Do Go On - 432 - Europe's Bizarre History of Putting Animals on Trial

Episode Date: January 31, 2024

In mediaeval and early modern Europe, there are many documented examples of animals being accused and tried for criminal offences, in this week's episode we are going to delve into this bizarre chapter of history!This is a comedy/history podcast, the report begins at approximately 06:16 (though as always, we go off on tangents throughout the report).Support the show and get rewards like bonus episodes: patreon.com/DoGoOnPodSupport the show on Apple podcasts and get bonus episodes in the app: http://apple.co/dogoon Live show tickets: https://dogoonpod.com/live-shows/ Submit a topic idea directly to the hat: dogoonpod.com/suggest-a-topic/Check out our merch: https://do-go-on-podcast.creator-spring.com/ Check out our AACTA nominated web series: http://bit.ly/DGOWebSeries​ Check out our other podcasts:Book Cheat: https://play.acast.com/s/book-cheatPrime Mates: https://play.acast.com/s/prime-mates/Listen Now: https://play.acast.com/s/listen-now/Who Knew It with Matt Stewart: https://play.acast.com/s/who-knew-it-with-matt-stewart/ Our awesome theme song by Evan Munro-Smith and logo by Peader ThomasDo Go On acknowledges the traditional owners of the land we record on, the Wurundjeri people, in the Kulin nation. We pay our respects to elders, past and present.  REFERENCES AND FURTHER READING:historytoday.comTHE CRIMINAL PROSECUTION AND CAPITAL PUNISHMENT OF ANIMALS by Edmund P. Evans (1906)Changing Conceptions of Criminal Animals in Fourteenth by LB MacGregorTHE HISTORICAL AND CONTEMPORARY PROSECUTION AND PUNISHMENT OF ANIMALS By Jen Girgen (2003)Rats, Pigs, and Statues on Trial: The Creation of Cultural Narratives in the Prosecution of Animals and Inanimate Objects by Paul Schiff Berman Walter, E. V. (1985) "Nature on Trial: The Case of the Rooster That Laid an Egg," Comparative Civilizations Review: Vol. 10: No. 10, Article 7. historic-uk.com/history.co.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Melbourne and Canada, we got exciting news for you. And we should also say this is 2026. Jess, what year is it? 2026. Thank God you're here. Right now, I'm in Melbourne doing my show with Serengy Amarna 630 each night at the Cooper's Inn Hotel, having so much fun. We'd love to see you there. Canada, we are visiting you in September this year.

If you've somehow missed the news, we are heading up Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal and Toronto for shows. That's going to be so much fun. Tickets for all this stuff, I believe, are online. And I'm here too. And welcome to another episode of Do Go On. My name is Dave Wonki. And as always, I'm here with Jess Perkins and Matt Stewart. Hello, David, you beautiful son of a bitch.

Thank you so much. Too far? No, that felt great. It felt great over here as well. What a beautiful 2024 energy. I know we're a month in, but I'm still getting used to this new year. Yeah, of course. It takes time.

It takes time. I think it's still allowed. Okay, great. Just. Just. But cut it the fuck out by next week. Okay. Yeah, this is the last time you'll be saying that.

This is the last time you'll be saying that. I think the... Next week you start happy Easter. Yeah. Hot Cross buns. Yes. Already in the shops. Crazy.

I love it. I think it's fantastic. Anyway, nice to be here. Oh, it's so nice to be here. I love it. Full disclosure, it's still 2023. No, no, no. They didn't know.

That was seamless. They all that bit about discussing the date four weeks in. They don't know that we're still on holidays and not thinking about this podcast at all. They don't know that. You call the help. line, you're speaking to a robot. Yeah, it's not us. It's not us at the moment.

It normally is, but not right now. Yeah. We're on holidays. Yeah, 1-800 do go on. Yeah, okay. We're busy. I'm on a beach. Let me alone.

Well, it's okay. We'll just chop this out. Okay, so no worries. Hey, Jess. Yeah. So we'll just come straight into this bit. Jess, how does this show work for new listeners? I'm so glad you asked, Matthew, my good friend.

How this show works. Cut that bit. It was not believable. One of the three of us goes away. They research as a topic usually suggested to us by the wonderful listeners and often voted on by the listeners. They research it. They write a little story about it. They bring it to the other two who listen politely, who never interrupt and never go on dog shit ribs and never criticize anything anybody ever does.

And we always get onto the topic with a question. And just for new listeners, yeah, we're tedious for the first two or three listens. Then you get used to us. We get used to us and maybe even come to like us. You know, like you watch the first step of the pilot episode of the old. office and you're like eh but you know a couple of seasons in you're like I would die for Pam or whatever I was just gonna take you a few years of episodes yeah it took me three seasons to get into shits creek just commit to it just get just give it a crack we're basically like your first cigarette

you're coughing your lungs up yeah yeah just keep going your first sip of beer you're like soon you will be hooked and addicted yes please okay join us so we always drink up with a question I'm doing the report this week. It was voted on by the Sydney-Shaenberg level and above. A bit of a landslide. My question, I don't know, because we do keep scoring the questions. This one, I don't think we can do that. Anyway, here's my question.

I wrote this report deep into the night last night. And I'm looking at it now going, oh, that's the question I wrote. Sure. Here's my question. What is the worst crime your pet has ever committed? Pissing inside. Pissing inside for Jess. So Jess gets a point there, Dave.

Oh, what about diarrhoea explosion? Oh my God, okay. I think you both, you split the points this week. This week's episode is about animals on trial. Yes. That's a great 4 a.m. topic. I am so on board with this. Animals on trial.

Are you aware that this was a weird thing from history where animals literally went on trial? Obviously, we've had slight experience when we visited the seaside village of Hartley Pool. I'm going to tell that. story. Which we all remember so well. I wasn't sure if you guys would remember that. So that's, uh, Jess, you'll get a little refresher call. I thought of my go-to stories whenever I'm doing an audience warm-up on the project

and we get people in from overseas, often Britain, they come in there. And if I say anywhere at Newcastle or slightly south of there, I'm like, oh, I've driven through Newcastle on the way to Hartlepool. Have you heard about this? Have you heard about this? And then I'm telling all the other, the rest of the crowd. It's one of my go-to stories about how we need this people are. And it always does really.

well. Yeah, they love it. They, I don't, actually, I don't want to give away because Matt's about to tell it, but they did something and it's outrageous. Yeah. And you're going to get to have those thoughts that you have about English people, about Western Europe in general. Fantastic.

So, anyone from Portugal in tonight? Okay, here we go. All right. So, this week's episode was suggested by Blake Wilde from Yuma, Arizona. Hmm. Sounds a bit like an animal's name, to be honest, Blake Wilde. Like an animal pretending to be a human. I'm Blake

Wild It's also very close to George Costanza's stripper name Buck Wild Blake Wild That's good So who are you? Wild animal

I mean wild Blake Wild I think Got away I got over that I nailed it I'm still talking out loud Oh no

Oh no I've said too much I call their eyes up My raccoon This topic I put up What I thought was the Shore thing Winner

It's a serial killer episode about this copycat killer of or otherwise of the Zodiac Killer. Oh, wow. And it was third out of three. Wow. Yeah, so I was really surprised. So is this like one of your filler ones? You're like, they'll never pick this.

No, it wasn't filler. I only ever put up killer, but I just thought, I'm like, this is the kind of episode. I put up all filler. Every week. Fill or after filler. That's why I consistently lose best report giver. History? I'm just doing fillers.

History of chairs. Yeah. And then people were like, oh, my leg's tired. I want to sit down. So they were like, what can I sit up? And chairs were made. That's not true. Dave's the one who does those bullshit episodes.

History of the Saxophone. I'm like, I'm like, History of the Dictionary. Settle down. And history of the saxophone one. Best episode. You came to my defense and I attacked you. The Dictionaire is the most popular vote over all of last year. And the Saxophone episode one episode of the year that year.

I've actually been toying with doing the history of the lemon. Oh, I like it. You know how it's spread around the world. Anyway, a bit of fun there. Lemon spread. Little sizzle. So there is actually, this is surprising me. I thought I found a one-off case, but it turns out there's quite a rich history of

animals being put on trial for crimes they supposedly committed. It seems pretty wild now, but in medieval and early modern Europe, and as it turns out, in multiple other places, but I'm going to be mainly featuring stories from these places. There are many documented examples of animals being accused and tried for criminal offences. This phenomenon came about due to a combination of religious beliefs, superstition, and it's fair to say, a lack of a deeper understanding of the natural world. There are two main kinds of trials, ecclesiastical, which is sort of basically religious

tribunals and secular. Not religious tribunals. as James Brigden writes for history.co.com. While domesticated animals tended to be tried in secular courts, vermin, such as rodents and insects, were tried in ecclesiastical courts. This is because the former were considered to be under human control, while the latter supernatural intervention was needed to bring them to justice. Sure.

If you want to get a, you know, a vermin under control. You got to call the priest. Yeah. But you got a dog. That's, you control that with your mind. Yeah. Does she use your mind. Fucking out.

She's your mind. Come on. This is on you. Academic Jane Gergan, who I feature quite a bit in this, wrote an article for one of the law journals called The Historical and Contemporary Prosecution and Punishment of Animals. She wrote, In spite of their non-traditional defendants,

both the ecclesiastical and secular courts took these proceedings very seriously and strictly adhered to the legal customs and formal procedural rules that have been established for human criminal defendants. The community, at its own expense, provided the accused animals with defense counsel, and these lawyers raised complex legal arguments on behalf of the animal defendants. Like, they took it fully seriously. And there's arguments I'll talk about a few that were pretty successful, that were just like they found the loopholes in the law, they were able to, just like they would to get off a human client.

They did that first. The lawyer would do that. Yeah. So with the saying, you know, a tortoise is accused of, you know, biting the threat out of a man. And they're in jail. Does the lawyer go and have a little pep talk with him and say, look, Terry the tortoise? I mean, obviously, I'm going to need the truth to get you off, man. Tell me, did you do it?

You can tell me. Tell me. Terry, come on. Come on. A couple of slaps across the face. Come on, Terry. This is serious. Terry.

Terry, if you are, if they want to put you in the stand, we can't stop them. I need to go through some questions. Okay. Terry, you can't say silent forever. Terry, if you do this in front of the judge, you'll be in contempt. The Fifth Amendment isn't a thing yet. In fact, the United States isn't a thing yet. Okay, Terry, I don't know why you keep talking about the United States.

It's not real, okay? It's not real. Okay. You've made it up here, Terry. Terry, this is a genuine thing we're talking about here. You're going to be hanged, Terry. Come back to the real world, Terry. Who's going to look after your wife, Tina?

Oh my God, Terry. Terry. Jesus, you're responsible for a family, Tess. Yeah, exactly. It's like that, yeah, that kind of thing. Yeah. Anyway, back to Gergen, which is just a fantastic name in itself. In criminal trials, animal defendants were sometimes detained in jail alongside human prisoners.

Evidence was weighed in judgment decreed as though the defendant were human. Finally, in the secular court, when the time came to carry out the punishment, usually lethal, youthily lethal, the court procured the services of a professional hangman who was paid in a like manner, as for any other, more traditional. executions he performed. Oh, good luck hanging a snake. They're all neck. It'd be easy then. They're all neck.

Oh, yeah. I don't know what they're, if you hung her, they're just sort of wriggle around and you're like, shit. Oh, that's true. Yeah, they could sort of slither out of it.

Good luck hanging a rugby union player. They're no neck. No neck. I think that's what you meant. What about a rugby union playing snake? Oh, my shit. There's nothing in the rule book, though. Yeah.

This changes everything. Are we got a snake in it? Scrum half? Is that a lair? Scrum half a position? Scrum half, yes. Well, Paramount are allowed eels out there. Why aren't we like a snake?

A loose head prop. Man, they got great position names. So, yeah, they were fully legit things. It's so wild to me to think about this. But they're serious in court, very straight-faced going. We're in the full wigs. Everything's on. Full silk.

According to Gurgen, the earliest animal prosecution for which reliable documentation exists. There are stories about earlier ones, but like in the Bible and stuff, but the reliable documentation was an ecclesiastical proceeding dating back to the year 824 when a group of moles was excommunicated in the valley of Aosta in Italy. And excommunicated, I think I'll talk about it later, but that basically means that you're sort of like you're out of Christianity. Can't go to heaven. You're damned forever. So these moles, it's like, you're out. Wow. Good luck.

Good luck, but you're not coming to Mass. And you're not going to heaven. So I hope you're happy with the damage you did to the farm. And do they have to like take them out to the desert and drop them off somewhere? Or is it fully like, you keep living there. That's whatever. But you're not going to heaven. Yeah.

Well, it depends. Sometimes they give them like an ultimatum. You've got a certain amount of time to leave. and if you're still there, then excommunicated. Right. Is that when they started the fortress? Yeah. I think this is where it all began.

Why would they have before that? Exactly. Turn your backs on us. We'll turn our backs and start digging. Yeah. I think, yeah, that's when they started mating with humans to make mole people. Was that their biggest crime? Yeah.

I think that was seen as, and I do touch on, I touch on similar activities later. Oh, okay. Only briefly, but yeah, also seen as a no-no in the church. Real stickless. Anyway, this week I'm going to take you through some of these strange but true tales. In this first example, I'll tell you about a time in the 15th century when a sow and her six piglets were arrested for murder. Bum-bum-bum-bum-b. I wanted to get enough bums for all of them. Enough bums for all the piglets.

Each piglet deserves a bum Yeah Hey you know In December I don't know In December of 1457 The sow and six piglets Were arrested in 70

In France for murder Together with their owner They were arrested and put on trial According to the court records Three lawyers were present Two for the prosecution And one for the pigs Well that's not fair

Straight up the back Oh, come on. There's seven fucking pigs here. Yeah. And you're expecting one lawyer to look after all? Wow. This is more like a kangaroo court. There's also, the kangaroo is represented.

After many witnesses were called based on their testimony, the judge ruled that while the human owner should have been watching his pigs, the animals were solely responsible for the murder, particularly the sow. According to Alexander Lee from the University of Warwick, writing for history today, After consulting with experts in local customary law, the judge solemnly sentenced her to death. The piglets were a different matter, though, since there was no direct evidence that they had participated in the murder. Oh my God. They had participated in the murder.

The judge decided to let them off on the promise of good behavior. Piglets. Raise your hoof. Yep. Pledge. Okay. Look at me. In the eye.

No mucking about. Come on. I'm happy to hang you as well. Okay, good behaviour Alright Okay Your word is your vow That's pretty cute

That'll do pig That'll do It was right there And he had to take it It's possible that the piglets behaviour in the courtroom Help them Off to get off to

They all sat very well They looked so cute They came in wearing gum boots Oh my God Piglet's in gumboats My favourite It's so cute The judge's like

Can't possibly Where did you get the little Gun boots Secretly they're thinking I'm going to tear the thrown out of that judge after this. You're so cute. Let me off.

And it'll be the last mistake, you make. That's it. It's animal farm. They're wearing pants walking on my leg. Hello. Apparently their behaviour would be taken into consideration in the courtroom. As Philip Jamison writing for Cambrian law review said, in court, Pigs would frequently act disrespectfully, grunting, squealing, and trying to poke their noses

through the bars of the prisoner's box. Disgusting. Disgusting. How dare they be so disrespectful? Don't they not? I mean, you're only hurting yourselves, guys. Let's think about this. You take your dog into a courtroom.

What's he doing? Crying. Yes. Probably peeing. Yep. Sniffing. Yep. Eventually barking.

Showing remorse. Licking. Begging for forgiveness. Now beg. Yeah. Your dog? Jumping on everybody. Probably pissing.

Oh, this does not reflect well. If there's, if anybody has a soccer ball in the courtroom for whatever reason, he's destroying that ball. Now, realize that they are basically treating the animals as if they were humans. Yeah. So you picture goose. Yeah. As a person. Your French bulldog.

Yes. It's a person. Yes. In court doing those things. What's the jury saying? Well, I honestly. think he'd be getting off because they'd be like, well, he's clearly insane. He's pissed everywhere and he's biting a soccer ball.

He's walking around on all fours. Why are we here? This poor man needs help, they'll say. But when it's a dog, it's kind of funny, you know? Please get it some pants. Oh no, you'd have him in pants. Of course. He always wears pants.

Respect for the charge. Yeah, please. God. We're not a nudist family. He'd piss his pants. Sure. But he's got pants on. I mean, anybody's saying my dog's genitals.

Probably I feel like I'm laughing like, Muttley. Yeah. Which would be a dog in a lot of trouble in the criminal court system. So, Jamison says, that goes on to say, an animal that remained quiet during proceedings would, on the other hand, receive a certain measure of consideration for its demeanor. Okay? So you're like, hey, this looks like a respectful pig. Yeah, that pig, it walked in, it sat down, it's very cute, its legs are kind of, the back legs are kind of to one side.

Your Honor. Your Honor. So cute. Do you see this pig? Yeah. This cute is beautifully behaved pig. This pig couldn't kill. Look at those eyes.

They're human-like eyes. Pigs have human eyes, they're right? No, they've got pig eyes, aren't they? Yeah. Yeah. No, I'm getting confused with humans. They have human eyes. Yeah, human do.

Human do. Some humans do have tiny little pig eyes. Yeah. Oh, yeah. That's true. I want to know what pig eyes look like now. Excuse me. I think if you, I think they have human eyes.

Like, if you saw. Yeah. Yeah, if you just saw, I'm sure Alistair Trombloberts and maybe had like... That looks like Donald Trump. Yeah. He's a human. That first one looks like Donald Trump's eye and that's a pig eye. So...

He's a human, we think? Anyway, very strange stuff. Yep. And yeah, so that was a French case. So all those, me saying, Your Honor would obviously be let on there and some like that. And where was this case taking place again? A seven-y. Yes.

I think is how you say that. Uh-huh. Very strange stuff, but apparently this was not unique back then, particularly in France. The earliest recorded pig trial took place just outside Paris in 1266. Oh, only 700 years before the Saints won there won an only VFL, AFL, PRMPFL, Premiership. Over the following centuries, they happened over other parts of en francais. Is that right? My son-Aren?

Yes, yep, correct. How do French people say France? They probably don't say France. We live in France. What do they say, Dave? They say fronce. Other parts of Francaise and in other parts of Europe, Europe including Italia and Deutscheland.

Another trial, that's Germany. Italia. Is that what they say? Italia. Italia. How fucking do you. I don't have to remind you my heritage, do I? I think you do.

Italia. One 16th Swiss Italian. That's a very, it's a regional accent I've put on there. Up on the Swiss. That's right. It's very Swiss, how you sound. Yeah, yeah. Wee, we, we.

See, C, C. Another trial occurred in 1386 in what is known as the case of the pigs. Of sauce. Of sense. Sense. That's a place in France. Sans. Place in Francaise.

Sans. Saint. Saint. Saint. Saint. Dave, have a go. Son, sauce. Saint.

Saint. I looked up a pronunciation video and the guy said, when it's a verb, it's a saint. You don't say the... Funal, yes. And when it's a nan, you say, son. Right.

But you didn't get the guys, Welcome back. Thank you so much for joining us here today. I'm about to tell you to pronounce a word and the word today. It is a German word. Here we go. Okay, the word is Berlin. Berlin.

I love that guy. I love that guy. I love that guy, too. But also, like, how could I trust him? He speaks, he knows so many different languages. Oh, welcome back today. Berlin. It is an Irish name.

Irish name. It's so good. He could listen. He needs to release a podcast of just talking for an hour and that perfect sleep podcast. Beautiful. So this one was very similar to the Savigny case where a group of pigs or I think in France they call them pork. Is that right? A group of poke or pigs were accused of murder.

Are they murdering people? Yes. Okay. Not other pigs. I don't get specific because it's usually... Pretty gross. Children. Oh, okay.

Oh, okay. Yes. We will shut up. I was going to say, how do they do it, but we don't want to know. This time, though... I'll tell you how I'd do it. Well, and it's clearly not the pig's fault, right? Tell you how I'd murder a kid.

Oh. Too far. Okay. Today, I'm going to tell you how I would murder a kid. pigs pigs I would use a pigs So yeah

This time apparently And like with all these things Slightly different retellings of these Multi-century old court cases Yeah But it sounds like all the pigs were found guilty Following the verdict Or perhaps even to just enter court in the first place

It's believed the pigs were dressed in human clothes Before being hanged Oh, okay Oh, okay. Before being hanged. Okay. But I also read... Why?

Another version that I read that they were dressed as humans to go to court. Right. That makes more sense. Has to respect. Put on some pants to piss in. But to hang them. Maybe like... You know when sometimes like a dog will like lie on its back and it's just like dick out?

And you can be a bit like, all right, mate. Put it away. Maybe it's like that. They didn't want to hang them and just have like these. big pig dicks hanging in the wind, you know? Yeah, because, you know, the mayor famously of sense at the time, trying to drink. And there's no problem with that.

That's okay. No problem with that. But he was quiet. But he was, and that's, you know, it's okay to be sensitive, but he was maybe took it a bit to a weird place. Yeah, yeah. He was angry at anybody for having a bigger dick than him, including pigs. Check out this pork chop over here.

Yeah. So to speak. Yeah. So to speak. So to speak. And I also read somewhere else that the younger pigs once again got off. Okay. For good behaviour.

Yeah, yeah, if they promised. According to Gergen, following execution, the animal's bodies were usually buried either under the gallows or in the same location that had been set aside for burying the corpses of human criminals. They were rarely eaten as consuming the flesh of executed animals was considered taboo. Also, according to Edmund P. Evans, and this guy, he wrote this book in 1906 called the Criminal Prosecution and Capital Punishment of Animals, which is kind of the book. It's the Bible of animal trials. And all these academics who write about it over previous decades, and I'm quoting from ones from like the 80s up to recent years, they're all kind of working off this book.

I think, you know, he really brought it to light, the strange history. Wow. But anyway, according to him, Edmund Evans, great name, consuming the flesh of the executed animal would smack of anthropophoge or anthropophoge, which I, that's a term I didn't know, Welcome back today. The word we are talking about is anthropopathy. Anthropathy.

Please like and subscribe. It's basically human cannibalism. So cannibalism kind of means one speaks eating itself, but anthropophagy seems to be specifically humans eating humans. So that because the animals have been tried as humans, you couldn't hang the pig. And then eat it because it'd be like, that's anthropophagia. Oh, right.

So it's just wasteful. And a lot of these times are these pigs being bred to eat anyway. Yeah, exactly. So they were going to be killed by humans, but now they're being killed and no one is eating. They're being killed as humans. And no one's eating their flesh. Yeah, that's right. And like you're getting the, like, the grandma of the village to sew like a little outfit for the pig to put off.

Yeah. It's a little pig jumper. But it's like I said before, very, you know, there's all these weird superstitions and and old school religious beliefs and stuff. So it's all quite odd, especially looking back. I love to think about the things that in, you know, 800 years' time we're going to be like, a peep, where?

I'll continue to live. In other years time, with the three of us will still be sitting here going to be. Can you imagine those things we used to do then? Podcasting. So inhumane. Can you believe the things people used to do? Die. They used to die.

Yeah, weird. I think ever since I decided to just keep living forever, I thought, that was a weird thing that you used to. to do. But anyway, Edmund Evans, Edmund P. Evans said that the animal after being executed had in effect become the peer of man in blood guiltiness and in judicial punishment. So yeah, it would basically be cannibalism to eat them. So apparently there are a lot of examples of perfectly good pigs and other farm animals being thrown away despite the fact that they could feed off the village or whatever, especially when it's like a group of pigs. Yeah. And

Some of these crimes, you know, it was just one pig did the murder. You know, the murder in inverted commas. Yeah. And then other pigs ate. Others got charged for standing by not doing anything. Get. Fuck. They're pigs.

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And they need to clean up their acts. Yeah, absolute fucking pigs. Were the pigs able to argue self-defense because they were being bred to be killed by the humans? I think it would really be about how good the lawyer was. Yeah. Okay, right.

But I think that could have been a great argument. Yeah, why didn't anybody think of that? They were about to kill her, so she killed them. There are similar arguments made that I might talk about later, about, yeah, I think there's one about weevils ruining a crop, and the lawyer's like, God made crops for all his creatures, including weevils. So how do they be sustained? Good one.

And I think that did pretty well for them. Anyway, a little sizzle for later on. It's exciting. So these pigs have been thrown away But this wasn't just for classic mean animals Cordon in 864 It was said that if a person died After being stung by bees

The bees should be suffocated in their hive Before they were able to produce any more honey Otherwise the entire contents of their hive Would become demonically tainted And thus rendered unfit for use as food Right So but they're saying kill all the bees And then let them make honey

Suffocate them all inside the hive No, the murderers. You can't eat that honey anyway. Only the murderers. Yeah, yeah. Well. But because it's there going, no, I think bees can go to different, I don't know, but I'm not a honey expert. You get rid of the hive.

Right. And then that, if, if you let them live and then they kept making honey, that honey's fucked. It's tainted. I guess they hadn't figured out the bit that we now know that bees die when they sting people. Yeah, yeah. No chance of it ever be. Yeah, that's right. Yeah.

But yeah, that's, um, it's. it's funny. Even bees. Even the bees. Is it only one gender of bee that sting? Yeah, is it just the soldiers or whatever? Yeah, because there's only one female than each time, right? Is that right?

Yeah, classic. Men doing all the work. The female bees are the only ones that can sting. Oh, there you go. That's what I was trying to say. Well, I'm completely wrong there. Well, no, that's what I'm trying to say, though. women doing all the work.

Isn't that typical? As a feminist, I just thought I should point that out. Yeah, so pigs and bees, they're not the only ones on trial, all sorts of other animals as well, and I'm going to take you through a few other notable cases. Great. There were probably more, but only a certain amount, you know, the records have been kept through the years.

Rats and mice come up a lot. Obviously, these trials happened a long time ago, and some are better recorded the others than others. The Rats of Ota trial of 1508 seems to be a pretty well documented one though. Paul Schiff Berman wrote about it in his piece titled Rats, Pigs and Statues on Trial, the creation of cultural narratives in the prosecution of animals and inanimate objects. Are we going to have a sequel episode about killer statues, which you have already done one before in the past? What?

About Bluifer. Oh, Bluiver, that's true. Yeah, no, I'm not going to go. I love that I've got this up my sleeve. and if listeners want me to do another episode about killer statues, I'm down. But yeah, so he wrote this for the New York University Law Review in 1994 writing. In 1522, in the district of Ota in France, a village was incensed to find that rats had eaten its barley crops. The townspeople took the matter to the ecclesiastical court, which duly investigated the crime, in inverted commas,

and then delivered a summons to the rats ordering them to stand trial. A court official went to the area of the countryside where the rats were believed to live and served a notice in a loud and solemn declaration. So we've gone out there to around the places and they're like, here you, hear you, or whatever, the French version, I summon ye rats to court on this date at this time.

Santa with a straight face. It's such a fun image. It's so funny how see. Seriously, they took it. And yeah, like, they don't understand you. But they're like, can you believe how disrespectful these rats are? None of them came out to even hear me speak. I said, hear ye, hear you.

For God's sake. This does not bode well for them. But yeah, it's some people, I think some people have tried to suggest or assume that these were almost for entertainment or for show, but it seems like they were genuine and taken very seriously. That's fantastic. So Schiff Berman continues. This seemingly bizarre case then proceeded to an actual trial. The court appointed a young lawyer named Bartolomei Chasigny to defend the rats.

And when the defendants failed to appear in court in response to the summons, Chasinier intervened to save his clients from a default judgment. So this is, these rats got lucky. They got a great lawyer. But he's standing there with the judge going, I'm so sorry, I don't know what to tell you. Yes. They said they'd be here. I was expecting them to be there.

Yeah, just give us five more minutes. Five more minutes, please. I swear they're on their way, Your Honor. But you know, in a... No, that's what a bad lawyer would do, basically conceding defeat. He gets on the front foot. So he argued that there had not been proper service of process

because, in fact, the salvation or ruin of all rats was at stake in this case. And so all rats, and not just those in the village with the crops, deserve to be informed. He's like, Your Honor, you can't expect those rats to be here. now, this, this charge is basically against all rats. And I, I think we need to get the word out to all of the rats, but for them to have a chance to defend themselves.

The town cry standing there going, oh, crap. I've got to go around the country. Hey, yeah, hey, yeah. God, I said this 10,000 times. Yeah. And they, the court agreed and, uh, you know, they adjourned and gave them more time. This is so embarrassing. It is.

Can you imagine being en froncée? No, I'm embarrassed to be a human. Well, that's the thing. You're kidding me? I think a lot of the French stories are well documented, but I think, you know, there are suggestions that these sort of things happen in different ways all around the world. I would love to know if you are the judges, they're taking it super seriously. They're sitting there going, this is such a waste of my time.

Yeah, this is ridiculous. I went to uni for ages for this. But, paychecks of paycheck. I've got an enormous hexted. And this is what I, I really wanted to affect change. and I'm here in a fucking rat trial And I've just given them more time Yeah, I've said, fair enough, go tell all the rats

What has happened to me? I'm glad my mum's dead She'd be so ashamed of me right now She loved rats She loved rats And she hated the law So he goes on When the rats once more failed to appear

At the next appointed session Chaston you, the rat lawyer, urged that because the rats were dispersed across the countryside, more time was needed for them to make the migration to the courthouse. He's just going to say this every time. He's like, they've got tiny little legs. Oh my God, they're on their way, though. How do you want them to get here? They can't ride a horse.

Oh, my God, there's a big country. He got them another delay. Wow. Then... All of the rats arrived. In little suits. I'd like to represent my... Myself.

Justin's like, what the fuck? I got you all this time. Fine. Fine. And they cook it immediately. Yeah. We did it. And we do it again.

And fuck you. You know, getting the judge on side of you, right? And then they shit in the courtroom and we know that's a big no-man. And just leave fingers up. Take, they unbuttoned their tiny little suit pants. Take a shit on the floor. Keep eye contact with the judge while flipping you off, while shitting on the floor.

I don't say rats out. Good luck locking me up. Rats forever! That's it, get the rat nose. One by one. So having been granted another delay, Shastinier pressed his case for the still absent rats. He argued that a summons implied the full protection of the law on their way to the courthouse.

However, his clients, the rats, though anxious to appear, feared they would be attacked by hostile cats and could not be expected to risk death in order to obey the summons. He's like, they would love to appear, but at what cost? Yeah. You know, the village is cats. And this is a story that's written about in a bunch of different ways and places. And somewhere he said, so the villages, you need to, you need to keep your cats inside. Everybody drown your cats.

If we kill all the cats, my clients will be here. Yeah. That's a little take. Not until every cat is dead. One version of the story, they basically said that because the villagers said, we're not going to keep our cats inside all week, they had to drop the charges. That was one version of it. But I've read that they still got done and they got off in different ways.

But Berman then writes, although this story may sound like an absurdist satire, the trial described above actually occurred. Wow. And apparently, yeah, depending on where. you read, but apparently maybe Chazinay's work in the case got the rats off and helped build his reputation as a formidable lawyer. But like just the arguments alone, I think people were impressed. It's just the fact that he's getting the case delayed for these rats. Yeah. Like, this guy's good at law. So yeah, he got a reputation as quite a formidable lawyer.

And according to Gergen, he went on to become the first president of the Parliament de Provence provol? A position corresponding to Chief Justice, which is, you know, obviously a big deal. And also, it became a significant contributor to the evolution of 16th century French legal thought. So you're pretty big done. Yeah. Like I said, I read that the case ended in different ways. In one or one article, which was more like a listicle, so I don't know how much I trust it, but they said that the rats were sentenced to death by hanging, which I'm pretty sure isn't correct. Like, how are they doing that? Just hanging a bunch of rats.

Firstly, they haven't rocked up. You're going out and getting, like they've said, little nooses and stuff like, I can't do it. Okay, but think of it like this. If you hang a lot of rats by tiny little nooses, it would just look like some sort of weird decoration. It would. What's going on?

Like fairy light type of. Is it nearly Halloween? Was hanging rats or? That was the origin of Valentine's Day. Yeah. Hang a rat for your sweetheart. Yeah, it's softened over the years now. People just give cards and chocolates.

But, yeah, it used to be your hangar rat. I still hang a rat for Dave every year. Sounds like a euphemism for going to the John. Hang a rat. I've got a hangar rat. A really big rat. That's no good. I apologize for putting out of that image of things.

Sorry, boys, I've got to go hang a rat. Back as soon as I can, probably 15 to 20. Honestly, a gentleman never hangs a rat. Yeah, I thought it was a rat. It was more like a mouse. I think it was just gas So yeah Like I talked about before

There was the two main things Ecclesiastical and secular Usually with the criminal animals Who were being pests Like rats etc They went to They went to the ecclesiastical courts Whereas like the murderous pigs

And that The pets and the farm animals and stuff They went to the secular courts And could end up being executed But yeah, that's why the rats, it seemed like, all the other cases, they would just be like the church going. That's it, rats, you're going to hell. We warned you. That's it.

Six months of Sunday's cool, okay? Yeah, okay. Bad luck? You like that? Okay. Oh, you want to talk back. Let's make it eight months. Okay.

All right. We're going to do six rosemarys. As Gergen writes, the guilty animals, in inverted commas, guilty animals were usually solemnly requested to vacate the lands or vineyards. They had been devastating within a given period of time, often six days. If the animals failed to leave, then the church solemnly pronounced a curse against the off, the off, uh, the offending creatures. For all practical purposes, it was sort of like animal excommunication. Wow.

In which the maleficent animals were considered damned. Oh my gosh. All right. Well, we gave you six days. Still hanging about? Enjoy hell for eternity. Yeah? Happy?

Well, you shouldn't be. We've been more than reason. Okay. Couldn't have been more patient. Unbelievable. These rats. If this is what you want, we don't want to do this. No. Okay, but...

This is horrifying for us. You've made your beds. Yeah. Your tiny little rat beds. You've made your little rat beds. You're going to have to have to have rat sleep in those rat beds. But yeah, as strange as it was, it could be seen as a win-win for the church as well, as Gergen-Rads. If the pests left, then the church's anathema had worked.

Alternatively, if the pest raced... remain, then the anathema's failure could be attributed to the sins of the people. Oh, they didn't leave. Well, I guess that's because you guys have been sinful. Honestly, come on. It's a sweet loophole for the church. We're so dumb. Humans.

It's so embarrassing. I don't know. To me, I've, you know, I grew up fully believing and all that stuff. You know, I still love to believe in some of it. But back then, they didn't know why anything happened. Trial. Okay. I mean, it's a bit of a silly.

That I think is fucking stupid. Okay. No what? I've met some pretty evil animals out there. I just want to stand up for humans. I'll cut you. He gets that from me. I just want to stand up for humans here.

And I think, you know. Oh, humans are so down. No, you're right. Humans are bad. It's so funny that they're like, all right, well, this pig has murdered on purpose. And it is an evil sitting pig. It's so funny. Let's make him wear a pants.

Come into the courtroom. Here we go. Okay. You push me. I got a pig. I got a pig. No, I got to hang a pig. Can't eat it.

Don't eat the pig. What a waste. You've wasted your life, young man. Because, like, best case scenario for this pig, it's found innocent. It grows up what they slit its throat. Then six weeks later, it's bacon anyway. Yeah. Living out its purpose.

That's the best case scenario. Yeah. The funny thing is, and you might not have considered this, the pig has no idea what's going on. No. The pigs are just like, why? Why am I inside? Yeah, why am I here now? What's going on?

And they're just seeing humans go, wah, wow, which is Matt speaking French. Jess, how dare you say that? Sorry, I'm not doing the hand gesture.

Yeah, but what you said was pretty offensive. It was a bit crook, but only you understood. Hey! Fair enough. So what is that I'm doing, friend?

Yeah. But as always the hand gestures this, and then you go, ha, ha, ha. Savon-i. Savon-i. Zajon. Bejor. That's you doing shuggy French. En-fonse.

Yeah. Savon-you. In 1993, a film titled The Hour of the Pig, or later released in America as the much duller, the advocate, was released. What? That sucks. And it was loosely based on the great lawyer, Chazonez, a career. of trying to get animals off. And Colin Firth plays the lead role.

The lead pig? No, no, the Shazzo. I was like, he's a very best time. He's very good. Very best time. Very best time. Yeah. 19903, Firth as well.

He can do drama. He can do romantic comedies. He can do oink. He can do oink like no one else can do oink. But these days, I would say pigs should play pig characters. Oink exploitation, films of the 1990s. Yeah. I think underrated.

beautiful sob jorra as the French might say A beautiful A beautiful Ragh Donald Duck on trial Well If he plays his cards

Wrong He's walking around with no pants He refuses to put it on Top and no pants Yeah man He's going to bloody child Don't you worry about that If you're like

If you're going to put on some clothes Let's cover the junk Yeah You got a corkscrew dick, mate. Cover it up. I was driving along the other day. And it was a Sunday morning.

And we drove along and there was a guy on the, at the cafe, like on the street, you know, sitting at it, he's sitting at a table on the street. Well, he's not sitting. He's standing. He's talking to people that are sitting there. He's got sort of blue, dark blue jeans on, nothing on the top. Really like kind of gross, slicked back hair. And just something about the way he was standing.

there, the body language, the gesticulation. I was like, he looks like the biggest asshole I've ever seen in my life. No shirt on. The reverse Daffy. Oh, it was awful. Reverse Donald. Sorry, Duffy's just full news. Yeah, the half Daff.

What are you thinking? He looks like a fucking tool. You're the worst person to get stuck in a conversation with, and he thinks he's God's gift. And I was like, you, suck. And you wind down the window and say, hey you, stop talking to him. He's really bored. Yeah, that's what I did say.

Yeah. And then, yeah, he started crying. And I was like, I don't care about your feelings that I've hurt. Turns out he lost his shirt in a horrible accident. Yeah. And it turned out. He was actually a saint. When you were pointing a finger at him, three fingers were pointing back at you.

And I was like, oh my God, I'm shirtless. And one thumb was pointing up at the sky. Yeah. So makes your thing. It does make the thing, doesn't it? It was obviously involved as well. One for the big guy. He credited it all.

What's for the big guy? Can I have that for stand? up. Matt, so Matt is trying to write his new show at the moment and, or is try it new material and you are desperate. Everything you come out, you go, could that be something? And I didn't even really say that. That was your line about the thumb, but.

You can have it, but people will know. People will know. I want, if you go see Matt this year and he does that, Joe, that's, I hope it will kill, but I hope people will yell at. Dave. Yep. Damn it. Edit that bit out, Joe.

Honestly, I'm not doing any, any, any, this year, so please go for it. I mean, I gave you the setup. You just did the funny bit, okay? Shut up. I did the easy bit. I did the easy bit. The concept, that's the hard bit.

Yeah, so I, so those rats on trial, I read a bunch of other ones with similar trials with rats or mice being charged for ruining crops or in another example, termites. All right, get out the news. It doesn't get much smaller than that. I called a Gergen in. We put them on trial. They started eating the pew. The ultimate disrespect.

Can't believe it. Right in front of her eyes. These dogs. Vandalism writing their name in the wood with their teeth. She knows what they're doing. Unbelievable. So disrespectful. Cordon de Ghergen in 1713.

Sorry about the pronunciation here. This is Portuguese, Dave. You mentioned it before. Piedade no Maran how in Brazil. A Franciscan or Franciscan. Monastery was overcome by termites. The insects reportedly devoured the fry's food, destroyed their furniture, and even threatened to topple the walls of the monastery.

They threatened. Don't push me. Hey, you. You don't fucking give us $400,000. I'll topple this, I will. This is all gone. Okay. I'll go.

I'll do it. I'll do it. And I got mates. And guess what? I'm a little peckish. Yeah. You know, big Greg. Oh, you know what a fucking Big Greg, mate.

He hasn't eaten in days. I want four suitcases, unmarked bills. Oh, no. I'll know. I'll check them. Yeah. I'll nibble them. Don't make me sick, big Greg on a year.

So menacing. And the monks are like, what can we do? What's happening? We have to turn to the sheriff. These threatening termites. We need to take this to ecclesiastical court, which I don't like to do because it's so hard to say. So the Fries requested an act of interdiction and excommunication from the bishop, and the termites were summoned to appear before an ecclesiastical tribunal. At the proceeding, the lawyer appointed to defend the insects argued that because they were God's creatures, the termites were entitled to sustenance.

Oh, this is what I was talking about before. wasn't Weevils, apologize for that. I imagine... Termites hate getting mixed up with Weakles. Being told, you're representing the termites. Yeah.

This could be my big break. This did huge things for the pig guy in France. He ended up being the top dog. Exactly. He was huge. The trial ended with a compromise in which the Friars promised to provide suitable habitat

for the termites who in turn were commanded to go and remain at that site. The proceeding was typical of the ecclesiastasy trials in the strict adherence to the legal procedure, the types of arguments made on behalf of the animal defendants, and the proposed compromise by the people alleging harm. They're like, I think that makes way more sense.

They haven't gone, we're killing the way, killing the termites. We've got another spot for you, okay? You're over here. Fair's fair. You guys are over here. You can eat all of that until you're, yeah, heart's content. Yeah, that's right. The Protestant church.

Yeah. Go nuts. Go nuts over there, that's fine. That's yours. Yeah. Or vice versa if this. I don't know if this is Catholic. Which one's a...

No, monastery's a Catholic, right? Anyway, it doesn't matter. But, um, or I haven't. Oh, I'm sweating all of a sudden. I don't want to... Yeah, anyway, um, so, yeah, so... And like, obviously the termites don't understand that. No, because they're termites.

Even less than the pigs. Franciscan? Yes. You're talking Catholic, baby. Thank you. Thank you so much. I thought I was on the money there. What a relief, though.

You really don't want to, like I don't want to start up any troubles. Okay. Weevil. Oh, no. No. Oh, God. Several smaller Protestant Franciscan orders exist as well, notably in the Anglican and Lutheran traditions. But odds are.

Odds are. If you're a betting man. Oh, God. Either way, insert the joke still works. They put them on whoever the opposite. Yeah, the joke works, and that's all the matters. Yeah, and it was a good joke, okay? Very clever.

So that was termites. We also had weevils on trial. Oh, there are weevils. Yeah, there are weavals. According to Ugar Niedem, writing for the Sydney Criminal Lawyers' website, wine growers in Bordeaux were angered by the fact that a group of weevils were devouring their prize grapes. They brought the matter to the attention of authorities who brought the weevils before an ecclesiastical court. The weevils were appointed a lawyer named Claude Moel, who argued that God made plants for all animals to consume.

Okay. When I said the weevil before I was talking about the weevils. Okay. Is this the most tedious episode since the last one I did? So the weevils were appointed a lawyer named Claude Moel, who argued that God made plants for all animals to consume, not just humans, and that the weevils were just doing what came natural to them. It's so logical. Yeah.

It's like, yeah, that's right. Yeah. The argument worked to an extent, rather than executing the hapless animals, the ecclesiastical judge, which I don't think they could have done anyway, but the ecclesicastical judge. I'm going to shoot the weevils. Ordered that public prayers be held. Another plague of weevils returned 30 years later. So this is like what I was talking about before. So the church says, all right, weevils, we're going to pray for you.

But you better ship up or shape out, the opposite of that. Shape up or ship out. There it is. They weren't. That's saying hadn't quite settled. Yeah, they were figuring it out. Yeah, yeah. So, and then they went away.

So everyone's like, oh, thank you so much, ecclesiastical tribunal. You did it. Yet again. 30 years you go, holy shit, they have done it. They did it. But, yeah, 30 years they came back and was subjected to a lengthy trial involving some of the greatest legal minds of the day. Unfortunately, we will never know their fate as the page of the archives

that recorded the verdict has been destroyed. Evans, the great man, Edmund Evans, the guy who wrote the Bible on all of this stuff, has suggested, and this is good stuff, this is why he's the goat. He suggested that the page may have been eaten by Weevils who are unhappy about the verdict. Oh, that's good.

I can only assume that's true. Yeah. Because what other explanation is there? I think it's a good point. And Weevils are notorious. gloriously very good readers. Yes. Yes, voracious.

They're, yeah, they're prolific. And not just like, they don't just stick to one genre. No, why they have it all. Yeah. One minute they're doing romance and they're doing Roman history. Yeah. Anything with row. Yeah, they do all the rows.

Can't be stopped. Rowing. That's why they love vineyards. They love rows. Exactly. Rows as far as the eye can see. Can I put, for listeners, one on the Patreon, we do a yearly

Dougon Awards and the one just gone, we did the first annual Best Evan award. Can I put up Edmund Evans for Best Evan for this year? That's a good early nominee. Yeah. Anyway, animals could be charged for being pests in other ways than just spoiling

crops as our great mate Gergen writes. In one reported instance, a group of swallows disrupted churchgoers with their chirping and earned the additional vexation of Egbert, Bishop of Trier in Germany when they sacrilegiously defiled his head investments with their droppings when he was officiating at the altar. He said they shed on his head whilst he was giving a little speech.

Yeah, in church. That's, I mean, that's making it. That's pretty disrespectful. I've been a lot of times, and that would have really added a bit of something to. Yeah, yeah, yeah. As a kid, I'm going to that, yeah. Yeah. They blur together.

That was the best church ever. Yeah. Do you remember when the birds shut on the priest? Father Foynes. It was the name of my priest. Father Baccair was mine. Father Farns. Father Foynes, Irish guy.

And he had a, because everyone, all the priests give it their own little. A little flavour. His one was during communion. I'm sure I've told you this before, because I love it so much, but he'd go, they'd say body of Christ and give you the piece of bread. Here you go, body of Christ. Oh, yes, you have said that. I was that to say, do you want me to do it? Because I know this one.

Body of Christ. Is that? It's just fun that at some point he's gone. I had a little bit of my own spin to this. Yeah. And then 20 years later gone, I'm still doing this. Yeah. This is what people come to expect.

This is what they want to say. They want a big show. He's about to say it. Body of Christ. Like doing like hundreds of times in a row. And he's he doing it with a bit of a smile in his face. I can't remember him saying this. No, I don't remember ever seeing him smile.

Was he Irish? He might not have been Irish. This sort of picture Catholic priests in the 90s to be Irish. For some reason. I think that's where a lot of them came from. Thinking of Ronan Keating. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm thinking of boy bands.

I'm thinking of Westlife. So, yeah, the bishop's getting shot on. No, yeah. So where were we? Bishops being chat on. Of course. And we're back. And also the bishop's name, which I think we need to pause on.

for a second. Eggbert. Yeah, I love it. Incredible. So he's getting shot on, and the bishop responded by levying a curse against the birds, forbidding them to enter the church on pain of death. Okay. That's reasonable.

You can come back in, but you will pay with your life. According to Evans, the great man, it is still a popular superstition at Trier that if a swallow flies into the cathedral, it immediately falls to the ground and gives up the ghost. This is back in 9-06. if that's still the case. But apparently back then... Still. I mean, it's difficult to hang a bird.

Yes. That's really tricky. It would actually... Yeah, it would just keep flapping around. Come on! They'll have to land eventually. Oh, man, that's true. Eventually, they'd tire and...

That's a way more brutal way... Yeah, that's pretty grim. Am I saying... Is T-I-R-D-R-D-R-E-R-P-R... German place? T-R-I-E-R... Not sure. I've never heard of tria.

And I can almost guarantee you that we're wrong. Yeah. Trier. Don't worry. I found a guy that pronounces words here. Oh, on the internet. We can probably find out how to say, Trylus, have a listen.

Okay. Hello. Tria. Tria. Tria. Tria. Tria. Tria.

That is a. Trier. Julian Miguel. Yeah. I love Julian Miguel. I'm Julian Miguel. He's so everything's like every word. It's round.

Yeah. It's up and down. Yeah. Quickly, just a quick run about bestiality. Fun fact. Okay. I always thought it was spelled B-A-S-T. Got auto-corrected.

I'm like, huh, it's like bestiality. It's bad, really? Is that right or am I? Is it just a different word altogether? Anyway, this will be very quick. Last time I talked about this, people asked for a little heads up, so I'm giving you that, but it'll learn. Oh, okay, got you.

Got you. Good two minute story. So, Needham also writes about a case involving a donkey. Like I say, BCLA, but a very quick one. Won't go into any of the details either. Needham writes, in 1750, a French man was sentenced to death for having intercourse with a donkey. The donkey was acquitted after neighbours gave character evidence that they had known her for

four years and that she was virtuous and well behaved. The donkey? The donkey. According to their character references, the donkey was never involved in any scandal and was quote, in word and deed and in all her habits of life a most honest creature. It was found that the donkey did not participate voluntarily, and she was acquitted on that basis. Which seems like obviously, animals can't give consent. Like, obviously that's clear.

But apparently, in the olden days, it was not that clear. But character statements for a donkey. Yeah. And it's so great that the humans did do that. Yeah. Because apparently it was quite common for both man and beast to be put to death for such offences. Wow. Like there's one example which happened in Massachusetts in 1642 when a mayor, a cow and other lesser cattle were executed along with Thomas Granger who'd been getting it on with them.

So, I mean, Thomas Granger, what a legacy to least. Yeah. Not everyone's name gets remembered. So yeah, that was a little... Little detour. Little detour. Well, you know... I've known the Oxford English dictionary website, bestiality.

It is B-E-S-T. And, you know, as we learned on your Oxford English dictionary report, they give you the origin that says, word origin, late middle English, from the old French for bestialite, which is from bestial, from late Latin, bestialess, from Latin, bestia, bestia, Which means beast.

Right. It takes the long way around, but it almost came back to where it began. Yeah. And it's funny, I think, I'm guessing maybe American English puts the eye in. Yeah, probably. Because it makes more sense. Yeah, it does. And America seems to like to make language make more sense, which for some reason,

people here and in England seem to rally against. Yeah. There's a you in neighbour, you know. Yeah, yeah. We really, we really care about that you. We should, if we were making it make more sense, words would be spelt very differently. Yeah. There would be no O or you in neighbor.

It would be just to end in A. Yeah. Neighbor. Yeah. E.R would disappear. Yeah. Water. Water. Yeah.

Beautiful language. There's no T in water. It's water. It's W-A-R-D-A. Water. Water. Water. Water. Water. Water.

Class of water. Water. Can I get a tumbler of water? I should say, some people did suggest best American accent as a, category of the two-go-waters. Beast American accent, I think. Water.

Why, I think that that would be a landslide to you, Bob. Yeah. But do they also get best Australian accent, which I think that I could get away with with Pizzeria. Bosaria, rise of lights. Another one that seemed to come up a few times was roosters being charged with being unnatural.

And that is because they laid an egg. It was a chicken. It seems like, yeah, it was probably just chickens. But they were just... This is unnatural. But, like, I think there, I think sometimes when there's no rooster in the henhouse, one of the chickens will start behaving like the rooster sometimes. And maybe that confused people.

There's different theories. You know what it is? It's just, it's typical because it's a woman taking a leadership role. Must be a man. Heretic witch. People just cannot handle it. Yeah. Ridic.

Oh my God. A hen, I think, yeah, they said it was because a roost laid an egg, but it was actually a hen wearing pants. Yeah, and they said, ah, ah, ah, ah, get that dress back on. Yeah, young lady. Either way. Very unladylike. Yeah, death regardless, but at least die in a dress, thank you. Unladylike.

Dave, is that a pun? Wasn't meant to be. And not because they lay eggs. Oh, yeah, I didn't get it. No, I didn't either. Didn't get it. Well, I didn't mean it. It wasn't a...

Like, nobody would have thought that. Great. Nobody listening would have thought. oh, that's a great pun because no one would say it's a great pun. I was thinking, up, pun intended. I thought it was funny

when people will write that either pun not intended or pun intended, which is basically what I did in real time now and I apologize that, but it's like, you've got, when it's in written form, you're like, you've got time to either take it in or out.

Yeah, plenty of time. It's like that Elton John lyric crew goes, if I was a painter, but then again, no. mate Just change a lyric Stupid thought And the best part is

He had to pay someone else to write that lyric And he went Great job Bernie Thanks Bernie God you're a wordsmith Bernie done it again But then again No

Or a man I can't remember the rest Anyway Something something shows Yes So yeah These unnatural eggs Egglang roosters

This one was suggested Specifically by Devin Bruns from Cedar Rapids in Iowa. What a great name Devin Bruns is. Love it. Was there not a Geelong footballer called Devin Bruns? Neither of us know. Sorry to speak for you, Dave.

I didn't know either. We don't know. I don't, yeah, that can't be. That's such a Neville Bruns. Okay. Sorry, Neville bronze. Close, but no cigar. Sorry, Devin.

Do you know Neville? Do you know Neville? Devin, you know Neville? Devin and Neville. Devin and Neville. Oh my God, what a family. Oh, pun intended. So I don't know if you say it and people go over.

Yeah. Is that one? Something he must have been in there. So yeah, Devin wanted me to talk about egg lang chickens. No, sorry. Roosters. Please talk about egg lang roosters. Love from Devin.

Perhaps the best known version of this occurred in 1474 in the Swiss city of Basel. Writing for the Comparative Civilizations Review in a piece titled Nature on trial, the case of the rooster that laid an egg. Evie Walter wrote, in 14, it's so funny that there's all these serious legal, scholarly articles written in all these journals that I'm quoting. They're just like dead serious about the time a rooster was on trial. It's just so solvable.

They say the law is an ass. Can that be worked in some of my head? You're always not mine. Oh, pun intended. Oh, oh. How's your father? Excuse me. Oh.

Oh, good on there. In 474, a chicken passing for a rooster laid an egg and was prosecuted by law in the city of Basel. The animal was sentenced in a solemn judic... This is what they always talk about. It's solemn. Like, they're just stressing, this isn't a joke. They were very seriously saying... This is solemn.

Your Honor, the jury has come to a verdict. Yeah, everyone's, you know. That rooster did it. So, yeah, it was a solemn judicial proceeding and condemned the rooster, really chicken, to be burned alive for the heinous and unnatural crime of laying an egg. Like all these punishments. Smelt amazing.

And they weren't allowed to eat it. That's so unfair. The villages are just standing there, mouthwatering. Exactly. There's a lot of poor people who are peasants going, They put it on a rotisserie. It's been cooking for ages.

It's just fall in a past. Beautiful. Everyone at the call is like, do you want to get Red Rooster on the way home? And these, they all seem like full on punishments, right? Hanging in it. But the humans were being punished like this a lot. And I've just got through listening to a book about old kings and queens of England. So many of them and people around that time just having their heads lopped off.

Or you also think you have a claim to the throne? head off. Well, I'm, you're arrested because you're a threat to my position. Yeah, yeah. Lopping your head off. But if I wasn't the one chosen by God, then I'd be down there and you'd be up here. Yeah, yeah. Honestly, this is really looking good for me.

Yeah, that's right. They'd justify it. Well, and they used to, I mean, all of this stuff, it's a similar idea. They'd go, well, we won that battle. God wanted us to win. Yeah, sorry. Sorry about that. So the execution took place with as great.

solemnity as would have been observed in consigning a heretic to the flames and was witnessed by an immense crowd of mouth-watered townsmen of peasants, I put the mouth-waters. That's according to the great man, Edmund P. Evans. The same kind of prosecution took place in Switzerland again as late as 1730. Wow. You know, like, you can, like, some of these cases, you're still picturing like, it's, you know, mud floors and stuff. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So society that barely resemblance. But 1730, it's starting to look a little bit. Yeah. Like, if you go to the country, you're walking through those same buildings that they were. Yeah, that's right. I've been to pubs that were around back then. What was the big fear about rooster laid eggs anyway?

Well, I went to someone who knows this stuff. This is off the Morano Chicken Farm blog. Oh, okay. The owner of the Marano Chicken Farm blogs. And she got into the weeds a bit with this one. writing at Basil in 1474 appears that a cock was accused of the enormous crime

of having laid an egg. It was brought to trial and condemned to be burned alive as a warning to all cocks not to lay eggs from which it was well known would have hatched a cockatrice or basilisk.

This is what they're worried about. Oh, okay. A rooster laying an egg like this is where the superstition stuff comes into play. Ruses start laying eggs those things can turn out to be evil monsters.

Wow. A coquatrice is a mythical beast essentially a two-legged dragon or serpent-like creature with a rooster's head. It has the reputed ability to kill people by either looking at them, touching them, or sometimes breathing on them. This is all from the blog. In the event that your rooster laid an egg and you did not want this egg to hatch and bring about mass destruction, do not bring it inside the house for any reason. In the event, if you don't want master, but if you do, you can bring it in. Yeah, bring it on in.

See what happens. Because the belief was like witches were doing this on purpose and stuff, you know. But if you're not a witch and you don't want to bring mass destruction. Cannot stress this enough. If you're not a woman in the workplace wearing pants, okay, a demonic witch. Cock eggs were believed to be used. Cock egg. All right, settled out, cock egg.

Cock eggs were believed to be used in witchcraft. So it needed to be destroyed immediately, lest its very existence, attract charges of witchcraft. Just incubating a cock's egg Will not produce this fierce and beast though A toad must incubate the egg At the behest of Satan For it to turn into a cockatrice What the fuck?

So I guess this is why Like that's not happening by accident A witch has to get involved to do this Or she's got to get the toad to sit on the egg Yeah Although as time has gone by The toad in this tail has often been replaced by a serpent So you've got options

If there's not a toad handy Grab a serpent Yeah, great A basilisk on the other hand Is a legendary reptile reputed to be a serpent king, which was hybrid from a rooster and a serpent, who can cause death with a single glance. They're quite similar.

The basilisk is alleged to be hatched from a cockerel by a cockerel from the egg of a serpent or toad. So basically the reverse coccatrice. Right. One's a toad egg with a cock on it and the other one's a cock egg with a toad on it. Say cock egg again. Cock egg. Maybe these are new nicknames for the group chat. You're definitely cock egg now.

Dave's toad egg. I'm still daddy. Dave's cock on a toad egg. I'm toad on a cock egg. Oh, that's confusing for you. Yeah, I don't like this at all. I don't like this at all. All right.

Just throwing out ideas. No bad ideas, but those are bad ideas. So yeah, you can you can sort of understand why such a serious crime led to the rooster being taken to court. It's like, this thing is possibly giving birth something that will kill us all. Yeah, okay, okay. I understand that then. We're getting towards the end. Dave alluded to this story before.

This one will be well known to primate listeners and Dave and not so much, Jess. Even though she's been there. On one of our UK tours, I made us go on a detour through the city of Hartleypool to see a monkey statue, which was actually a chimp. They've got that wrong, but doesn't matter. Won't go into that. And I think we're, do you remember, we went into a pub? And I went and asked the woman behind the bar.

Yeah, the woman behind the bar, I brought it up. but I remember she didn't really like me. She wasn't like, oh yeah, another tourist talking about the fucking monkeys. We didn't talk about that monkey around here. Yeah, that was the varbogop. But I, yeah, I think depending on you talk to this, I'm a lot of. Maybe she was related to as a distant relative to the monkey. Oh, my God.

Oh my gosh. She was the missing link. Maybe, because I remember her. Anyway, I want to tell you the story via Ben Johnson from Historic UK, who writes, A French ship was spotted floundering and sinking off the Hartleypool coast during the Napoleonic Wars the early 19th century. So this is even more recent, you know, early 1800s. Suspicious of enemy ships and nervous of possible invasion,

the good folk of Hartlepool rushed down to the beach, where amongst the wreckage of the ship, they found the only survivor, the ship's monkey, which was apparently dressed in a miniature military-style uniform. That's so cute. It's so cute. Do you this alluded to? Well.

Depends on its rank. Yeah, is their respect across? enemies, you know, back then. No, sorry, I meant more meant his people on the shit with him, his colleagues. I would hope so. So I imagine he's pretty high up. How does it work with saluting? Do you have to salute people higher than you?

Sure, you don't have to salute somebody the same rank as you. Hmm, you just, you fist bump them. Yeah, you say sup. Sup. But you don't say sup to an admiral. No. You salute an admiral. Unless it's another admiral.

Or you're a five-star general. Is that a rank? Probably. Or a sea-lord. I think that's an American one. Sea-Hod. What about a brug. What happens if you see two brigandigy generals across each other's past?

They fuck. They have to fuck. They have to fuck. It's the rules. They have to fuck. They have to fuck. They always see each other like, oh, God. Oh, God.

We've really got a time is better. You're doing this on purpose. I swear to God you're doing this on purpose. I'm no! I got to tell you, I don't hate it. It is good to see it. I was just getting a sandwich. This is so annoying.

It's so embarrassing. But anyway, back to mine. Come on. Come on. Come on. Oh, do we have to do it here? Right by the sandwich machine? Oh my God, if I must.

Hartleypool is a long way from France, and most of the populace had never met or even seen a Frenchman. Some satirical cartoons of the time pictured the French as monkey-like creatures with tails and claws. So perhaps the locals could be forgiven for deciding that the monkey in its uniform must be a Frenchman. And a French spy at that. There was a trial to ascertain whether the monkey was guilty. of spying or not, so I'm glad there was, you know. And they don't speak French.

So the sounds of the monkeys making, they're like, that could be, that's French. Yeah. That's the language they speak. That's the language they speak. Someone, yeah. Yeah, just like that. So, yeah, and I liked that there was a trial. Well, all these, I'm like, thank God, due process for.

Thank God. Justice has been served. However, not surprisingly, the monkey was unable to answer any of the court's questions and was found guilty. Again, I think this is before the Fifth Amendment in America, which didn't affect English law anyway, which is interesting. The townsfolk then dragged him into the town square and hanged him. Over the centuries, the legend has been used to taunt the residents of Hartlepool,

indeed, still today. That's why she didn't like this. Yeah, the publican was like, God damn it, man. But, no, I think it's mixed because at football matches between local rivals, Darlington and Hartleypool, United, the chant, who hung the monkey can often be heard, which is interesting because it technically should be who hanged the monkey, but. But is that who saying?

Who's that even true? Who's saying the Hartleypool people or the opposition? I think the opposition. Oh, right. It's not like, who hung the monkey? We did. We'll hang you too. Oh, wow.

It's menacing. Hartley puddians. Oh, Hartle puddlians, yeah. However, loved the story, apparently. Huttle puddles. Huddle pool. Hartlepool. Hartlepool.

Hartle pool. Hutley Pool, United's mascot is a monkey called Hengus the Monkey. I can't believe it. And the local rugby union team, Hartleypool Rovers, are known as the monkey hangers. So they've linked into it. I thought it was the soccer team that were the football team that are the monkey hangers, but it's the rugby team, is it? Yes, whereas, but the football team has hangus the monkey. Who hung the monkey?

We do. We do. The successful mayoral candidate in the 2002 local election, Stuart Drummond campaign dressed in the costume of Hengus the monkey using the election slogan, free bananas for school children. I thought, you've got my phone. I promise he was unfortunately unable to keep. However, I've done the maths and it's going to bankrupt our city.

I'm sorry. So bananas are much more expensive than I thought. I didn't think, but I don't buy. bananas that off, but I didn't know how expensive they were. Was this around the time, this wasn't around the time of the big banana shortage? How unlucky would you have been? However, this appears not to have dented his popularity as he went on to be re-elected two more times. Whatever the truth, the legend of Hartlepool and the hanged monkey has endured for over 200 years.

So, yeah, like, there's a strong chance. This is bullshit, but that is a story that they've got behind. Anyway, let's start bringing this home. I'm talking a bit about why these trials have. happen and that sort of stuff. So yeah, there's been all sorts of animals who've been up on trial, and there's a bunch more, to be honest. Couldn't go through more. Although, if I had more time, I reckon this could have been about a 10-hour episode. But yeah, as Lee writes, although exact numbers are hard to come by, more than 100 cases are known to have taken place between the 10th and 18th

century involving all manner of creatures and crimes, rats and locusts with the destruction of crops, cockerels with laying eggs in defiance of their nature, and dogs with theft, but pigs were by far most common criminals. But yeah, so, I mean, based on those numbers, 100 cases over centuries, it's not like it's happening all the time. Yeah. But it's also, you know, some people say there probably were a lot more, but they weren't documented. It's, you know, it's hard to know for sure. Yeah, because those little weevils have eaten all the documents. That's right. Sneak your little weevils.

Pigs, of course, should have never been put on trial. It's a bit controversial to say, but I believe that. It was a basic principle of Roman law that animals could not be culpable as they lack reason and were incapable of harboring criminal intent. So it couldn't be guilty of a crime. As Lee says, any offence committed by an animal was the responsibility of its owner or the person whose care it had been entrusted. If a pig harms someone because a swine herd could not control it, for example, The swine herd rather than the animal would be liable on grounds of negligence.

Swineherd, by the way, is a term I hadn't heard before. Like a shepherd, but for pigs. It's a pig shepherd, which I'm a big fan of. Me too. Lee continues, alternatively, if it was felt that no one could reasonably have prevented the offence occurring, the swineherd either had to make reparations or hand over the offending animal to the injured party. But unfortunately for those animals, areas of France didn't necessarily warm to Roman law and instead favoured their own traditions, which were often shaped by folk beliefs.

But putting pigs on trial never really made much sense anyway, as Lee questions. Even if pigs could in principle be held responsible for their actions, why did communities feel the need to bother prosecuting them at all? Surely it would have been easier and cheaper, simply to have killed the guilty party on the spot rather than go through the rigmarole of a trial and public execution. Some like Philippe de Bernmaneux, are writing back in the 13th century,

have argued that as the trials were so patently absurd, and this is back in the 13th century, the only reason for them to have existed would have been to enrich the local judges who heard the cases. They're like, they're just like, we're making cash from this. But Lee totally disagrees with this saying,

the only problem with this, of course, was that since pigs were generally executed, there was nothing left for the judges to take for themselves. Indeed, the proceedings actually cost them money, like I was talking about before, paying the animal defense lawyers. You know, the pigs aren't paying for that.

The execution has got paid the same as if it was a human, same as the jail. So they actually, each of these is costing the crown or whoever money. Adopting a rather different approach, Pierre Aero, argued that the objective was more likely to be deterrence. Although a sow being found guilty is unlikely to dissuade other pigs from crime, A-Roll thought that it might help to convince people to take better care of their pigs and also be wary around animals. Then punish the people.

Yeah. That would probably... That would make more sense. Yeah. And Lee agrees that logic doesn't stack up. That doesn't make any sense. Saying, as some historians have pointed out, if the intention was to deter, why were some animals tried and executed in absentia?

If there was no pig twisting in the wind, what was there to stir greater vigilance? So, it's like, none of these qubits. quite make any sense, but it seems that Lee believes a theory, which has been put forward by Paul Schiff-Berman, who I quoted earlier, and Berman's idea is that the whole point of the trials and executions was to ritually reimpose order on a universe, which, after a trial's death, must have seemed frighteningly random and unpredictable. By turning the pig into a human, putting it on a trial, and executing it in public, all with the most scrupulous correctness, the world was made stable and comprehensible once again.

It's maybe makes sense. It's somewhat theatre, but they're like, okay, the guilty party has been punished. Yeah. It wasn't a random chance. Yeah. See, the world now makes sense. Yes, we can move on. We kill the pig.

We put pants on it and then we killed it. We killed it. Yes. Hey, happy sense. Exactly. This pig puts its pants on like anyone else. Four legs at a time. Yeah, there was, I mean,

won't go on others, but there was another example. I think it was in India. There were tribes from centuries ago that if someone was killed by a tiger, that family would then have to go and hunt that tiger down and kill it, and that would be seen as justice. But if they didn't, they'd have to at least get another tiger killed. And if they didn't do that, that would be sort of excluded from the community until they made it happen.

Oh, my God. So not only you're mourning the death of someone. So I think there's just this whole history around the world of things that didn't quite make any sense, but it's based in old superstitions and whatnot. There are some recent examples of animals being involved in court cases, though luckily for modern-day pigs, they don't have to worry about the death penalty anymore, as far as I could find. Oh, it's good to be a modern-day pig. But France still does have some pretty weird animals involved in trials occasionally, as Leslie B. McGregor wrote in his thesis.

In 2013, in the French city of Tours, what would that be? Tours. Tours. Tours. Tours. Tours. Could you get a man up? Tours? How do I spell that? T-O-U-R-S-T-U-S. So in 2013, in the French city of Tours, a judge called forth a witness during the preliminary hearing of a murder case. The witness was a nine-year-old Labrador named Tango. This is in 2013. Tango is a good name. That's a great name, isn't it?

Tango. That rules. And Tango, the dog, and this is in 2013, was asked to confirm the allegations against his owner's alleged killer. The judge ordered the suspect to threaten Tango with a bat, believing Tango's reaction would indicate whether the suspect had indeed been the killer. is in 2013. Oh my God.

For the sake of fairness, a second Labrador named Norman was brought in to serve as a control group. The attorney for the defence thought the whole thing was absurd, saying, I find it very troubling for the French legal system. The results were inconclusive, and the whole enterprise was deemed a failure. That's so embarrassing. Like, that all sounds like a thing that happened 400 years ago. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're like bringing the dog And just watch what the dog does

If it's afraid of this man with a bat We know he's a killer Yeah Imagine me like you're having to threaten a dog Hoping that it doesn't react My dog got scared of some flowers the other day He also got scared of wrapping paper at Christmas time Was that because you were

You're holding the roll up above your head threateningly Yeah, I was screaming at him So I don't think dogs can necessarily be trusted to consistently be scared of the same thing. You know? Did your final pronunciation? He doesn't say that, but I do have something else from Julian Miguel.

This is a different guy? Oh, no. Me too. That's it without the S. Okay. Tour. You said I wasn't able to find it, but I thought you meant you found another guy saying it.

Oh no, I just found him saying tour. I just enjoy his work. Because we do our French listeners and I know they will be furious. I'd never get us on us. Sorry, they'll be furious. They'll be a furious. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's very good. He's like the basiest guy ever. Yeah. Can't hear him when you're listening in a car. Yeah. Worm, man, rum, rum. Furious. If Nathan Damon's listening in his road train right now, he's just like, what just happened?

What's happening? Finally, here is a brief story about, and I know just like to bring it back to Australia. So I've done that here. Thank you. Another 2013 court case. Because we've spent all episode thinking, geez, people are a bit silly in other countries. But here's a story from Australia in 2013.

Didn't we go to war with emus? So. We do. How are we to judge? No, yeah, certainly not. Cordon and Edom, animals are not deemed to be capable of committing criminal offences in modern day Australia. But a goat named Gary did make it to court in 2013.

Gary's owner, Jimbo Bazoobee. Gimbo. Jimbo Bazubi is an all-time great. That is Jimbo. The fact that his goat's name was Gary was enough, but when I'm like, I've got to include this. Jimbo Banzubi. Jimbo Banzubi.

That's almost good enough that I kind of want to change Jack the Hadm McVitty to Jimbo Banzubi. Chuck it in the Jimbo Bazubi. That's so good. I want a tattoo of Jimbo Banzubi. Should we change one of the Patreon levels to the Jimbo Banzubi? Maybe. Do we have a dud?

We're going to put a placeholder level that we need to really jojou-je. It's so good. We can create a new tier. Yeah. The Jimbo-Bazubo. A million dollars. A million dollars. And we all give you a goat.

Yeah, we'll get you a goat. We'll give you one. It's an expensive goat. No matter where you are in the world, we'll get your goat. Yeah, we'll get a goat. Anywhere in the world. For a million dollars. For a million dollars.

We would do that. We'd do that. I'd figure out a way. Even if I had to deliver a goat. That's at the Jimbo-Bo-Bazuby level. So Gary's owner, Jimbo Bazzoobie, was issued with a $440 infringement notice after Gary allegedly ate flowers outside the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney. Although Gary was not in trouble, he accompanied his owner to Downing Center local court for moral support after Jimbo appealed the fine. Gary spared no expense for the occasion, donning a colourful hat and black bow tie.

In the end, so I like they're still dressing up the animals for court, In the end, Gary and Jimbo were triumphant. Their lawyer successfully argued that the offence of destroying vegetation had to be committed by humans, not their animals. Yeah. The infringement notice was declared invalid and the overjoyed pair headed happily home. And that's the happy ending to this report on animals on trial. Wow. Well done, Jimbo Baszoobo.

Jimbo Busubi. I'm surprised he didn't represent himself, to be honest. Yeah, Jimbo Basooby sounds like the type of person that's going to represent. represent themselves. I'll field this one. Yeah. Thank you. No, actually, I think Gary would have been the one representing him.

He was wearing a bow tie. That's right. Very smartly dressed. A beautiful, beautiful goat. Oh, what a goat. The goat. The goat. I think Jimbo Bazzoob is my goat.

I agree. It looks like Jimbo Bazubi might be a comedian. Okay. Who performs with Gary the Goat. Oh, my God. Gary the goat and Jimbo Busuby were, I'm so sorry. An Australian comedy duo who performed in a, Aussie towns becoming very popular. They began their comedy career in 2011, mostly through

Facebook and YouTube, with their Facebook page having over 1.7 million likes. Wow. Yes. So, what a, what a tale. What a fun story? Thank you for sharing all those stories with this, Matt. What made you think I'm going to do animals on trial? That's so cool. I think it was used as a question on one of those first stories, maybe the 70-pig was used as a Who-Knew-it question. Oh, yeah. Months ago, I think maybe even one of our UK live episodes day, which obviously made a big impression on you. You know, it's so weird.

I remembered, I thought, when you started talking about pigs, I thought when we were in Bristol, did one of us once do it? I thought we did a do-go on about maybe like a witch or something with pigs. Yes, I did that about something about a witch and like... She possessed a pig or something? Something like that. Yeah, I feel like there was something like that. Yeah, great.

I reckon you're right. It was at the hen and chicken. Yeah, we're in a hen and chicken. Oh, my God. No rooster. No rooster. Whoa. Yeah, I'm going to have to run, but can I entrust you too with the most important section of the show?

Yeah, everyone's favorite section, you mean? Yeah. Yeah, great. We'll take over. But have a great laugh. See you never. Well, with Matt Stewart departed now. It's time for everybody's favorite section of the podcast, which I believe has a jingle that might sound a little something like this.

Fact quote or questions D-D-D-D-Shing. She always remembers the sing, and he always remembers the ding, even if they're a little unsure about it. I just sort of, I was just kind of like, is that what we're doing? But it's the only one that has a jingle. That's right. We're into our fact, quote, a question section. Now, this whole section, this back after the show is dedicated to our Patreon supporters.

People can go at any time to patreon.com slash do go on pod or to our website, dogo onpod. Click Patreon. And then if you want to support the show, keep us rocking and rolling into our ninth year. what you can basically do is sign up at different levels. You get different rewards for different amounts of money. And basically, yeah, you keep the show going whilst getting extra stuff like being part of the Facebook group. We put up three bonus episodes a month. Now there's 200 in the back catalog that you can get.

Access to live show tickets. You can also vote on topics, which is what happened with this match topic today. We never know what you're going to pick. He thought the Patreon people would go for a serial killer, but they ended up going with this rather interesting tale about wacky stuff where humans put animals on trial. So you change the show, basically. And yeah, anytime go to patreon.com slash do-go on pod. But the first thing we do is our fact, quote, or question section.

Now, these people sign up at the Sydney-Shineberg deluxe package level, Jess. And what does that mean? Well, it means that they get to give themselves a title. They get to give us a fact, a quote, a question, a brag, a suggestion, a joke, a compliment, a recipe. A recipe. It can be anything they want to share with us. Absolutely. We love it.

May I read them? It's an honour. Matt usually does, but... I would actually love if you did it. Okay, great. I forgot that one of us had to read there, so I'm glad you've got it open there. Honestly, it's the... At the time of it's recording, it's the end of the year.

It's 538. We're checked out. This is the last bit of the year. It's been a big day. It's been a big month. Big year? But I feel 2024 is going to be a good one. Yeah, a good year?

I feel it. Finally. Finally, Jesus. I've been holding out for good one. Hopefully, when you're listening to this, you're thinking, well, it already has started pretty good one. here, so that's good. Yeah.

I know these people always give themselves a title as well, Jess, a nickname. So the first fact-quoted questioner this week is Stephen Edmonds. Stephen has given himself the title, consumer of too much trivial information. Is that via us, Stephen, or through other methods? Well, Stephen's, you know, reliably always at live shows in Melbourne, front row. One of our greatest life supporters. Love him so much. I believe when we first met Stephen, it was in Thailand.

Really? At the Coast of Moby podcast. I think that's the first time I remember meeting you, Stephen. and maybe we'd seen you at live shows before, but that was definitely when we first saw you there. That's fun. And, yeah, since then, basically. Every time we look out of a live show, they are on the front row,

and we really appreciate it. Love you. Love you, Stephen. When you look out and see people, dare I say it? Love you. When you look out and you see people in front and you recognize, you go, this is going to be fine. Yeah, exactly right. It's comforting.

Yeah, it is really nice. So, Stephen, yes, consumer of too much trivial information. Steven's giving us a fact in brackets, maybe. Oh, okay. So let's see. Got a fact check it. Let's find out. And just like Matt, I haven't read these until I read them.

So we'll see how we go. Here we go. From time to time, I think about some tidbit of information and can't remember where I got it from or even if it's true. This is possibly a side effect of listening to too many podcasts and watching too many YouTube videos. One such fact, in quotation marks, that comes up recently, was that ranged weapons, i.e. cannons, guns, etc., were not honored,

but instead conflicts. What? We're not honorable, but instead, conflict. conflicts should be sorted out hand to hand. Of course, heavy or pointy things like swords were allowed. I have no idea if this is true. A quick Google suggests maybe for the ancient Greeks. You couldn't have a gun.

That's not honourable. If you've got a conflict, hand to hand or maybe a sword, at most. The weapon has to be wielded by a hand. Yes, I suppose. But a gun is held by a hand. Yeah, I guess so. Yeah, you're right. But you see that often in movies and stuff.

At the end, it's the action hero versus the super bad guy. And they put down their guns and they just fucking punch each other to death. Yeah, punch each other and maybe grats. Then the bad he cheats and pulls out a knife and then the good guy pulls out a plank award. Yeah. And you're like, whoa, he's honorable. This is sick. Stephen continues.

Specifically for Jess, a related aspect mentioned was that submarines are sneaky. So a gentleman would have no part in that behavior. A Google of this one suggests that the bad behavior of German U-boats is part of what brought the USA into the First World War. They're like, you boats are fucking sneaky. Yeah, that's right. We don't trust these submarines. I kind of get it. That is what they feel. They feel sneaky. They do feel they also just feel silly. They don't feel honorable. No, they feel very silly. I'm sorry if you live and work in a submarine. There's nothing wrong with them. Would I go on a submarine? Maybe. Not too deep, but I would, but I think they're silly. I think the closest I might go like

on board. You ever have one of those ones that's like docked in a river somewhere. You know, that's basically decommissioned. Yeah. Just to see what it's like in there, but no way I'm going underwater. I don't want to go underwater. I don't like that. I want to be, I want to have very easy access to oxygen at all times. And I know you can breathe inside, but I don't like being underwater.

Yeah. Anyway, unless I go a snorkel on. Oh my God, submarines. They got the little periscope. That's right, but that's not where they're getting their air. What? The snorkel gives you air at all times. Yeah.

Anyway, thank you to Stephen. Our next fact, quote, a question comes from Michaela McCray. And Michaela has given us off the title. a brigadier major in the feline servitude division. Brigadier. Brigadier. Fieland servitude. Obviously, someone's going to look after those fantastic.

Someone has to and they deserve kindness. Well, they deserve to be pampered in their own minds. That's right. There's cats. Michaela's given us a question saying, Hi, gang. Have you ever looked at the Google or equivalent street view of your home and seen your pet? I was looking at mine recently to see how it had changed over time.

And in the most recent image, I saw my sent. sentient shag rug sitting in the window. She often sits there and watches the goings on. I'll paste a link here to my address, but I ask that you don't read it out, of course. Oh, okay, that's nice. Please enjoy this candid view of Her Majesty doing her best work. That's great.

I love this, and thank you for sharing this. Of course, we're not going to docks you. No, but we'll look at it. And to be fair, I won't remember your address anyway. Okay, I'm looking. I see it. Oh, okay. You can see the rug.

I think I can spot. So it's, It's a tough one, Dave. I think top window on the left. Oh, yeah. There's a little cat in the window. That's so fun. That is pretty fun.

I've gone back, I must say... I don't feel like... Can I zoom in? Oh, I can. You can zoom and see. Yeah, there it is. There's a little cat. Look at out the window.

Does that kind of? Is the face blurred? No, I think maybe it's slightly to the side. Because do you remember the old stupid old studios? Yeah, so... And because you can go back and look at old... Yeah, the history. You can go through the history, which I've done with my, like, my parents and my family home growing up.

And it's funny. And I'm like, oh, this is my high school girlfriend's car. Oh, wow. It's so funny. Oh, there's, you know, my dad's car from that year, from that. Ooh, that's interesting. But I had quite a long driveway, so you can never see people or anything like that, unfortunately. But you can see, like, the garden and stuff change over time.

So that's really, I love doing that. Oh. But if you went back to the old stupid old studios, which used to be on oven street. Yep. hanging out in the window, the Auntie Donna guys one day saw the Google, like car driving past. And it's so funny just to see, because they're very distinct looking guys.

Yeah. And they're right there. It's very fun. I'm looking at my parents' house now. The bins out. Oh, yeah. Can you go and go to the old ones? I love it.

It goes back to like 2007 or something. Yeah, I want to go back to like before. No, the oldest is January of 2008 and we already lived there. But they have, the fence has changed colour as my parents painted it. Oh, is that me? Are you there? No way. Oh my gosh, please tell me you there.

No, by the time I moved forward, there was, there's a person, that's my car, I reckon. Is it? No. Sorry, this is tedious. No, it's fine for us, though. But I just, there was a person walking along the street and it looked a little bit like me. Let me find it. Yeah, most recently, 2021.

I don't think it's changed since then. 2008. I'm going to my current house and looking at the oldest thing goes 2007 and I'm like, huh, that tree in the front yard is still alive. Yeah. But it's really big now. That's not me. Could that be me?

That looks like you. That could almost be me. That looks, what year's at? 2009. I did live there. Did you have hair like that? Yeah. Oh my God.

Looks like I'm just going for a walk. But if I try and like move on, it's different. The person's not there. you know when you try and sort of yeah yeah yeah yeah oh my gosh that's so fun that's so funny it could be me going for a walk or maybe not at all anyway um thank you for sharing uh that's exciting yeah the picture of your cat

in the uh in the window that's very cute and uh i haven't well i guess i have now um i haven't looked up my address but also i live in a big apartment building and uh i don't think my dog's going to be on the balcony at that exact moment It could be, though, honestly. Because if he's on the balcony, it's because he's pissing. Yeah. You know?

I'll look it up. I'll look it up. Here we go. This is fun for people to... I know, we're really... Listen to us, Googling. I know, I'm getting carried away. God, it's fun though.

And I'll be able to see when they put in the new fence. Oh, yeah, the new fence is there on the... Hang on if I... When's this? August 2023. They've done this quite recently. We are not on the balcony. But I can see the lights from the back of my TV.

So I have little govy lights on there. That's a bit of fun. That's cool. Sometimes it's nice to see evidence that you definitely exist. Yeah, I've also forgotten there was a big tree right in front of the apartment and then they cut that down and now you can see my... Anyway, yeah, cool, let's have a bike of disco in 2007. Wow. What fun.

This is tedious to listen to. Yeah, sorry, everyone. Nice to see the trees growing in my yard. Do yourself a favour and have a go. That's fun. But yeah, no pets, but I appreciate you sharing. with us. Yeah, that's a good one. That's really good. Great question. All right. Next, we have Chris Torres. Chris giving themselves the title, official North Carolinian living in Ohio with family near Gary

Indiana of the podcast. Oh my gosh. I think Chris has had that title before. Yes, I was going to say, and I love it every time. Because last time I remember saying, you're ticking everything off there, except for Vermont we said. That's right. And Chris is giving us a brag, which we love. We love a brag. We welcome a brag. It's a safe place. Chris saying, Hi gang, I'm writing in this time with a brag, which is really uncomfortable

because I'm super humble and down to earth. I'm really excited. It has recently become official that in the fall of next year, I'll be starting my dream job as a professor of biology. Oh, wow. That is so cool.

I still can't believe I managed to convince people to pay me to think about dinosaurs all day. I wanted to shout out to my parents, Bob and Rhoda, who listen, my partner Christina, who listens, these are all exclamation marks, and my dumb old dog X, who watches me listen for their support as I struggled through the often heartbreaking process of finding an academic job. One more thing before I go, in my field, a really exciting little moment we get to

experience is the first time we put out a call encouraging prospective graduate students to apply to work in our labs. Usually that first announcement happens at a scientific conference, but as an American and researcher, I figure, why not do it in everyone's favorite section of an Australian podcast? So, if any undergraduate slash uni students out there are interested in doing a master's degree on bird evolution, especially in flamingos in California, find me on Twitter at Torosaurus underscore Rex. That's awesome.

And it says, looks like my title is going to be getting a little longer. And he finishes by saying, books forever. Books forever. Oh, my God. I reckon you've had your books cut out over the last few years. Big time. To become a professor, that's incredible. That's fantastic, Chris.

Congratulations and a great brag. Yeah, love that. Please. Love that. Because you can be humble and also, you know, celebrate your achievements. I think it's great to celebrate your achievements. I find it, I always find it not odd or, I don't know, like we are great at celebrating weddings and engagements and babies. Yes.

But nothing else in our lives. And there's so many other things that we do that are so great and deserve to be, you know, celebrated. Yes, you have a 21st and then what, your next one's what? Your 40th? Yeah, maybe. Or you do like. Maybe a 30th. Maybe.

But yeah, it's, you know, and there's other stuff in your life. And maybe you don't do those three things of having a baby getting engaged or getting married. Exactly. Your life is still worthy. It's still valid. It's exciting. You still have achievements. That's right.

That's so cool. Thank you so much, Chris. And hopefully you've also inspired people to celebrate their victories with us as well because we love it. Yes, please. Write in. We always say it. We love a brag. Share your good news.

And it can be small stuff too. I love a small victory. Oh, my good. Yeah. Love it. Anyway, finally, Patrick J. Early, giving themselves the title, Chief Effective Detective Inspector of inspecting defective detectors. Well done. I did all right.

Well done. Considering it's like late in the day and my brain is done. Yeah. She's powered down. Patrick, giving us a joke. Oh, this is great. Love this. Please.

Ghetto Legends. Here's a joke I came up with recently. An original. Patrick original. Love this. Okay. What do you get when a poet smokes weed and overthrows the government? Oh, okay.

A poet overthrows some sort of dictator, I'm thinking, revolution. Uh-huh. Oh, yeah. A two-day. Coo day. Yes, a coup's in there maybe. A high coup. A high coup.

A poet smokes weed and overthrows the government. A high coup. Fantastic. That is good. Yeah, that's a really good stuff. That's a good joke. Oh my gosh. And finishes by saying, love you all and stay safe out there.

That's great. That's great. Patrick, a fantastic joke. Honestly, yes. A high coup. I'm going to say it one more time just for anybody, if you want to write it down to share at a family dinner next time. That's right.

Claim it is your own. No, no, no. Give credit, but share it. I assume if Patrick's sharing it with us, he wants it to be shared with the world. That's right. What do you get when a poet smokes weed and overthrows the government? a high coup. That's fucking good stuff. That is great.

So thank you once again to Patrick, Chris, Michaela and Stephen for your fantastic facts, quotes, questions, brags, jokes, etc. And the next thing we like to do is I usually come up with a little bit of a game. Yes, based on the topic at hand, which is animals on trial. Yeah. Nothing come to mind. I think all of these people are judges. Yes. And we just have to say the animal and the crime.

Okay. Is that fair? Yep, love it. Okay, great. Do you want to go one for one on this? Let's do it. Okay. I'll kick things off. Firstly, from Seattle, Washington, I would love to thank Case Lane.

Ooh. Case Lane. The Honorable Judge Case Lane. Oh, okay. The case with Case Lane. That's good. I'm going to say Case Lane is judging a... Cheater.

A cheater? Yeah. I mean, a very guilty animal. Yeah. A cheetah who's been embezzling Yeah. From the casino where they work. That's right.

They are usually a card dealer. Yep. You know, a poker dealer, but they've been taking a little... Crupier or whatever it is. Yeah. Cropier, I love that. I love that word. Case Lane.

Hopefully, you know, you're a fair-handed judge. And we should say, allegedly, of the cheetah. Yeah, exactly. This subjudice is in place. You know, let's not influence the court. But, yeah, a tough case. and we trust you, Case Lane. Do you want to thank somebody?

I'd love to thank from Garden Suburb, which sounds made up in New South Wales, Ashley O'Neill. Ashley O'Neill. The Honourable Judge Ashley O'Neill. Presiding over a mongoose on trial for... Harassment. No, no, no, no. Stalking.

I'm thinking of Jeff the talking mongoose. Okay, yes. Yeah, which I guess is kind of like harassment. He's like in their walls. Yeah. Yeah, pretty tricky case, Ashley, that you've got on your hands there. We wish you well, Your Honor. But thank you, Ashley.

I would also love to thank from Dublin in Dublin in Ireland. Oh my gosh. Adam French. Adam French, what are you doing in Ireland? Your name should be Adam Irish. That reminds you. I'm sure I've said this on the podcast before, but when I was in prep, which is the first grade of primary school in Victoria.

There was a girl in my class called Amy French, and I remember specifically, this is one of my few memories from prep, the teacher had to call a meeting to tell the class that Amy, just because her name was French, doesn't mean that she is French. We could not understand that. Couldn't get the concept.

No, no, no, no, no. That's just the name. So, I wondered that ever happened, ever happened to Adam French. We had somebody in, have we given a name yet, a case or anything yet? No, no, no. Okay. Well, we had a girl in primary school whose name was Katie, and then she kind of spoke to the class one day and was like, hey, guys, I don't want to be called Katie anymore. Can you please call me Catherine? Okay, which was her full name, but, you know, but she was like, don't call me Katie, call me Catherine. Yeah. And of course, being the mature, what, grade twos we were or something, we would run around the playground going, Katie, Katie!

Like, absolute pricks. But I think, like, she would sort of pretend to be really annoyed by it, so I think we were, I think it was lighthearted. Okay, but clearly I reckon what's happened there is Katie and I said to my mom and dad, look, I don't want to be Katie. I think I prefer Catherine. And my mom's like, that's fine. Just go in there and tell them that and that'll be fine. They'll be fine. Everybody will respect that. They're mature.

They're seven and eight. You could be called whatever you want to be called. Yeah. And then you doubled down on it. Okay, Adam French. I'll say an owl on trial for insurance fraud. No. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. It doesn't look either. Spelled look. but the Honourable Adam French. Adam will give a fair trial to this out. I agree, yes. Adam has a reputation of being quite fair. Firm, but kind.

You know, like, you know, yeah. So I think the Al's in good hands. Do you want to thank somebody? Well, I think from Wooddale, Illinois, it's Marta Escobedo. Oh, are you kidding me? Escobito. Escobito. Go to write down some of these names.

I don't know what I'll ever do with them. Like, if I ever create a character or something. Don't just walk around with a list of people's names in your phone, Dave. When you die in suspicious ways, they'll look like a list of your enemies. Marta Escobedo. That's amazing. Marta Escobito, the Honourable Judge Marta Escobito, presiding over a case in which a jackal has stolen a BMX bike.

Whoa. And like a good one? Yeah, like a huffy. Shit. Like a really good huffy. It doesn't look good for the jackal. Do you think the jackal's a good nickname? The jackal's a great nickname.

Yeah. I recently watched the Bruce Willis film. Bruce Willis Richard Gear called the Jackal. Ah, okay. From the 90s. Seen that one? That does vaguely ring a bell. It's got the scene where he shoots a young Jack Black's arm off.

What? Yeah, it's quite horrifying. Okay, no, I have not seen that at all. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But most people, that's all they remember about that scene. I know that because I looked at that scene on YouTube and all the comments are like, I've never seen this film, but I've somehow I remember this that scarred my childhood. And I had the same thing.

Wow. I watched the clip because I was like, I don't think I remember this. And then I went back and watched the movie. It's pretty good. Okay. Bruce Willis, it's an interesting one because he, he's an assassin and his thing is that he changes his disguise really, really well. Oh, okay. So it's pretty funny because he's like sometimes wearing a hat, sometimes got like blonde hair sometimes.

So he's not actually changing his disguise super well? And he always looks like Bruce Willis. Yeah, of course, but he's got different hair. You know what would be funnier is if it was a different actor every time. Yes, that would be a rude. That would be funny. They should have done that. That's good stuff.

Anyway, thank you so much to Marta Escobedo. I would also love to thank from Spartanburg in South Carolina. Wow. Sarah Faith White. Sarah Faith White. My gosh. So you watch that name. Okay.

Sarah Faith White is on, well, presiding of a trial where a starfish has been accused of committing. Um, uh, of, well, actually cat fishing. Oh. Yeah. Oh my gosh. Yeah. I'd have to strike that from the record because it's not looking good. And like a lot to be.

honest. A lot of catfish. Yeah, yeah. And like, yeah, like, stealing money from people, but also just like really breaking hearts. Yeah, because people thought that are on the chat to like a, you know, a beautiful blue whale. Yeah, but it's a starfish. Well, gross. Yeah, exactly. No, that's fine. That's good for you, but I'm not into starfish. Yeah, that's not for me. No, thank you. So yeah, there you go. Sarah Faith White, a tough case ahead. I would like to think from a location unknown, we can only imagine deep within the fortress of the. Moles, which we discovered the origin of the Fortress of the Moles on this episode. It's Chris Wan.

Yes. Or Chris Wan. Chris Wan. Chris Wan. It's like five ends. Five ends. W-A-N-N-N-N-N-N. N-N-N.

Chris, the Honourable Judge Chris Wan presiding over a case in which a Flamingo. Have we already done Flamingo? No, Hapenomino. It has been accused of breaking it into someone's free. and stealing all their yogurt. No. And they had a lot of yogurt. Are you kidding me?

They've just been to the yogurt store. That's when I'm at my happiest. When I open my fridge and I'm like, ah, full of yogurt. Full of yogurt. I have so much yogurt. So many flavors. Yeah. I made a smoothie this morning with the tropical yogurt in it.

Oh, yum. Fucking delicious. That's delicious. What else was in it? Mango, passion fruit, milk, protein powder. Yes. So then you add the protein yogurt. it, that's another seven grams of protein baby.

Oh my gosh. And do you blend it so it's like really drinkable, a liquid type thing? Yeah, I'm drinkable. Okay. Smash it down. God, you're really, I'm powered. I'm ready to start my day. Yeah.

My God, you're like kicking the door down. I do anyway, but I did it with more power this time. Yeah, it didn't quite zap me and all my energy because I had some. Thanks, Chris Wan. I would also love to thank from Holly Springs in North Carolina. I've had the Carolinas today. Yeah, I don't have a fun fact about that. that place so you can keep reading.

I'd think fuck. I'd love to thank the Honorable Judge Karen Little. Karen Little is presiding over a case. This is a strange one because it's a pretty rare animal, a commodo dragon. Yes, accused of purposefully switching up patients' subscriptions for their, prescriptions for their glasses. Oh my gosh, that would be so annoying. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So you're going to pick up your new glasses. You took ages choosing new frames. Oh, forever. Got to find the right shape, right color, all that sort of stuff. You're excited. going to pick up your new specs, you put them on and you're like, I can't see a thing. This is worse than nothing. And it turns out that's basically every person who's gone to that particular spec savers.

Yeah, yeah. And it's not just an accident, like purposefully. Yeah, the commo, well, we accuse the commode dragon. That's right. Yes, allegedly. Yeah. So that's up to Karen Little to get to the bottom of that case. And the, and the motive why is what I'm really interested in.

Like, what are you getting out of that? Why are you doing that? Is it just to watch the world burn? Yeah, because if so, lock them up. Yeah. I don't like that kind of energy in people or animals. That's evil.

I would like to think from Kedron in Queensland. It's Anita C. The Honourable Judge Anita C. Overseeing a case involving a... Hmm. Dugong. A dugong. Is that a thing?

Dugong. Dugong. Yeah, basically. Potato. Potato. Dugong. Dugong, a dugong, which has been accused of, it's difficult because that's mostly a water animal.

A dugong has been accused of putting holes purposefully in people's parachutes before they go out. Oh, come on. And no one died. No one died. No one died fortunately because the backups weren't tampered with. But the main shoot always had these big dugong shaped teeth holes. Shit. And they got big old fangs on it too, don't they?

Yeah, they're fanging it up. Tusks. Yeah. Oh, that's awful. That's attempted manslaughter. Yeah. Or attempted murder. I can never remember.

Is that attempted murder? I think that's attempted murder. Because it's like, like, you've really planned it. Manslaughter's like, oopsie. Yeah, I don't think there's an attempted manslaughter. You attempted an accidental death. Yeah. Attempted murder.

That's full on. Anita, you've got, poor, your hands full with this case. Yeah, that's a sick, you're going over to do it. I think that's going to be quite a long, a long hearing. Yeah. Clear the schedule for that one. So all the best to you, Anita, in that tricky. trial.

And finally, finishing it up, I would love to thank from Sunderland in Great Britain, Keely Ludford. The case of a two can. Committing Grand Theft Auto, allegedly. Grabbing the steering wheel with its bill. Oh, yeah. Driving along. Crazy stuff.

But actually, and I would cover our asses and say allegedly, but there is a lot of phone footage. Phone footage, yes. I've seen a couple of dash cams as well. Yeah, it's pretty hard to claim you didn't do it. There was a GoPro in the car, thankfully, that was recording. Facing the two cam. Yeah, and the two cam was even there saying, ha ha, it's me. You know, saying their name and like saying, I'm doing this on purpose.

It was like, oh my God, stop talking, toucans. Still saying not guilty. Yeah, which is an interesting plea. But yeah, there you go. So we love to thank once again, Keeley, Anita, Karen, Chris, Sarah, Marta, Adam, Ashley and Case. Thank you so much for those people. Now we also need to check if there's any new inductees in the Trip Ditch Club, which is our Hall of Fame, our honor roll.

Yes. But it is also a club, like a hangout zone. These people have been supporting the show on that shoutout level or above for three consecutive years. We've already shouted them out a couple of years back. But to say thank you and to enshrine them, put them up on the wall, gold letters, all that sort of stuff. We induct them forever into the Trip Ditch Club. Yeah. And Jess is always behind the bar with it.

I mean, it could be a smoothie. Who knows what you're making? Food, drink, you're the caterer. Yeah, that's right. I've got animal crackers. Okay. Good one. And I have making like cocktails.

I guess you could call them, but I'm using animals. Yeah. Okay. Just like a meat cocktail. I don't eat meat, so I can't taste test it or anything, but I'm just blending a lot of meat. And I think that should be right. So there you go.

beautiful and I always book a band. Yep. Have you got Animal, the Muppet? No. The Muppet drummer? Didn't rewrite back to my emails. I don't know if he can type.

I don't think he has thumbs, dude. I don't know how he's fucking holding drumsticks. You're never going to believe it. Why? Obviously. Yeah, we spoke about some rats on this episode. Yeah.

I booked this band a long, long time in advance. What have you done? But the instrumental band Ratatatat. Oh, are here. Wow. Wow. Wow. Are they going to play their big hits such as...

Such as loud... Actually, do know this band. Loud pipes. Loud pipes. Yes, remember that song? They played at Meredith, one year I went. Oh, fun. They were very cool because they're sort of electronic or instrumental,

but then also had like a light show going, and it was like very late at night, so some people are absolutely off their dial. Yeah, yeah. A few beers, it's a bit of fun. A few beers and a few other things. I would never. No, not you.

Yeah, my God, I'm a freaking nerd. Talk about other people. Other people have had had all the things. But yeah, they were really great. But I can't believe that I booked them the night that we talked about rats. Yeah, that's crazy. What are the change? It keeps happening.

And so, yeah, we like to, normally Matt is sort of the one to raise the velvet rope, tick you off the list, welcome you in. We all stand around cheering and welcoming you. I guess I can do that this time, Dave, and then you can sort of hype them up a little bit. Oh, yes. How many have we got? Three. Three.

I think you can do that. I absolutely think. Do you feel confident? Yes. Okay. great. Well, here we go. And also, Matt's not here to bring you down with his negativity. Yeah, that's right. It's just pure positive vibes. I am the human equivalent of a little pat on the bum. Yes. You know, so I've got you here. Everybody finds that comforting.

Yeah, yeah. Find me somebody who doesn't find a little pat on the bum comforting. Exactly. There's nothing weird about it. It's nothing weird. Maybe a stranger giving you a pat, sure. But a loved one, that's nice. Yeah. That's why babies like it. It's comforting. Chill out. All right. Back off. About liking a pat on the bum from certain people. Anyway, So, welcoming into the Triptage Club this week. From Silver Springs, Maryland, it's John Brophy. I don't have a trophy case here, but I do have a John Brophy case.

Yes, we'll put you in glass, Charles. Put you on display. Look pretty. Shine for us. From London, in London, it's Charlotte. Charlotte from, not London, but from Fondon. Oh, she's fun, she's Charlotte, she's fun. I get a party started in here.

What in it, alright? What's up? I'm Charlotte. Let's party. Yeah, we'll have a bit of fish and chips, mushy peas. We love you, Charlotte. Yeah, we love you so much. We love you.

And finally, from South Borough, South Borough in Massachusetts, it's Paloma Velasquez. I was in a coma, and the first person I saw when I awoke was Paloma Vasquez. Your very comforting presents. You made Dave feel safe again as he came out of the coma. You're whispering sweet, nothing's in my ear and said, oh my gosh, I'm awake. Hello. Oh, that's beautiful. Thank you.

And now you're here, would you like to be inducted into the Tributees Club? And Paloma said, I mean, if you've got time, because that's just the cool person, Paloma is. Yes. So thank you and welcome. Paloma, Charlotte and John, welcome to the Triptich Club. Now that you're in it, you can never leave. But why would you want to? We haven't actually had anyone request to leave, but there is a rule that you can't. You can't.

But no one's requested it even. Yeah, I don't know what we would do if we did get a request. Yeah. How do you think maybe you'd have to take it to a panel? Yeah. And we could sort of decide. You'd have to have a good reason to one leave. Yeah, obviously.

it's a no from me as well, but maybe Matt could be swept. Nah, but we've already said no. Yeah, two to one. This is a democracy. I don't know why you'd wanted like a demotion in life. Exactly. Go back to the real world with all those suckers. Yuck.

But yeah, I guess that brings us to the end of the episode. Just one thing I would like to say to people. A couple things, actually. Remember to wash your butt. Okay, good step. Good thing to do. Thank you. It is.

Just wash your butt. How often? Once a year? I don't, you can probably over. overdo it. Really? Okay. Too clean.

Yeah. He gets red raw. I'm scrubbing it. And if you would like to suggest a topic, anybody can. You don't have to be a Patreon. It doesn't cost you any money or anything to suggest a topic. So if there's something that you think would make for a good Do Go On report. Yeah, I love when people do that.

There's a link in our show notes. It's also on our website, which is do go on pod.com, which is also where you can find information about live shows, our other podcasts, all sorts of fun stuff. So head over there. You can find us on social media. at Do Go On Pod as well, and Do Go On Podcast on TikTok, where we are going viral. We are huge on there. Oh, my gosh.

We're massive. We might be one of the top three creators. Yeah, I think we're getting to the top three. Yeah, it's pretty big for us. Anyway, Dave, boot this baby home. We'll be back next week with another fantastic episode, I'm sure of it. But until then, I'll say thank you so much for listening. And until then, goodbye.

Bye. Ladies. That was a pretty good man. Yeah, that was your best yet. Ladies, I'm a big dumb idiot. Don't forget to sign up to our tour mailing list so we know where in the world you are and we can come and tell you when we're coming there. Wherever we go, we always hear six months later, oh, you should come to Manchester.

We were just in Manchester. But this way you'll never miss out. And don't forget to sign up, go to our Instagram, click our link tree. Very, very easy. It means we know to come to you and you'll also know that we're coming to you. you. Yeah, we'll come to you. You come to us. Very good. And we give you a spam-free guarantee.