Higher Learning with Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay - RIP, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Plus a Historic Emmys for Black Culture

Episode Date: September 22, 2020

Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay discuss the various wins and losses for Black culture at the Emmys, Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s tragic passing, and the recent spat between Doug Gottlieb and Maria Taylor before another “Am I Dumb?” segment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yo, yo, yo, thought warriors. What is up? It is I Van Lathan, another edition of higher learning. I love how I put myself before the podcast in this particular time. I'm sorry. Is I Van Lathan? No, no, no, be you. Do you, babe.

Tell us how you really feel. Oh, and hey guys, I'm Rachel Lindsay. Rachel, how was your weekend? The playoffs are here. And you can predict the action all the way. to the finals with Fandul predicts. Predict the spread, total points, and even the game winner. Sign up and get a $25 bonus.

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if you have an infection, flu-like symptoms, or need a vaccine. Explore what's possible. Ask your doctor about Tramphia today. Call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more or visit Trimfair Radio.com. Man, my weekend was busy. So I don't even think I've talked about this, but I've been here for what, two and a half weeks, two plus weeks. None of my personal stuff was here, only furniture.

I've been living out of a suitcase. The moving company has had my stuff for four weeks. It has not been a pleasant process. I have not been nice about it, but it finally got here on Saturday. So all my stuff was here. I was unpacking Saturday. And then I had the Emmys on Sunday.

So it's been an eventful weekend. Oh, how did the Emmys go? It's different. It's my first time covering an award show, and it was virtual. So, you know, it's... A lot of stars didn't want to do one-on-one conversations after they won.

They were like, I'm already at home. Kind of like, I'm done. I'm done. It's over. And I get it. You don't want to talk to 30 media outlets. Yeah, especially if you don't... If you're not there, right? If you're there, you're sort of roped into it,

you're wrangling into it. I just want to shout out some people real quick. I want to shout out. Anthony Anderson, Don Cheeto, Tracy Ellis Ross, Cord Jefferson, all of my friends who were nominated. Court is the only person of all of those people who actually won. Schitt's Creek just dominated the entire award show. And so Tracy and Anthony, I think Don was nominated for his Showtime show.

He was for Black Monday. For Black Monday. So, yeah, Shitt's Creek won everything. They won everything. She's a good show. Do you watch it? Yeah, I watched the first season. It's funny.

It wasn't enough for me to like really, really care about the second season of the show, but it's a very funny show. All those people are top right, top rate performance. It really gets better and the acting is really great. And I don't know. It's just a really, really good story. I will say this, though. I thought, I feel like they won, yes, because it is excellent.

I don't want to take anything away from them. but it's also, the show is over, right? They just wrapped the series. There's no talk about a movie. Yeah. Yeah. Otherwise, I think it would, Anthony Anderson has been nominated nine times

for this role in Blackish, lead after and is not one. Tracy seven times, these are my notes coming back to me. I was fully prepared to interview them. I even spoke with Anthony Anderson before all of this, and I felt like we manifested this. This was happening.

So here's my, here's my, mark this. Martin, mark this. Next season, they're going to be covering everything that has happened in 2020, specifically to black people and how it affects them as a family. It's going to be out of this world. So he will get his 10th nomination and his first Emmy. Tracy will get one too because of the show's already excellent, but because of what they're going to cover, mark my words.

They're winning. Things going to happen for him. I know it's going to happen. Here's what these awards shows basically are. Not that I'm dissing any of the awards shows because they're fun to watch. But they're fun to watch. And I'm, I've been nominated for two Emmys, by the way.

I'm just nominated for two movies. Can we get a counter of how many times he compliments himself in this podcast? No, no, I'm saying. I'm saying, but a lot of times. Out of curiosity for what? Seriously. For being a producer on TMZ. Oh, that's great.

You're a producer on TMZ? Yeah. That's what I've never been nominated. Yeah. So a lot of times these award shows aren't really award shows. There's something called Find a White Person. It's Find a White Person doing something, some white person that's set a line somewhere, and they go, bam, you win the award. Come get it, white person.

Because we're white, and it's our award show. And since it's our award show, we understand your art better than we understand. Understand that culture is a very powerful thing. There are jokes that are funny to white people. obviously that aren't funny to black people. So that's true. It's true. Like I have, I talk about this all the time.

I have a Seinfeld group of homies. I mean, there's a group of my homies that understand Seinfeld. Now, we all get Martin and living single and all of that. But there's a select few of my homies that watch Seinfeld and go, yo, this shit is really fucking funny. Yeah. I found these guys in college or curb or any of those other things. So the thing is, what these award shows is, It takes a show that comes at a specific time and has a specific sensibility

to sometimes cut through to the people that are making these shows. The Grammys can't even get the fucking hip-hop award right. Like the Grammys, the Grammys gave Macklemore a Grammy when Kendrick was in the same fucking category. So, you know, to everybody, don't put too much into it. Now, I say this as somebody who, you know, obviously it would be great to win, but don't put too much into it, but put more into the Soul Train Awards, the NAACP Awards, all of those awards.

We have award shows that understand us. So why don't we care as much about those awards shows, Rachel, as we care about? Because those shows pertain to a particular audience, whereas, like a Grammy's or an Oscars, even though it doesn't include us, it is something everybody watches. Do you get what I'm saying? Obviously you're not. Well, here's my question.

Here's my question. Does do sole trade awards include white people? And NAACP? I mean, I honestly don't know. You can get nominated for that stuff. You just got to be in some black shit. Okay. Like if you're, if you're, I think, I'm pretty sure,

and I can look at this. Like, I know that the BET Awards do, right? Because the BET Awards, if it's in culture. And the BET Awards is obviously another huge award show. The BET Awards, if it's in culture, you'll get nominated. Like Iggy Azalea, people like that, Eminem, I've been nominated for the BET Awards. Whatever you're doing, if it's within the confines of black culture, all right, you could probably get nominated for those things.

And my thing about all of these different shows, right, all of these different awards ceremonies is, sure, they're supposed to be for everyone. but they're really not. Like I love Shitscreek, right? I think Shitt's a cool show. I would say I love it. I'll say I like it. But I can't find you five black people that watch that show.

I mean, everybody in the town, in everybody that's here, they know that that's a good show. And by the way, it's not like, when I say five black people, I might not be able to find you five people who watch Ships Creek. Let's not act like Shits Creek.

That's actually true. is the biggest. It is a fantastic show. I think it came on IFC. So it's a pop TV? Yeah, I don't even know. Something like that. It's a smaller network show.

That's a good show. Don't get me wrong. But it's not like a sort of, you know, cultural phenomenon in any way. It's a Canadian show, but it really grew popularity because it's on Netflix.

And, you know, people are, that's how I started watching it. I started watching it this summer. It's not that I've been following it for six seasons, because that's how many there were. I just jumped on the train. And I don't know if I would have if I had been quarantine, you know?

Yeah. Yeah, I mean, the reality is this. And I think everyone that I talk to, obviously you want to win an Emmy because those awards are tied to professional accomplishments and professional achievements that then drive your rate up, get you more opportunities and things like that. It's like winning the NFL MVP or the NBA MVP.

If you're in the league, of course you want to win the awards. I get it. Same time, blackish and watchman insecure, that they shut out insecure. These shows are not defined by what those people that make those awards say. They're defined by what they do for us, how much we look. love them, how much the audience that is loyal to them in the case of blackish and insecure what we put into them. And those creators have to remember that.

Yeah. That we feel well served by them. And I think they do. But I will acknowledge the people who did black people who did win because they had phenomenal speeches. Regina King won an Emmy. This was four per fourth Emmy. Her speech was about voting.

She wore a say her name, Brianna Taylor's, she wore a say her name, Brianna Taylor shirt. Uzo Aduba, Brianna Taylor's shirt. Wonderful speech about Shirley Chisholm. That's who she won. The TV show Mrs. America,

which I wasn't familiar with. Yes. Good. On Epx. Yeah. Okay. And she portrayed Shirley Chisholm and she said one of the most beautiful things about it

is that so many people don't know what Shirley Chisholm did. And she was able to do that and win an Emmy for it. So that was beautiful. And I don't know if you caught Yaya Adul Mateen's speech. Yeah, yeah, the guy I was telling you about last week. That's what a dude was I was telling you about. When you did you talk about him last week?

When I was telling you about the fact that the sexy chocolate actors and stuff like that, I was telling you by... Is that whose name you couldn't remember? Yaya, yeah, yeah, from down there in New Orleans, man. Yaya. He's fantastic. Dr. Manhattan. His speech. Oh, he gave a toast to black women.

It was beautiful. He was so shocked. He was emotional. He ran off the screen. screaming when he won it was great. I have not seen Watchman. Watchman won a few awards, but I'm inspired to watch it

after last night. Look, all those creatives are fantastic. Zendaya, sorry. Totally forgot about Zendaya. Euphoria. Zendaya is going to be the biggest Zendaya's going to be the biggest fucking star in the world here pretty soon, right? That's going to happen, right?

Pretty soon Zendaya is going to be the biggest fucking star in the world. It's just she's like 13 years old or something. She's like, she's a baby. And she's doing everything that she's doing right now. So shout out to Zandah. Shout out to all of them. But it's just very important to remember,

it's very, people can't award what they don't understand. And so a lot of times, and the most frustrating part about being black or being a black creative or being whatever is to explain to somebody why something's funny or why something's funny or why it's going to hit or why it's going to work or why or whatever it is. And you have to do that sometimes.

You have to articulate that plainly, but sometimes you have to do it through art. You know what I mean? And so I just don't think that the people I've talked to, they don't put too much stock into it. It would be great to win. They don't put too much stock into it. It's a sad state of affairs that we sometimes have to be foreigners

in this country, even when it comes to us. art. Now that's not to say that we didn't get a ton of recognition last night and that these things aren't changing because, you know, there's more representation ever. And when I say representation, it's very important we also point to this. I'm not saying representation for representation's sake. I don't give a fuck about that. I don't care about representation for representation sake. I don't care about that. What I care about is representation in terms of actually investing into the genius of black creatives. Investing and nurturing the genius of black creatives.

Because see, there's this weird idea. And the idea says that if you invite black people to the table, some kind of way the table then becomes less impactful, less genius or less effective. Like you hear it all the time. Well, we're going to get the best person for the job because if we hire a black person. then how do we know we're going to get the best person? That's a fucked up way of thinking because it assumes that the best person is not black. It assumes that we can't write and produce amazing content that can go on and be worth

anything. And the more we see black creatives get the opportunities, the more you're going to see amazing television, amazing acting, an amazing film. Moonlight is a movie that could not have been made in 2006. It could not have been made in 96. Moonlight was made in 2018, I think it was, 2017, 2018, whatever it was. And when you look at how brilliant it is written, directed, and acted, fucking tell me if anybody's fucking with Barry Jenkins or Mahershala or Janelle Monet or Ashen or Ashin or.

Tramante or anybody else who's in that movie, they all did a fantastic job. So, you know, it's what it is. Don't let the Emmys get you down. Okay. How was your experience, though? How was it like doing the Emmys from the Starship Enterprise?

Wait, what about the Starship? Oh, stop, stop. I had to think about what that was for a second. No, I mean, it's different. You know, part of being on the red carpet is the adrenaline of people coming through and you're getting to talk to so many people about their Emmy experience

and what they're up for or if you're in the back, what they won. We didn't have that. So it was pretty much, I mean, it was two and a half hours before I was able to speak to anyone.

Right. So we sat there, we watched it, and then we talked to people. If there would have been an actual Emmy show, like let's say there would have been

a socially distance Emmy show. Okay. Would you have felt comfortable covering it? Yes. You would have covered it. You'd been on the red, carpet covering a socially

distanced Emmy show. Yeah, because I'm sure I would have had to wear a mask. I don't know if you saw, but they had the stars pulling up that showed up at the Stable Center getting COVID test. There were stars at the Stable Center? Tracy Ellis Ross, they captured her getting a COVID test, right? Like a rapid

test, I guess you can find out immediately. So everyone you saw, like Zendaya was there, Anthony Anderson was there, Tracy Ellis Ross, Sterling K. Brown. I didn't realize they went to the actual place. Yeah, Jason Bateman was there. There were a few. Is there any celebrity that you would risk getting COVID to talk to?

There are a lot. Everybody I just named, like Tracy Ellis Ross, Sterling K. Brown, Anthony Anderson, absolutely. You'd risk getting COVID to talk to Anthony Anderson. Yeah, especially if he won. Yeah, it's my man. I don't think, I don't think, I tell you one thing, I can tell you one thing, knowing Anthony, he wouldn't risk getting COVID to talk to you.

He don't know me. That's fine. He wouldn't risk getting COVID. You know, my man, you know, aunt was in the house during this whole thing was going on. He was like, nah. I'm like, yo, I want to call. No, you can't. Nah.

I invited myself his 50th birthday party. Oh, you may have make that happen, bro. It's a nice man. Now, shout out to everybody who wanted him me. And once again, to everybody who didn't win an Emmy, we love y'all. And you guys win the innings of our hearts. Yeah, whatever, nigger.

No, no, no, we want to win. Okay, you don't like me saying honor to be nominated. Whatever. No, it's no honor to be nominated. It's cool to be nominated. Okay. Well, you can put whatever word you want to on it. It's cool.

Okay. It's an honor to hold that thing, dang. I wonder how you'd be if you had won an Emmy. If you had actually won an Emmy, an Emmy. If I had one, you know what you would be doing right now? You'd be showing it to me. That's what you would be doing this conversation. No, I wouldn't. No, I wouldn't.

Because at that point, you know, once I, if I wanted, if I had won an Emmy for TMZ with the way things ended, I'd have go ahead. I'd probably would have gone so crazy at the end. Lada would probably like took the Emmy and probably pulled a Kanye on the Emmy.

I'm like, yo, I don't even need this, man. I'm free. Think about how gangster that would be. If I had the TMZ, I mean, I'm just driving down a 101. I'll just chuck that. You know what I'm saying? It's not. It's not.

Chuck that, just chuck it. No, but shout out to everyone. Now, this week you got started with, I was over at my friend Tommy's house. Shout out to Tommy, Alter. I was over at Tommy's house, and I got a notification on my phone. And this notification shook.

me to my core. The notification said very, very directly Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has died. When that notification

popped up on my phone, I had myriad of emotions. Okay. And I am going to be ashamed to admit something. Not one of those emotions in that immediacy

was any feelings of personal loss for Ruth Bair Ginsburg's family or for anyone who might have loved Justice Ginsburg or for anyone around her. I reacted the way I imagined that a lot of people reacted to the death of Ruth, Ruth Barry Ginsburg, which is completely and totally selfishly.

Yeah. And that is an easy thing to do when someone transitions that had given their entire life to making your life better. When someone spends their whole life to make your life better and then their life is over, it's hard to think of the sadness of people that might have been close to Justice Ginsburg, the family, the immediate. idiot people, the people that worked with her. And just the loss that you feel when any human being is gone from this earth. This is the first thing you think, oh, man, so sorry. Even with like when we lost Nip, right? Even when we lost Nip, so sad for Nip, right?

But I was thinking about Lauren and the kids and everybody else. I was thinking about what everyone lost by not having Nip around. When Cold Pass, right, I was thinking about his wife, his daughters, what everyone lost by not having co-brown. In this situation, I was thinking about not the people that were going to lose the presence of Justice Ginsburg, but what we were possibly going to

lose as Americans by the fact that she had passed away before the election. And I can say I am now ashamed of the fact that I did not let this Titan have a moment of humanity when she passed away. And everyone should take a step back and look at the fact

that I can't think of many people who when she passed away felt sadness. There was fear is what I felt. I mean, I think that you're expressing the same sentiments that a lot of us felt. When I saw it, I was on, I was FaceTiming and it popped up and I screamed out in the person and they were like, what, what happened?

And then, you know, a part of me was like, you didn't get the same alert? What kind of notifications do you have on your phone? Why are you not getting these alerts? That really was my first thought. Then my second thought, I yelled out, this is so bad. And I heard myself say, this is so bad.

And then I felt bad. Because in me saying this is so bad, I was thinking politically, judicially, what does this mean? But I caught myself immediately because I thought, she has done so much. so much in the fight for justice.

And what we're going to think about in the end is this moment in this election year. That's all I kept thinking about. I don't want her life to come down to this election, this 2020 election. And that was my fear. And so then I step back and I started watching the coverage on the news. And they kept talking about it politically. So I shut it off because I really. I really wanted to think of her as a person and what she did for those, for the voiceless, for women,

for those who, you know, just were suffering from some type of injustice. And MSNBC had a really good tribute to her the following day. And it was almost like they too had the same reaction that we did. Everybody was talking about what this meant for the courts and was trying to foresee what could happen and play out every single possible possibility. And then it was as if 24 hours later, they started to do tributes to her to recognize what she did. And I think because I think it's important. She has become a celebrity in the last few years, but has been fighting for decades for justice.

And I think that's what people need to understand. So if you haven't seen, you know, there's a movie that's been done. There's a documentary RBG that's been done. You should really take time to educate why people regard her. in this way. Why she has been placed on a pedestal, why they call her notorious RBG? What gave her that name?

Not just the cases that she was involved in, but her voice in writing, the dissents that she would write is really how she became known as notorious RBG because she was not afraid to call out the court in the name of justice. And you don't see many people doing that these days because they're aligning themselves

with the political party. And Ruth Bader Ginsburg always was the side of justice. Always, even if it was unpopular. Right. And by the way, wasn't someone who always got it right in the days after the Colin Kaepernick situation,

Ruth Bair Ginsburg was asked about Colin Kaepernick's stand or the fact that he was kneeling or sitting during the anthem. And she was very critical and said some things about Cap that I was like, yo, crazy from Justice Ginsburg was then educated and came back and understood better why what she said was so short-sighted. So that to me is a direct measure of intelligence. Intelligence isn't getting it right the first time.

Intelligence is getting all the information then getting it right, right? So sometimes we're all human. But Justice Ginsburg, every single time she spoke or with every single decision that she was a part of, reminded people about what it is that she stood for. And even when she thought that she was in the right, you know what I mean? All it took was somebody pulling her coat

and letting her know what exactly is going on, and she ended up on the right side of history more often than not. It's important for people to remember that in order to have a standard for the next Supreme Court justice or the next sort of political hero that you might adopt now that Justice Ginsburg is gone, you have to know what the hero before did for you. The reason why it's important for all of us to know about everyone who paved away for the people that are on this podcast

and are talking, Justice Ginsburg was a tremendous, tremendous figure in terms of her feminist ideology and all of that stuff. You just have to know about that. And it would be amazing if while we fight this battle, in the Supreme Court, which we're going to get to right now, that we also take the time to educate people and exactly what it is that we lost. And I hope that we're able to do those two things simultaneously.

I hope that you guys understand what a hero we have to lay the arrest. And I hope that people understand the standard that she set in the court. So while we're hand wrangling, and like my man, Baccari said, Bedwetting, Baccari accused me a bedwetting. So we're all in this. I keep telling you about the little group text we're all in. And so when Justice Ginsburg passed away, I go in, I went, oh, shit, we're screwed. And so everybody starts going, yo, this is so fucked.

The bottle of the lot. Bacari goes, hey, hey, hey, hey, shout to Bacari. She goes, stop bedwetting. Let's get ready for the fight. And I was like, God damn, Bacar. Yeah, you're right. That would shut me up real quick, though. Yeah.

I told them, I said, I don't have to bed wet anymore because I'm all out of pee. I p. I p. I'm giving all the pee that I can. I'm scared. Now, the fight commences. What does this mean? The death of Justice Ginsburg means this. It means the liberal faction of the Supreme Court is down by one. Okay. Supreme Court has one less member.

Now that it is 4-4, President Trump, and Mitch McConnell have said that they are going to, President Trump has said he is going to nominate a justice to replace Justice Ginsburg by Friday. Mitch McConnell says he will vote. He will make sure that the Senate votes on confirming this nominee before the election. Okay. The election is, I think, some 70 days away. Okay. It's like 40 days away. Okay. It's like 42 or something like that. Stop. I'm sorry.

We did this last week. I'm sorry. Your face, like 70? No. No, it's 42 days away. It's 40-some days away. So that's quick. That's fast.

It would be one of the most fast. It would be one of the fastest, yes. Confirmation process in history. Also, I'm sure you guys have heard this. What Mitch McConnell is doing right now is, cutting against his own words and their party's sort of own ideology going back even four years now because when President Obama was still in office, he was a lame duck president. He nominated, I think Scalia died eight months before the election, the election.

And he nominated Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court. And the Republicans said that you should not confirm. It's unfair to the American people to confirm a Supreme Court nominee before the election because it takes away their right to choose the nominee. They choose the president. The president chooses the Supreme Court. Now, however, it's completely different. What McConnell is saying now is that because they won the midterms in 2018 that America made its choice in terms of reelecting the a Republican majority.

And because they feel like they have a mandate from the country, a Republican majority, and they have the presidency, they are going to vote on this nominee. I mean, listen, if you live in Kentucky where Mitch McConnell is a senator,

or you live in South Carolina, where Lindsey Graham is a senator, who also said, and you can quote me on this, he's also on the record, not once but twice in 2016 and in 2018 saying that a nominee or a justice should not be nominated during an election year. Now they're both taking that back.

If you're a constituent in those states, like, where do you go from there? How do you feel like you can trust these people to accurately represent your needs? How do you feel like democracy is being served? and how do you feel like these people are for you, are representing your needs when they stand for nothing other than themselves? That's what they're, and their political party. That's what they're showing at this point.

I mean, it's, do I think it can happen? Here's the thing. This is what I think people need to understand. 40 something days or whatever it is, is not that far from now. But it's actually more than that. What you need to know is even if Biden wins,

Let me take that back. When Biden wins, there is still what is called the lame duck period. And that is between the time the new president is elected to the time that president takes office. Up until that point, the president, who's currently the president, until the new one is inaugurated, can still nominate a Supreme Court justice. That would be, that would be fucking upset. But that's what can happen. So if the president, if they actually had the election and Trump lost. Yeah.

And he still went through a nomination process. It can still happen. And that would be absurd. Which is why it is so important. It's not just about the presidency. It's about controlling the Senate. So, you know, if it goes through, let's just say Biden wins. And Trump still has this nominee out here.

If the Democrats control the Senate. Senate, then you don't have to worry about this problem. Well, when are new senators inaugurating? I believe there are some are up. Oh, wait, when are senators inaugurated? That's a great question. I don't know. Right.

And so I don't know either. So the question is, if you lose a Senate race, this is good. Maybe one of our facts of a sixth class, I should remember. If you lose a Senate race in November, I'm sure that there is a lame duck period for senators as well, right? There's got to be some sort of transition. By the way, I am less, look, if they start a process and they get it done by the election, that's one thing. I'm less worried, significantly less worried about any lame duck sessions on Supreme Court nominees because that would be, first of all, that would be such a fuck you to America, right? that it would leave Joe Biden

with nothing but a nuclear option in terms of at that point. So what the Democrats could do, just so people know with all of this, if the Democrats won, if Joe Biden were to win, there are things that they could do. Number one, he could add seats

to the Supreme Court. He could go up to 11. That's something that he... He could go beyond 11. Right, yeah, but he could go up to 11. He could fix it. He could change it. Another thing that he could do

in order to guarantee a majority in the Senate is he could add Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C. He could add Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C. as states. And if he did that, he'd add four Senate seats. And then the Democrats would have

even more of a majority in the Senate. Now, this depends on a lot of things. Now, if you listen to 538, there are a couple of different outcomes, and we're getting deep in the weeds here. If in November, the Senate ends up tie 50-50, which could happen. There's a chance that it gets high 50-50.

The Democrats still have the Senate because then Vice President Harris, if Joe Biden would win, would cast the deciding vote in the Senate. So there's a lot of things that are going on here. This is the basic thing to take away. If the Republicans do this, right, we have to change the way we view them and Mitch McConnell specifically. I'll tell you what I mean. A lot of what I just said is political gibberish, mumbo-jumbo, it's hypothetical situations that you have to know the rules on and all of these things like that. Like all of that stuff like that.

But there's a difference between being a politician and being a political terrorist. Okay. A politician is someone who has a constituency and he works for that constituency with other politicians in compromise, negotiations. in battle to get the best vision of America that his constituents want. His or her constituents want. That's what a politician does.

And a lot of times those games are dirty. A political terrorist is something different. And what Mitch McConnell and those guys are doing right now, it's worse than being hypocrites. Hypocrite is too light of a word to describe it. In my estimation, it's not violent, it's political terrorism. It is politics. that is one-dimensional, motivated by one specific set of ideology,

where there is absolutely no loyalty to anything other than the nearly religious beliefs of the faction that you represent. That means very clearly. When we talk about terrorism, we talk about people who don't care about what anybody else is going through, what's happening with anybody else, they'll blow it all up and burn it all down for their people. people. Doesn't matter what the collateral damage is. Doesn't matter what it does overall. Their point is for their people, for the people that follow them who believe as they believe, they'll create as much havoc and as much carnage, change anything and destroy anything in order to put that forth. To me, when McConnell goes back on something he's so clearly articulated in 2016, and Graham goes back on something.

something he's so clearly articulated in 2018. What you have are people that don't have any loyalty or any thought or any concept of what's good for the country, of the precedent they're setting. Right. What they have is an almost religious and almost extreme loyalty to the ideology and the agenda of President Trump. and they would burn down or blow up any other American structures, precedents, or agreements or ideas in order to get that through. And it's a very, very, very dangerous place to be

when politicians become, to me, ideological terrorists. Listen, you're right. Justice Ginsburg addressed this days before her death. She was quoted by saying, her most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new, until a new president is installed. She knew what was going to happen. She knew what she was dealing with and she knew the aftermath and the fallout of what her death would do to politics. And I think what's,

what's, what's, I agree with everything you're saying. The only thing I would say is that it's not about, you made a, you made a point in there about he's doing it for the people that follow him. I don't even think that's where, we are at this point with Mitch McConnell's and the Lindsay Graams and whoever else is like them

with political power. They're at the point where they don't, it's not for people. It's not for people at all, not even the people who are following them. It's all for them. It's all for them to keep their power, to keep their party, all of that. And I think what's so disappointing about this is you have this checks and balance system, right? Like you learn it. You learn it in school. Okay, you've got these three branches, the executive branch, the legislative branch, the legislative branch. and the judicial branch. It's supposed to be a checks and balancing system. It's not supposed to be policing and it's not supposed to be politicized.

And that is what Mitch McConnell is doing with what he's doing right now as far as nominating someone and going against his words in 2016. And it's scary. We've talked about a threat of democracy when we talk about the things that President Trump is doing, but we now need to emphasize what Mitch McConnell's doing. You know, we've even talked about Attorney General. William Barr and how he's a threat to our democracy. It's all of them.

It's everybody who has jumped on the Trump bandwagon. Yeah. And who is all about pushing forward his agenda. And it's scary. And that's why you had the reaction you did when Justice Ginsburg passed the way. That's why I did. That's why the media did because we're watching it play out 72 hours after her passing. Still.

Yeah. It's, it's fucking crazy. Also, you know, we have to keep an eye on who President Trump is thinking of nominating. And so I should say something real quick. In order for President Trump, excuse me, in order for new President Biden to add Washington, D.C. and Puerto Rico, as states, he would need a majority in the Senate. If he was able to win a majority in the Senate in November, the president would have to make sweeping changes in order to put. counteract what the Republicans, the majority that they could possibly have in Supreme Court. Because if you're looking at a situation where the Supreme Court ends up

being 6'3, then if they're in any way, you can say goodbye to Roe versus Way. You can say goodbye to so many things that would tilt, tilt the fabric of American society for a long, long time. I mean, almost so many, so much progress has been made, a court that's that conservative and one-sided, the president would almost have to do something to address those numbers. There's no possible way that that would be able to, that you'd have to let that send. That would be political war if they did it and they say that they're going to do it. Isn't it crazy that all that Justice Ginsburg has done and she passes away and her seat could be filled by the very person

who takes that away from her. Isn't that crazy? It's what it works. So the two people that are talking about is a zeroed in on two people. Judges Amy Coney-Barette, United States Court of Appeals in the Seventh Circuit, and Barbara Lagoa

of the 11th Circuit. Okay. Now this is five names are on that, but these are the two names that that he's talking about. One of these names, Baret, jumps out at me because of the year she was born.

Their birth date is 172. She is 48, meaning that that is a full lifetime. A full lifetime of legislative authority, excuse me, of judiciary authority

on the Supreme Court. That is a lifetime of us fighting this person. if she would be nominated and then confirmed. I'm telling you, this is also a legacy play for President Trump because he's trying to make sure that he is a conservative icon in the way that he has affected the court for years and years and years to come. Now, the situation with Barbara Lagoa is that she is from down there in South Florida.

So when Trump was talking today, he was telling people about her, he said she's from Miami. why does that matter people because Florida is going to be a very very tight win or loss for whoever wins it or loses it in November

so that's a little red meat for the people down there in Florida to say hey Trump is going to put one of our own on the Supreme Court so we should vote for him a long career as a member of Supreme Court so there are a number of things here that are

sort of incredibly important. But the main thing that I feel like people should play attention to is, once again, whether or not politicians and elected officials are doing what's best for the continued functionality of the American political and economic and judicial system or whether or not they're doing what's best for the interests of one particular guy. And you cannot have a society that operates where, The only thought that is put into decisions of this magnitude is whether or not it works for one particular guy. I don't see how we got here.

Because what is that called? Decadorship. Have you been drinking wine this entire time? I have not been drinking. This is water. Are you sure? Why is it in a wine glass? Because I put my water in a wine glass.

Because I don't claim y'all's dishes? Wow. Just like that, huh? You run out of cups? You start drinking out of a wine glass? I don't run out of cups. I like to, like, for me personally, I put this right here. For me personally, I like to feel sexy and fancy.

Okay. Okay. I like to feel sexy and fancy. So what I do sometimes is because I have an ice maker now. I never had one before in life. I'll probably break the thing with how much I'm using it. I've never had an ice maker before. Because I have an ice maker now, I'll crush the ice up, put it in this cup,

and drink orange juice out of it. I'll drink water out of it. See, I have this big water thing right here that the water's really in. but then I pour the water into the wine glass and I drink out of it. And it makes me feel sexy and fancy. I would like to point out that I am no longer the boozy one on this podcast. I think that was a title I held, but I'm seeing differently now, ice makers drinking water out of a wine glass.

Right. So having an ice maker makes you boogey is what you're saying. It's just the way that I, no, what you're holding in your hand is what really makes boozy. Okay. Well, number one, you can't be boozy right now because you look like you're behind bars as a correctional facility. With this, whatever this orange fleece jumpsuit.

With this orange fleece jumpsuit that you're wearing today is either either you're in a correctional facility or a Buster-Rimes video. Woo-Ha got you all in check. All right. Look, it's fucking scary times out here. We're navigating a lot of shit. I might say not well. This is a difficult podcast to go into all the.

the possible ways that shit could fall apart in the next 40-some odd days. Yeah. We're getting down into the dirt politically, but we're telling people, where we're telling people is this. The people at the top right now are big-time fucking hypocrites. Okay? They're hypocrites. That's actually a quaint way of putting what it is that they're doing.

The whole union hangs in the balance. The question to everyone is, what are you going to do? You have got to vote like the country depends on it because it does. But not only that, you can't just, your vote isn't even enough. You got to be loud. You got to make noise. The only thing that politicians pay attention to is whether or not people like them. Because then that decides who then votes for them.

And that decides the main thing in America, which is, of course, who gets paid. So if you don't want Justice Ginsburg's life to have been in vain, if you want everything that she's sacrificed for and worked so hard for to endure past this election, then you got to vote and you got to be loud and you got to be fucking pissed off because I know I am. Do you feel, you know, I often tell people, you got to vote, you got to vote,

but do you ever feel like you need to just be like, you need to vote for Biden. You need to vote for Biden and you need to vote to turn the Senate blue. Don't you feel like sometimes you just need to say that? Because everybody knows what you really mean anyway, right? You need to vote to get these people out of office who are corrupt, who don't care about your interests, who don't care about the people, who don't care about this country.

They care about doing everything that benefits them and pushes their agenda forward. So I almost feel tired of saying vote. Like, I don't want you to just register and vote. I want you to vote what I feel is the right way. Right. Vote for who racial says. Vote Trump. But don't you understand what I'm saying? Oh, no, I completely understand.

I know people know who I mean, but I get a lot of people, which I question, I'm like, who the hell is following me? Because I'm so vocal. I get a lot of people every single time I post something like, vote, hey, make sure you're registered to vote. Make sure you check your deadlines. I'm having a conversation with this person.

Trump 2020, American flags. Trump, Trump this. You know, like, make America great again. And I'm like, who the hell is following me? Like, why are you following me just to troll me to say that? So now I just feel like, forget it. Vote Biden Harris, make the Senate blue, and take back this country. You want to talk about making America great again?

This ain't it the way that they're doing it. It's not it at all because they don't care about you. And if nothing else, time and time and time, every single week, they show you in some form or fashion, they don't care about you. And they showed it again in the death with the death of, Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Yeah, how quickly they moved. No, I understand what you're saying.

This is what I'll tell. This is what I tell people about this. So I'm not a guy who thinks conservatives are bad. Not at all. I agree with you. I am from Louisiana. And I know a bunch of people who are great people who happen to have conservative beliefs based upon the fact that, you know,

they're fiscally conservative or they're pro-life or whatever. We disagree on a great many things. I'm not telling you that conservatives are bad. I'm telling you this guy. this guy is bad. Right. That's it. I'm telling you that there are a lot of people in the past that have been poor at their jobs.

They've been bad leaders on both sides of the aisle. There are a lot of people who have been corrupt. But they're crazy as different. Inept to the point of there is a little, inept to the point of destructive is different. Narcissist to the point of, I almost lack the words to describe it, this degree of narcissism

in that powerful of an office, even symbolically, is so particularly destructive, corrosive, and dangerous. I don't think the country, and in a lot of ways, I don't think the world survives, another four years of it.

It doesn't. So I'm asking everybody to dig down into the corridor of whatever it is that makes you you, to like look at your view of society in America and the world and ask what you want,

what you want, and then take a step back and ask, is this it? Yeah. But I even feel like, like the people who are listening to this podcast, you want to seek knowledge,

you want to understand, you want to know what's happening and you're doing, your part. It's the people you know that are like, I saw somebody post something on Facebook, and it was like why I'm voting for Trump. And it was the most general thing that you could have said. I love my country. I love the flag. I love law and order. Like a list of things like that, all surface level, but you don't know the depths or the ends and outs of what's actually happening, because you're not doing the research. You're not seeking out knowledge to understand what this

president has done over these last three plus years. So, My call to action for you guys listening to this is forward this podcast onto somebody else. You're doing the research. So pass it on to somebody else who's not. You need to make these people understand that it goes deeper than a flag, deeper than just spilling out key terms like law and order. You need to make them understand why their democracy is being threatened right now and how it will only get worse. if this man has another four years. Or a 12 like he threatens.

Yeah, it's whatever. It's whatever. People decide what you want to be. Like, I'm not going to stop drilling in your back. I'm going to be that annoying guy that keeps your mind of the stakes every single time we discuss this. Now, oh. This episode is brought to you by Sweet Green. The day doesn't ask for permission.

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plus 24-7 U.S.-based support. Millions of business owners already trust Spectrum business. So visit Spectrum.com slash business to learn more. Restrictions apply. Services not available in all areas. I have somebody who I really dislike.

I'm sure there's a list. Yeah, but this guy I really dislike. like the Doug Gottlieb. I have worked with him before. Well, tell me the story on Doug Gottlieb. I mean, I don't really, I was the worst. I was a sideline reporter for college basketball, and he was calling the game, and I was a sideline reporter.

There really isn't much to say. I didn't have a bad experience with him. I know his reputation, but I'm not going to defend him by any means at all. I just had a one-time experience with him. That's it. Yeah, so give you guys a little background here. Maria Taylor, who is a fantastic on-air personality over there at ESPN, talked about the fact that she made a very clear mistake in leaving Anthony Davis off of her all-NBA ballot.

Okay? It's all-N-BA ballast. She put Anthony Davis on it. It's a mistake. All right, whatever, big deal. Like, she talked about it, whatever. Doug Gottlie, who is an analyst over there at Fox, who also is an asshole. Yeah.

It takes every single opportunity that he can to be an asshole. He didn't used to be an asshole. See, there was a time in the last four or five years where being an asshole and one of the biggest assholes you could possibly be became more in vogue than ever before. Now, it's always been, there's always been a couple of assholes, right? A couple of big assholes who wasn't big, Rush Limbaugh, assholes since fucking 1917 or whatever he was born, whatever.

And by the way, I'm not talking about these. I'm not saying that these people are assholes because they have different political or social views than me. I'm saying that they're assholes because they take every single, what does an asshole do? What an asshole does is it shits on people. So I want to give people a very, very clear definition of what it means to be an asshole.

I thought you were going to say visual. And I'm like, yeah, you're doing that. No. asshole does is it takes every opportunity to shit on someone. So if you're a person out here and you take every opportunity to shit on somebody, you are what? An asshole. And that's what Doug Gottlieb is.

So she made a mistake. And she talked about that mistake. She tweeted that she's been a long week. And to the people that are saying that she take her voter privileges away for her mistake, feel free. Doug Gottlieb came back and questioned why Maria Taylor had a vote in the first place. He basically said, hey, why should she get a vote in the first place? She came back and said, because I've played basketball, I cover the league,

and I deserve everything that I've worked hard for. This is Doug's full tweet. I should make sure he says, why does Maria Taylor have a vote? Real question. She's a studio sideline reporter, studio host slash sideline reporter in her first year covering the NBA. She works a ton, just not on the league, no reason for her to have a vote. Now, I'm going to be honest about something. I don't know the exact criteria that it takes to get a vote on the all NBA team.

but I know that it's not the players in the league that are voting on the all NBA team. No, I know it's a lot of writers. It's writers and it's media personalities. Okay? Yeah. So my only question is this. Who is Doug Gottlie to question whether or not she should have a vote?

Like to me, and by the way, this is not a one-off thing for this guy. This is something that this is, he always wades into the waters of saying something that makes him seem like a complete fucking dick. And I want to know why is it always necessary for him to be the jerk and the one that goes, oh, well, she shouldn't have a vote in the first place. Well, my question is, why does anyone get a vote, right? Does Skip Baylitz have a vote? He's wrong every time he fucking opens his mouth. Right. You know, what is it?

She made a mistake and why is it him? I take it personally when you shit on the black woman. When you had somebody else earlier in the week, a different guy from a different place come in and say she looked like she should be dressed for the avians when she was covering NFL doing her job. So I'm like, why does it always have to be black women and black people who are criticized and scrutinized when they get to positions where they have, a say and a vote and wherever, where does Doug Gottlieb get off? That's my whole problem and my whole question. I guess I'm asking.

Yeah. I mean, first of all, Doug has this reputation just like you said. And I look it as, it's very obvious to me, you're a tryhard, right? You're trying so hard to say something that's going to be clickbait or what you think will garner social media attention and make you go viral. You don't care how it makes you look. You're just trying so hard to be recognized. That's really what that is.

You're not a Stephen A. Smith. You're not a Colin Cowherd. And you're trying to be to that level. And you think this is what you need to do to get there. That's how I feel about Doug. But at the same time, I laugh because you're showing your hand. Maria Taylor has you pressed. She is a 33-year-old black woman.

And she is killing it. This is someone who was sideline reporting and volleyball games, doing it on the collegiate level and has soared to hosting NBA countdown to hosting Monday night football or being a sideline reporter for ESPN's Monday night football. I mean, she is really doing it. She's done college game day and she's really doing it in an unprecedented way. And she's a trailblazer in her own right in how she's doing it and how she's covering so many different sports and then on different levels. And a dog looks at that and you feel threatened. This black woman has you threatened and you're showing it. You could have called out Maria for leaving him off

the list for not voting for him. And you could have just simply said that like, how could you leave off AD? And she's like, it was a clear mistake. I had a long week. But the fact that you even question why she had a vote is where you took it to another level. I had people that asked me, do you think that his comments were sexist? I really want to understand what your opinions are. Yes. Because you question her ability to even have a vote. You question her right to even be in the room to sit at the table. And that's where the issue is because I didn't see you doing that for anybody else because everybody makes mistakes.

Doug, I'm sure you have too. Maybe that's why you haven't reached her level yet. Maybe that's why you feel threatened. Doug's made some mistakes. When he was in college, I think he led his dorm room in steals. Yeah. I don't know why that one took me a second to get. All right.

He led his dorm room in steals when he was in college. She's made some mistakes. But, you know, we all get over. Well, there you go. There you go. And that's my point. It's almost like you took the low-hanging fruit, right? Let me go attack the black woman because that's going to get some attention.

No, like, you aren't attacking anybody else. I'm sure other people made decisions that weren't okay when it came to voting. And instead, you went after Maria Taylor. I actually think it's funny because he's so bothered, so bothered by her. And he even continues to tweet after that, trying to defend. what he said as if it wasn't sexist. No, you can't dance around this one. It is what it is.

It's misogynistic and it's sexist. Yeah, it's sexist, misogynistic. It's all of those things. And it's also, once again, we're not asking Doug Gottlieb or any of the Doug gobblies out there to litigate the qualifications of people who have made it to where they've made it. Shut up. Do your job.

Like, stop like, do your job. Talk about the things that you're talking to. I assume that you're on television. because you're qualified. Seeing you do it a long time, I know you played, I know you did all of these things. I've watched you for a long time. Maria Taylor is obviously qualified to talk basketball. She's obviously qualified to do what it is that she does.

She's not the first person to have made a mistake like this and she probably won't be the last. But why is it at the slightest hint of imperfection for a black woman, it always has to be a conversation of why are you here anyway? It's a weird thing And there's always a white boy like a Doug There's always a Doug That's like, well, why are you here anywhere? There's always a Doug. It just makes me fucking sick.

Now, I have a question now For the Am I an Asshole segment? Not just Am I an asshole, but is this wrong? Is this wrong slash am I an asshole second? All right. And I want you to brace for this one because You're like 0 for three in these. Right?

The answer always is, yes, you are. But, okay, let's try again today. This was a little dice here. And it's also, it's also a little bit more precarious because we have to talk about vaginas. Okay. Okay. You hesitate. Well, because now my mind is trying to figure out what it is that you did.

I didn't do anything. Okay. It's, am I wrong slash am I an asshole for thinking this? It's nothing that I did Because that's a whole different podcast It's something that I did And it has to do with that I don't know

And it's really something that happened So I'm on my way to my friend Tommy's house Yesterday We're going over there We're going to hang out We're going to watch the games a little bit Do whatever we're going to do And I see a girl on Melrose

She's riding a bike Okay She is You know Thicker lady riding the bike. Okay. It was something I've never seen before

because she was riding the bike in a skirt and the bike seat was underneath the skirt. The skirt was pretty short. The bike seat was underneath the shirt. And I'm watching this and I'm transfixed by this. It's not because there was anything going on

because I'm thinking to myself, that hurts. Right? it's like the bike seat is underneath the skirt and isn't she damaging something? Is it like, is it, is it, what are you, what's in the, I thought you were reacting to what I was saying. Is there a bulk?

I don't know if it's a bee. I have the window open, so copper, you know, he likes fresh air and likes to sit on the balcony. I, not window the door. And I don't know if it's a bee or a fly. It's a bee or a fly. It's probably about to get stung. But I need you to concentrate.

I'll tell you this story about the girl. Y'all see how my co-host does not care about me? Yes, you're an asshole. Right. No, I'm saying. I'm saying. And so this is what happens. This is true.

So she's riding and the seat is under the skirt. And I can tell that she's not wearing like bike shorts or anything like this, right? How can you tell? Because the skirt is so short. Because the skirt is so short, I can tell that she's not wearing about. Were you at a light? Because how did you see all of this? Kind of.

Did you turn around and follow her? I didn't follow her. I'm thinking to myself, I'm like, damn, I've never seen that before. I've never seen it to where the bike seat is underneath. It's like almost to wear like the underwear and stuff are. I've never seen this before. It's something new. I've never seen that.

I've never seen the girl in the skirt with the bike seat or whatever. I've never seen it. So I go to Tommy's house. I'm like, Tommy. Like, you know, I saw a girl riding the bike. and the bike seat was up, like, right near the hoo-ha situation, and she had a skirt on, and he goes, oh, wow, that's tough. Like, that's a, like, that seems like, that's like, that's like a, that's going to hurt, right?

That's like a no-brainer. It's going to hurt. Then I asked Kalika, and I asked another one of my friends, right? And they go, no, what do you mean? It's completely okay. Like, you don't, there's nothing that has to go on there. And I asked Jackson before we started this podcast, I'm like, do you, doesn't that seem like a painful thing?

Like you riding around with the bike seat against your lady parts or whatever, whatever. And Jackson goes, yeah, yeah, yeah. That seems weird. Am I stupid to think that a bike seat bike on, because I would never do that. I could not like ride a bike in my underwear. It would be too much pounding on my fellas down there. Am I wrong to think? Am I an asshole to think?

And am I dumb to think that the bike seat could injure this young lady? Okay. The answer is no, you're not. You don't have lady parts. So it's reasonable for you to see something and ask, how would you know? You're not designed like that down there. True. And no, it doesn't.

There's like, it doesn't at all. I'm pretty sure I've ridden a bike in a skirt and I did on The Bachelorette. You rode a bike in a skirt on the Bachelorette and the bike seat was in that same way? Yeah. That's tough. Yeah, no, it's not.

You act like we're riding on a metal bar. There's like a cushion and a padding on the bike seat. But it's right next to your underwear. Like you're basically riding a bike in your underwear. Basically that's what you're doing. No, I didn't feel that way. But that's the way that it is.

But it's not like, it's not like that though. I can't explain it to you, but I didn't. Not at one time was I like, oh my gosh, it's like I'm riding in my underwear right now. I never, that's not how you think. Because the skirt covers, the skirt covers you. So you don't feel like that. Decency, Rach. I know what you're saying, but I think that's why you don't see it that way.

Is there enough barrier between the bike seat? Okay. Is there enough barrier between. the bike seat and very sensitive parts. Yes, yes. We don't have balls like you guys do where it's like there's like a sensitive, it's sensitive, you know, like, are you saying that a vagina is more durable?

It's not hitting it the same way. I don't know how to explain it to you. It's not hitting it like that. I don't know how to explain it to you. I don't, okay, I'm full on and learn mode. I'm asking here because I know that personally, if I was to like, if I'm going to ride a bike, right? Okay. So if I'm going to ride a bike.

And by the way, this is a big fear of mine. Like, injury to my penis area is always a big fear because I'm thinking, because I always think about this. This is what I think about. I think you don't hear about a lot of cataclysmic penis injuries. But it's such a sensitive part of your body. body that like, you know what I mean? It could happen. And like when I was playing baseball back in the day,

nobody else, like when I was playing football, right, all of the guys, they wanted to be fast and they wouldn't wear a cup because it sold them down. I'm like, I'm fucking wearing a cup. I'm wearing a cup because I'm protecting it. And so when I saw that, I was thinking, there's no protection. Okay, but what do you think bike or shorts do? There's no, like, biker shorts.

There's, like, are you kidding me? There's no protect. It's the same thing. No, but it's like double. But it's like double stitch. It's for riding the bike. No, it's not. Biker shorts aren't like that.

Like, I'm not talking about biking shorts. I'm just talking about, like, if I was wearing biker shorts, it would be the same thing. Not shorts made for riding. But then you wear the biker shorts and then you wear underwear under the biker shorts. Not everybody does that. Some people just don't wear any underwear under the actual biker shorts. I don't. Okay, I don't want to know you that well.

But what I'm asking you is, is like, I don't think. I like that, okay. Well, no, what I'm asking is, so looking at this, there's no reason, because all the fellows I've talked to, they've expressed concern, are we? Because you don't have lady parts. Like, I don't know how else to explain it to you. All the women say one thing. Why?

Because we get it. All right? We do this. So in talking about this, I was put up on the fact that, like, this is not even the most uncomfortable thing that happened. and like that happens. Like someone said, you know, well, Kalika said, she said,

like twice a year, there's this thing called a speculum and you have to go get an exam and they use a speculum on you. What is a speculum? Okay, is that what it's called? Like when you're, like when you go to the,

um, uh, gynecologists, that's what you're talking about? Yeah. Is that what it's called? A speculum? She said,

I was told that there's a like a duck bill thing. Why? Why? Why? So it says it looks like a duck bill and it goes in there and then it opens. But why, though? Like a Venus fly trap. Oh, my God. Why do you need that? What does that do? You have to get, you know, tested to make sure everything's okay. Like there's no, you don't have anything cancerous going on right there. And the speculum makes that happen. You know what's crazy? You know why I knew the word speculum is because back in the day of, back in the day of chat rooms, like 1996. Okay, I don't like where this is going.

It's true. So back in the day of chat rooms, this happened. Back in the day of chat rooms, when it was about cyber sex, you know what I mean? He just wanted to chat and have cyber sex with somebody and something like that. I didn't do this, but go ahead. You were too young.

This was 96. This was like literally I was like 16 years old, right? And it was back in the time where you would trade pictures and stuff like that, but it literally took like 15 minutes for one picture to download. To pixelate, it was like falling down. And one picture took like 15 minutes. But back in the day, you know, I couldn't get any girls in the regular rooms to have the cyber sex with me, right? I couldn't get it.

I just didn't know what to say. But you could always pretend, you know, you could go into like a lesbian room and you could pretend to be a woman. You were catfishing people? Yes. And you can pretend to be a woman. At 16. You can pretend to be a woman. And you could do all this stuff.

I remember this one, I'll never forget this. Because I didn't know what it was. Cleek of jog my memory. This one lady could tell that I was a man. How? And she started, I don't know, she could tell. She said, I never forget this that I was a man. And she started like quizzing me.

And she said, I remember she said, what color is your speculum? I remember she said that. And I panicked. I panicked. No smartphone. Couldn't jump over. Well, I panicked. And I just left because I know what she was talking about.

I can't remember. Right. And then she pined me again and she went, you fucking man, asshole. This is why women don't trust fucking men like you. You're fucking blah, blah, blah, blah, whatever. And I thought, hey, what? That's a speculum?

That's it. That's so fucking wild. And you have to do that? Open up and they stick some through the scrape. Papsmear. Papsmear. You never heard that term? Yeah, you never heard the term of a Papsmear is, but I thought a Papsmere was like a physical.

Like for me. Well, it is. But I go in there, I go in there and I have a physical, right? The doctor grabs the balls, cough, cough, you're good. Bye. you know, I do go, I have had something a little bit more invasive that I'll talk about, where now since I'm a little bit older, I have to go in there and get the little prostate type of deal, but I don't have to have it every year.

So a pap smear is like an invasive scrape scrape technique. Yeah, got to get in there. That's what it does. That's what the speculum, which I didn't realize that was the name of it, it opens it up. It's very uncomfortable, as you can imagine. Well, I don't know. And it's cold. And it's cold.

They can't warm them up. They don't warm them up. They don't warm them up. They don't warm them up. So why don't you, why doesn't somebody come with that invention then? That seems like if that's a thing, like come with a warmed up speculum. I don't think it would make the experience any better, to be honest with you. It's very quick.

You just want to get in and out. So here's the thing. You're saying that that hurts and that seems like it would hurt. and just because I have balls, it seems like the bike would hurt, but the bike doesn't hurt. The bike is okay. Not at all. Do you have any questions about the male anatomy that you would like to know?

No, I'm good, man. I'm good. Sure? Yeah, I'm positive. Maybe next podcast. But right now, I think I've tapped out of this conversation. You've tapped out of me. Well, I'll be honest with you.

You have another question? I don't. I don't. Oh, I do have one more question. It's not about this, though. Oh. I want you to admit something. What?

I want you to admit that you were totally fucking wrong about my octopus teacher. I haven't seen it yet. I know, but just off, based off of what everyone has been saying, be real. People are tweeting me, people are messaging me, letting me know, like, man, I had to check it out after Van said it. It's because you told people you got emotional. So I think they had to see what could bring Van to tears. We haven't seen him or heard him get emotional on this podcast yet, the octopus. Now, I saw a picture of something.

Is it really that small? Because I don't know why. When I think of an octopus, I think of Ursula. You know nothing about to see. This is why you have to see this movie. I mean, like, as in the bigness, as in the bigness, I did not realize they were that small. This octopus is like, it's small enough to be,

oh, I have to read you something to. This octopus is small enough to like. It's like a squidworth. It's almost like a squidworth and not an Ursula. chest. Like this octopus is small and the fin of the eye. I have to read you something because somebody hit me with something. I didn't even think about this before we go.

I do want you to hear this from this gentleman. He sent me this and I now realize that when I was talking to you about this, that we weren't on the same page because you don't understand what one term means. This guy said me, this is from J. Rodriguez, okay? The real Jared Rodriguez on Instagram. He says, Yo, Van, I love you and I love Big Rache. I'm actually a batch and a Rage fan

before I was on to you and your career. Can't tell you how many people have said that. Thank you guys. Anyway, yo, listen back to the My Octopus teacher conversation. There's one inescapable conclusion. Big Rache does not know what a documentary is. Listen, listen to this. He goes, he says, you had said it was a documentary.

She heard that and then asked you if it was true. You repeated that it was a documentary. She asked you again if it was true and why you wouldn't answer her question. Then three minutes later, she asked again if it was animated. Okay. All true. By the way, she goes, Want to let you know because it'll be funny to hear you give her a hard time.

And because maybe she'll be more open to the movie if she understands the whole thing because I don't want Rage to reveal this in the future and not have someone in the thought family warrior, thought warrior family clown her. Okay. Me, I hear a man finds himself and opens his heart up back via a relationship with an octopus. And I can't get to Netflix fast enough. thank you for the recommendation and all that y'all do. So you did not know what a documentary was.

No. And Jared helped me figure this out. I remember asking you, is it true? But then I thought I also kept saying, well, is it a documentary? But for some reason, it was a movie in my mind. That's why I was like, is it animated? Does he talk back? Remember I was like, is this like castaway?

I don't know why I heard a movie. I just got to watch it. I guess the last question. Thank you, Jay. Thank you. Last question I'll ask before we leave. Is a documentary not a movie to you? Or is it a documentary just a type of a movie?

I separate the two. I don't consider documentaries movies. I don't. What the fuck are you talking about? You don't consider documentaries movies? To me, it's a category in itself. I mean, when I'm scrolling through Netflix, I click categories.

I don't know. I guess you're right. It's a type of movie with comedy and horror and sci-fi. But I've always seen it as something different. Right. So a documentary is not a movie.

So that is not that you don't know what a... Because it's always based on on like something that's true. Well, you know, you realize that there are movies that are based on something that is true as well. Right? There's an option. So I guess that's why I put it in...

I separated it. I guess that's... That's my logic. You know what the crazy thing is? I weirdly get this. You know what I'm saying? You know what? I weirdly get this.

It's in my nature of a clown, but you know it's crazy? Is you don't say I want to watch a movie tonight. You say I really want to watch a documentary tonight. It's like a separate thing. Yeah. I'll be like, Brian, let's find a really good documentary. I say that all the time.

So, and even if he's, even if you say to Brian, even if you say, let's watch a really good movie, he'll say, oh, how about a documentary? He'll separate it. We do that. We do that. I thought everybody did.

Well, you just helped me get to the point. I just thinking this last 15 minutes, I learned about speculums. I learned that I was completely wrong. And not only that I was wrong, but that we were all wrong and thinking that girl was in some trouble. But she's okay. She's most likely okay, is what you're saying. That's just how we ride a bike. Interesting.

I'm not riding any bites of my underwear. I'll be limping. I just can't do it. I also have like a big lower half. I got big thighs. And that changes. Okay, it's time to go. All right.

I got big thighs. I've been noticing this for this. I'm thick. I'm like, I really am. I got thick thighs. But you're a big guy. Like you're six, four. I know, but like the thickness has never really bothered me in my life prior to like this era.

You know, not bothered me, but I never. I never just, I never realized before, like when I put on jeans sometimes, when I put on jeans sometimes, I'm like, yo, I'm a savage, classy, you know what I'm saying? Like, it's like sometimes I feel like making the stallion, like, I feel thick. She laughed in the background. Yeah. Oh, you can hear that? Yeah.

You can hear that? Like, yeah, I feel, I feel thick. Like, and it's, I don't want, I don't want my thighs to show. And I, it's just, it's a whole thing now. Wait. So you don't like it because if you're a savage, classy, boogie, ratchet, like you like the way your thick thighs look in your jeans. No, I don't.

It's like, I don't know. Like, because like when you see, I'm an athlete, right? So I got powerful thighs. Yeah, what's the problem? No, I got to do something with it because I feel like I got, I'm a little knock knee. Now, I've been noticing this. I've been spending a lot more time with myself since the quarantine and all of this.

stuff like this, I've been like home a lot. Apparently in the mirror a lot. Well, I haven't worn jeans a lot, right? Okay, fair enough. So when I was wearing jeans every day, I wasn't seeing it. But then when I wore the jeans and I looked in the mirror, I was like, yo, am I thick? Did you ask yourself that question as you lost in the mirror? Yeah. I'm like, yo, am I thick?

Man, we all have a little bit of body dysmorphia. I suffer from it as well. For real? Yes. Hmm. We all do. We all do. All right. It's going to be okay.

Hopefully. You need to take a dry erase marker or a post-it and put I Am Beautiful on your mirrors. I'm definitely not beautiful. Why do you say that? I feel like this podcast is taking a turn. Why can't you be beautiful, Van? I'm definitely not beautiful. Well, I'm right, and that's cool with me.

What about your spirit? You can't have a beautiful spirit? I feel my spirit is beautiful. Then that makes you beautiful, Van. Think about it. I think about how concerned I was. And say it with me. I am beautiful.

I am adequate. And that's good enough for me. So everybody sliding in Van's DMs and tell him how beautiful he is. Don't do that. That's not what I want to hear. Come on, thought warriors. You are beautiful too. No, no.

Okay. Look, we got to go. Listen, I want to say something real quick. we talked about RBG earlier. I want to like everybody get engaged. It's the ninth inning. We need you guys. We need all the thought warriors out there, okay?

And pay attention to these things. Like find a news source that you believe in and get the news as it comes to you, fill out your senses, talk to somebody, never be afraid to ask questions to someone who knows more than you. All right. That's what we'll try to do here. We'll try to ask those questions.

And in some cases, we'll try to answer them for you as well. Now, if I see that girl again and, like, she's in crutches or a walker or something like that, or in a cup? Like, what does it have to do with anything? I'm just saying. Everybody, as the end of the podcast, I'm a little bit all over the place right now because I don't like talking about my physical form. It makes me uncomfortable.

You started the conversation. I know. But we got to go. All right. I am Van Lathen. I am Rachel Lindsay. All right. I am beautiful.

I am Van Lathen. And I'm I. We'll see y'all next time. Bye, oh.