The Podcast of the Lotus Eaters - Christmas Pre-Record ｜ The Year of the Squirrel

00:00:00.400 Merry Christmas everyone. I hope you're having a nice day. I hope you're spending time with your family, you spoke to your friends, and you're not spending all your days on YouTube, although watching this video will be good, so I'll allow that one thing.

00:00:13.020 So what I wanted to talk about today is a weird bit of transatlantic synchronicity, and I think that on both sides of the Atlantic, both in America and the UK, much of our political discourse could be summarised by two stories, and they just so happen to be about squirrels. And I've got my resident squirrel expert with me, Carl.

00:00:32.660 I am something of a squirrel expert.

00:00:34.400 Yeah, and this is some rather unknown lore about you, is that you once had a pet squirrel.

00:00:40.620 I did. I asked my mum, because there were a couple of photos we had of me on the stairs of this house in Germany, where I used to live in Germany, feeding a hazelnut to this little red squirrel, and she can't find it, and I was gutted.

00:00:55.420 And one day, I'm sure this photo will turn up, and I'll put it out on Twitter or something like that, so people see fat me when I was 14.

00:01:03.900 I'm not even wearing a shirt in it, so it's like, God. But I'm feeding this little squirrel on the stairs, and I will put this photo out at some point just to prove I did have a pet squirrel, because basically I'd rescued it.

00:01:16.400 A friend of mine and I were walking through this particular bit of woods on the way to the north of JHQ, and we heard some rustling in the leaves, and we're like, oh, okay, what's that?

00:01:26.640 And these four baby squirrels just came out, and then we saw a big squirrel laying dead behind them.

00:01:32.720 It was like, okay, well, two plus two, I assume that's their mum. They're lost, and they came straight to us.

00:01:38.920 And so we picked one up each, and I was going to get the other ones, but then this couple came by with a dog, and that sort of chased the squirrel, the other two, off into the brush.

00:01:49.960 And so, you know, I was like, oh, okay, well, we've got these two. So me and my friend took them home. His parents wouldn't let him keep them, or keep his one, and so he brought them around to my house, and my parents were soft touches, and let us keep them both, right?

00:02:02.860 I think that's good, though. I think it's healthy to take care of animals. I think that's a good and nurturing thing to do.

00:02:10.480 Yeah, yeah. I mean, they could have had rabies, because we were in Germany, so they could have been.

00:02:15.320 Oh, I don't, I'm not too sure squirrels are carriers of it, are they?

00:02:18.260 Well, I don't know, but the point is, you know, it's a wild animal on the continent, so it actually could have had rabies, but they didn't.

00:02:23.440 They were, at least, I mean, they did bite you occasionally, so.

00:02:27.880 But they're only small squirrels.

00:02:29.260 Yeah, yeah, well, I mean, they still hurt when they bite you.

00:02:31.460 But it's when they're getting too excited about something, basically, you know, when they're hungry.

00:02:37.600 But the point being, they're actually really, really adorable little animals.

00:02:41.300 For example, when I'd come home from school, I'd close the back door, and you'd hear this boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop, as it was on the landing, and it'd run down the stairs.

00:02:50.440 I'd go into the hallway to hang up my coat, and it'd run up your leg and just run around your body, happy to see you.

00:02:55.580 And it'd be like, it lets you, like, grab, like, looking up at your face, and you'd give it strokes and stuff.

00:02:59.600 It was really, really cute.

00:03:00.820 And my mum used to have a big wax jacket, and on the inside pocket, it would sleep in the pocket.

00:03:04.920 And so it was like, you know, in the morning, you'd come down, like, pull open the jacket, and it'd be like, ooh.

00:03:10.440 Now I really want a pet squirrel.

00:03:12.240 It was really adorable.

00:03:13.860 And so when I heard about the US government killing one, just assassinating a squirrel, I was like, okay, that's awful.

00:03:22.240 Why would you do that?

00:03:23.560 Again, they're genuinely adorable little creatures, and they're very friendly.

00:03:27.960 So it was just like, oh, that's horrific.

00:03:30.220 Why did you do that?

00:03:31.760 So yeah.

00:03:32.580 Soulless bureaucrat.

00:03:33.340 I think that the story of Peanut the Squirrel, and also his raccoon brother, being euthanized by the state, epitomizes the nature of American politics.

00:03:46.040 And it sort of summarized the story and the mythology of the American political journey.

00:03:52.880 Hang on, hang on.

00:03:53.460 I'm not going to use the word euthanized, right?

00:03:55.680 Because euthanasia...

00:03:56.360 Murdered.

00:03:56.780 Yeah, exactly.

00:03:57.380 Euthanasia is usually, you know, oh, this person's in tremendous pain or dying, there's a terminal disease or something like that.

00:04:03.340 We have to euthanize them to put them out of their misery.

00:04:05.900 No, Peanut the Squirrel was fined, completely healthy, and the state was like...

00:04:10.620 Assassinated by the state.

00:04:12.120 Yeah, assassinated.

00:04:12.980 That's the correct word.

00:04:13.780 So what actually happened here, there they are, there's a few pictures of them.

00:04:20.280 It's owned by a man in upstate New York, where it's illegal to keep squirrels as pets, and squirrels are only allowed to be kept...

00:04:28.780 Believe me, by the way, while I'm explaining this, I am not a defender of rules, generally speaking.

00:04:34.500 All right.

00:04:35.340 So let that be known.

00:04:36.820 But some absolute Karen at some point is sat there going, well, we can't have people having squirrels as pets.

00:04:42.700 Why the hell not, Karen?

00:04:44.400 Oh, no, it's just, you know, a hippo, I can understand.

00:04:49.460 A squirrel?

00:04:50.780 Oh, come on. 0.87

00:04:52.240 You know, anyway.

00:04:54.360 It's frustrating, isn't it?

00:04:55.560 Because they're not exactly dangerous.

00:04:58.000 Exactly.

00:04:58.620 They're not dangerous animals.

00:05:00.500 So they're only allowed to be kept in New York State by licensed wildlife rehabilitators.

00:05:08.100 You don't have your squirrel license.

00:05:09.900 That's true, and people make fun of us.

00:05:12.360 Apparently he was in the process of getting it as well.

00:05:14.580 He also had a raccoon, which is illegal for the same reasons, but more so because they are known to carry the rabies virus, whereas I don't think squirrels do.

00:05:24.760 Well, they killed Peanut looking for the rabies virus.

00:05:27.540 That's true, yeah.

00:05:29.140 So he might, they must have, you know.

00:05:30.920 Well, I think one of them bit one of the people that came around, and therefore to test for rabies, they had to actually kill the animal first, because that's how they test for it, supposedly.

00:05:45.280 And obviously rabies is fatal, and the treatment needs to be administered quickly, and so that was the justification from their end.

00:05:53.720 And although I don't agree with them being there in the first place, I can somewhat understand.

00:05:57.920 But also, this squirrel's been living with this guy for years.

00:06:02.620 Why would he not have caught rabies?

00:06:04.980 I know, yeah. 0.92

00:06:05.780 It's silly.

00:06:06.880 Also, if the squirrel's living inside, where's it going to get it?

00:06:10.160 Yeah.

00:06:10.860 It's not like it's a wild squirrel.

00:06:12.780 I mean, that's really horrible.

00:06:14.460 It is horrible.

00:06:15.560 And it was the Department of Environmental Conservation that raided his house, by the way.

00:06:20.360 And apparently...

00:06:21.280 Where to conserve your squirrel?

00:06:22.600 Yeah.

00:06:24.580 Apparently he was treated like a terrorist, and the raid lasted for five hours, and he was basically held sort of outside of his house, from what I can gather.

00:06:38.540 Like a terrorist.

00:06:39.480 Yeah, exactly.

00:06:40.920 Which seems like a massive overreaction to me.

00:06:44.680 Yeah.

00:06:45.360 I mean, it's a squirrel, bros.

00:06:46.900 Yeah, I'm sort of thinking of that scene from Inglourious Bastards, where he's asking about hiding people under the floorboards.

00:06:54.320 The state turns up you're hiding squirrels under the floorboards, are you not?

00:06:58.040 It's that sort of thing, where it's so inherently evil.

00:07:02.260 But this is the entire problem with the mindset of the bureaucrat. 0.98

00:07:05.760 It's like, sorry, you've broken this rule, and therefore you are bad, and the squirrel must die.

00:07:11.140 And it's like, okay, but can we be human beings for five minutes?

00:07:14.060 You know, this is a beloved pet of mine, and I haven't really hurt anyone.

00:07:18.440 You know, nothing was...

00:07:19.240 There were no problems, apart from your artificial and abstract rules.

00:07:24.200 Calm hell down. 0.82

00:07:25.600 Like, there was no real problem here.

00:07:27.140 Nothing was going...

00:07:27.940 Nothing was going wrong.

00:07:29.240 There was no damage to property or something.

00:07:31.640 Also, surely they should know better than to get bitten.

00:07:35.160 If they're there to control animals...

00:07:37.320 Yeah, why wouldn't they wear any gloves or something?

00:07:38.340 Yeah, should you really be having exposed skin, if that's the main thing you're worried about in the first place?

00:07:43.160 Yeah, I don't buy it.

00:07:44.160 I think they just hate squirrels.

00:07:45.560 It was a setup, yeah.

00:07:46.720 Well, no, I think they were just vindictive towards this guy.

00:07:49.640 They're like, no, no, you've broken the rules.

00:07:51.080 I don't care.

00:07:51.700 I'm kidding.

00:07:51.980 Oh, the squirrel bit me.

00:07:52.940 Look, see? 1.00

00:07:53.640 We've got to kill it now. 1.00

00:07:55.020 Come on. 0.94

00:07:56.100 It is worth mentioning as well that the guy did use the squirrel as a mascot for his OnlyFans,

00:08:01.560 which I do not approve of, but it doesn't mean his squirrel deserves to die either.

00:08:05.280 The squirrel didn't choose to become an OnlyFans star.

00:08:09.100 But the thing is, with American bureaucrats, there's a remarkably callous regard for the

00:08:13.980 lives of pets anyway.

00:08:15.400 See all the videos of American cops just shooting dogs. 0.99

00:08:17.880 Now I can shoot a dog. 1.00

00:08:18.680 Bang. 1.00

00:08:19.280 It's like, dude, that's a family pet.

00:08:20.560 Well, Ruby Ridge, you know, in the 90s, started by, I think it was the ATF shooting the family's

00:08:28.580 dog, which then angered the 14-year-old son, which resulted in him getting shot by the

00:08:34.740 ATF.

00:08:35.360 Jesus.

00:08:36.320 There are loads of these videos where, like, it's, you know, like, if it was like a massive

00:08:41.500 Doberman or something, I'd understand, you know, if it was a pit bull or something.

00:08:45.700 But it's not.

00:08:46.200 A lot of the time it's like, you know, a little collie cross or something like that.

00:08:49.240 It's something that is knee-high dog, and it's barking, and so the cops are bang.

00:08:53.620 It's like, come on, dude, that wasn't a threat to you.

00:08:56.140 You know, you know that wasn't a threat to you. 0.99

00:08:58.740 You were just doing it because you could do it, and it's fucking cruel. 0.99

00:09:01.960 You know, you've killed a family pet in front of the kids or whatever. 0.99

00:09:04.300 There's so many videos of this, and I'm like, it's just so awful, man.

00:09:08.060 Yeah, they're more than happy to shoot family dogs, but criminals these days less so.

00:09:13.280 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:09:13.740 Yeah, but this is what the internet's reaction was sort of summarized as, because it started

00:09:23.700 a bit of a meme, really, and everyone was mad at this.

00:09:29.260 I didn't see many people justifying it, and I did see some people on Reddit of all places

00:09:36.300 saying, well, the right wing's making a big deal out of this, but you need the correct

00:09:40.760 squirrel permits, and I was just imagining them seething.

00:09:45.380 It's like, the right wing cares about this dead squirrel, and that makes me mad.

00:09:48.780 I didn't have a proper permit.

00:09:52.140 Becoming weird squirrel death justifiers just because the right cares about it.

00:09:57.760 But I do, I am glad that people are becoming radicalized against petty bureaucracy.

00:10:02.200 This is, again, one of the things that Clarkson's Farm has done.

00:10:05.000 So, yeah, anything that radicalizes people against just constant, like, state karening

00:10:10.200 of people, I'm totally in favor of.

00:10:13.040 And a squirrel has become a symbol of this, and of course, Trump is the person who's clearing

00:10:18.740 out the bureaucrats.

00:10:20.100 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:10:20.600 So, posts like this did very well.

00:10:23.020 You can see crazy engagement.

00:10:25.240 Thank God for AI, man.

00:10:26.460 It's also nice to see that they're red squirrels as well, which I believe aren't native to North

00:10:34.580 America.

00:10:35.280 No, they're not.

00:10:35.700 There we go.

00:10:36.700 Giving our nice European squirrels the credit that they deserve. 0.93

00:10:39.560 You know what's interesting?

00:10:40.420 All of the squirrels in Europe are red squirrels.

00:10:42.720 I know, yeah.

00:10:43.280 They don't have grey squirrels on the continent.

00:10:45.160 We only have grey squirrels here because we imported them from America.

00:10:47.640 I know.

00:10:48.200 We'll be getting onto that.

00:10:49.100 Yeah.

00:10:49.340 Oh, okay.

00:10:51.300 They're killing the squirrels.

00:10:53.000 Yeah, they literally are.

00:10:54.480 And the New York Times was spilling it as how the death of a celebrity squirrel became

00:11:01.240 a Republican rallying cry.

00:11:02.980 Yeah, okay. 0.96

00:11:03.220 Because the American election became the story of people trying to kill your pets. 0.70

00:11:07.960 Yeah. 0.99

00:11:08.500 Because, of course, the Haitians were eating them. 1.00

00:11:10.700 Yeah. 0.99

00:11:10.940 The state was murdering them.

00:11:12.480 Dogs.

00:11:12.900 Yeah. 0.92

00:11:13.480 The government, the Democrat-run government is killing your pets.

00:11:17.340 Like, now what?

00:11:19.160 You know, surely it is.

00:11:20.120 It's just cartoonishly evil.

00:11:21.420 Yeah, it is.

00:11:22.120 It's genuinely cartoonishly evil.

00:11:24.480 I don't know when this was written.

00:11:25.900 Okay.

00:11:26.640 So, it's the day before the US election.

00:11:29.320 Yeah, it is.

00:11:29.360 Yeah, yeah.

00:11:30.760 They were trying to swing the election.

00:11:32.660 They're trying to say, listen, don't listen to them.

00:11:35.500 It's just propaganda.

00:11:36.840 They didn't really kill the squirrel.

00:11:39.060 It's horrific.

00:11:39.600 But it got to the point where things like this were circulating, where loads of...

00:11:45.200 Obviously, this is a sort of rehashing of the Gadsden flag, which is very anti-state.

00:11:50.360 And lots of people were posting things like this.

00:11:52.460 This was just one that I particularly liked.

00:11:55.180 It's a good symbol, actually.

00:11:56.820 And I think using a squirrel as a symbol for a political movement is quite good.

00:12:00.860 Yeah, I mean, squirrels themselves are quite libertarian creatures, right?

00:12:04.540 Well, they have a very strong respect for property rights, because if anyone tries to steal their stash of nuts, they will go crazy.

00:12:12.900 But there's also something very Protestant about the squirrel.

00:12:16.520 They've got a good work ethic, do they?

00:12:17.840 Yeah, they really do, right?

00:12:18.880 Well, they collect things when the times are good to ride out times of hardship.

00:12:26.020 Exactly.

00:12:26.480 They think ahead.

00:12:27.460 They plan ahead.

00:12:28.540 Like, they have a large prefrontal cortex.

00:12:31.300 They don't.

00:12:32.140 No, I'm joking.

00:12:32.920 Of course they don't.

00:12:34.280 But the point being, they work hard during the summer.

00:12:37.420 They bury their nuts.

00:12:38.340 And then they've got a good stash, and they can sleep through the winter.

00:12:41.580 Like, they're a very sort of Northwest European coded animal.

00:12:46.040 That's so true.

00:12:46.880 It is, though, isn't it, right?

00:12:48.880 It's so true. 0.97

00:12:49.760 Like, these are the animals of Protestantism. 0.71

00:12:53.020 And they're adorable.

00:12:54.460 They're really adorable.

00:12:56.320 And so it's like, yeah, no, this is, you're right, this is a great mascot for the libertarian movement to adopt.

00:13:01.220 Mm-hmm.

00:13:02.260 And I think that it very much summarizes the American experience.

00:13:08.200 The election and a lot of discourse around American politics is about clearing out petty bureaucrats,

00:13:14.960 deflating the size of the state, and how the government is evil.

00:13:18.100 And, you know, Trump has become a lot more libertarian in a lot of his rhetoric.

00:13:24.120 And I think that this story epitomizes the narrative arc of American politics.

00:13:30.900 And now shifting to the other side of the Atlantic, let's talk about another thing.

00:13:35.820 And that is the war between the greys and the reds in Britain. 0.96

00:13:40.800 And this epitomizes our political struggle, I think.

00:13:43.220 Yes.

00:13:43.920 And things started off very badly at the start of the year, as a disease was killing more of the native red squirrels of April of this year.

00:13:54.900 And it was looking very bleak and bad for us natives.

00:13:59.000 I assume you know how they get this disease, right?

00:14:01.120 It's from the greys.

00:14:02.100 Yeah, it is. 0.99

00:14:02.840 It's the foreigners introducing disease. 1.00

00:14:05.880 They're literally, yeah, they've come here, they've introduced the disease, and our greys are vulnerable to it.

00:14:11.200 Do you know what the evolutionary psychological explanation for racism is?

00:14:16.380 Prevent disease?

00:14:18.760 Yes.

00:14:19.720 It's that outsiders bring disease, and disease is not worth the fraternization with the outsiders, and therefore it's a defense mechanism. 0.53

00:14:29.780 And here we have a literal example of that.

00:14:31.760 I know, yeah.

00:14:32.820 Makes you think, doesn't it?

00:14:34.080 But I'm not focusing on that.

00:14:37.360 Then, by the way, before I talk about...

00:14:40.140 Red squirrels, but for racist reasons.

00:14:42.280 They're cuter.

00:14:43.420 They are.

00:14:44.400 Look at that.

00:14:45.420 I mean, the little white belly, the little tufts on its ears, its little tiny hands.

00:14:50.700 The squirrels we had as well had really furry tails.

00:14:54.240 They were reds as well.

00:14:55.720 The tail is really, really furry.

00:14:57.700 It looks like a big bottle brush.

00:14:59.660 They're really soft as well.

00:15:00.780 I imagine they are.

00:15:01.280 Yeah, they are.

00:15:02.000 I mean, it's adorable.

00:15:04.320 It looks like it's been designed to appeal to the human...

00:15:08.060 Yeah, yeah.

00:15:08.720 And they've got little hands.

00:15:10.720 That's the thing.

00:15:11.200 They've got little hands. 0.88

00:15:12.100 And their thumbs are very nearly opposable as well.

00:15:15.200 Like, you can see it on there, actually.

00:15:16.980 They've got literally little human-like hands.

00:15:19.660 They're little tree guys who just work hard, save their nuts.

00:15:23.580 And it's like, again, it's the most European animal in the world. 0.95

00:15:26.720 They're just arboreal Protestants. 0.58

00:15:28.500 Yeah, they really are.

00:15:30.060 They really are.

00:15:30.920 But in October of this year...

00:15:32.880 They're clean as well.

00:15:33.620 Yeah, that's true.

00:15:34.280 American ones covered in disease.

00:15:35.800 In October of this year, there was some good news.

00:15:38.980 Apparently, because they hold out in Scotland, similar to British people as well, they started 0.63

00:15:47.480 to actually invade the territory of the Greys and kick them out of their own territory.

00:15:53.020 And so they're actually making some headway.

00:15:54.880 Did you look into this?

00:15:56.400 Oh, don't worry.

00:15:57.220 I'll be getting on to it.

00:15:58.860 But this sort of mirrors this point in time for politics as well, in that the reaction

00:16:05.360 to Keir Starmer's government was becoming very strong.

00:16:07.540 He was very unpopular.

00:16:08.440 And it felt like there was a real resurgence in native spirit.

00:16:12.780 And I think there still is to a certain extent.

00:16:14.920 But there's a sort of push and pull nature between the natives and the Greys that sort of

00:16:22.600 resembles that of British politics as well.

00:16:25.940 And here we have...

00:16:29.380 Oh, is that the same link again?

00:16:31.600 Yeah.

00:16:32.000 I think it is.

00:16:33.400 Migrating Grey squirrels have invaded...

00:16:35.060 Ah, yes.

00:16:36.280 So by December, so the start of this month, the Greys launched a counterattack because the

00:16:43.580 Reds saw some victories and the Greys counterattacked seemingly in a coordinated counteroffensive.

00:16:50.360 I don't know who's organising them, but it might be...

00:16:53.980 Using biological warfare?

00:16:55.220 Foreign powers, perhaps.

00:16:57.040 Maybe it's, I don't know, the Iranians, the Russians, the Chinese.

00:17:01.040 Enemies of Britain, basically.

00:17:02.940 Yeah.

00:17:04.020 But this sort of hardship here, this back and forth, this unknowability of the battle for

00:17:10.940 the essence of Britain, I feel like epitomises the story of our politics for the year in

00:17:17.800 many different ways.

00:17:18.840 And you can see just how harmful the Grey squirrels are when you realise that unlike

00:17:26.860 the traditional Red squirrels, they board trains and they cancel trains because, and

00:17:33.720 this is the actual release from the service, the squirrel boarded without a ticket, breaching

00:17:38.840 railway bylaws.

00:17:39.920 Well, I mean, good point, frankly, and, you know, you never see a Red squirrel going on

00:17:45.820 a train without its ticket, do you?

00:17:47.200 No, well...

00:17:47.940 And the proper Protestant squirrel... 0.96

00:17:49.940 The Red squirrels are enculturated in the British way of life, whereas the American Grey,

00:17:54.360 you know, loud, bigger, more dangerous, perhaps.

00:17:58.280 Covered in disease.

00:17:58.940 That's the real problem the Reds have with the Greys.

00:18:02.460 They are bigger, but that's not, like, the biggest thing in the world.

00:18:04.720 The issue is they give them a disease that the Greys are immune to.

00:18:09.540 I mean, it's literally like the Native Americans... 0.72

00:18:12.220 It is.

00:18:13.140 ...with the bloody smallpox blankets.

00:18:16.100 It's literally...

00:18:16.760 The Native Americans' revenge on Britain for the colonisation of the Americas comes in

00:18:21.380 the form of the squirrel, but this led to the squirrel discourse, because people became

00:18:27.980 aware of the analogy of it, and so it was seen as a sort of symbol of British resistance

00:18:34.240 against colonisation, and this did quite well, and there are also things like just sharing

00:18:41.860 silly memes, and there are plenty of other analogies as well.

00:18:46.040 Well, here's one here, the Red Squirrel population, 1945 to 2010, you can see that the demographics 0.52

00:18:52.900 have shifted, particularly in southeastern England, very similar to how the demographics

00:18:59.760 of the human beings in Britain have changed as well, in that the holdout areas are the 0.99

00:19:05.660 fringes, the Wales and Scotland, and the Isle of Wight there is a bastion, which is true

00:19:12.160 of British people as well.

00:19:13.380 I didn't know that, actually, that's a good point.

00:19:17.240 Yeah, and supposedly the island of Anglesey as well is a holdout, so islands are good.

00:19:23.220 How did they bloody get to Ireland as well, though?

00:19:25.640 I imagine they were probably introduced there, because it seems like Dublin is a sort of hot

00:19:30.060 spot, because that's the same with a lot of invasive species, they spread out from the

00:19:35.540 capital city, like a lot of diseases.

00:19:38.360 So here, David Averton's talking about the analogy here.

00:19:44.940 Grey squirrels were introduced into Britain in 1876 and spread nationwide.

00:19:48.720 The native Red Squirrel has been pushed to the margins and some areas to extinction.

00:19:52.600 The current battleground is Cumbria, where locals are trying to eradicate the greys. 1.00

00:19:56.400 Apparently one man has killed 300 of them.

00:19:58.780 That sounds like, you know how the mid-century Germans had that one soldier who killed lots

00:20:05.960 and lots of people, and they held him up as like a hero.

00:20:08.800 It kind of sounds like that. 0.65

00:20:10.720 The white death in Finland. 0.52

00:20:11.520 Yeah, exactly. 0.98

00:20:12.400 It's the Russians, yeah, yeah. 0.72

00:20:13.380 Yeah, I've single-handedly.

00:20:15.940 Like, with 300 grey squirrel pelts, surely you can make a nice fur coat out of that.

00:20:20.500 That's true, yeah.

00:20:21.740 Yeah.

00:20:22.360 Wearing the skins of your enemies.

00:20:23.940 I love his reasoning.

00:20:25.260 They're our native species.

00:20:26.420 They've been here since the Ice Age.

00:20:27.560 And if we don't stick up for them, who's going to?

00:20:30.000 Said a descendant of Cheddar Man.

00:20:31.920 Hear, hear.

00:20:33.020 That's the fighting spirit I like to see.

00:20:34.440 Yeah, that's what I like to see.

00:20:36.080 I love how just unabashedly nativist people are getting about the Red Squirrel.

00:20:41.880 It's so good.

00:20:42.360 If they can get to it with squirrels, I feel like it's going to become a time where people

00:20:47.420 are just like, hang on a minute, we think this about nature, but what about the people?

00:20:51.480 It's only a matter of time, lads.

00:20:53.520 And there are lots of people who were pointing out pretty explicitly, what's happening to

00:20:58.780 the squirrels is happening to the British people.

00:21:01.320 And then, oh, I've got that one already.

00:21:04.640 And then the BBC even picked up on this, and it became quite a big story.

00:21:09.100 Lots of people were talking about it, that the greys invaded the red squirrel strongholds.

00:21:13.020 And even the leftists were just like, no, we can't have this.

00:21:15.880 Look at them.

00:21:16.320 They're so cute.

00:21:17.040 We've got to preserve them.

00:21:18.360 Yes.

00:21:18.620 This is our vector for attack, lads.

00:21:21.480 This is how we turn hearts and minds to our favour, by pointing out the cute red squirrel,

00:21:28.300 you know, if we let it die.

00:21:29.400 I love the fact that people's minds are saying, yeah, no, grey squirrel genocide.

00:21:33.000 Total grey squirrel death.

00:21:35.040 But it's not even like, can we deport them?

00:21:36.860 I feel like that's where our analogy needs to end.

00:21:39.120 Yeah.

00:21:39.720 But it's not like, can we deport them?

00:21:41.300 Can we, you know, neutral?

00:21:42.440 We're like, no, no, no, no, no, no. 0.99

00:21:44.000 I've killed 300, and I'm going to kill 300 more. 0.96

00:21:46.660 And I'll do it again, yeah. 0.99

00:21:47.720 Yeah, exactly.

00:21:49.280 I've actually got some red squirrel socks on right now.

00:21:52.060 Not made of red squirrels.

00:21:53.240 No, no, no.

00:21:54.160 No, it's just got pictures of them.

00:21:55.500 I'm not going to show them, because that's going to be a bit awkward.

00:21:57.940 But in solidarity.

00:22:01.380 And the final thing I wanted to end on here, this was from the 8th of December, there is

00:22:08.080 a note of hope, because red squirrel sightings have surged as conservationist efforts have

00:22:14.440 increased.

00:22:15.620 So apparently there have been more than 2,500 sightings of red squirrels reported during

00:22:22.800 this year's Great Scottish Squirrel Survey.

00:22:25.640 But isn't that funny?

00:22:26.360 Like, red-only zones?

00:22:28.420 Like, no, we've got squirrel apartheid now. 0.99

00:22:31.380 The greys are going to get shot.

00:22:33.460 We need, like, an inversion of the better dead than red slogan. 0.95

00:22:38.060 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:22:39.120 Some sort of rallying cry.

00:22:41.240 But the fact that we've got literally racial areas for different kinds of squirrels.

00:22:45.220 The grey squirrels are shot on sight, and the red squirrels are given peanuts or whatever.

00:22:50.760 Okay.

00:22:52.000 But it's interesting as well that even, I know it's adorable, isn't it?

00:22:56.500 Even in the squirrel, there are areas where they're sort of ethnic enclaves. 0.91

00:23:02.560 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:23:03.400 Got to keep out those diseased greys for the civilised Protestant squirrels. 1.00

00:23:07.020 But my Christmas message is, there is much to be learnt from the humble squirrel.

00:23:12.020 Merry Christmas and a happy new year.

00:23:14.320 And what you should be doing is using your new Lotus Eaters gift subscription, that new

00:23:18.480 feature we've got on the site, to watch all of our premium content while you've got

00:23:21.520 lots of downtime over the holidays.

00:23:23.060 I hope you're having a nice time.

00:23:24.140 Also check out our Twitter, where we post links to everything that we're putting out.

00:23:28.280 Thank you very much for watching.

00:23:29.940 Have a nice holiday.

00:23:31.240 And goodbye.

00:23:31.760 Bye-bye.

00:23:49.800 Bye-bye.

00:23:52.300 Bye-bye.

00:23:56.120 Bye-bye.

00:23:56.820 Bye-bye.

00:23:56.840 Bye-bye.

00:23:57.380 Bye-bye.

00:23:57.900 Bye-bye.

00:23:58.380 Bye-bye.

00:23:58.860 Bye-bye.

00:23:59.940 Bye-bye.

00:24:00.560 Bye-bye.

00:24:00.580 Bye-bye.

00:24:00.960 Bye-bye.

00:24:01.020 Bye-bye.

The Podcast of the Lotus Eaters - December 25, 2024

Christmas Pre-Record ｜ The Year of the Squirrel

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