There's no way for us to rescue

00:05:57.420 you guys. 300, 300 campers. And they said, jump in the lake to survive. You've got to just go into

00:06:05.160 the lake, put your head underwater. It's the only way you guys are going to make it. Well, then army

00:06:11.040 pilots found out about it. And so the U S military said, we'll go in. California fire said it was too

00:06:18.420 dangerous. The, the military crews go in. There was zero visibility in the Canyon, zero visibility.

00:06:30.660 The, uh, the overload with people on these helicopters was also really, really dangerous.

00:06:38.720 Are people going to overload it? Is it going to crash in the, none of it happened. They went in

00:06:44.440 with zero visibility. They went to the lake and they rescued 300 people. They went in

00:06:51.100 and then they got survivors and went out and then went back in again, got more survivors and got out.

00:06:59.180 This is who we are. We are people that we don't care. They didn't card people who you voting for.

00:07:06.320 They didn't care. They didn't care. We're Americans. And we have such little pride right now that we're

00:07:15.080 not even talking about the heroes like these guys, absolute heroes that remembered we're all Americans

00:07:24.060 and Americans don't leave Americans behind. We don't say, Oh, it's too dangerous. I don't, I don't hold this

00:07:31.960 against the fire. You know, the California fire because they don't have military experience and

00:07:38.440 helos like the federal government does. So I'm not saying anything bad. I'm not calling the

00:07:43.620 firefighters anything bad. I'm just saying we do things in America. We do things. We've spent a lot

00:07:51.180 of time, a lot of money, and we have a lot of, we've, we've shed a lot of blood to be able to do

00:07:57.360 amazing things. Can we step and just recognize it for a minute?

00:08:04.720 That's a great idea. I mean, I kept coming back to that thought today as, as we sit here on 9-11

00:08:09.820 and the 19th anniversary, all this, uh, anti-cop stuff we've been taking in lately is it puts kind

00:08:17.000 of puts you in a different place on that, doesn't it? And obviously I think this audience is, you know,

00:08:21.080 generally pro police and doesn't put up with that nonsense, but it's been so commonplace

00:08:25.200 over the past few months to just basically say all cops are bad, all cops, A-C-A-B.

00:08:30.600 And you, and you know what?

00:08:31.420 That's not what that stands for.

00:08:32.600 We made the other, we, we went too far the other way on September 11th. We said all cops are good.

00:08:39.760 No, not all cops are good. Not all cops are bad. Cops, uh, military, everything. It's a section

00:08:49.000 of society. All cops are us. They're us. Some are good. Some are bad. You root out the bad ones

00:08:57.800 and you elevate the good ones. We're not doing that anymore. Instead. It's just all cops are bad.

00:09:03.640 All cops. I mean, remember people all over the country were wearing like NYPD t-shirts and hats.

00:09:10.720 Couldn't keep them in stock. Yeah. And now we're told they're just these evil people that basically

00:09:17.020 just show up everywhere and just try to kill minorities. Well, now people are losing their

00:09:21.580 job just for supporting cops online. What? Yeah. Uh, there's been a couple of professors

00:09:27.920 who have said good things about, uh, police officers and got fired for it. Well, wow. It's,

00:09:35.980 have we come that far that you can't even say anything good about police? You can't, uh, I remember

00:09:43.360 the, the 4th of July celebrations that, that, uh, people were pissed off about. You can't celebrate

00:09:48.720 the nation anymore. Uh, it's no, no, no. I'm saying no. Yet I know you believe this too. No,

00:09:55.420 not on my watch, right? Not on my watch. And it's look next week. We are going to tell you an outline

00:10:04.600 how America could very well be in civil war by Christmas. Uh, it is being plotted and planned

00:10:12.660 and either side could start it. The crazy right wing, uh, groups, which I think there's maybe

00:10:19.720 12 members of. Um, but they are, they are just as interested in destroying America. I mean, 0.54

00:10:27.600 Richard Spencer is a socialist. So he is just as in, uh, motivated to destroy America as the far

00:10:37.580 left is. So, uh, there are all kinds of people and all it needs is just a little shove, but we have

00:10:48.140 got to find the people who we don't agree with that we can actually talk to and say, we've got to keep

00:10:56.580 our heads. We've got to keep our heads and remember who we are. Eric Weinstein, you know,

00:11:03.680 he is, right? He's the lefty professor up in Oregon. That was, I mean, he's as left as they come.

00:11:11.340 He tweeted after the fire, uh, story. He tweeted, I miss heroic official behavior.

00:11:18.140 I miss heroic official behavior. I also miss rule breaking for the greater good.

00:11:26.580 Good. Can you imagine being an abandoned, abandoned in a lake

00:11:32.400 and seeing a chopper with an American flag coming to pick you up, highlight, uh, piloted

00:11:40.360 by actual Americans who remember what the hell that even means rather than whatever it is that's

00:11:47.980 tearing us apart. That should be our goal. I, I call on you to reflect on the last 19 years

00:12:03.400 and where we were and who we were and what we knew to be true.

00:12:09.160 And then look at what has torn us apart. And are there things with people that you don't vote the

00:12:19.720 same way? Are there neighbors that are just afraid, just as afraid of talking to you as you might be to

00:12:26.760 them because they think you're an extremist that's just going to yell at them or you think they're an

00:12:33.480 extremist is just going to yell at you. Well, some of them might, but we're all feeling how close we

00:12:41.460 are to the edge. Reach out to anybody you think, and don't try to win. Just say, we got to keep our

00:12:48.740 heads. I don't care how you vote. We got to keep our heads because if it's a fair election, we'll be okay.

00:12:56.980 But the way this is being set up, it is being set up to cause people on both sides to feel like it was

00:13:08.380 unfair. And this will be our undoing that this election will be our undoing if we don't remember

00:13:18.440 who we are. So take today to remember where we were, what we went through, how many lives have been

00:13:25.940 lost to protect this country and to save our principles and our constitution. The treasure

00:13:32.880 that we have spent and the blood that we have all spent over the last 19 years, it cannot be for not

00:13:39.860 today because we're all pissed and not talking to each other. Remember who you were on September

00:13:48.420 12th. Remember the 9-12 project. Remember who you were the next day. You were kind. You were

00:14:00.960 generous. We were in it together. Race didn't matter. Status didn't matter. Religion, politics, none of it

00:14:13.540 mattered. Because in the end, we all realized we're Americans. Find those Americans that still 0.99

00:14:22.480 remember what the hell that means.

00:14:30.360 You're listening to the best of the Glenn Beck program.

00:14:33.180 Anyone who really knows cooking understands that the tools you use are almost as important as the

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00:15:38.140 That's R-E-C-T-E-Q.com. You know, we're just talking about the difference between coming together 0.99

00:15:45.780 at 9-11 and coming together over COVID-19 and how it's not happening. There in and you know,

00:15:53.240 our guests said, well, there's a couple of reasons, uh, the masks and social distancing of

00:15:58.160 being, uh, being locked up, you know, where we're not with each other. And Stu and I were talking about,

00:16:03.240 we, we have a few new people that have joined us here on the stage. I have met them. I work with

00:16:09.000 them every day. I would not recognize them on the street if they didn't have a mask on because

00:16:13.900 they're wearing masks the whole time. And I have no idea what they look like. I mean,

00:16:19.560 you don't know people in the mask. You lose that connection. But I also seem to think there's a

00:16:25.720 big difference in our media than there was in 2000. Social media was not a thing. Uh, and that's

00:16:33.780 ever so destructive. Uh, and the other is we're an election. We were three years away from an election

00:16:40.720 and gee, when did that unity start going away? Hmm. About the election time. Um, all right. I want to

00:16:48.460 talk a little bit about, uh, what's happening in California in California. You know, we know the

00:16:55.420 Nancy Pelosi, uh, you know, blow my hair out, uh, scandal where she just called up a salon and said, 1.00

00:17:04.060 Hey, I need you to, you know, blow dry my hair and, and, uh, make me look nice. And the owner of the

00:17:10.720 salon was so upset because wait a minute, I can't open my salon, but you can just come in and get a

00:17:17.300 haircut. And we've got another situation like that. This is, uh, Danielle Rabkin. She is the owner of 0.99

00:17:25.200 the CrossFit Golden Gate gym. And I want you to hear her story. She's got this unbelievable gym

00:17:32.740 where she could social distance people by 30 feet and have them wear masks. She's not allowed to open, 0.73

00:17:40.900 but the state has opened the state gyms. Welcome to the program, Danielle.

00:17:49.060 Good morning.

00:17:50.480 So tell me, tell me what's happening in San Francisco.

00:17:56.500 It's been pretty unbelievable. It's been the hardest six months of my life. Uh, we have been

00:18:05.900 pretty closed still. I don't know that the rest of the country realizes we're almost still entirely

00:18:12.940 on lockdown. The only things open are outdoor dining, indoor retail. I think that's pretty much

00:18:19.800 it. Um, San Francisco has incredible COVID metrics. When I checked yesterday morning, we only had 88

00:18:27.280 COVID deaths since March. We have never had more than 38 COVID ICU patients at a time since day one.

00:18:35.880 Our hospitals were so empty in the early days waiting for the surge that never came, which is

00:18:41.220 wonderful, but we were cutting back nursing hours, doctors shifts, giving salary cuts because hospitals

00:18:48.920 were bleeding money. So we've been in really good shape, uh, to flatten the curve and somewhere along

00:18:55.400 the line, flattening the curve turned into flattening the local economy because we've just kept everything

00:19:01.340 closed. Um, and, uh, I, my personal life and livelihood has just been completely burned to the ground. I've spent

00:19:11.040 over eight years building this business and I'm watching it just completely fall apart before my eyes. Uh, San 1.00

00:19:18.300 Francisco has experienced a mass exodus. People are leaving left and right. If they're going to be locked down, they want

00:19:23.660 more space. They want cheaper rent, but as other parts of the country continue to open up, why do people

00:19:29.780 want to be here? Of course they don't. Uh, tech can work remote. Uh, there's no reason to stay somewhere

00:19:36.180 where you can't get a haircut or go to the gym. Um, you know, it's just been so extremely frustrating.

00:19:43.520 Even the Tony Fauci's of the world say that prolonged closures will cause irreparable damage. So it's just

00:19:50.940 been mind blowing to me why this has been going on. Okay. So, so tell me first, the, the state has

00:19:57.920 opened their gyms. Are these, are these publicly financed gyms or are these gyms for state workers and city

00:20:05.720 workers? These are publicly financed taxpayer dollars. So I know with certainty that at the

00:20:13.820 end of the, sorry, at the end of June, police station gyms were closed. Uh, a good friend of

00:20:18.620 mine is a police officer. Um, and I know that his gym was shut. So I really hesitated to build an outdoor

00:20:27.100 gym in my neighborhood. The streets are not clean here. Uh, the air is smoky. Uh, it's just not a great

00:20:33.920 setup for outdoor activity, which is what we're moving towards. But I finally bit the bullet and

00:20:38.540 did it. And recently I saw a couple of police officers at the end of my block. And I'm thinking,

00:20:42.760 all right, I know that their gym is shut. I got this. I'm going to get them to come work out on

00:20:46.900 at my outdoor gym with me. So two weeks ago, I go up to them and I chit chatting and I say,

00:20:53.700 Hey, what are you guys doing for workouts these days? And they tell me that their station gym has

00:20:57.760 reopened and I about fell over. I couldn't believe it. Here I am suffering with prolonged

00:21:03.740 closure. And I find out that their gym has reopened. So I immediately reach out to a friend

00:21:09.140 of mine who, uh, is an attorney and works out of a courthouse in the city. And I say,

00:21:17.340 does this set a precedent for me? What does this mean? They've told me Cal OSHA has inspected

00:21:21.660 their gyms. Can I get a Cal OSHA inspection? And he says, Oh yeah, I know that paralegals have

00:21:27.780 been working out at the hall of justice. And I couldn't believe it. Glenn takes me everything

00:21:32.660 to not drop 20 F bombs right now. I could not believe it here. I am business owners like me

00:21:39.820 still shut and paralegals are working out at indoor gyms funded by taxpayer dollars.

00:21:45.920 So I actually go down to the hall of justice to check out these gyms. And I see notices on the door 0.94

00:21:51.080 saying that they've been reopened since July 1st, limited occupancy, new COVID rules,

00:21:57.260 new sign-in sheets. So, uh, we send it to the press. Um, I was trying to reach out through a city

00:22:04.940 attorney, through my supervisor's office, through the office of economic workforce and development.

00:22:09.580 Why is this happening? Why am I still closed? Does this mean I can reopen? Does this set a precedent

00:22:14.600 for me? Um, I want to be very clear. I don't want to see these gyms shut down,

00:22:19.860 but what are the implications for gym owners like myself? Right. Cause the PPP money, the PPP

00:22:26.500 money is long gone and it probably didn't help San Francisco. I can't even imagine what you are

00:22:32.920 paying in rent for a 4,700 square foot gym. No, you don't want to know. I know it was unbelievable

00:22:40.640 to me to see articles about people throughout the country, having windfalls with the cares act,

00:22:47.100 $600 a week. And, uh, you know, there being debate over them, uh, wanting to incentivize people to go

00:22:53.740 back to work. And I'm thinking $600 a week doesn't even pay for the rent at my one bedroom apartment.

00:22:58.080 And there are people, you know, gathering savings from that. This isn't right. San Francisco is

00:23:03.340 extremely expensive. There are businesses across the country that got the same PPP loans that we got.

00:23:10.500 They weren't ever closed. Maybe they were closed for one month and we've been closed for six months.

00:23:15.440 Where's our help. If the city wants me to stay closed, they can start paying my rent. Cause as you

00:23:20.900 said, it's not cheap. Um, I'm many, many tens of thousands of dollars in debt to my landlord now

00:23:27.180 because of this. So, so if I, if I may voice what I think some Americans may be saying, and that is

00:23:37.580 why would we pay for, why would we take my tax dollars that I'm working hard for and send them

00:23:46.280 to a state that is absolutely out of control in fire on fire, literally and figuratively,

00:23:53.640 and they're screwing their own people. I don't know why, but they're screwing their own people. And I, 0.94

00:24:00.960 I, I think Americans really feel for people who, um, are trapped in this, but it's kind of like,

00:24:10.600 you know, this is what everybody in San Francisco voted for.

00:24:15.040 I get it. And I've heard that a lot, but the reality of the situation is that small business

00:24:19.680 owners like myself, we are where we are. People voted in who they voted in. This is the situation now

00:24:27.340 and we need help. Uh, I've never admittedly, I have not followed local politics and that's my own

00:24:35.480 fault. And you sure as well better believe it's a learning experience, but the decision makers right

00:24:42.520 now aren't just the local politicians. It's the department of public health. And well, I don't know

00:24:48.840 how your department of public health can say that working outside and working out outside is safer for

00:24:55.180 you. I mean, the entire, the entire state is on fire. Smoke has to be, I mean, California wildfire

00:25:02.380 smoke was at my home in Idaho last weekend, Idaho. It's got to be in San Francisco.

00:25:10.700 Glenn, I completely agree with you. And I've been trying to push that up the chain for weeks.

00:25:15.180 I have human feces on the sidewalk next to my outdoor gym. We are dealing with extremely poor

00:25:21.520 air quality. I've been trying to push for an indoor reopening for a very long time. And my voice just

00:25:27.660 isn't loud enough. Um, and an interesting turn of events, um, two weeks ago, of course, as soon as

00:25:33.640 I found out about these courthouse gyms reopening, uh, you know, we've been pushing this up the chain

00:25:41.000 to supervisors, the office of economic workforce and development just yesterday, public health

00:25:47.820 officers announced that they were shutting down the city gym. And I want to be very clear. That was

00:25:53.860 not the goal, but within minutes they've announced that gyms, hair salons and tattoos can now reopen

00:26:01.300 on Monday. It is unbelievable to me. Maybe it shouldn't be so unbelievable, but it took something

00:26:07.660 like this to get it to happen. So wait, wait, wait. So they are letting you open on Monday

00:26:13.260 because of the discovery of these city gyms. They just announced yesterday that they're letting

00:26:19.500 open on Monday. Well, congratulations on that. Uh, I mean, I don't know. I mean, we're, we're living

00:26:30.940 in a time now where, uh, many of these people are rulers. They're, they're not, they're not just

00:26:39.480 politicians. They're not people that were protecting our rights and they're just rulers. And this Nancy

00:26:45.920 Pelosi thing at her, you know, hair salon, it did, are people in San Francisco waking up 0.78

00:26:52.860 and saying, wait a minute, this is, this is, or are they still just as crazy?

00:27:00.920 It's a good question. I can't answer for you, but it certainly has not felt like a democracy to me

00:27:06.780 lately. Uh, it's, it's very difficult to feel like your voice isn't heard. Um, I'm curious to

00:27:15.980 know if, if the mayor has been using these gyms, these public, these police station gyms, if her

00:27:22.340 name is in the log books, um, we put out a records request and I don't know if they'll try to keep those

00:27:28.620 names public, but I think it'll be very interesting to see if her name is, is on there between, uh,

00:27:34.340 March and September.

00:27:39.440 Danielle, I, I, I, I feel for you. I mean, I live in Texas and things are still crazy here. Not like

00:27:46.820 that, but even in Texas, uh, and there is, there is, uh, you know, when you have about 600 people in 10

00:27:55.820 days in a, in a country of 350 million dying in those 10 days, that's the last 10, I think has been

00:28:05.400 about 600 people nationwide, 350 million. And we are shutting and destroying our economy. It makes no

00:28:14.440 sense. And you have to ask yourself, what's the real agenda here? Because it, this is doing far more

00:28:21.780 damage to our children, uh, to our psyche and to our economy. People like you, I mean, how long is it

00:28:29.680 going to take for you to recover? Yeah. I don't know if I will, to be honest, and it's devastating

00:28:35.040 to me. I can tell you that San Francisco is letting the local economy burn to the ground. I don't know

00:28:42.200 that anywhere else is as severe here where reopenings can be done safely, slowly, and cautiously. They need

00:28:50.840 to start moving forward. Thank you so much, Danielle. I appreciate you, uh, speaking out. Thanks for

00:28:56.440 coming on. This is the best of the Glenn Beck program. And don't forget rate us on iTunes.

00:29:11.240 There is another, uh, uh, video or documentary out right now that is so well worth watching and

00:29:18.420 watching with your kids. Um, and it really kind of stars Tristan Harris. He's the, the best one in it.

00:29:25.020 Um, I think, uh, he's called the closest thing to Silicon that Silicon Valley has to a conscience.

00:29:31.380 He is a, uh, uh, former Google design ethicist. He is now working on the problems that are being

00:29:40.360 caused by social media. Welcome to the, um, welcome to the program. Uh, Tristan, how are you?

00:29:45.660 Glenn, it's great to be back. Thank you for having me. So in the social dilemma, I mean, it,

00:29:51.200 it is really quite clear, uh, that they are profiting off of the divide, even though they're

00:29:59.420 saying they're trying to heal us. That's exactly right. You know, I'm really concerned with the

00:30:06.680 fact that, you know, how can you do anything when our fellow countrymen disagree vehemently across

00:30:11.760 all topics that matter, right? I mean, how can you fix anything if at least half of the world

00:30:16.160 violently opposes the idea and I'll counter every strategy that you do. This film is the first time

00:30:22.120 that the, you know, the people who built some of these products, you know, the inventor of the

00:30:26.000 Facebook like button, the person who built the YouTube recommendation system, uh, the guy who brought

00:30:30.900 the advertising business model to Facebook, uh, Jaron Lanier, the father of virtual reality are on

00:30:36.560 camera saying, look, these are the harms that it's causing first to children and the problems of

00:30:41.340 addiction and the breakdown of the family that we all know that I'm sure that so many parents are

00:30:45.900 struggling with, especially in COVID times when you have your kid on zoom calls, right? I mean,

00:30:49.860 I know how, how deep this is, uh, and, and the mental health issues there, but then the second

00:30:54.580 is on the polarization. And that's what I'm really most concerned about because as you just said,

00:30:58.620 they profit from the divide because no matter what topic that there is, social media will take the

00:31:04.520 most, um, egregious and extreme and worst part of that topic and show it to your out group,

00:31:09.520 to the other side in the least charitable way, which means that we're all biased in a worse way

00:31:14.960 about each other. Right. And it's driving us crazy and it's actually killing our democracy.

00:31:19.160 Um, if we don't actually fix it. And I'm really hoping is that if enough people see this film,

00:31:24.960 we'll have a new shared truth about the breakdown of our shared truth in reality. Uh, and that's,

00:31:31.260 that's really what we're hoping for. Okay. So by the way, if you don't know what we're talking

00:31:35.380 about, it is a new movie on Netflix called the social dilemma. Uh, I think you, you break it down

00:31:42.400 really, really well. And it is very credible, um, in its approach. And because everybody who's in it,

00:31:49.840 uh, is pretty much legendary. I mean, they were there, they invented it. Um, however, the, the problem,

00:31:57.420 uh, is, and I, I mean, I, I try to listen to, well, I do, I listen to two podcasts every day,

00:32:05.180 uh, that disagree with me. I don't necessarily listen to anything that agrees with me. I read a lot,

00:32:12.120 but I read all sides and, um, I'm surprised on both sides. How many people don't know how a story was

00:32:22.760 covered by the other side? A lot, a lot of people on, let's just take on the, the right. A lot of

00:32:28.040 people say the New York times never covered that. Well, they did. They did. They may have covered it

00:32:32.540 differently. They may have covered it one day or on page 18 where the right was saying, this is a

00:32:38.520 front page story, but they did cover it. Um, and I'm shocked at how many people, uh, on both sides

00:32:47.360 don't know what the other is side is being fed. Yeah. Well, it's because, uh, as you said at the

00:32:57.100 beginning of the hour, the, um, you know, these companies profit by showing you a, your own Truman

00:33:02.940 show, your own affirming view of reality, because imagine there's two news feeds at Facebook, right?

00:33:07.180 One called the everything you believe is right feed, right? And it just shows you more and more

00:33:11.800 news from your side that basically gets you to click on it more. Right. And there's another feed

00:33:15.960 called the everything, you know, might be different than what you know, right? We're

00:33:19.460 going to show you news that like challenges your views constantly, right? You can imagine

00:33:23.020 they could easily find two different sets of stories to show you which one is going to do

00:33:27.600 better for their business model of capturing your attention. The one that you like, the one

00:33:32.740 that affirms your view of reality, the one that you like. And so the problem is each of us

00:33:36.540 have been given our own Truman show, our own reality, right? Where it's not that everything

00:33:41.520 that we're believing is wrong. We've just been seeing a tiny, tiny, tiny sliver and it's

00:33:45.580 actually infected the rest of the media because even cable news or radio news, where do they

00:33:50.400 get their news from? Well, they get their news from Twitter as well, right? So Twitter

00:33:53.840 is, is, is the basis. It's this divisive force is the basis that's feeding into all forms

00:33:59.280 of media. Uh, and it's making us all bias in a worse and worse, uh, a way. That's what

00:34:05.580 we've got to, we've got to fix that.

00:34:06.820 So we, we've talked about this many times that we don't want to get news off of Twitter

00:34:12.000 because it seems like journalists, um, are not doing real journalism. They're reacting

00:34:18.140 to Twitter.

00:34:19.640 Um, that's right. It's turned all of us into little monkeys that react, um, you know,

00:34:23.980 impulsively to the latest thing and whatever media ethics or journalism or training that

00:34:28.140 we might've had in a previous generation. That goes out the window. When I win, the faster

00:34:32.800 I make an assertion about what the other side did and I say something without, without actually

00:34:37.660 stopping and holding, because if I don't do it, the other guy will. So it's a race to

00:34:41.240 the bottom of the brainstem, a race to the immediate who can say it first, but that just

00:34:45.640 means that exponential hearsay, exponential gossip. Uh, and it doesn't lead to good sense

00:34:50.500 making, right? And if we cannot agree and it just leads to violence and, and really

00:34:54.600 escalating towards levels of violence that I think people are worried about civil war, that's

00:34:58.920 not actually productive. And by the way, our enemies are, are using this right

00:35:02.640 now, um, against us. Right. I mean, they actually want us to just sit here fighting

00:35:07.040 with each other after world war two, you know, with the big powers with nukes, you can't

00:35:11.020 actually wage a conventional war anymore. So you want to use subtler methods with plausible

00:35:15.360 deniability proxy wars. But if you're Russian, China, Iran, Turkey, or North Korea, you know,

00:35:21.720 you're not going to launch a nuke against us. Right. But you might want to take the existing

00:35:24.920 tensions and turn the enemy against itself. And that's what Sun Tzu exactly would say to do.

00:35:29.180 That's what the Chinese military strategy is. And Facebook makes it a trillion times easier.

00:35:34.360 Uh, so if I'm China, I want the, you know, the extreme right and the extreme left to proliferate

00:35:38.300 and fight each other and would be stoked about the rise of extremist groups on all sides.

00:35:42.540 So, so let me ask you, Tristan, because, because here's the problem, uh, from the right point

00:35:48.240 of view, from the conservative point of view. Um, and that is, um, we don't have any billion

00:35:55.900 dollar, hundred year old institutions like the New York times, um, uh, Fox news. A lot of

00:36:03.140 conservatives are just not even, they're not even watching Fox news anymore. They're tired of

00:36:07.400 a lot of the stuff. Um, and, uh, when you have a group of people, let's say the blaze where we,

00:36:16.140 we really not, I'm not saying all of our stories are perfect or anything else,

00:36:20.020 but we really try to look into things. And for instance, I'm saying right now about civil war.

00:36:27.220 There are people that want civil war. They do want to tear the country apart. I can tell you what

00:36:33.400 the groups are. I think they have, they are on the left, but there are also, as I said yesterday,

00:36:39.760 um, there are also people who like Richard Spencer, you think the Nazis and the white supremacists

00:36:45.780 don't want a civil war. They don't want freedom either. Um, and, and same with the outside. But

00:36:52.300 if I say what MSNBC is now saying about civil war, and they're saying that it's all coming from white

00:37:00.180 supremacy, but I say, well, yes, there might be some white supremacists that want that, but there's

00:37:05.820 also these organizations that want it. Antifa is in the street calling for the destruction of America.

00:37:11.260 America, I'm somehow or another, uh, unreasonable. How do we, how do we bridge that?

00:37:18.440 Well, this is the thing. So, you know, are there reasonable versions of each of each thing going on?

00:37:23.660 You know, are there new Patriot movements where people are learning the constitution, learning how

00:37:27.100 to do homesteading? You know, absolutely. But then there's also acceleration is orienting towards

00:37:32.100 civil war and which side is social media going to expose? They're going to take a tiny percent of

00:37:36.480 the worst side. And they're going to expose them in a statistically much bigger and greater way,

00:37:41.640 uh, of the evil parts, uh, missing the good parts to the other side. Right. And that's going to

00:37:46.660 disproportionately create a counter response by the other side that says, well, if they're going to do

00:37:51.320 that, then we're going to escalate this. And then that's also going to take the least represented,

00:37:55.280 most extreme view, uh, on say the left on Antifa. Right. And so, and I'm not saying that,

00:38:00.300 that there's, there's, there's real legitimate problems on, on, on both sides here,

00:38:04.020 but the problem is that it's selecting for the worst of us and making us hate each other.

00:38:08.400 And by the way, we're not going to get anything done as a country, uh, you know, when that happens,

00:38:12.480 I mean, and do you think that when we're sort of devolved into conflict with ourselves,

00:38:16.000 that our adversaries just sit around and, you know, handle things and drive their own

00:38:19.420 countries or they want to take advantage of it? And, you know, I think, you know, there's this line

00:38:23.620 that, you know, while we've been obsessed with protecting our physical borders, we left the digital

00:38:27.500 border wide open because if, if Russia trying to try to fly, you know, uh, a bomb or cruise

00:38:33.020 missile into the United States, we'll get shot down by the department of defense. But when they

00:38:36.980 try to fly an information missile into the United States, they're met by a Facebook algorithm that

00:38:42.280 says, yeah, exactly. Which zip code or personality do you want to target? And they make it as easy

00:38:46.440 as possible because the digital border is wide open. So they say, all of them say they're trying

00:38:53.520 to stop and suppress hatred in the division, et cetera, et cetera. So is any of that true?

00:39:00.100 Well, I think that they've, they've been very slow on waking up to these problems, Glenn. And that's

00:39:06.260 actually why I think, um, and I'm not saying this as a self promoter, I think the film is important

00:39:10.200 for this reason, because at this point, the tech companies can't just fix what all of us are

00:39:15.040 thinking and believing we're 10 years in to this social media washing machine that spread that split

00:39:20.780 us apart into these two different, almost like a, what do you call the centrifuges? You know,

00:39:24.260 you spin them around, right. And then split us apart on two completely different sides.

00:39:27.780 I think the only way to actually reverse that is to have a new cultural understanding about how this,

00:39:34.160 this, this hypnotic induction took place. And I don't mean we've each been hypnotized to believe

00:39:38.240 something is wrong. I mean, each of us have been hypnotized into these different bubbles

00:39:41.960 of reality that are not compatible with each other. And I'm really hoping that the film can actually,

00:39:47.440 again, create a shared truth about the breakdown of our shared truth. And so far, it seems to be,

00:39:52.540 you know, working really well at having people say, you know, I want to have a conversation with my

00:39:56.140 family. And the best thing, by the way, you can do if you see the film is watch it with your family

00:40:01.040 members, especially who might have different political beliefs than you. And after you watch

00:40:05.020 it, exchange, open up Facebook on both your phones and exchange your phone and look at the other

00:40:09.780 person's newsfeed. And you will be surprised that even with the same friends, because you're probably

00:40:14.260 your husband or wife or, you know, whatever, you have many similar friends, you will see a completely

00:40:18.960 different feed, which will show you, imagine if I was living in that world for the last 10 years.

00:40:24.180 Well, of course, that person would be, say, concerned about climate change because their

00:40:27.620 entire feed is so good climate change stories. Or on the other side, of course, that person would

00:40:31.740 be like, we got to do something about Black Lives Matter because they just see infinite evidence of 0.92

00:40:35.700 just people looting and rioting on the streets. Right. And that's the thing is we can't really see this

00:40:40.160 because we've been so narrowly trapped in these realities. And it really is an issue that can unite

00:40:45.160 us because the whole thing is meant to divide us.

00:40:47.400 Tristan, I'm I'm very glad that people like you exist. I've I've talked to Ray Kurzweil about

00:40:55.960 ethics in Silicon Valley for a while. He scares the hell out of me. And I had been praying for 20

00:41:06.420 years that ethicists would wake up and start to really guide these companies. I hope it's not too

00:41:12.920 late. I don't think it is. But thank you for everything that you're doing. The documentary

00:41:18.020 and you should watch it with your family. Watch it with your whole family. It's called The Social

00:41:23.580 Dilemma. It's not only going to show you how we're being divided, but it'll show you if you

00:41:29.020 aren't convinced you're being watched and spied on, boy, you will understand why and what's really

00:41:35.660 going on. It's The Social Dilemma and it's on Netflix now. Tristan, thank you so much. We'll

00:41:41.160 talk again. Thank you so much.

00:41:43.380 You bet.

The Glenn Beck Program - September 11, 2020

Best of The Program ｜ Guests： Tristan Harris & Danielle Rabkin ｜ 9⧸11⧸20

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