Reply All - #134 The Year of the Wallop

Episode Date: January 17, 2019

New Year! Alex Goldman’s audacious plan to get punched in the face, plus special guest Jason Mantzoukas returns for a very Azkaban Yes Yes No. Tweet from the episode Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From Gimlet, this is Reply All. I'm PJ Vote. And I'm Alex Goldman. Okay, before we start the show, do you know why I want to talk to you? I have no idea. First of all, it's a new year. Okay. Welcome.

Thank you. You made it. Mm-hmm. Do you remember what your New Year's resolution was last year? I don't. Did I say something on the radio? Not that I recall. So, like, you're not holding me to some crazy standard.

Oh, you were never going to eat M&Ms again? No, I don't remember what it was. I ate a lot of M&Ms this year. Do you have a New Year's resolution this year? I'm not like a resolution guy, but at the same time, I feel like that's a cop-out because every year I'm like, okay, this isn't a resolution. I'm just going to do this independent of New Year's because I don't want any pressure to be put on myself. Great first step. I don't want anyone to hold me accountable for making any changes.

No, I just don't want it to be led in with expectation that I'm going to transform as a human being. You want it to be buoyant with anticipation that you won't. I'm sorry, what? Go ahead. So, oh, I get it. Yeah, I joined a boxing gym because I want to start boxing. And why? How come?

Just want to be in a situation where, all right, this is going to sound messed up. Hold on a second. Sarah, my wife, I apologize for saying this in advance because it was probably going to freak you out to hear. Okay. I really want to know what it feels like to get knocked out. Like, you want to be fully, like, knocked out? Like in the movies? I want to be K-O'd.

You know, like, have you ever seen those crazy videos of street fights where, like, one guy is stepping to another guy? And the other guy just, like, just clocks him. Just clocks him. And then he immediately turns into a statue and just falls straight over. What kind of crazy bodily, like, why is your body doing that? I want to know. I feel like it's possible that getting punched in the face and being knocked out is not going to answer the question of what happens to your body when you're not. out because I feel like what's going to happen is you're going to feel panic and pain and then nothing.

And then you'll just get the experience of what is it like to wake up really disoriented and in pain. I mean, to be fair, I also want to get into better shape. The classes are brutal, man. How much, how much of this is column A and how much of this is column B? How much do I want to get walloped versus how much do I want to get in shape? I'm going to say 60, 40 getting in shape, to be honest. Okay, that's better. Do you have a New Year's resolution?

I've been trying to find one. I've been trying to find one. I think I have one. Okay. I want to try to limit my feuds. What are you like a Hatfield looking for a McCoy? I'm a Hatfield trying not to look for a McCoy. What kind of feuds do you have?

I have like a lot of small feuds. I'm not a big feuder, but I'm a person of many small feuds. Without disclosing the names of the people you are feuding with. Oh, I don't care. All right. Well, then tell me... One of my neighbors. About what?

I didn't say hello to him for a while because I just didn't want to. Like, I just didn't feel like whatever. And he's, like, kind of drunk sometimes. And he started getting really aggressive about me saying hello. So then I didn't want to say hello even more. Like, I'd be like, I have headphones on you. Like, oh, you don't say hello to me? I was like, well, not it.

I don't say hello out of this situation. But then I said hello to him. And now we're having totally nice conversations as, if like the super aggressive thing never happened, where he was screaming at me all the time. All right. Way to defuse a feud. But then I've got another feud with this guy who has like,

I think he's like a state assembly man or whatever, but he parks illegally outside the coffee shop all the time in a way I find very unsafe. And I glare at him. How do you know he's a state assemblyman? Because he's got like a special license plate and a thing on his dashboard. I'm like, why are you advertising that you're being a jerk? So how are you going to diffuse this? I'm not diffusing that feud.

I'm holding on that feud. And the other view that I don't totally see myself like can go of now that I started say this is like the delivery guy for the Chinese food place has this thing where we're in this battle of I promptly come to the door when the doorbell rings or my cell phone rings and he's got this thing where he started trying to call me like he's like a couple blocks away. Yes. So I'm standing outside like in a robe being very cold freezing your butt off. Yeah. And then and then he gets there and he's like trying to make me you come down to the car. And I know that it's not like super sympathetic for somebody to be like,

this service industry person's not doing a good enough job. But dude, I used to the liver food, walk up the stairs, and stop messing with me. Yeah. I don't know if I'm letting go of any of these feuds. I think the thing I want to do is be more efficient in my feuds and figure out who I'm feuding with and not feud with anybody else. I think that's a noble goal. But I feel like I was talking to my dad this. weekend and somehow you came up. Really? Yeah.

And I was like, I would hate to be on PJ's bad side because he's like a cunning person who never lets anything go. He's like a person who I feel like you have, I feel like you have the cork board with the red, with the red twine connecting stuff, machinations for like everyone who's ever wronged you. Like you are definitely a Nixon. I don't doubt you have an enemy's list. Oh, yeah, no, no, you have to have an enemy's list. Because the thing is, if you don't have an enemy's list, and somebody else gave me this advice,

but the reason I have an enemy's list is it tells you who did not care about. Like, an enemy's list isn't so it gets super long. You get an enemy's list, you keep it short. And then when somebody doesn't bother you, you're like, are they on my enemies list? No, I don't care. This is the most insane thing I've ever heard. There's a person on my enemies list who's been there since second grade. He beat me up.

I ran away crying into what I thought was the men's room. It wasn't. It was a lady's room. and then he stood outside the lady's room yelling and making fun of me until I came out of the ladies' room also crying and then I got taller than him

Let me tell you a story Yeah About about enemies holding grudges, feuds Uh-huh He used to have a roommate His name was Jamie Sabuda He actually was born Jamie Green

His parents were together But were not married So he had his mom's name Is this going to be material to the story? Yes, okay Because they started to feel like a Bible story where you have to say Where everyone was begat from

So he was born Jamie Green his parents got married, changed his name to Jamie Sabuda. He is like 19 sitting at a Denny's with some friends, three in the morning. This guy walks off to and goes, hey, are you Jamie Green? He says, yeah, I used to be. The guy pulls his arm back and punches him as hard as he can in the face. Walloped. No discussion.

Walloped. And Jamie's like, who are you? What are you doing? And the guy was like, you pushed me off the swings in the third grade. Yes. And he walked away. Yes. Is that you, PJ?

Kind of. You're out of your mind. I feel like I've talked myself out of my resolution. Okay, you get walloped. I'll just continue to be the same person for one more year. Sounds great. Okay, coming up, I know we have a special guest for Yes Yes Yes No. Let's just get the ads out of the way first.

Welcome once again to Yes Yes No, the segment on the show where normally our boss, Alex Bloomberg, comes to us with stuff from the internet. He doesn't understand and we try to explain it to him. But this week we have a big Hollywood show. star Jason Manzoukis. Yeah, that's right. I guess Bloomberg's too much of a coward in 2019 to come on the yes yes knows. So I get the call. I'm here. I'm ready to rock, gentlemen. It's incredibly professional of you. I wish we could expect the same from our boss. Guys, here I am in Hollywood, California, mere steps away from the Walk of Fame, Grauman's Chinese Theater, the Hollywood sign. It is resplendent.

It does feel like a much more glamorous yes-tiss now. I know already. It does, right? I imagine the Entertainment Tonight theme play. I'm in a tuxedo. Alex is wearing one of his hoodies that has way fewer stains on. Alex is actually wearing a hoodie, just so you know, Jason, that is literally an I-heart New York sweatshirt that, like, a tourist would wear, or like a kidnapper who was changing out of bloody clothes.

And who needs something to wear, but still it's stained? Yes, still it's stained. Where is there a stain? Next to the heart? I ate a dosa for lunch. Like, for real, you ate a dosa for lunch in your white sweatshers? It's a black sweatsher. Oh, okay.

Oh, so you thought you were safe. I thought I would get a wade a dosa for lunch is not, like, therefore I'm covered in stained. It's not like gazpacha without a spoon. Well, not for you. A dosa, like, a dosa is very, should be very easily eaten without, like, without, you could, here's the thing. You have, what, 11 children. Blame it on one of them.

Just be like, ah, you know, it's hard when you've got 14 kids running around. I mean, I do that, but that doesn't hold water for PJ. He's just like, he thinks that the very fact that my clothes have stains all over them means that I should probably change them. And I'm like, I've got too many kids to change my clothes. Here's the deal. Both of you are right. PJ's right, you should change your stained clothes when you're at work,

especially because it's possible it's possible that at some point one of those stains is like your children's shit Yes, it's very possible Like how likely is it that there's like a smear of turd on your sleeve And you're coming to work like

Doot do do do do do Uh oh I think it's a dosa I had a dosa for lunch At the very most it's a 20% chance You guys are You guys are literally a disaster. Yeah, it's really gross. It's really gross. This show is

like falling apart. You're lucky I'm here. Holding this show together. All right. Third official host of Reply All, Jason Manzuka's here with a yes, yes, no. Coming from Twitter. That's right. I'm running the goddamn segment now.

We also gave you access to Alex's Twitter account because you don't normally use Twitter. I'm not on social media. Still, not on social media. Okay, so what have you got for us today? Okay, here we go. From Twitter.com. It is a tweet from the person whose Twitter handle, Twitter name. I'm not sure how you, what it is, is hold on. I mean, I've lost the piece of paper. I wrote the thing down it. Okay. That's such a low tech.

Yeah. Okay. this comes to us from Twitter. This this tweeter's name is please at me for access to my powerful brain. And then it is at Chris Caesar

and the C and the C are both capitalized. And then the tweet is huh comma didn't realize Chuck C. Johnson went to Hogwarts. Just goes to show you there's a little magic in all

us. All right. So, um, okay. PJ vote. Do you understand this tweet? Mostly, yeah.

Okay. Uh, Jason Manzukas, do you understand this tweet? Listen, as someone who didn't go to Hogwarts,

uh, I went to, um, Bo Baton, um, the all-female magic school. Um, is that a real place?

Yes. Really? Yes, yes. I mean, I didn't go to, derm string guys. I mean, I'm not practicing dark magic. We're talking

to like a real hot, we're talking to like a Harry Potter officionado here. So I literally can't tell if these are like very good fake Harry Potter specifics or... No, these are real Harry's Potter specifics. What you guys don't know is that I am an enormous Harry Potter fan.

Really? And if you're wondering, that doesn't make any sense because you are a 46 year old childless man, Jason. I'm here to say it is uncomfortable how much I know about Harry Potter. How did you get into it?

I got into it. I would do, every year I would come out for pilot season in Los Angeles. I lived in New York and I would come out to Los Angeles for auditions when it's like the busy season of the year for TV shows. And on those drives, I started listening to audiobooks

and I started listening to the Harry Potter books because they're like 26 hours long. So it's perfect. And then in years subsequent, I found them so comforting that I will repeatedly now, I just have relistened to the entire series of audiobooks again. Wow. Wow, man. You are committed. Yeah, I'm very into it in a way that is I find so satisfying in my life, but also so, so sad and weird.

Because I will frequently find myself in super in-depth. technical conversations about Harry Potter lore with my friend's children. Like what kind of what kind of in-depth a conversation? Oh, it's like it usually starts with they don't think I know much about Harry Potter. Then we get into a debate about Harry Potter. Then it becomes trivia contest and then it becomes I shame them. And then we get then oh, because I will decimate kids on Harry Potter trivia. Just don't fuck with me.

And then we bond over it, and then it just becomes like the thing I want to talk about with them the most because they get excited about it and I'm excited about it. And then I abduct those children and we live happily ever after in a Subaru outback with plates from Europe. Well, I'm very excited about this particular yes yes, no then, because it deals directly with Harry Potter lore. Great. Let's get into it. Did I say, do I have Alice Goldman? Do you understand this tweet? Yes, I understand this tweet.

Okay, just trying to make sure we do our rituals. Thank you. Okay. So, wait, we're right. Yes, Harry Potter, yes, but maybe not the rest of the tweet? Yeah. Yes, because I don't know who Chuck C. Johnson is. And I don't know what, yeah.

Could be like a, could be like a Harry Potter fan fiction character. Okay, so here's something, too. So I'm seeing, so he tweets this. January 4th, somebody tweets him back. I thought he went to troll warts. Okay, so that makes me think Chuck C. Johnson is a troll. Then the guy goes, he went to the school where you poopie on the floor. And let me ask, now I'm going to ask you guys this.

Do you know what this person is referring to? Do you know what that tweet refers to? Yes. Yes. Yes. Okay. So one part of this tweet definitely has to do with Harry Potter, but within this tweet is an entire separate, wholly unrelated drama that I will get to, but let's start with the Harry Potter part first. So being a huge Harry Potter fan, Jason, you probably know that JK Rowling is kind of notorious for like once all the books came out, basically saying things after the fact about characters that were never revealed in the books. Yes, every year she apologizes for certain characters' deaths. She retcons certain characters' storylines or adds further information to a lot of the characters that you might know and love. Right.

And do you follow that stuff? Because it's Internet, but it's Harry Potter. So, like, which of... Yeah, PJ. Yeah, I follow that stuff. Okay? Yes, PJ. I was in my 30s when these books started coming out.

Yes, I was an adult. Do you have a Pottermore login? Can we not worry about it? If you're trying to find out what my patronus is, I'm not telling. You'll have to be in my presence when I think of something happy and scream expecto patrona. And then immediately burst into tears because it reminds me of the scene in the books when Harry rescues Sirius from the Dementors.

Guys, he thought it was his father, but it was himself. Come on! This is really overwhelming for me because I've never read any of them. Really? We're not friends anymore. You've never read them? No. They're really good.

Just listen to the audiobooks. Listen to the audiobooks. Yeah, it'll just take you like 150 hours. Okay, so I know, the part of this that I know is I know that, like, a few weeks ago, Jay H. H. H. Relling did, like, a weird update to Harry Potter. Potter mythology. So it wasn't on J.K. Rowling's Twitter. It was actually on the Pottermore Twitter. And I didn't know what that was at the time, but like what I found out after reading people retweeting and commenting on it is that Potter more is like the online universe of Harry Potter

stuff. Like it's like a website and it's got like J.K. Rowling writes on it and just like there's like extended lore about the series on there. Right. So on January 4th, the Pottermore Twitter account tweeted the following information, Jason. Hogwarts didn't always have bathrooms before adopting muggle plumbing methods in the 18th century, witches and wizards simply relieved themselves wherever they stood and vanished the evidence. Hashtag National Trivia Day. I don't like that. Yeah, this has been something that's been discussed in the past that I think is patently ludicrous.

And it gets at a thing where people really start to pick apart this world looking for like, oh yeah, why, if magic exists, why do they have muggle plumbing? Like, why would they need that? And they're, this is, it's so upsetting to me that, that the magical world, the wizarding world, rather, has either shitting on the floor as an option or, like, plumbing, or like functional muggle plumbing. Those are the only options to getting rid of your own waste. Oh, like, shouldn't there just be like a magical toilet?

Correct. Correct. You shit in a toilet and the toilet vanishes the turds or whatever. But the idea that they're putting forth is wizards. Wizards who are fucking wizards are like, oh, you know what? I've got to drop a deuce. You know what I'm going to do? Squat here in my office.

and then wave my wand over it and send it elsewhere. That's not, that's not civilized. Why would you just disappear the poop from your butt? Great question. Or straight out of your body. Yeah, I had a lot of those questions. My question was like, did they do it in a way that was discreet? Or if they were like walking down the hall,

did they just like lift up their wizarding robes and crap and then wish it away? These are people who have figured out there are magical ways to do things that are so insanely complicated. I mean, Voldemort is able to split. split his soul into seven distinct pieces in order to remain immortal. And you are telling me that up until recently, these motherfuckers were shitting on the floor and then just vanishing it. You're telling me that more often than not somebody would just turd the bed and then be like, zip zaps up, it's out of here, wave the old Wondie.

So expecto poop tronum. I mean, get it out of here. But then why? What I don't understand is like a not deviant. devoted like Harry Potter Arcana person is like, why are they even commenting on this? What I think is going on is in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, which I guess is it's the second book, right, Jason? Yes, of course.

Yes, it's the one where the chamber, I'm so mad at you. It's the one where the Chamber of Secrets is opened again, letting loose the basilisk that stood in, that slitherin hid inside of Hogwarts. It's a giant snake. It's getting around through the pipe. Spoil, by the way, spoiler alert for this book, because I'm like full-blown spoiling it. But a huge portion of it takes place in a girl's bathroom with a dead girl's ghost named Moneing Myrtle.

So this tweet on the Potomor account about how wizards make their poop disappear, it is actually referencing an article that J.K. Rowling wrote on the Potimore website a few years ago. And I can read from it to you. Give me just a second. Okay. And I quote, when first created, the chamber was accessed through a concealed trap door

and a series of magical tunnels. However, when Hogwarts plumbing became more elaborate in the 18th century, parenthetical, this was a rare instance of wizards copying muzzles because hithers... Muggles, muggles. Muggles.

This is a rare instance of wizards copying muggles because hitherto. Hitherto? Hitherto. Hitherto. Are you okay? I don't know how to read. Suddenly I'm having a stroke. What's happening?

Honest to God, what's happening? Hitherto. Alex, for real, are you okay? Like, you can't pronounce words. You're wearing a grossly stained sweatshirt. You are like... I knew what it meant. I knew it.

I just, I just misread it. Oh my God, I've never panicked like this before. You just said it. I'm so embarrassed right now. Oh, man, I wish Bloomberg was here right now to see this. Hit there too. Ha! You moron.

All right, let me try that again. Yeah. No, no, no. Hit there too. Yeah, go ahead. This was a rare instance of wizards copying muggles because hith there to, they simply relieved themselves wherever they stood and vanished the evidence. The entrance to the chitthair too. entrance to the chamber was threatened being located on the side of...

Wait, so she's just moving on from that. Like, that's close parentheses. Close parentheses. The entrance of... Oh, no, that's an aside. The entrance to the chamber was threatened being located on the site of a proposed bathroom. So I think that they were trying to justify the existence of a bathroom in the Harry

Potter universe that would have been built on top of a mystical chamber. So we're all clear on the floor. We're all clear on the floor pooping, I guess. So she just, she has an arbitrary habit of just, updating answers to questions no one had, and then sometimes making it worse in the process. Right. Well, I mean, some examples where, like, she said,

shortly after the last book came out, she was like, oh, by the way, never mentioned in the books. Dumbledore's gay. She just, just. Yes. But I get that more, actually. Like, I get being like, hey, I keep thinking about these characters I made up,

and I want to tell you something that will be interesting and make you think about it. Some other things that I've learned that she, that she included after the book is, someone asked her about the religions of the people there, And she was like, they were like, are there any Jewish people at Hogwarts? And she was like, yes, but no Wiccans. I mean, this is a series, a wonderfully written, wonderfully structured series of children's fantasy novels.

Guess what I don't need to know. Where do they poop? And also, how many Jews? What? What are we doing? So the original tweet, if we go back to it, says, huh, didn't realize Chuck C. Johnson went to Hogwarts. Okay.

So who's Chuck C. Johnson? That's what I don't know. Now, my presumption based on the previous thing that I read was that he's some sort of internet troll. That is correct. So Chuck C. Johnson is this classic alt-right guy. He's like very fringy and like super conservative and kind of a troll and like a bomb thrower. He's not, he calls himself a reporter, but really I wouldn't call him a reporter. Is he a reporter for a very reputable website, like the Drudge Report? Oh, it's way more reputable than that. He has his own website. Well, he used to have his own website. It was called got news.com. Okay, cool.

But he started off as this wannabe journalist. Like, he really wanted to be taken seriously. He would, like, be, he was on Megan Kelly's show and stuff. He was on Fox. And he tried to set himself up as this really serious journalist. But one of the things that he decided to focus on was women who had come forward saying, they'd been harassed or assaulted, and he took it upon himself to prove that they were lying. Oh, wow.

Yeah. It was pretty gross. So, for example, there was this woman. She was a reporter. Her name was Michelle Fields, and she said she was assaulted by Corey Lewandowski, who worked for Trump. Oh, I remember that. Yeah. He, like, grabbed her really hard or something, like in front of people.

Right. Like, I think he bruised her. And so Chuck Johnson writes all these articles, which are like, Michelle Fields is a liar. I hear all the reasons I think she's a liar. She lied about this. She lied about that. She's a totally fake victim. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And then he happens to see her out on the street. Chuck Johnson? Yeah. Chuck Johnson sees her on the street with her fiancé. Oh, wow. I think there's actually video of this. Hold on just a second. I'm going to find it.

I'm going to send it to you. Great. Is it recording? That's Chuck Johnson in the red hat and the beard? Yeah. So just to describe him a little bit for the listeners. He has kind of like a baby face and like this very thick red beard. He's wearing a Make America Great Again cap.

And there's a lot of other Make America. Oh, he takes the head off. Interesting move. All right. Show you go. Do you see her? As you can see, he's like walking super fast. His cameraman is behind him. In that couple that he's like hustling up to right there, that is Michelle Fields and her fiancé.

And like, like, right as he's about to confront her, Michelle Fields' fiancé turns around and, like, blocks him. Oh boy. Hey, Jamie. Hey, Jamie, did you just say me? Hey, we got it on camera. We got it on camera, Jamie. So, like, in this video, Michelle Field's fiancé, considering some strangers just, like, come up and accosted them,

is being relatively calm. And Chuck Johnson is just, like, freaking out. Like, you assaulted me, you assaulted me. Huh. And if you actually look at the title of the video, the video is Jamie Weinstein, which is the name of her fiancé, assaults Charles C. Johnson. Like, he's not being a journalist.

He's just being a troll. He's trying to goad people into doing something that will make them look bad. But, like, the thing that he's most well known for, and this is where we're going to get back to the tweet, is do you remember a few years ago there was this article in Rolling Stone that was about an alleged and very brutal assault at a fraternity in Virginia at the University of Virginia? Yes. Right, and it turned out to have been like pieces of it were either made up or fabricated or something. So the principal character in that Rolling Stone story was this woman who went by pseudonym. They called her Jackie in the story. She said she'd been assaulted and it turned out that the account wasn't verified by the journalist

and it wasn't properly fact-checked and they ended up having to retract it. Right. Okay, yes. Chuck Johnson basically tweeted, I'm going to be. giving Jackie until later tonight to tell the truth, and then I'm going to start revealing everything about her past. Oh, yeah. And then he named a person and used their picture, and it was the wrong person. Oh, wow.

Oh, wow. Yeah. So in response, journalists are naturally doing stories about the guy who got the wrong person. And they're like, who is Chuck Johnson? Where did he come from? They're reaching out to people who knew him, like people who went to college with him. And at that point, it's like December of 2014.

Chuck Johnson posts on his Facebook page an open letter to his former college classmates that said, I've received a number of emails, tweets, and phone calls from you, and I want to make something clear, some things clear about me and you now. So he's like, hey, everybody from college, I want to say something. Yes. So further down, he says, now that I have some measure of notoriety and success, I don't owe you phone calls or responses to your condescending concern for me. Please know that most of these emails will be deleted or archived. Some will be openly mocked. others may be retweeted or written about in future things.

And so he says, some of you have talked to the press about me and pretended we were close. We were not, but you've decided to trade on relationships we never had in the hopes of seeing your name in the press. This is pathetic. Here is what you may not do. You may not accuse me of racism, sexism, blah, blah-ish,

without asking me for my point of view first. I may or may not choose to give it to you. I'm also not interested in your pop psychological explanations about what's wrong with me. The truth of the matter is that I'm the happy, I've ever been doing the work I love doing. I'm very busy on that project. What an angry, lonely sounding person. Right. So he goes on and on. And the reporter from Deadspin wrote an email to him just to say, hey, did you actually write this? I want to

confirm before I put it in the story. They have a back and forth. And then, unprompted, Chuck Johnson sent a one-line email that says, oh. And the comments about me- Deadspin reporter? Yes. Okay. It says, oh, and the comments about me shitting on the floor were made up. Whoa. And then the deadspin reporter says, sure enough, on the Facebook post.

Wait, and the deadspin reporter, just to be like in 100% crystal clear, I had not asking questions about him sitting on the floor. I was going to say, had that been reported? No. Oh, wow. And then the deadspin reporter says, sure enough, on the Facebook post, there are cryptic comments from friends and former classmates about some mysterious floor shitting incident. But are you familiar, Jason, with the concept of the Streisand effect?

Do you know what that is? I'm not sure I do. I'm a no on this, I think. What about you, PJ? I do. So many years ago, Barbara Streisand got upset about a image that was taken of her mansion. Oh, wait, I do know this. I do know this.

And tried to get it taken off the internet. And because of that, it became much more widely seen. Right. So Chuck Johnson saying, like, by the way, the floor shooting stuff's not true. that's all anyone wanted to talk about. Also, it's kind of just like the floor shitting effect. Like when someone says they pooped somewhere that they weren't supposed to, people get real curious. So, like, not even a week after this article comes out, Gawker does a follow-up article where they ask a bunch of people who went to college with him about the floor-pooping incident and they get a bunch of people talking about the rumor.

one person says quote hilariously he graduated being best known for pooping on the I think I'm remembering this right seventh floor of Stark a dorm

I'm sad this idiot's getting any attention at all but I hope this guy becomes famous for the same reasons he was in college his public pooping problems and what was there a context

yeah do we ever find out why he did it maybe it was a hilarious prank to me it almost feels like an urban legend Like, no one ever produced any evidence that he did it. But it's weird. It's not, like, it's a weird thing to just make up.

I can totally imagine being like, hey, you know that obnoxious guy who's like, who's constantly bragging and he's like blustery? Like Chuck Johnson from the writing that I have read, it doesn't seem like a particularly pleasant guy. I can imagine people saying, like, wouldn't it be funny if we said he pooped on the floor? Right. Or they even could have done that in college if he was a jerk then. Right.

But also he could have pooped on the floor. Guys, I don't know. Maybe he had the flu and he couldn't get to the bathroom and he fell down. down and he pooped on the floor. I like the idea of him falling down. But then it would have been a story about how he pooped his pants. It would have been that he pooped on the floor. Well, maybe he's starting to pull his pants down.

Yeah. Can't we get in touch with the... This is something you guys should do. Get in touch with the college. See if a complaint was filed. Yeah. Or call the people on the Facebook comments. Go to India, Alex.

Figure it out. All right. So in June of the, that article was written in December of 2014. In June of 2015, Chuck Johnson sues Gawker for $66 million. Wow. Why not $67 million? I don't know how that number was reached. Wow.

I read the- Because of this? Yeah, because of this. And did he win? It got rejected by the judge, but then there was the whole big Hulk Hogan lawsuit. So for anybody who does not know, Gawker posted. an excerpt of a sex tape of Hulk Hogan and Hulk Hogan sued and bankrupted the company. Well, what really happened was they did a post about Peter Thiel, who's like a tech billionaire

who's gay, where they said he was gay, and he hated them. And so then he would fund lawsuits of anybody, well, not anybody, but a bunch of different people that wanted to sue them. And the Holkogen one was one, but then after that, it turned out like he was bankrolling other people as well. He was. He bankrolled a number of people. So during the bankruptcy of Gawker, Chuck Johnson basically said, like, I'm going to sue you again and got a settlement from them. Really? And the article that I was reading you about whether he pooped on the floor was taken down. Whoa.

Oh, my God. But since the internet is forever, I was reading it off of the Internet Archive. And if you want it, you can find it there. Because, like, basically, whoever ended up with, like, the distressed property that was Gawker was just like, we don't want to fight this. Basically, Gawker sort of was bought at, like, this fire sale price. and there were a bunch of people who like availed themselves of this opportunity.

There's a guy named Shiva Ayatari who says that he invented email and sues everybody that says he didn't. And sues everyone that says he didn't. He got a settlement and he got an article taken down. Chuck Johnson got articles taken down. So like there are all these articles that now if I actually go to where

it was like a holiday where every person who sues newspapers got money and got their thing got the article taken down. And since this whole floor pooping story reached its end, Like Chuck Johnson was sort of a personality in the right-wing media sphere for a while. But he got kicked off a Twitter. He tried to start his own like crowdfunding site.

That didn't work out. He shut down his new site this fall. He's kind of like disappeared. Wow. There is so much to this tweet that I was thinking was just going to be an opportunity to talk about Harry Potter. So Jason, do you think that you, now that you know this, the components of this tweet, could you go back and explain it for us? Yeah, I think I could. Hold on. Let me just reopen it again. Hold on one second. Open your scroll of paper. We can cut this out. We can cut this out. Finding it. And here we go.

Okay. Yeah, I think I can answer this. Okay. So once again, this is from, please at me for access to my powerful brain, aka at Chris Caesar. huh, didn't realize Chuck C. Johnson went to Hogwarts. Just goes to show you there's a little magic in all of us. And so this tweet is essentially combining the story about Chuck C. Johnson, internet troll provocateur type person, who at one point had some sort of scandal go on in which he either did or didn't admit to shitting on the floor at his college, He says he didn't.

He sued. He settled. He made money off of it. It is a combination of that story, be it apocryphal or not, and its intersection with the recently divulged or popularized information that J.K. Rowling has been made known, which is in the wizarding world, prior to adopting muggle plumbing, wizards would shit freely wherever they wanted and then use magic. to vanish those turds. By the way, vanish those turds is the name of a heavy metal band

that I'm working with and it is pretty great. Anyway, so I think that gets to me. So this person is basically saying Chuck Seas Johnson must have gone to Hogwarts because that's the school where it's appropriate

to poop on the floor. I think we're... Yeah. Yes, yes, yes. Wow. And the slender man. I'm sorry? What?

And also the slender man? No, he's not a... involved in this one. Okay, cool. Jason, it is it's such a pleasure to have you on even though you're talking about the poop and grime that's on my sweatshirt. I just see

Alex, Alex, cutting a hole in a garbage bag. So we can wear it like a poncho and the dosa guy arrives and just throws it at Alex's head, you fucking monster. I'm like so desperate to

end this phone call right now. I'm just feeling like so, I'm feeling so abused. But either to this, you were feeling fine, right? All right, Jason. Thanks so much, man. It was a lot of fun. Thank you guys. I will talk to you soon. Jason Manzukis currently stars in the Long Dumb Road, which is a movie that is available on all streaming services, and he is the co-host of the How Did This Get Made podcast. Reply All is hosted by PJ Vote and me, Alex Goldman. We're produced by Shruthy Pinaminen, Fianna Marquetti, Anna Foley, and Jessica young. Our shows edited by Tim Howard, were mixed by Rick Kwan. Fact-checking by Michelle Harris. Our intern is Christina Ayale de Josa.

This is our last week with our outgoing intern, Heather Schurring. Thank you so much for all your help, Heather. We will miss you. Our theme song is by the Mysterious Breakmaster Our ad music is by Build Buildings. Special thanks this week to Matt Schiltz and Earwolf studios. Matt Leaver is one of those cotton candy machines where you get to dump in the like cotton candy mixture and then you turn it on and you put a stick in there and then the Cotton Kenny magically weaves out of thin air onto the stick. You can listen to our show on Spotify, iTunes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks for listening. We'll see you in two weeks.