Pablo Torre Finds Out - Theater of the Aaron Rodgers Absurd: Share & Tell w/ Wyatt Cenac, Domonique Foxworth & Pablo

Episode Date: March 15, 2024

What is the line beyond which we need to say Aaron Rodgers shouldn't be taken seriously? And why won't crows pick up trash? Plus: Bone Tomahawk, Inspectah Charles Johnson, the QAnon of architecture, and Project Acoustic Kitty.Further reading:RFK Jr.'s VP prospect Aaron Rodgers has shared false Sandy Hook conspiracy theories in private conversations (Pamela Brown and Jake Tapper)Here's all the dumb sh*t Aaron Rodgers recently said on a conspiracy theory podcast (Sean Keeley)The Magic of Bird Brains (Ben Crair) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to Pablo Torre finds out. I am Pablo Torre, and today we're going to find out what this sound is. It's murder. Right after this ad. You're listening to Draft Kings Network. I got an Olympic comedy album called Peekaboo Street Jokes. Peekaboo sounds like it's a syllable way from problematic. Didn't she name herself?

That's the thing, right? Is that right? I thought that's how she got the name is that whatever, yeah, I'll just let Pablo look it up before I say something offensive. Pekaboo Street, her parents decided to let Pekaboo choose her own name when she was old enough. So for the first two years of her life,

she was called, quote, baby girl, end quote, or little girl. Oh, there's another great Olympic bit in that. Yeah, oh yeah, no, this is, yeah. I mean, I would go the easy route. She's white, right? you were wondering if a child who got the power to name themselves was white and who became a skier

my whole bit if I did Olympic stand-up would be about black people named like this and white people named like this letting someone name their name themselves is of I cannot relate to that power well let's do it right now what if you could name yourself what would you name yourself I would have named myself like

like a fucking Wolverine Wolverine Wolverine Bernard C Sontore the third Okay so

you have to take all scenarios into a kell Like you would be fine Introducing yourself as Wolverine That's right Bub Be terrible

Deep cut X-Men jokes All the time I got it What would you name yourself I don't know I like my name There was a guy I remember a story

years ago about a guy in I believe in New York who named his kids Ghost Face and Rayquan and he was a white guy Obviously Yeah that tracks

This kid's gonna be fine Because he's got a trust fund Ghostface Killer Or is just Ghostface Or do you give him the killer? That's a good question You gotta go full in You can't go

Ghostface Richard Johnson You gotta go Ghostface Killer Johnson Inspector Charles Johnson Deck

Dick Wyatt What's your name I don't know I feel like Like you I like my name Yeah

Wolverine would be terrible I like my name too by the way Like I don't like being boxed into this thing You're the only junior And clearly I'm not a junior What are you The third

I'm the third There you go So clearly Disrespect to your family Yeah I'm a junior Oh, word? Yeah. Maybe that's also why I feel a certain connection to it.

Why am I continually shamed for choosing to be Wolverine? We're here on Wolverine Toray finds out. Welcome to WTFO. It would make the show a little bit better. That's a way. We're going to have Nuch Photoshop that. Oh, gosh. I just don't get it.

Like, I guess you were going for the joke. The joke? The joke, it's not a joke. It's if you gave a kid the power to name themselves. No, I didn't say Pablo. pretend that you are two years old and name yourself and say Pablo,

what would your name be? And you said, I would choose Wolverine. Yeah. Now. Then. All right. Now, what would you choose?

Wolverine? Logan. Yeah, Logan. Wolverine's alter ego. Yeah, I'm into more serious adult versions of Wolverine now, guys. The best part is you have not fully shaved your facial hair. That's right.

You got a little Wolverine pattern. You know what? That is the nice. thing diving he's ever said to me. And you're wearing a yellow shirt, which is kind of like Wolverine, like you just need a little... Wait, do you guys hear that? No, I don't. You hear that sound?

No. Snicked. That one? Snicked. Is that going to be the sound... But the way you did it, they sounded, your claws sounded so just meek and just... Snicked. Do you mind if I cut you?

Snicked. I'm going to stab you, stabby, stabby, stab time. Snicked. That was the worst. It was the worse. It was like, you remember the old Flash Gordon movie where it was like, Flash, ah! That's what you just did.

Snicked? I didn't feel, I didn't feel, I got you, good about that one. Shing? Shing? Yeah, I think I'd rather be a shing than a snick. How dare you? I mean, I would be. I felt racist, I'm not sure how.

I felt it. I could tell, that's where you were going with that. Wyatt, do you want to talk about crows? Sure. Yeah. I should bring a computer in next time. Do you want me to introduce the crows? Ravens are crows.

I play for the Ravens. That's right, yeah. And I'm from Baltimore. Very smart birds. Also, somebody told me that blue jays are crows, too. Are they? That's what I was told, yeah. I want to talk about my conspiracy that I believe in that's not rooted in systemic racism.

Are you going to say birds or cameras? considering it I'm going to put that off to the side, maybe. I'm talking about... Isn't that a thing, though? Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know people have never seen like a dead...

They've never seen like a dead seagull. And it's like, where they go? In the ocean. But also, are they, like, they're saying their cameras for spy organizations? I have to... I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

I'm sorry, I said it's down the wrong word. Well, no, because that also, though, makes me think about there was this weird thing that is going to sound conspiratorial. Why is grinning way too much for this to be anything but a tremendous, tremendously dangerous tangent? There was a thing, and you can look it up. It was a real thing that the U.S. government did where they tried putting microphones

in cats so that they, like, sewed microphones into cats so that they could spy on people on like, you know, I believe it was like Russian, like on some Russians. This was obviously years and years ago. It has like a name like Operation Danger Kitty or something. Incorrect. Project Acoustic Kitty. There it is, yeah. 1962, the Office of Technological Service came up with a plan.

They would implant a microphone and a tiny transmitter into a cat's ear canal and train it to follow audio cues towards a target. I feel like the guy on Joe Rogan, who, googling stuff and reading it. So I should say that this actually links

into my conspiracy that I had which is the con of mammals which is that we care all of this shit about all these mammals because we are mammals too and we see

their pain and we believe them to be smarter than us and meanwhile not smarter. Well, sorry, the mammals

are smarter than everyone else. And we are the mammals and so we are smarter than everybody else. But that's because we call ourselves mammals, they may not see us as mammals. They don't identify as mammals. Yeah, they don't,

they're like, we're saying, we're of you. And they're like, now the hell you were not. The thing, the animal that I feel the most for, though, in this theory that I have is, of course, the bird. Yeah. Because there's an insult that is very common, bird brain. And so this article in New Yorker, which is titled, I want to get this right, the magic of bird brains, subtitle, subhead, crows are smart enough to pick up trash, why won't they? And it turns out that so many people throughout time, scientists dismissed the interior lives of birds because avian brains, bird brains are smaller,

and so they seem to be idiots, but it turns out that they're actually just dense with neurons. This is an actual scientific revelation to bird researchers even. And so these birds got used to, in a program, by these organizations, to see if they could train crows, Corvids is their family, which includes crows, jays, magpies, to pick up trash because they could do stuff like this, actually.

Everyone knows crows are smart. They recognize faces, they can make and use tools. But how smart and how do they learn? That's where one of Asip's fables comes in. It's the one about a thirsty crow that dropped stones in a peasant. pitcher in order to raise the water level so it was high enough to get a drink. Seems unlikely. But, in fact, experiments have shown that New Caledonian pros once they're trained to pick up and drop stones, which is not something they do a lot in the wild, can figure out this problem

pretty quickly. They use the stones to raise the water level to get a piece of floating food. Are you guys impressed by that? I am impressed. Dominique's not impressed by the bird. Oh, no. I mean, I, I mean, I, I've seen this before I've seen them, I haven't seen that specific video, but I've seen them do this, and I've seen them, like, break down more complicated puzzles than that. But, yeah, it is incredibly impressive. So let me point this out, then, coming off of that video, is that crows? Can it turns out read each other's intentions?

They can plan for the future. They can solve puzzles using abstract reasoning. All of it just to say, they trained them to do stuff, like pick up trash, and they said, fuck you, no. And they're like the one animal that is cohabitated with us, basically, in our spaces, lived in our spaces, and maintain their independence. And that is this mark of their genius. So, crows.

Yeah. Why the fuck do we want slaves so badly? Like, we can't, we just can't shake slavery. Pick up your own trash. Yeah, pick up your own trash. Why can't we just teach ourselves to use a f***ing trash can? But no, we're like, we got to find a slave to do that. And they don't want us using people anymore.

How about crows? And when the crows don't do it, okay, well, why don't we, I don't know. Let's find like a kitty cat. Let's see if we can get cats to do it. We just need slaves. Get a robot. Whatever. We just, oh, my God, we can't shake.

We can't shake this slave addiction we got. I was going to say, like, you guys are going way too far with this crow racism bit. And then I was thinking of, like, what was the actual program called when America was racist? Jim Crow. Well done, Pablo. Even a blind crow finds a rock every night Yeah Birds underrated

I mean there's some pretty dumb ones too Like the shoe bill It's a very scary looking bird Which apparently is not that bright So like we're talking about us mammals And us humans as a group And I'm sure there are some humans that we've talked about And some we haven't

That all of us were like, no, I'm not like him So I think that birds are probably separate also The shoe bill? Crazy. They'd be like eating like mammals and stuff. Like large, very scary. I'm sure you'll put up a picture to terrify it.

Yes. The shoe bill is like a fake. It looks like a dinosaur at like a puppet. What do you guys? A puppet studio? Oh, sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A puppet workshop?

Yeah. How does the shoe bill stack up against the cassowary? They're great kickers. Yeah. Like velociraptor like talon. Velociraptor talons, they got a bone mohawk. They do have a bone mohawk? Yeah, they got a bone mohawk.

And there's some great video online of cassowaries, just like somebody trying to, like, put a broom into a cassowary pen, and the cassowary just rips it to shreds. This guy uses a sick shield to protect himself during an attack. It's more like running at you and kicking you and jumping at you with those feet, and like a velociraptor. They're going to shred you. It looks mad.

Yeah, that's better the rake than you, pretty much. That's what we reckon. There's a Caswari. Everyone run away from the Cassuary. Right, the deadliest bird on the planet is the Cassowary. Watching Pablo try to figure out how to spell Cassowary and then try to figure out how to find a Casaberry without writing. He put Bonehead Bird.

He put all types of nonsense. Just writing, man. Give it a shot. Google a guess it. I was briefly looking up the Wikipedia summary for a movie called Bone Tomahawk, starring Kurt Russell. Ooh, when was that made? 2015. Oh, wow.

I thought that was going to be like 1970s, for sure. No. It grossed over $480,000 in theater sales. Oh, that was in, like, our theaters? Where was that? I never heard of that. No. I thought it was going to go straight to streaming or something.

Yeah. Maybe they only put it in theaters to try to get it like Oscar contention. Maybe. So that's why it just loved numbers. But that's how they gross 400? it. Oh. It was just one weekend

in a couple art house theaters. Maybe it wasn't meant for us. Maybe they marketed it to some others. The Crozsche Democrat Gazette called the film

racist, calling it, quote, the equivalent of having as villains, a sect of orthodox Jews. What? What? Oh, gosh.

Are crows the only birds that, as a group, are called a murder? I think so. I believe so. Which, that's impressive. Gotta say.

Feels a little racist. Yeah. Unless they chose it, unless it was like, hey, crows, what do you want to be called? They reclaimed it. Yeah, they were like, we want to be called a murder. I'm sorry, a murda. There we go. We're a murder of crows.

It's murder. So Dominique is already exasperated by the Aaron Rogers topic that I wanted to bring in, which I do understand. Yeah. I mean. Yeah. So I agree, by the way, I agree that that's a reasonable response to this. It's funny how this played out because before all of this stuff happened this week, which by the way, I guess we should say that this happened this week.

In 2013, when CNN's Pamela Brown was covering the Kentucky Derby, she was introduced to Rogers, hearing that she was a journalist at CNN, Rogers began attacking the news media for, quote, covering up important stories. Rogers then brought up the Sandy Hook shooting and said the news media was intentionally ignoring that the shooting wasn't real, that it was a government inside job. I remind you the shooting, of course, was very real, very tragic. 20 children and six adults were murdered that day. When Pamela Brown asked Aaron Rogers for evidence of what he was talking about, Rogers then began sharing various theories that have been disproven numerous times by evidence.

Rogers falsely claimed to Pamela Brown that there were men in black in the woods by the school and he asked if she thought that was odd. Brown says that she found the entire encounter disturbing. And then, like, minutes before we sat down here, Aaron Rogers tweeted out his first comments after everybody, of course, are talking about this because by the way, I guess I'm backing into a lead here,

which is that Aaron Rogers is one of the two top contenders to be RFK Jr.'s vice president. Sure. He says this, quote, as I am on the record saying in the past, what happened in Sandy Hook was an absolute tragedy. I am not and have never been of the opinion that the events did not take place. Again, I hope that we learn from this and other tragedies to identify the signs that will allow us to prevent unnecessary loss of life. My thoughts and prayers continue to remain with the families affected along with the entire Sandy Hook community, hard emoji, hashtag thing. So that happened after I wanted to do a thing about Aaron Rogers.

But your first reaction, I guess, to Aaron Rogers now saying, clarifying, actually, no, no, no, have never believed the thing that now CNN has accused me of saying to their reporters. I want you to read it again because it sounds like, based on what he told Pamela Brown, he says a thing happened. He just thinks the thing was some conspiracy. Oh, you see an immunized legal. This feels, yeah. So this is what he says. It's a good boy. I am not and have never been of the opinion that the events did not take place.

And then he hopes that we learn from this and other tragedies to prevent unnecessary loss of life, et cetera, et cetera. So it's an absolute tragedy. The events did not take place is not a thing he believes. And so, look, we're just doing the thing again, Dominique, which I guess is why Dominique was exasperated when he set out. And I was like, I think I have Aaron Rogers takes. I don't like talking about any of this stuff. I know we need to.

I think the interesting thing for me was when we first found out he was going to potentially be the running mate of RFK is that we all joked about it? Yes, yeah. And it was like, we joked one other time about a candidate. And that ain't turned out so great. And so I guess it just wasn't, and I guess this feels a little bit more far-fetched or whatever,

or does it, I don't know. It's just an uncomfortable place to be in and also just generally, just kind of embarrassed that he, and this is before we even get to the Sandy Hook stuff. Exactly. It's just like, what are we doing? Yeah, New York Times reports this and it's immediately like,

oh, we're doing this now. Right. We're doing the thing where Aaron Rogers is in our discourse in a way that dares us to take him seriously. And so the serious part, incidentally, is when people begin to do exactly that, and they're like, now officially, you know, reporting stuff, the political presses, in ways that reveal that actually Aaron Rogers' whole persecution complex with the sports media, is actually nothing compared to what would happen actually if he was a real candidate being vetted by all sorts of political campaigns. Right. Yeah. He's definitely in a world where he's insulated because he has a perceived value. And in a weird way, probably getting injured was the best thing to happen for him because it all.

only gave another year for that value to kind of increase because people are like, yeah, maybe he's going to come back and save the jets. And it's just for a guy who probably loves attention more than he loves winning championships, he is getting it. And that's what it seems like. It seems like, yeah, this is a guy who constantly wants attention. And there's no world in which. A, if RFK were a candidate that were taken seriously and then RFK were to win, there's no way that

Aaron Rogers would be content having to be a politician and having to, and not just having to be a politician, having to be a vice president. Like, that's basically... The Nathaniel Hackett of politicians? I was going to say it's backing up Brett Farrve. It's, you know, it's that. thing of like, oh yeah, no, this is a person who wants the spotlight at every turn. And I, and for anyone who's in his life when he retires, whoof, I hope, you know, get him

interested in golf. I, um, rarely. So like, I get excited, I think, or when we get an opportunity in sports to take on some real things. And it's happened more and more recently, and I kind of feel like, you know, I get excited, I think, or, Yeah, the other stuff is fun, but we actually get an opportunity to talk to people who are outside of our whatever bubbles we live in through sports. Because there are lots of people from all different political spectrums who are willing to listen to me who would not turn on or read the same things that I read. And I think that's what I was trying to investigate my exasperation because, like, oh, I mean, it's not really affecting.

me why does this stress me out so much? And then it hit me that like I should be excited because this is my opportunity. But I think more than anything, it's just reinforcing that I don't know how much progress if it has been made. I don't know where we are going. I don't, and I also don't know what to do because through all the like through, I don't know what to do or say. Because through COVID and whatever racial or reckoning.

or whatever we called it that period. There it is. Love a reckoning. Oh, man, it was one of the happiest stretches in my life. White people was listening. You're putting phone calls? I was getting random phone calls. Apologize.

Like, hey, you know all this racism shit? My bad, dog. That's all I wanted. And then, like, through the campaign of Donald Trump and through his presidency, like, we're all finding ways to do whatever part we can. and you convince yourself that you're actually like taking some risk and making some progress. And then we get out of it and it's like, hey, you know what? Is anything that much better?

Is anything that much worse? And that's what I think I was confronted with was like, now how do I handle this in a way? Because I made mistakes through those stretches. Like I have regrets on things that I said and things that I did. You went hard in on Aaron Rogers as lots of us did. And then you sort of modulated being like, Okay. Yeah, because I mean, I, like, that don't get you anywhere.

And so I think that's what was stressing me out is like, how do I handle this? Because it's absurd. And like making fun of it, it's fine. But like, what do you actually say about it if it's real? I don't know. But maybe is it, do you think on some level it's the absurdity of it? Because when I think about what you're talking about as having this platform to be able to maybe engage in different conversations with people who are sports,

sports fans and getting them to kind of open their mind and be empathetic to a different perspective. When you say that, I think about people like, you know, when Greg Popovich and Steve Kerr and Doc Rivers were during, you know, 2020 talking about, you know, police violence, I think about when Carl Anthony Towns was talking about how COVID impacted him. And those are real things that feel like pegs that you can talk about where you can say, okay, to any COVID deniers, here is a basketball player that you potentially root for, and he just lost his mother. And that, to me, feels like it's much easier to peg a story around that than the absurdity

that Aaron Rogers often exists in, whether it is he may be the vice president, the vice president of candidate for a third party candidate, or his claims on COVID or his, Joe Rogan appearances, they're all in the theater of the absurd. Yeah, but I think so around COVID stuff, like the message is simple. Get vaccinated or stay home. The tough thing about this is like, what am I, what is the message that celebrities shouldn't be politicians? Or Aaron Rogers shouldn't be taken seriously. And I think that's what I was having a hard time with is like, I don't want to say

shouldn't be taken seriously because we thought that at once. upon a time. He should be taken seriously. But I also know that if I say, you know what, don't vote for Aaron Rogers. Like, that's not the right thing to do either. That's not going to be properly received. So you're endorsing. You're endorsing Aaron Rogers. Can you Photoshop that image? Oh my gosh. You know how to get me to never come on this show again. But can I, can I say that the reason I was interested in Aaron Rogers and the reason why I was interested in him before even the Sandy Hook stuff, which he says or is trying to make us think he does not believe now, at least, is because he is kind of like this one man

like Overton window, right? This guy who is a line at which, I guess, we have to figure out, are we just going to let this guy just say stuff and not take it seriously anymore? It's this line where it's like, oh, what is the line beyond which we need to say with like some amount of seriousness, this is f***ed up and you shouldn't be taken seriously. But that's where even with his statement, his statement doesn't actually respond to CNN's claims.

His statement doesn't respond to those conversations. He's just saying, I never said that. And it feels like, okay, well, then somebody needs to hold his feet to the fire and say, why would this person say that the interaction they had with you at the Kentucky Derby was different than, like, let's kids? even not saying I didn't say that. He is saying, as I'm on the record saying in the past, what happened in Sandy Hook was an absolute tragedy, I am not, I have never been of the opinion that the events did not take place. And then he goes on to say that it's... I just had a lot of mid-jolips at the derby and got loose.

But I think the question of Aaron Rogers gets to like, do we find him interesting enough to wonder how he got this way? And so what is funny to me about this, beyond the fact that RFK Jr. turns out in, I guess, leaking his two top vice-person presidential candidates are Jesse Ventura and Aaron Rogers that he's really, really cornering the fucking, you know, Democrats, former Democrats who believe in 9-11 conspiracy market, right? Beyond that, it's Aaron Rogers went on this three-hour paywalled podcast that I had Ryan Cortez listened to. I'm sorry, Ryan.

Because I got a text from somebody. Actionable legally, Ryan. You should call a lawyer. Unless you just became red pills. Cortez will eat garbage when it comes to television and love it. And this was like something he actually pushed back on and I made him do it. And that is Exhibit A, that little audio clip that Cortez. That is Exhibit A in your lawsuit.

It was three hours long and he sent me a long embittered summary of what he found out. but I want to play one of the clips because it proves that A, this guy Eddie Bravo is a real person I thought this might be like a literally like a satire of like an Aaron Rogers podcast episode that doesn't exist

but it turns out it exists and Rogers said stuff like this Tartaria is interesting to me because I just don't have a natural skepticism paired with a true curiosity about about history

I studied history in college. When I was nine years old, I studied Egypt. And that's why I'm so fascinated by Graham Hancock and Randall-Carrison and their theories about Egypt. I love their podcast with Joe. And why does that history matter? Because there's been probably thousands and thousands and thousands and tens and hundreds of thousands, maybe years of extremely advanced civilizations. Why does that change things? Because everything that they've told us could be a lie.

And so Eddie Bravo is like a Q&ONA adjacent guy, it seems. The theory they're talking about is the Tartarian Empire, which is billed, according to Bloomberg, as the Q&ONO of architecture. And it also proceeds, if we have that video of Roger saying his origin story about how he started questioning things, it gets back to RFK Jr.

if we have that clip. My thing on politics is I've always that's a f*** sham because the majority of them are all juiced in and it's run by the big banks, the big farmer, the lobbyist,

the big everything, right? It doesn't give a shit deep down about the American people. All they care about is profits, power, and control. Right? So my antidote to that

is RFK Jr. because I think although he has the pedigree of family being in politics, the last real president was the first president I studied, which was JFK. And that's what got me into questioning things, because I did a sophomore project on JFK, life and death. For a guy who doesn't believe in vaccines, it's weird that he would call RFK the antidote. But I play all of this to point out that there are some things where it's like,

Hey, Aaron Rogers, you're not a problem if what you believe is the pharmaceutical industry is a problem. Cool, I agree. It is. There are many, many issues with big pharma. If your whole take here is that, like, we should do more psychedelic drugs. Also on board. Cool. Let's talk about that. If he's even like anti-mainstream media, like, okay, I'll hear you out on that. If it's a JFK conspiracy thing, I'm like, not scandalized by this. But the question is, where is the line? And I feel like the line is somewhere around the Q and on the Q&on of architecture and Sandy Hook's truthorism.

And he's clearly on the other side of a line that just feels like we should say the issue with you as a candidate is that you believe some shit that's just actually deranged. How the human mind works

is still a mystery to a lot of us in many ways, or me to all of us in many ways. Not anything. except for Wyatt. However, and correct me if I'm wrong, it feels to me like, I'm going to use this sports car analogy.

It feels like Aaron has a sports car like in his head as far as like horsepower is concerned, but he's a drunk driver. It's just like, it just feels like because in... You should not be trusted to drive us, to drive this country. Oh, just himself. You know, so like I don't, I'm hesitant to say that he's smart. And smart's such a like loaded word because it like oversimplifies intelligence.

Like you're either smart or you're not. You can be intelligent in a bunch of different ways. But for the sake of this conversation, it's clear to me that he has some like above average level of like brain power. But where he chooses to focus it and what he does with it is the concerning part. The other question that comes up to me is you talk about the line. I don't know where the draw of the line is. We all recognize that some Sandy Hook, truth orism or whatever they're calling at,

is across the line. But the kindest thing I can say about Aaron Rogers is like people like him with that impulse are like necessary because I know we all understand this. We are being lied to about something. Sure. And somebody like the journalistic, instinct to like be skeptical all the time and question everything is something that we need to have in

society. Yes. Again, like the whole like we got to find out stuff is yes, I embody this. Sure. But I feel like there's a line that needs to be drawn between curiosity and conspiracy theorist. And to me, what's interesting about seeing Aaron Rogers over the years is that he very much seems like he falls into the camp of conspiracy theorist. And there are a lot, and there is maybe something to unpack about the psychology of conspiracy theorists, because whether they're Cuban, whether they're QAnon, whether they're Hoteps, there is this large population that seems to just be growing of conspiracy theorists. And what is it in that particular makeup of a person that is driving them that way?

Are there things that Aaron Rogers has in common, psychologically speaking, to a lot of these other people? And maybe that's something we should be looking at and focusing on because the danger is, especially when these people have voices and platforms, they then just popularize not just their way of thinking, but the anxiety, narcissism and other things that drive that thinking. You know, I was wondering about like how Aaron Rogers in his psychology was going to respond to this.

I now am persuaded that he's going to go with the immunized loophole, careful rhetoric. I think why it's right now that I keep on looking at this statement about this Andy Hook stuff. But I think when it comes to how he got to be this way psychologically, you know, I think he's going to describe at some point. He'll do the thing he always does. He'll complain about being canceled, how he has opinions that are too brave and all that stuff. I can see that happening. It might be happening as we speak right now. But the funny thing about his persecution complex is that Aaron Rogers has actually been a fascinating

experiment because he used to be beloved. All the people who are his critics now who tend to be loud about it, he was their guy. He was a friend of Dan Lebitard's show. He was in Mina Kimes' home because he wanted to, which is weird, especially now, to think about in retrospect, that he wanted to visit her as she was profiling him at ESPN. he was somebody that I admired because it seemed like his brain power was being used to be interesting and thoughtful while also being one of the greatest quarterbacks of all time. And the question then for him is, okay, why did he then feel like everybody turned on him?

And I think, or why is it, the question might be, why does he feel like he lost that audience? And he would say, I think, because of the woke mind virus, because he said some things that cut too close to the truth and these people are sheep and they're not awoken and all that stuff. And in reality, I think the answer is you started trafficking and shit that we cannot possibly even begin to defend. And he never seems to consider that that is actually the answer. He's always looking outward at people don't get what I am putting down and therefore it's them and not me. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I feel pretty sure that there was. I think there was something that happened before a game in Green Bay where Aaron like admonished

the Packer fans for booing a Muslim person, I believe. It was the attacks in Paris that happened in 2015. Yeah, go ahead. Explain it. Okay, so religious extremists killed at least 129 people in Paris. And a fan at a game appeared to shout, quote, Muslim. Muslims suck during a moment of silence. And Rogers said after the game that, you know, that he was very disappointed with whoever the fan was

who made a comment that I thought was really inappropriate during the moment of silence. It's that kind of prejudicial ideology that I think puts us in the position that we're in today as a world. That was Rogers. I don't sound like, yeah. And I think not knowing exactly what pushed him to the point where he is now, I think part of what happens in life

is there are guardrails that you bump into or like you kind of, if you're like a, you're born with like, you're like a raw material, as you tumble down this hill, things will like bump and knock and erode you into a point where you're smooth, able to operate within society. There's something to be said for being an exceptional person in some realm because while, all Aaron Rogers, I'm sure, has had many challenges to overcome as an athlete, a lot of the social experiences and a lot of the demands that are placed upon you as a growing young adult to an adult will have you conform to some degree. And if you're a great quarterback, there's nothing, there's hardly anything, and you're in

Green Bay all the time, there's hardly anything that, like, forces you into that spot, which I think Aaron would argue is why he is on to the truth. But I would argue what you did with that freedom is like dangerous. And that's the scary part. And that's why I don't know what to say about any of this. It feels irresponsible for him to use his platform in a way that does not display critical thinking when his influence is meaningful, let alone actually resulting in political power. And so I guess why what I am struggling with two as I listen to Dominique on that is simply, I don't want to be a scold. I wanted to do the thing about, can we get Eddie Bravo and like that podcast, play some clips and laugh?

And now I'm like grappling with, do we have to be the people who are the guardrails? Is it incumbent upon us in sports to be like, we've been covering this guy forever? He's not trying to be an actual vice president of the United States. He's daring us to take him seriously. And if that happens, what happens? Well, but it also feels like if we've lost the ability to actually hold people accountable to the words and they have to then respond to them, not in a tweet,

but to sit across from reporters and have to answer these questions and have to be presented with facts and truth. Whether it's Sandy Hook or even, I'm assuming the Egypt stuff he's talking about is like the Egypt alien shit, which even that stuff, there is a thing there that is rooted in some deep racism.

That is Africans couldn't have built all that, aliens did. And so if you want to have these conversations, you can't just go on Joe Rogan or Pat McPhee, and I call him McPhee, because I assume Aaron asked him to move both the A's into his first name, so they could be more alike. But you can't just go on shows

where people are just going to kind of let you blow by and say whatever the hell you want. But he can. That's the thing. But that's what I'm saying. That's the point that I'm making is like, I don't know. Well, and that's what feels like that's what's so problematic and where it feels like we're not going to find a solution to it if we continue to exist in this economy where anybody can have a podcast,

anybody can kind of say what they want without any checks and balances. And this is where Aaron Rogers is somewhere out there and people like him in his coalition are saying, you guys are doing the same thing you're accusing me of doing. You guys agree with each other. You're talking. You're laughing together. Ha, ha, ha, ha.

It's the same exact thing. And Aaron, you are welcome to come on this show and we'll put it behind a paywall if you like. And we can have the conversation. If you're listening, yeah, we can have that conversation. Ryan Cortez is walking out the door. That's why it says that sentence. You know what? I think that I just landed on me

that is really annoying or really confusing for me is I'm talking about this as if there is another side. Whereas this does not, there is no other side. because that's what I'm thinking is like, all right. If I accept that I am not going to convince people who are in this camp, I accept that I'm not going to convince them. And I accept that they come with this new world that we are in. Then I'm sitting here thinking, all right,

there's a good conversation that we're having. This is not something that I would have thought of by myself. But now, since I'm talking to people, it tells me that what I really need to do is work aggressively on the opposite end of what he is putting out there. Yeah. We have to debate a Sandy Hook truther, Dominique. That's how we get to be fair and balanced. I mean, even if you're not talking about directly at that specific idea,

or Tartaria. I just think that this group of people who are talking about this, because they don't fall perfectly into right or left. They're in a different place. That's the whole RFK party. We're the conspiracist party. We're Democrats who believe that there's bullshit on all sides. And so if my belief is that it's our responsibility to make sure that we are taking as much advantage

of this new world, then I should be propagating something as extreme as him but on the other side. And I'm like, what the hell is that? It doesn't exist. So I'm supposed to say, Merca is so honest and so good.

America never lies to its people. No, the Egyptians built all that shit by themselves with their hands. And you know what? The Egyptians built this building that we're standing in right now. They traveled in time and did it. Like,

What is the opposite of a conspiracy theorist? It sucks. You can't fight against that. But it's, but it also, it's funny because as you're saying that, I'm reminded that I spent a lot of time working on a show, a television show, where the host would go and say, let's bring, let's bring Jim Kramer on. And I'm going to debate Jim Kramer, or I'm going to go on Bill O'Reilly's show. I'm going to debate Bill O'Reilly.

And the reality is nothing changed. It wasn't actually helpful to the conversation at all. All it is is clickbait. And it then spawned other people saying, oh, yeah, let's do some confrontation for views. And that's all it really is. And so to your point, it's not about, okay, yeah, I will counter with this.

It feels like, sadly, the counter is... structural. It is, it is weirdly, it's the harder work of, like, de-radicalizing conspiracy theorists? Well, it's the harder work of, like, we need to make... A society that doesn't reward that stuff. A society that doesn't reward that stuff, but also, we need to re-engage people with access to education that makes them critical thinkers and not conspiratorial thinkers. That, like, a lot of this is, you know, I hate to go back and be, you know, the person who's like, well, the problem is our schools are fucked up. But on some level, our schools are fucked up.

Our social safety net is fucked up. No, we're going to have the internet, Wyatt. The internet's our school now. I mean, and I know, yeah. But if those things were stronger, then I'm not saying it, I'm not saying it eliminates any of that stuff. I'm not disagreeing with you. I am just going to point out the fact that it's because we're racist.

Like, that's Our schools are f*** up because we're racist. Yeah. Yeah. Like, our social safety net is fucked up because we're racist. Yeah. Like, all of these things were born as a result of white people not wanting black people to have shit that they didn't have

or have anything close to what they have. That's why our schools are fucked up. That's why our communities are segregated because we are fucking racist. And it's, I mean, it's a point. It's not a novel point. It's a point that's been made before. But racism is bad for all of us. And until we understand,

that the fundamental, like, principles of this country are based on racism. And that's why the white grandma can't get surgery is because we can't have health care because we're fucking racist. Like, that's like, it's all. So, Aaron, get on that. There's a great plug for my podcast that didn't wind up going. Oh, everything's racist. Yeah. So to be clear, and I think that maybe not everyone.

is as critical a thinker and critical a listener. So I will take my time and be clear that I am not saying that every white person I walk into today is like some radical extreme racist. I don't know y'all. I don't know everyone. But I do believe that the systemic issues that our country faces that impact us all is a result of race. I don't know how we got here from talking about Aaron Rogers being conspiracy theorist, but that is, it's not a conspiracy. it's real. But also as a person, what you're talking about is also to sort of bring it back to sports, it's teamwork.

And it's the idea that, well, the white guy might have gotten knocked down or might feel like he's getting knocked down. But if the offensive line, if they don't have the tools they need, if they don't have the resources they need, then yeah, you're going to keep getting knocked down because they're getting knocked down too, because they have less than your ass. And they don't recognize that we're all on the same team. But I want to modernize your analogy. I mean, a lot of quarterbacks are black now. Well, I was just thinking about Aaron Rogers.

No, it's a perfect analogy. I think that we don't recognize that we're on the same team. And we're saying, so like if to confer this analogy, which could be useful, I'm using this again at some point. And I may or may not credit you. But we got there together. Did we? No, it's kind of like slavery, man.

You did the work. I'm going to take it. So who's who's who's who's who's tarad Taylor in this metaphor? All right. The point that I'm, America's the Jets. The point I'm going to make is that assuming that if black people represent the offensive line and we're like,

hey, these deep tackles are whooping I ass. Why don't you give us some help? And the quarterback is the white person. He's back there getting sack like I can't help you. I'm getting sacked all the goddamn. time. It's like, listen, bro, you know what would help us all is if we took care of this offensive line, then we would no longer get our asses kicked and you would no longer be getting sacked. But we don't view it that way. We view ourselves in many ways as on opposite teams.

And I'm not, I find myself in that position all the time where I'm looking around like, motherfuckers, they don't give a nothing about us. They don't care. They don't want to do anything. But the fact of the matter is all of this stuff is connected. And I think that is probably the most appealing part about conspiracy theorists is they see that there are some connections. They just connect in the wrong dots. They don't have the numbers on the connected dot game. They just like, fuck these numbers.

One, 12, 14, 66, boom, bam, bam, bang. Oh. Exactly. Wait, so here's an update to the Aaron Rogers story. Uh-oh. So, and we'll have to fact-check this because we're doing this live, Rogan style.

but someone ran Aaron Rogers' statement that we started this episode with through an AI detection software and it was detected as written by AI. That's like a ridiculous 2024 experience. I got a fact check this. I got to check this right now. AI detection tool. Yeah, I think somebody just made that up. I would love if there was some flag football game that was let AI call the plays for one team.

and just see AI versus Rex Ryan. I hate that this is a thing that I'm like, oh God, I hope this is real, but also it's all like a meta third level prank. I mean, the truth of the matter is he's what in Costa Rica? He's not really, whether it was AI or whether it was his agent.

Isn't it really the same thing? It did the same thing. It was detected as written by AI by this website called undetectable. Dot AI. Jeez,

because we trust that website? It's, man. I feel like that's, that's kind of the perfect

that dig. I don't know anymore and I'm tired of I'm finally tired of trying to find out. But I can

only imagine how tired I would be if I didn't have the following people because Pablo Tori Tore finds out is produced

by Michael Antonucci, Ryan Cortez, Sam Daywig, Juan Galinda Patrick Kim, Neely Lohman, Rachel Miller-Hawr, Ethan Shrier, Carl Scott, Matt Sullivan, Chris Tuminello, and Julia Warren. Our studio engineering by RG Systems, a post production by NGW Post, our theme song by John Bravo. I'm going to turn off my computer and go to bed. I'll see you on Tuesday.