Pablo Torre Finds Out - Share & Tell (Dark Triad Edition) with Katie Nolan, Dan Le Batard, and Pablo Torre(s)

Episode Date: November 3, 2023

Would you clone your dying dog? Why are burner accounts still a thing? And how much do you REALLY care about what other people think about you? Also: Stephen A. Smith mispronouncing Pablo's name (twic...e), Dan sobbing shirtless in a convertible, and Pablo defending the relative scale of his narcissistic, psychopathic Machiavellianism.Further reading:Are Pet Cloners Happy With Their Choice? The AtlanticHBO Bosses Used ‘Secret’ Fake Accounts to Troll TV Critics Rolling StoneThe Sociopaths Among Us — and How to Avoid Them The AtlanticDark Triad Personality Test (If You Dare)Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/xZvtRCuNdPs Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript
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Starting point is 00:00:00 Welcome to Pablo Torre finds out. I am Pablo Torre. And today we're going to find out what this sound is. I wanted to be an alpha in this test. And I wound up a Machiavellian narcissist psychopath. Who needs the approval of the bottom of Stephen A. Smith's boot. Right after this ad. You're listening to Draf Kings Network.
Starting point is 00:00:24 Can I start with a clip? Yes. It's your podcast. Before we get into the show and the topics that Dan and Katie have brought and me, can we play this clip from Stephen A's show? Yes. That has to do with me. And I want to unpack it here for a second, Dan. Can we play that clip, please?
Starting point is 00:00:58 We begin with Pablo's narcissism. Now, that was them on Pablo Torres, my former colleague at ESPN. Great guy, by the way. Contributes to Dan Levitard show sometimes. He's got his own podcast as well. He's doing great things. Always root for my colleagues and consider, now all of them. You know, not the fat bastards.
Starting point is 00:01:16 I don't root for people like that. Y'all know what the hell I'm talking about. We ain't stuttering, but I won't mention that. I don't root for the fat bastard. Preach. Okay. But most of my colleagues I root for. And Pablo Torres is one of them, so I wish him nothing but the best.
Starting point is 00:01:30 Oh, no. Yeah, yeah. It's okay, yeah. It's okay. It's okay. So two things, like I appreciate him. He knows who you are. He did on him.
Starting point is 00:01:39 on his show on his podcast. He did the Marcus and Lars' episode. He doesn't know who he is. He does. He knows the idea of him. Well, no, he's got the wrong idea of him. A rose by any other name. Torres, no, Torres is not Torre.
Starting point is 00:01:53 It would smell as sweet. These are not the same thing. These are not the same thing. I worked with Stephen A in the seaport for years. Yeah, your desks were very close. I showed him a sonogram of my baby. Oh, wow. Baby Torres.
Starting point is 00:02:10 Baby Torres, Lil Violet Torres, to which Stephen A went into an extended monologue about how, I remember this vividly about how I will never care about anything else as much in that I would one day, like him, want to murder someone to defend my child. Whoa. And now I am just a Torres. Torres. Well, look, the man deals with a lot of information all day every day, okay? and if he gets an athlete's name wrong, he's going to hear about it. But in the places where he can slack off, he's got to because he's got 75,000 shows. The man is constantly on air.
Starting point is 00:02:52 This is what makes him the most gangster of all the sports journalism gangsters. He can get away with calling him Torres because Pablo is insignificant in his wake. It does not matter if he is Torre or he is Torres. He's someone working for Lebitard over there. That's right. He did get your name right, I noticed. Over there. Yeah, fat bastard.
Starting point is 00:03:15 Well, that's it. No. I was going to say. We all know who that is. Do we? People thought it was me. And he had to come back from commercial break as if to say, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's not the fat bastard I was talking about.
Starting point is 00:03:27 He exonerated me by saying I was his buddy. He would not call me a fat bastard. That's right. I know who it is. You know who it is. Oh, we'll bleep the name here, but it's obviously, I mean. I'm not even going to say his name because I don't trust that you'll bleep it. And I do not speak that man's name.
Starting point is 00:03:40 It's like Beetlejuice. I for one love crap. Oh, stop it. Is it bad that I was still deeply excited about this? Not at all. That's the other thing about being in his wake. I'm like, oh, yes. I'll tell you right now.
Starting point is 00:03:55 This feels good, having his sun shine upon my pluralized face. If you put a picture of me in front of Stephen A. Smith and gave him no other information and said, nameer. He'd go, nice girl. I don't, I'm not sure. I'm not sure I remember. This is why I'm telling you, it's the most gangster of things. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:04:16 You, us, us little, us little journalists. Barnacles. In his giant wake, whether it's a Torres or a fat bastard or a lebitart, he is sprouting his wings and he doesn't. It's the ultimate insult that we can all genuflect and say, yeah, he doesn't need to know your name. Doesn't need to. And now I just want to make it my voicemail message. You should. Pablo Torres.
Starting point is 00:04:37 Thank you. Katie Nolan's. Who's going first? Katie Nolan goes first, Dan. Katie Nolan goes first today. Katie Nolan brought... Katie Nolan's. Katie's Nolan.
Starting point is 00:05:06 Attorney's General. Katie's Nolan brought an article from the Atlantic about cloning your pet. It says, our pet cloners happy with their choice is the title of the article. And it goes into basically, this is a technology that's been around for a while. We all remember in 96. when they cloned Dolly, the sheep. That was big. I remember that being in my yearbook as like a big thing that happened this year.
Starting point is 00:05:30 Katie, that's literally the last thing I remember about cloning. And this story is updating me. Really? From 96? Yes. I checked out on cloning after that. And then I wake up to this story and am learning. So you didn't know about Barbar Strysand?
Starting point is 00:05:48 Because that was an update to the story for most of us. She cloned her dogs in 2019, I believe. Yep, missed that. When we found out that she cloned her dog. So it's apparently like a thing. It's a cottage industry now, I guess you would call it. There's this one company that's the biggest facility in the U.S. called Viagen.
Starting point is 00:06:11 They started cloning livestock and horses in 2002, and then they expanded the dogs and cats in 2015. It is expensive. It is not cheap to clone your dog. But basically, they take a pet's tissue sample. They produce millions of cells from it. And then the nucleus of a donor egg is removed and replaced with one of those cells. And then the embryo is implanted into a surrogate animal, which will then give birth to an identical twin of the original pet.
Starting point is 00:06:41 Now, because surrogates are implanted with several embryos, there's about a 30% chance that multiple clones will be born, which means you're going to get two dogs that are like your original dog. Clones. Clones. But why are they doing this? Well, Pablo, I think you can easily understand that loss is difficult to cope with. And so when told that perhaps you won't have to cope with that loss, that you can just delay the dealing with this a little bit longer. A lot of people jump at the opportunity. There's people who say they have this unique bond with this animal that they've had multiple animals before and they've never truly felt connected until this dog.
Starting point is 00:07:22 And so if, or a cat. So if this happens to, if their cat or dog happens to die, they want to bring that cat or dog back, which to me sounds like straight out of black mirror and is obviously not a good idea. Can we, Dan, I don't know if you're familiar with Viagen. You guys are both dog owners. There's a real Jurassic Park ass vibe to Viaget. Yeah, they have promotional material. Should we take a look?
Starting point is 00:07:52 I think we should. Let's take a look. Today, Viagin pets has thousands of clients who have chosen to genetically preserve their pets, as well as a growing number of clients who are moving forward with Viagin's cloning service. I'm with them through the whole entire process from start to finish, give them updates along the way, and hopefully I'll actually be the ones to deliver the cloned puppy or kitten to the client. I manage the cell culture department. I'm the one that receives your pets tissue biopsy samples.
Starting point is 00:08:26 Clients will call typically and they say, you know, I've got this dog and I've had lots of dogs, but this is the best dog ever. There's something special about this dog. And so I'd like to have another one. The music underneath alone makes me suspicious and cynical about what's happening here. They're larding it with that, yeah, that real friendly acoustic. stick medical disclaimer. Well, but it's easy to mock, okay, but I really don't know how it is that people want to move around wherever their grief is to scientifically bring back something that aids
Starting point is 00:09:04 them coping with losing something. But I think what is funniest about that commercial is just that those people paid or sincere are arguing on behalf of look how sweet it is it is that we are going to allow you to have a scientific replica that is soulless of the beast you used to love just because you can't cope with this like that as a commercial is abhoriously funny by itself even if you don't want to judge this i i wonder though dan whether any part of you seeing this is is moved by the premise like i i know I don't want to make every conversation we have with you about losing loved ones, but I know you've lost a dog before. Well, let's talk about this part of it, though, because I don't know what Katie, before Katie took on a pet at the beginning of the pandemic, I'm guessing having no idea how unholy those beasts can be to tame.
Starting point is 00:10:05 You know, I had a horse, a wild horse in my house chasing around cats because we didn't know what we were taking into our house most recently after I lost my dog in the funniest way. possible. But, and heartbreaking. And I think this whole thing is here only because Pablo wants me to tell this story and wants to tell everyone to see how uncaring he is because in the middle of deep deep loss, Pablo said something
Starting point is 00:10:30 to me that was so cold and scientific that has to be heartless and render sort of me thinking that he and I should never be friends really because science over heart doesn't work from here. But this is the short story Katie, because I want to get to your relationship with your pet. I don't know what your history.
Starting point is 00:10:45 with pets is. But 20 years, I have a dog, a tiny miniature schnauzer, left by my brother in my care, a wonderful dog, good relationship. And the last, I don't know, 18 months of its life were terrible for me because he was in a diaper and I was just chasing him around the house. He wasn't in any pain, but I had to have like the people with him if I wanted to go out. And still after that, I hear like the clacking. I'm hitting getting stuck in corners still to this day. He, one night. Nemo, Nemo.
Starting point is 00:11:21 Nemo. So one night he, he start late in life. He starts to spasm. I'm shirtless. I'm trying to get to a vet at 2 o'clock in the morning with a dog that's, you know, spasming and about to die. I'm in my convertible. I'm trying to find an emergency center. The dog is spasming.
Starting point is 00:11:37 I tell Nemo it's okay to go. And he dies in my arm. So he takes his last. breath. I'm sobbing, shirtless at a stoplight, sobbing because my dog is dead in my arms, but you can't see my dog because I've got the car door to my left, and someone pulls up next to me at, you know, 2 a.m. on a Tuesday, and it's like, sees me sobbing there, but doesn't see the dog, and just says, damn lebitard? Oh, no. Oh, no. Yes. And so they can't see the dog. I'm just someone party so much that he's shirtless and sobbing
Starting point is 00:12:14 at a stoplight. In his convertible. At 2 a.m. But Pablo, when I told him this story, which was a heartbreak. I don't think I knew all of the details. It was a heartbreaking story to me, and Pablo looks at me one day when I'm telling him how heartbroken I am, and he simply doesn't understand how I could
Starting point is 00:12:29 possibly love an animal. And so he calls it... No, it's laughing. It's crying from laughing. He calls it, Katie, the con of mammals. Wait, what? Okay. Well, that's because you've had a horrifying experience with pets.
Starting point is 00:12:44 Yeah, you guys know my hamster story. We'll play a clip from that here just as a quick refresher. Still haunts my nightmares. I'm a little kid. I'm growing up. I can't have a dog or a cat in my apartment. What can I have? I can get hamsters.
Starting point is 00:12:56 I go by hamsters. I get a wire cage. I get a plastic spinning wheel like an exercise wheel. So hamsters, what do they do? They procreate a lot. All of these hamsters are born in the circle spinning wheel, right? That's cool. But you know what else hamsters do, Katie Nolan?
Starting point is 00:13:13 Hamsters eat their young. So what happens? Well, the hamsters begin to eat their babies inside of the plastic translucent Patrick Bateman Ferris wheel of death. And what else happens? The hamsters decapitate their babies. And so you have a spinning wheel that they're still exercising on. So the wheel is still spinning,
Starting point is 00:13:33 forming a literal death rattle of hamster baby heads that I watch every day when I wake up and see How are my pets doing? The answer, very badly. You've never had a pet? Never had a dog, a group in an apartment building, never had the emotional bond that you guys clearly, with multiple animals, now multiple beasts, have felt.
Starting point is 00:13:54 And so for me, I think of like, you know, I'm like, a bird can speak English. What? Like, we don't give a fuck about birds, you know? What are you talking about? We care about dogs in a way that is elevated, pure, because they are mammals, they remind us of ourselves. We see ourselves.
Starting point is 00:14:15 We see them as creatures with souls. And I am just like, but this bird is speaking English, we don't give a fuck about this parrot. So anyway, I gave a take. I'm not proud of it now that the whole prelude was the whole thing about. The timing was bad. The timing remains bad. Oh, so I have a dog.
Starting point is 00:14:32 Her name's Myrtle. She's the greatest thing that's ever existed in the world. She's just a little bag of goo. And I love her so much. She's my first dog ever. I wanted a dog my whole life. My parents never let me have one. Now, guess what?
Starting point is 00:14:44 They're obsessed with my dog. Isn't that funny? But she's the greatest. I would never clone her because, and this is why Pablo, what you were saying is interesting to me where you don't think that they have souls, which is fine. Well, not the same soul. And you say that we only love them because they remind us of us, which again, I think will be very interesting when we take a look at your narcissism test rating at the end of this podcast.
Starting point is 00:15:05 But I would think you'd be supportive of. cloning because to you if they don't have souls then it's like you should just get the same dog and it'll be exactly the same to me It's like if I were to make another you there will never be another myrtle for a million different reasons But one of them is just that like the the we built our relationship She did not come to the house with this relationship with me We built this relationship and so like it's $50,000 basically to clone your dog I think this is a very expensive therapy is cheaper than that.
Starting point is 00:15:40 Men will clone their dogs. Men will literally clone their dogs before going to therapy. It just is like a, and look, I'm not, look, if it helped you and it helps you cope or whatever, and I'm sure there are you could cook up like two or three specific situations where I'd be like, okay, I get that. No, but Pablo's cutting through it. I'm sorry to cut you off, Katie, but I just think he's cutting through it and saying, hey, kind of mammals, this is the equivalent of a sex doll.
Starting point is 00:16:06 It's not. Well, that's pretty yucky. That's a take that part of me does cosign, admittedly. In this sense, Dan, in this sense, this story, the bereavement tool that is a clone dog, it's about us. Yeah. It's about the user. It also feels selfish because there's plenty of dogs out there that need homes. Well, that's the other thing, right?
Starting point is 00:16:29 So like just get a dog? But that's the apocalyptic part. that, oh, real animals that need real care, let's let them die in shelters, but then let's bring on these science robots so that you can have a coping mechanism. That's not actual, that the care that an actual dog with an actual soul should receive isn't something recreated in a lab. And I also imagine, too, when these cloned animals one day in this dystopia get the ability to actually speak English, like a parrot.
Starting point is 00:16:56 Sure, as they will. They will wonder, like, why the f*** are we worthless to? you in this joking manner. We didn't ask for this. I was bored inside of a surrogate dog that apparently, like, they're not a... Okay, so that part's even crazier. Right. So the surrogate dogs that are birthing these clones, this is the part that appalled me
Starting point is 00:17:19 and makes me feel better about, like, laughing at that video or criticizing this act in general. Surrogate dogs are rentals. They lease them from shelters, and they fill them, or no, from breeders, sorry. So they lease them with an option to buy from a breeder, and they put the embryos, tons of them, into the dogs, and then the dogs give birth to the baby. They used to give the people who would be ordering their cloned dogs an option to take in the surrogate dog. But then complaints from the people who were ordering the clones, so the customers, they were like, the dog is more, the clone dog is bonded more with the surrogate. than with me and I don't like that.
Starting point is 00:18:05 So then they stopped letting them also donate the surrogates. If we were adopted surrogates. If we were to extend empathy to its most extremes, then I would simply say to the both of you, hey, someone who is sad is being made less sad by whatever this purchase is. How about we just let that person be less sad and not judge it with whatever we think about a soul or coping with grief? I just feel like the technology on this.
Starting point is 00:18:37 The reason it was jarring to me why I'm obsessed with this story is because I woke up one day and this was possible. And I just don't think that we have reckoned Dan with the unintended consequences of a world in which we just do this now. And part of me does think that we should just be giving people sex dolls. Okay. Here we are. Oh, see, he did do that.
Starting point is 00:19:01 I went where he wanted to go the entire time. Are you guys having sex with your dogs? No, this is what's doing. That's not the relationship that Myrtle and I have. Look, he didn't want to say it. I will say it for him. He is a pet agnostic at best. And what he's saying is that basically your relationship with these animals,
Starting point is 00:19:18 no matter how much you want to humanize them, they are basically the equivalent of sex dolls. There are a place for you to put your emotions because you don't want to put them in human beings. I hate this. That's not specifically what I say. That is what you like. My emotions into a lot of human beings. but I also love my dog.
Starting point is 00:19:33 That's what he implied. And we should all have that right. Not brave enough to say it. As long as we don't pretend that they are something they are not. Pablo Torres would say it. Their pets. Pablo Torres would have the balls to say it. Pablo Torres loves a sex doll.
Starting point is 00:19:54 I feel bad about what I did to you guys and to dogs and to mammals. as a mammal. Can we move on? Mm-hmm. Okay. Who's next? Dan? I'm next and I don't, he's insincere, and I'm just telling you that the things that he really thinks. He's not brave enough. He's not brave enough to say the things that he really thinks about how humans shouldn't, shouldn't even have these relationships with animals because they're not humans. Like, all of this is muted. He's hiding. He's hiding behind a mask. Pablo Tori finds out, but he doesn't because he doesn't want to. Speaking of bravery in opinions, Dan, what do you want to talk about today? Thank you.
Starting point is 00:20:45 I'm sorry. So I was reading this story and I, Katie, am falling woefully behind when it comes to just in general social media. I don't even want to keep up. It's a toxic fire pit. And I'd like to just let it go and fly away and not be addicted to it the way that everyone else is. But HBO executives, evidently, were creating. and there's a paperwork trail of trolls that they would go to shake the confidence of TV critics.
Starting point is 00:21:16 Like instead of, you know, being confident in the content you're making, still caring in the modern age, because everything's high school, everything is high school, no matter what age you are, your insecurities are going to show. The idea that Hollywood executives would care for a moment, what critics are writing so much that they would try and send an army of bots that way. I just wanted to sort of talk about what it means that these TV executives would care what Rudy Mardsky of the modern age, what a, what a critic that has no real power. Why would that affect a Hollywood executive when you're making good content?
Starting point is 00:21:56 Well, the story here is fascinating. It's in Rolling Stone. And they have the paperwork, as Dan says. And I think something that we should accentuate here is the idea that this mattered. to the most powerful people running the most prestigious television network. Formerly. HBO, Casey Blois, the head of HBO at the time, he was conscripting not just bots,
Starting point is 00:22:21 but like lower level employees to get in the replies of like Alan Seppinwall, right? Noted TV critic. To respond to tweets that they had about their thoughts on like the show The Nevers, apparently, which was a show that came out. Never heard of. Never's. Never's heard of that.
Starting point is 00:22:41 Same. Same. It was a Joss Whedon Steampunk Fantasy series. That's why I'd never as heard of it. And Rolling Stone's own TV critic, Alan Seppenwall, gave it a two and a half star review. And so here is a in this lawsuit filed by one of the lower level employees who was told, please go be a burner account for Casey Blois. He was told to tweet, quote, Alan is always predictably safe and scared in his opinion.
Starting point is 00:23:08 and just got into the mentions. And there's this pattern of this where this guy would create an account named Kelly Shepard. Okay, Kelly Shepard is a self-described Texas mom and herbalist who would reply to Alan Seppin-Wall's tweets word for word to things that he had been instructed to say.
Starting point is 00:23:28 And it goes on and on. Like here's one that Casey Blois had literally dictated to have said, quote, maybe our friend, this is a response to the numbers again, maybe our friend needs to say what a shock it is, that two middle-aged white men are shitting on a show about women. Like, just planting in a way to get back at these critics. And all of it reminds me, Dan, like, it doesn't matter, but it matters to them.
Starting point is 00:23:54 Oh, but it's not, but it's not just, look, it's not just getting back at the critics because you're sensitive or because we all want our work judged in a way that's friendly and has a lot of applause. I'm the part that I'm more interested in is sending an army of people at the at the TV critic who has now had an opinion about your thing and then those people rattling at the mental health of Alan Sepinwall who dared to be a critic and now is reading that his mentions are sort of meant to bring the war back to him. Okay, criticize us now we're going to bring something your way that feels like it's the real world but it's just seven people we've paid. to actually attack you. Yes, yes. That's most of the internet now,
Starting point is 00:24:40 is that everything you see could be a paid bot. You saw it on a more serious scale with the, I'm afraid to even say these two names out loud publicly, but Johnny Depp and Amber Heard, that whole trial, everything online was like a, what do they call it when you have a bunch of bots? Astro-Turfing. Astro-Turfing.
Starting point is 00:25:02 It's like a thing now that you can pay, people to do, to change the online narrative in regards to your story. So it seems like you have a lot of support that then garners real support that then becomes a thing instead of just not happening that way. And it's like controlling the narrative. That's why like people always say you can't put too much stock in Twitter replies, but X replies you can put zero stock in because you have no idea who they are. And the more we're on the internet, the more we're going to start faking things on the internet, the more things are going to stop being real entirely. Do people understand? I'm just curious because my parents used to tell these stories about how
Starting point is 00:25:45 communism crept in, and it obviously wasn't technology, but it was these things. It was techniques to inflame propaganda from sides that would bring communism because people who have lived in freedom all their lives don't know that it, or maybe don't really understand. that it requires unrelenting, unrelenting protection and resilience, and that you have to protect it and the way that communism creeps is just like this. With, with, these are almost military campaigns, really. If you can create an alternate universe where people attack from all angles to just divide everyone on whatever the divisions of the day are.
Starting point is 00:26:31 When we talk about it's a campaign, it's a campaign. It's a campaign not because it's just ego alone, but because they know it can make an impact. And I know it can make an impact because I am the person still checking my mentions. Right? Like, Dan, the whole thing about the sci-op aspect, the reason it's a sci-op,
Starting point is 00:26:51 a psychological operation, I believe it stands for, is because the human brain was never intended to consume this many opinions from this many strangers. And so the idea that at the end of my day, the thing that'll stick with me is what this person said in my mentions, which still happens, by the way, to me. Oh, this one person made a dent.
Starting point is 00:27:12 I know it matters to Casey Blois because Casey Blois in all of this way is telling us it matters to him. He, his brain has been dented by all of these people, these commenters, these critics. And I should point out that Casey Blois is also saying, quote, how dare someone write that? Exclamation point, exclamation point. I want to say something along the lines of, quote, loll, okay. they are just counting their Emmys, end quote, or something like that, exclamation point, giving messages to respond to not a critic in this case, but just a random person.
Starting point is 00:27:44 Arguing with the commenters, not just the critics. Yeah. And we've seen this not just in entertainment. We've seen this in sports. Brian Colangelo's burner accounts with the 76ers. Shout out. What a day that was to be in sports media. Shout to Ben Dietrich and the ringer for breaking that story.
Starting point is 00:28:00 But James Comey had a burner account. former director of the FBI, stuff that he wanted to say that he could not say under his own name, Kevin Durant. The list is endless because the human brain cannot reconcile the idea that this person personally talking about me in public is not consequential. Of course it is to us. I also think it reinforces this idea that if you have something to say, you can't respond. Like the whole reason he felt the need to task this to somebody below him and to say specifically in the text, we need this to be removed from us. It can't come back to us, which maybe don't write that in a text if that's really the plan. Just a little bit of advice from me.
Starting point is 00:28:47 Across the board here. Maybe just make a phone call. But anyway. Very bad at science. If it can't come back to you, it's like it reinforces this idea that when somebody like me admits that like, yeah, I do check my mentions and sometimes I'll mix it up with people in there. And people are like, that's embarrassing. You should be above that. It's like, look, nobody's above this.
Starting point is 00:29:05 It's just whether or not you make somebody else do it so it looks like it isn't you or you do it yourself. Like if this guy himself jumped in to replies, it would be a story. It would be a very different story. And this is like somebody trying to control the narrative without participating in it or having any of it reflect on them, which is impossible to do. So if you care, say you care. If you care, don't pay somebody else to pretend to care for you. Get in there, mix it up. There is perpetual ego measuring in a way that makes me feel.
Starting point is 00:29:40 Dan, this brings us back to Kevin Durant, right? He's maybe the most famous user of burner accounts. Kevin Durant did, Katie, what you said. He went from guy using burners to defend his own honor. And by the way, we've seen an NBA ref. Eric Lewis get fired from his job for having burners in this way because he was biased in favor of the Celtics, allegedly all that stuff. Kevin Durant is now out here just saying the thing.
Starting point is 00:30:02 Shout out Kevin Durant. And shout out to him. Our greatest Olympian. That's right. Dan, I don't even know if you know this, because I think you're divorced from the entire internet in ways that old people are, invariably. He just called you an old guy. I mean, but this protects me, though.
Starting point is 00:30:20 He did call me an old guy, but this protects me, right? After a lifetime in the columnist business where I had 25 years of people, just torching every opinion I had. Eventually I got to a rather strengthened point of like, okay, I'll take critics without it hurting me if my critics are people whose opinion I respect, but not if it's just random strangers who don't know as much about what we do for a living as we do,
Starting point is 00:30:44 then, you know, like from there it can't really hurt you. And then if I check out on social media, then I can skate free of something that I think is an addictive, poison well of temptations to reinforce that your opinion matters and your ego and identity need to be fed. Like, it scares me being too addicted to commentary of any kind, praise or criticism. I like the little tidbit about what was in her bio. She was a what? She was into herb. Oh, yeah, she's an herbalist. My burner account bio. And I don't use my, I don't use my burner account for anything other than on Instagram. You know how you can't watch people's stories without
Starting point is 00:31:23 it saying like, this person watched your stories. So, I have a burner account so I can watch people's stories that I don't like and that don't like me. Oh, wait. So breaking news. My burner accounts bio is something like just a guy who loves his dog and craft beer. I know that was a pretty good bio. Pretty believable. A good disguise.
Starting point is 00:31:45 Is it better than herbalist though? No, is it better than Kelly Shepard at Kelly S.H. 33889 356? That's crazy. That already sounds like a fake. Bio. She slash her. Great. Mom.
Starting point is 00:32:00 Texan. Herbalist. Aromatherapist. Vigant. Oh, wow. They really went for a vibe with that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. If you're going to use your burner account to send tweets, which again, I don't.
Starting point is 00:32:12 But if that's the purpose of your burner, as this one was, you've got to make sure you also tweet about random other stuff. Had a sesame bagel today just so that when somebody clicks on your account, they don't just see. They don't just see at Alan Seppenwall constant, because then they're going to put two and two together. It's the number one. It's how they caught Calangelo. It's like there are no other tweets about anything else except this very specific thing. Another pointer. If you're going to do that, maybe don't have it operated by a lower level employee that's going to sue you later for being asked to do this.
Starting point is 00:32:48 100%. All of this show has been a natural segue towards a thing that I've wanted to do. do with you guys that I'm actually afraid of in a real way now. Play Spider-Man 2? Love Spider-Man 2. Dan has will never know the joys of playing Spider-Man 2 on PS 5. I'm scared of
Starting point is 00:33:15 I'm sorry to interrupt you. Go ahead. You were pointing at me. I'm still playing Miss Pac-Man. That's a real game. I was going to say, Dan has a Miss Pac-Man arcade machine in his home. All right. That was unnecessary. Is that invasive? Is that too much finding out? Yes, well, yes, because yes, because it's the lamest of the video games.
Starting point is 00:33:33 No, I mean, it just makes me look the oldest. No, no, you're in favor of gender equality among the Pac-Man. Yeah, that's supportive. You're an ally. That's right. Yes, I like the game, and I'm not going to apologize, and I'm also very good at it. Oh, good. And still.
Starting point is 00:33:47 Shocking. Does she move different than he does? What's the difference between Ms. and Mr. She's just got a ribbon in her hair. Look, it's from a different time. Stop judging what I'm doing. I have in front of me the results of my test, but I haven't actually been told what the numbers mean. So go ahead. Okay. That's why I'm uncomfortable sharing them. This is perfect. So I'll explain what it is
Starting point is 00:34:07 that we're doing here. I have my results. Katie has her results. There's a story in the Atlantic about what's called the dark triad. And this is a psychological term that was coined by the psychologists, Delroy Paulus and Kevin Williams in 2002 for people with three, as per the triad term, salient personality characteristics. Number one, narcissism. Number two, machiavellianism. And number three, a measurable level of psychopathy, meaning you are in total here, quote, social predator who charms, manipulates and ruthlessly plows their way through life, leaving a broad trail of broken hearts, shattered expectations, and empty wallets. Now, the dark triad is a personality type that can be tested.
Starting point is 00:34:52 And so I asked all of us here to take that test. It takes about two and a half minutes. Everyone should do this, I think. And so we did. It's about almost 30 questions, and it gives us the results on where on those three levels, narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopath we are. And I got to say, I don't know what your guys' experience taking this test was before we reveal our answers. But some of the questions, it made me stare into the middle distance for a while, reflecting on what my actual answer here is going to be. These types of tests I always find a little bit difficult because they depend on the honesty and self-awareness of the test taker.
Starting point is 00:35:40 You have to be honest with your answer. You have to not see the obvious, oh, I know that if I answer agree to this, I'm going to get a high score. you have to and you have to answer it not in the way you idealize yourself which I think a lot of us do we're like oh I wouldn't care what others think about me or you have to sit there and go do I
Starting point is 00:36:06 do I care what others think about me and you have to ask yourself and then you have to answer honestly so I think a lot of these questions for me I was like eh oh well but even through that lens Dan through the lens of like we're going to say these aloud the fact that we don't know how to interpret
Starting point is 00:36:22 our own results is part of I think think why this is great and dangerous. I should explain to the people, though, because as Katie is saying all that, what she is bringing to the testing is honor in self-assessment. And I'm assuming a lot of people would just take the test and try to win the test by, I will not be a narcissist. I will not be a psychopath. I will not be Machiavellian because I don't want to be seen as somebody who is cutthroat.
Starting point is 00:36:51 and we should define some of these things. McAbellionism is pejorative. It means you will do anything to cut someone's throat. Narcissism. You are so self-involved. You care about yourself and very few others. And psychopath is self-explanatory. So when you answer these questions,
Starting point is 00:37:05 none of us want to be any of these things. And so there's a correct way to answer. But as Katie is saying, there's also an honest way to answer. But this is the beauty of this testing instrument, which is, again, something that I've only taken, haven't really studied. But it's lines like this, right? It's so much of it is about the phrasing of the statement.
Starting point is 00:37:23 So it's a scale of disagree, slightly disagree, neutral, slightly agree, agree, five rungs on that spectrum of answer, right? And so when there is a question that is a statement, that is, quote, I know that I am special because everyone keeps telling me so, period. I read that and I thought about this so long that my phone went back to the lock screen. I was like, like, how much do I actually rely on external validation to reinforce, like in an honest way? Somewhat agree.
Starting point is 00:37:58 I, I, I, I, this is where I think. Wait a minute. So you're being honest, so honest with yourself that you're not sure that you like who's looking back at you. Correct. These silly questions are making you think about yourself in a way you had not explored before this, this silly three minute 30, three minute 30 question test.
Starting point is 00:38:17 I thought about like my mom encouraged me when I was younger, like telling me I'm smart and special. And I was like, wait a minute. I did not think about that. Is she in the everyone? Like, do I actually have the confidence? Do I need? Why do I feel so good when people tell me that I am special? Right.
Starting point is 00:38:32 That's what I was dealing with. And I think I settled on slightly agree. Yeah, but by the way, another question like, oh my God. I mean, this one, Dan, this is where it hurt me, right? I like to get acquainted with important people. Yeah, you are a full agree. If you could do agree so hard, my fingers are falling off, that should be the one that you hit. If I could write in maximum agree, I would have had to for honest and sake.
Starting point is 00:38:59 Let's explore that for a second before you get into the results of the testing. Because when you need the validation of Stephen A. Smith and you hate to admit it to yourself. But you're, and you'll take it as the validation even if it's Tor. It's a pathetic. Even if it's Torres. Like, honestly, the faint width. Whiff of the man's boot gives you orgasm. It's pathetic.
Starting point is 00:39:21 It's pathetic. Like, you have to have more self-respect. You have to. This Afrodisiac-ass boot is getting me horrid. No, Dan, but here's a question that I want to know how Dan answered in his memory, right? Dan didn't answer these honestly. Here it is. Statement.
Starting point is 00:39:37 But I will say I answered it quickly. I was not pondering my existence as I answered them. But I also was not trying to win the test. I did. Why? How cut throat am I? Yeah, no, how cut throat am I? Well,
Starting point is 00:39:52 what statement? Yeah. Quote, it's true that I can be mean to others, period. Noticable silence from everybody as we pondered at what we're answering. Oh, I thought you said you wanted to know what Dan would say. Well, what did we all say to? Well, so for me. He made me think about it, Katie, the way that I did the first time, because can I be mean to people?
Starting point is 00:40:14 Slightly agree, but I don't want to ever think of myself as a person who lands me. So it doesn't mean I don't. It means it forces me to look into a place like I have to, I can't go neutral there. I have to slightly agree with that because too often without intent, I hurt people and it can feel like cruelty. And I didn't know I was doing it. And it doesn't exonerate me that I didn't intend it. Yeah, same. I think if you answer disagree to that, for me, that would make you narcissistic.
Starting point is 00:40:44 Yeah. Because that would mean that you think you couldn't possibly mean to somebody. The test is testing us. So to me it was like, look, people have told me that something I have said has hurt them before. So I have to acknowledge that, yes, slightly, I guess I could be. I don't look at myself as mean and I try very hard not to be mean. So I'm not going to say agree. But I would have to slightly agree.
Starting point is 00:41:06 I would have loved to click neutral or slightly disagree. I'm going to be honest with myself. But I want to be an empath. I like to be an empath. And an empath would know. to admit that you're mean is to say that you have blind spots about you are not the most empathetic.
Starting point is 00:41:22 You are not caring enough. You are a failure as someone who cares appropriately. What about this one, though? I insist on getting the respect I deserve. Period. All of these things, by the way, when you see them through the lens of sports, it's like, I insist on getting the respect I deserve
Starting point is 00:41:41 is like the definition of like Mamba mentality. Right? Like that's what it means to be an alpha. It's, of course, I will get what I deserve, what I have earned. The hard one for me was something about celebrity when it was like, I want to be treated like a celebrity. And I was like, well, that's a tough one to answer because. Right, we have some degree of. It's not the exact phrasing of it, but it was something like.
Starting point is 00:42:03 No, it's, do you consider yourself a celebrity or essentially that? Which was tough because it was like, in the guise of what I do, I don't. I know that I am the lower of the, but in the guise of this test, to be honest, I'd have to say, like, slightly agree. Yeah. But it doesn't take into account that, like, maybe you, maybe that is your job. Maybe that is what you do. Maybe you are that. I think the point, Dan, is that the jobs we do are, by definition, blurring the line between narcissism and,
Starting point is 00:42:41 normality. Like, it feels like... I think it would be impossible to do this for a living and score a zero on the narcissism part of this. Agreed. Because there's another thing that was like, I like being the center of attention. Right. It's like you can't say... There are situations in which I don't. But I also sit here and I tweet a link that says, watch me talk. So I have to be... You can't be on television without having... I mean, there's nobody on television. Nobody who doesn't like in some way to be. be the center of attention. You wouldn't choose that as a career. But when you say, it's funny, my answer to that question, I guess we'll get to our numbers in a second, because I want to know
Starting point is 00:43:22 what mine mean, but legitimately, the answer to that question is I wanted some other option other than the five because I wanted to be saying, well, I did consider myself a celebrity when I was on ESPN every day. I don't anymore. I've retired from celebrity is what, because. It wouldn't let you say that. No, that wasn't right option. That wasn't one of the choices. Yeah, I wish it was. Yes. Because I would have answered the same thing. I would actually click that same exact button. Should we give some of our scores to give context here? And then we can explain them. I don't know what they mean here. I'd like to know what they mean. So I got a, I got a two on Machiavellianism. Okay. I got a 2.7. Oh, God. What did you get?
Starting point is 00:44:11 I got a 3.8. Yeah, I don't find myself to be Machiavellian at all. I don't think I am, but clearly I have been counter, I've been countered in that because when some statement, like, quote, most people can be manipulated comes across. I had a problem with that as well because. Strong agree is what I gave that. Strong agree because otherwise Q and on wouldn't exist. Like, I think, I don't think about it as like I would manipulate them, but I would be lying
Starting point is 00:44:38 to say that people couldn't. I know they can be. I don't use that to my advantage. I don't manipulate, but I know that most people, I mean, obviously people can be manipulated. A scale of one to five. And I feel like I answered a lot of this. This is, I'm defending myself on the stand. Yeah, I think I am too.
Starting point is 00:44:56 Your Honor, I'm 3.8 out of 5, 90th percentile among U.S. adults on Machiavellianism because I'm a keen observer of human nature, not because I'm actively manipulating everyone around me. That holds up. This is not going to exonerate. Narcissism scores. The way the numbers work, just to explain it to the people. So it's 1 through 5, and if you're close to 5 or you're 90 percentile, you are running very strong societally as a psychopath, as a narcissist, or as a cutthroat Machiavellian person.
Starting point is 00:45:28 So you were at 3.8. So on all of these, 2.5 is about going to be the middle of this of the average? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you guys are pretty safe. I don't feel good about mine. I'm above average on narcissism. I'm at 2.6 on narcissism. I'm at 3.6.
Starting point is 00:45:46 I'm at us just a flat 4. Oh, that's up. I'm not, this is bad. Yeah. Can we bleep these? Yeah. This was your idea, and I don't know why. I was thinking you guys are going to be way more like my scores.
Starting point is 00:46:00 No, I was shocked by these two. I'm scared. Psychopathy? You're not going to rate high on psychopath. One. Either one of you. I have a one. I got a one.
Starting point is 00:46:09 Katie has a flat one. Katie wins. She's the least psychopath. I'm 1.3. But look, it says one. It looks like a 0. So is it possible it's 0.1? Like, it's the lowest.
Starting point is 00:46:20 Okay, Katie is quick. My percentiles for psychopathy are 0 and 4. Katie scored the lowest possible. Yeah, I don't relate at all. That's the only part of it that made sense to me. Here's the part that sucks as a narcissist, who is Machiavellian, is that I'm also a 1.4. on the psychopathy scale, which is unfortunately still the highest among the three of us.
Starting point is 00:46:45 Yeah, wait, Dan, what was yours? 1.3 was mine, so I got it. I was pretty close. I was pretty close. Dude, I don't feel good about any of this now. I don't like this test. I think the test is flawed. I think the phrasing of the questions can be kind of confusing.
Starting point is 00:47:00 There were some that were negatively phrased in a way that made it hard to say agree or disagree because you were like, wait, do you mean? It's not the test. It's not the test that's flawed, Katie. It's not the test. Well, no, it's certainly us as well. It's the host of finds out over here that is the most deeply and obviously flawed. I just want to warn you guys that in response to, quote, people who mess with me always regret it, period.
Starting point is 00:47:24 I slightly agree. I disagree. There's nobody's ever regretted messing with me. Watch the fuck out. You can't answer it that way. You can't. I think this was aspirational. I think that one out top of the test problem.
Starting point is 00:47:38 Pablo, you tried to make the test respect you. You're trying to make the tag. It's going to give me the respect I deserve. I wanted to be an alpha in this test. And I wound up a Machiavellian narcissist psychopath. Who needs the approval of the bottom of Stephen A. Smith's boot. So in terms of what we found out today, I think it's self-explanatory, for me at least. Yeah, I found out that I'm obsessed with myself.
Starting point is 00:48:14 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. While also definitely being a person who likes to think that I am definitely not obsessed with myself. That's the number one trait of a narcissist is thinking you're not narcissistic. Yeah, I should have read the fine print on this test. My wife is going to have a feel day with this when she gets my results, incidentally. I want to give this to an ex-boyfriend because I think he would score very high on all three. Oh, I would suggest to people listening to this, if you think that you are in any kind of abusive relationship with a partner, go read about narcissists to see if any of the behavior. speaks to you because people who would come high on these narcissists lists could Pablo be psychopaths.
Starting point is 00:48:52 Like they could be dangerous manipulators if they know how to trick you into getting into an imbalanced relationship. Well, one in 14 people in an international population sample qualified as dark triad members. Thankfully, I think we did fall short of membership. How, what does it have to be? Do you know the threshold? I don't. I'm just going to hope.
Starting point is 00:49:14 You're just going to say. We're good people. What did Pablo Tori find out today that when the testing that may be flawed and the people may be flawed, they get together and try to win the test, we're good people. We're good ones. The three of us, the light triad. That's right. People have been calling us that. I've heard it in the internet comment sections.
Starting point is 00:49:34 And it may just have been a guy from HBO, but it has definitely been said, the light triad. What would a narcissist not do? Oh, yes. You would credit everyone. who is responsible for his success. So Pablo Torre finds out is produced by Michael Antinucci, Ryan Cortez, Sam Daywig,
Starting point is 00:49:56 Juan Galindo, Patrick Kim, Neely Loman, Rachel Miller-Howard, Ethan Schreier, Carl Scott, Matt Sullivan, Chris Tuminello, with Studio Engineering by RG Systems, host production by NGW Post, a theme song by John Bravo, of course, and, uh,
Starting point is 00:50:12 God, I am never going to hear the end of this, am I? Okay. I'll talk to you soon. Thank you.

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