Rooster Teeth Podcast - Black Lives Matter - #599

Episode Date: June 2, 2020

Join Gus Sorola, Gavin Free, Barbara Dunkelman, and Mariel Salcedo as they talk about the state of unrest in the United States. If you can, please donate here: George Floyd Memorial Fund: https://www.gofundme.com/f/georgefloyd Black Visions Collective: https://www.blackvisionsmn.org/ Reclaim the Block: https://www.reclaimtheblock.org/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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If he can survive the drive, also starring Stephanie Beatriz, Samoa Joe, Nev Campbell, Will Arnett, and Thomas Hayden Church, twisted metal, streaming now, only only on peacock. Hey everyone, welcome to the Rishi Podcast. I'm Gus. I'm Gavin. It's me. Hi, I'm Ariel. You guys love this like three times. I'm so sorry. Barbara, it was in perfect personality Ariel. And I'm Gus. Before we get started, I just wanted to say that we thought a long time about whether or not it was appropriate to do a podcast today. And we thought about canceling it or just doing something else. But ultimately, we didn't feel like that was in our voice. We thought that people may want to hear from us and hear our thoughts and what we have

to say, even though we're in very strange times right now. I just wanted to reinforce the notion that everyone's been seeing online that take action if you can, if you can protest, go on protest, if you can donate please donate, spread the word. We'll have some organizations in the description for this video that I'd recommend you can donate to. There's things like George Floyd Memorial Fund, Black Vision's Collective, reclaimed the block, and I just want to remind everyone before we get started that Black Lives do matter. All right, now with that, I see more of what we're talking about the current state of affairs a lot today on this podcast. I'll just one other thing I should mention. Oh, this is one of the things I should mention. Tomorrow, this is tomorrow, June

2nd, we're going to be taking part in Blackout Tuesday. We're not going to be posting any content aside from this episode of the podcast, which is going to go free for everyone. There'll be no live streams or content on our TTV tomorrow, but chat will be open. There's no new episodes of videos on the site or on YouTube, and all our social media will go dark. So we encourage everyone to take the time to educate yourself, donate, listen, learn, and definitely take action. Okay. Now that that's out of the way. Thank you, guys. Yeah, you got it. How's everyone doing? How was I was everyone's weekend, eventful? I think a thankful quarantine baby is putting it lightly. I guess I should warn everybody right now as we talk about the state of the world and

the state of things. I probably will be crying a lot today. So that'll be fun and entertaining for everyone to watch. For once it's not me. Thank goodness. You've got some good company with you there, Maryl. Yeah, it's not just me this time. Don't you worry, Barbara? It could only ever be one of us at a time. It can never be both of us. There's too much power. It's weird seeing the level of action and protests that we're seeing here. I feel like we've definitely seen protests in recent years

after different police killings or even before that. I was thinking about, or before that. Also in addition to that, things like Occupy Wall Street, but it seems like the scale of everything that's been going on over the past week has just been seemingly like order of magnitude greater than what we we seen previously. And it's it's it's strange because I've been thinking a lot about like being a little kid and reading in history books like about

civil rights marches and you know what people went through in the 60s and you know at the time reading and being a kid and thinking that, oh, if that were to happen today, I would definitely be on the right side of history. I know that I would take action and do something about it, but it's like we are living in a very similar time. It seems like this is a period of time that history books are going to be written about, right? In a couple of decades, either your kids or your friends' kids are going to ask you,

like, what were you doing in 2020 when, you know, everything was going on when all the protests were happening? You know, how were you? What were you doing to try to affect a positive change in the world? And I hope that everyone is doing something, right? Trying to at least, you know, protest or donate or get out there and try to help create some kind of change. Yeah, I've read from a lot of people who are only able to do so much, whether it's, you know, I don't know the lot of money, I can't donate much or, you know, I shared this, but there's not really much else I could do. Every little bit that you could do is something because a little bit of progress here and there ends up being a lot of progress in the end. So no matter that you could do is something because a little bit of progress here and there

ends up being a lot of progress in the end. So no matter what you could do, it's always a step forward and don't feel like because you're not financially stable enough to commit more money to something or whatever it is or if you're not in a state where you could go out and protest or in a, you know, you don't feel like it's, you don't feel like you're able to do that. Sharing information, being there for people, speaking out when you can against people who do have those beliefs and maybe racist tendencies or behaviors speaking out against those people. Yeah, I feel like education is so important. So important. Even amongst family members and friends, if you know of other people's struggles or the way

that they could change, you know, if they're sort of, you can tell they're going to end up on the wrong side of history, just like spreading the word is enough as well. Yeah, I mean, it's like you've got no donation money. Right, it's such a big goal. There's multiple ways to achieve it and multiple ways to help out, right? Like any little bit helps try to push that needle to the right side of history. It's strange, you know, with all the stuff going on.

It feels really overwhelming, right? I mean, this year has been absolutely terrible. I think I feel like the past four or five years, we keep saying thank God that year's over. And the next year just comes along and it's like what in the world? 2020 is officially hell. I know.

2020 is canceled. I was trying, earlier I was trying to write down like everything that's going on in the world that you have to deal with right now. It's like the list just, it just made me depressed to look at it. I listed off a couple of things. It's gonna wear you down mentally. And I think it's okay to acknowledge that as well.

I wish that almost like there was an adult, I could go to it's like, oh shit, I'm the adult, right? It's on me to try to do something about it, you know, with that between the pandemic, this massive unemployment everywhere, all these protests, it's just like, what, what else? You know, what next? And just, I guess, I mean, you just got to, I laid down on my floor a little, well, I laid down over there a little earlier and just, like, stared at the ceiling for like 15 minutes, trying to get my head straight and figure out how to process it all.

It's a lot. It's almost impossible. Yeah. I think just to talk about what I've been doing this weekend and what I've been going through, it has become so liberating to truly just say, fuck it. Like, this is what I think. I'm not worried about you. Unfollowing me, I'm not worried about you. Like, attacking me, this is how I feel. And I'm going to yell it. And I'm going to scream it because people have been doing that for centuries.

And no one else is listening. And I just like, I can't stand by anymore and I can't stand by and be complicit because I realized that's what's going on. You know, I was I was living in Austin whenever the Mike Brown protests were happening here and that was a super-peafsal protest. And that was and that was a super-peafel protest. And that was, my brown was killed in August of 2014, I think. That was six years ago. And people keep saying, well, like, you know, why are they're protests, why are they're looting, why is they're rioting?

Like, that won't change anything. It's like, well, kneeling hasn't changed anything. Like, marching hasn't changed anything. So, what is it that you guys want to invoke change? Because at this point nothing's worked. And I think it was Van Jones who said it. He's a news commentator, I think he's also an author, but anyway, he said, you know, hurt people holler.

And if you were hurt, you're gonna say something. You're gonna say, hey, this doesn't feel right, help me. And if people don't help you, then you might shout. You might start shouting. And then if you don't listen to you, then you might start screaming. And if they don't listen to you, then you might start breaking something

because that's how you're gonna get attention. And it's, that's what this has come to. And it's just so infuriating to watch it happen and to, I think the biggest thing I'm feeling a lot of times right now that I have to kind of fight back with is shame. In shame that I have inside anything before and that it took me this long and that it took most of us this long that we, it took us watching a video, a 10 minute video of a black man being murdered in front of our eyes to actually say, oh, hey, wait.

That doesn't seem right. Yeah. You know, and I'm so mad at myself because I'm in the same boat. I'm not doing anything extraordinary. I'm just someone who was finally like, oh shit, you know what, me sharing this nice quote, this nice inspirational quote, me, you know, silently donating once every blue moon,

once a year to a charity. That's been enough, that's enough for me. And it's just something just clicked in my head that I was just like, holy shit, like what the fuck have I been doing? I'm complicit, I'm allowing this to happen. And I can't go on allowing it to happen anymore. And so I'm going to do whatever I fucking can to do it.

And it's not enough anymore to say, oh hey, like, yes, we need to start with Black Lives Matter. But where does that conversation go? What are we doing not only within ourselves and our families, but what are we doing in our communities to echo that message and to make sure that people are listening because they've been screaming it for years and we've just been ignoring it. And I can't do it anymore. I'm not going to, I'm not going to allow myself or the people that I know and love that I know can be better to be complicit anymore because that's what it is.

If you're not talking about this, if you're not loudly yelling about this and you're, if you're not in your people's face about it, then you're complicit. And that's, that's what it is. That's the point that we're out right now. Yeah, and I'm hoping that there's other people who join you, right? That's what we need to do. It can't be just one segment of the population trying to fight for this kind of thing. It needs to be everyone needs to really step up and put forth a genuine effort, like a full-hearted effort,

not just kind of like a slak-tivism kind of approach. Like maybe we've seen in the past. By the way, I just read your shirt while you were talking right now, and I'll be sure to wrap it up. Thank you. So it's got Gavro now, which basically means bitch on in Spanish. And some dude on Twitter called me a bitch like a few minutes ago. So it's like, I'm gonna put this on. But you know, Barb's point is right. Like, yes, money matters and money talks, obviously, and you can show your support that way, but it doesn't end there. You don't have to just, like, I think a lot of,

a lot of this stuff can be performative, and that's what I don't want. I want people to do something, but then, you know, if you can donate, donate a dollar, donate five dollars, donate what you can't, but then make sure that you're having those conversations with your friends who make racist jokes every once in a while, with your friends who only have white friends. You know, I grew up in a pretty predominantly white community, and I'm Mexican.

I, both of my parents are Mexican. And I grew up, and guess, I don't know if you, I don't know if you'll feel the same way, because I know you grew up in a different part of the, of the state, but I grew up kind of like hating myself, basically, because I wasn't white. And because I had friends and people in my life who were like constantly like, oh yeah,

she's one of the good Mexicans, or she's not like that kind of Mexican, or she doesn't speak like a Mexican. And it really fucked with me, and it really made me feel like, oh yeah, she's one of the good Mexicans or she's not like that kind of Mexican or she doesn't speak like a Mexican. And it really fucked with me and it really made me feel like, oh god, like that was such a dirty word for me, Mexican. It was such a dirty word. And I hated when people called me Mexican. And I found every excuse to try, I would like ask my parents constantly, like, please just like tell me where something else. Tell me we have something else in our blood. Like, I don't like this. I don't want to be this. Like, you know, and I have so much privilege.

I'm dripping in privilege. Look at me, like, on the inside, yes, I am a lesbian. I am Mexican, but I can walk around and take both of those things off and you would never tell. I can pretty easily pass as a white woman, you know, and I have no trouble doing that. Like, I can do that. And so I just can't imagine that like, it's the way I've been feeling these past few

days and the anger that I've been feeling that has been consuming me has consumed these people for hundreds of years and we've allowed it to happen. And it's just so fucking scary. My, the town I grew up in was, like, I want to say, like 96 or 97% Mexican. So it was a very, a very different experience than what you had. But I remember when I told my little sister that she was Mexican, she cried.

Yeah. She didn't, she didn't want to acknowledge that, even though we were a majority in the town at Groot Pampwiches, really, really strange. Yeah. First of all, Merrill, I think we need to absolutely address what you've been doing this last weekend. It's been phenomenal. For those of you watching who don't, Mer'Mara has literally raised over $50,000

for various charities and groups supporting Black Lives Matter and things of that nature. And it's been so inspiring for me to see and it has made me want to speak up more and donate more and spread the word more. And I feel like you doing that has caused so many people to feel the same way, not only donating money, but just feeling more empowered and more passionate about this situation. And I think that you don't give yourself enough credit for that. So thank you for doing that. Well, thank you.

I think a lot of what I've been feeling is, you know, I get frustrated when I think of, you know, people reaching out and not to say. Like, I take it a lot of heart and I'm very appreciative, but at the same time, like, I'm not doing anything extraordinary. I'm sitting on the couch for the most part, like, my phone with my double chin, just sitting and sitting, you know, and that's all it takes, guys. I think that's the most important thing. You don't have to go out and be a revolutionary to start a revolution or to help the revolution. You don't have to go out and do crazy things.

You can have so much impact from just sitting on your couch and doing what you would normally do. What am I going to tweet about today? I don't know how I cried or a sword that I have. Fuck no, this should go on. and I need to say something about it. It's also using your platform and I that's what I feel so proud about with a lot of people who I know have been using their platform to speak up and to focus their efforts on this since it, you know, since all of this started happening.

And I also wanted to talk about how Merrill earlier, you said, like, this has happened so many times before, but now feels like I, it's hard to articulate. And I'm trying my best because with having a platform like this, you want to choose your words carefully. And I think that's what I've struggled with because I don't want to say something wrong. And I want to make sure that my intentions are very clear at what I feel like. And I feel like we at Richard Heath have done a good job promoting our support for various people, including the LGBT community.

I think we've done a really good job with that and have a lot of representation within the company. And I think that we all recognize that we don't have a lot of black representation here. And I think that that is something we all know we need to work on. And I want to make sure that we all dedicate ourselves to working on that and being aware that that is a really big problem. I don't really know where I'm going with this. I feel like I have... I just feel like it's just always been cyclical before. It will... there'll be a big event and then it just goes off the radar until the next event. And I think that's what...

it's the point. That's what needs to change is that. I think that's what the system wants, right? Like it wants to wear you down and make you weary and make you feel like you're just gonna burn yourself out. And I think the key is to sustain that voice and sustain that anger and sustain that motivation to keep moving and keep taking this action. To your point, Barbara, one of the things you were saying is like, it's strange to be on this platform

talking about this, even if you were talking about choosing your words wisely, it's like, we're not trained for this kind of thing, we started this company because we wanted to make dick jokes on the internet. And so we're normal human beings like everyone else. I think we're just trying to do the best that we can to make sure that we're doing the right thing

and to try to hopefully continue pushing that conversation forward and trying to get people to take action. I don't think we'll be able to match what Mary hoped it this weekend or is continuing to do, but we can hope to aspire to that kind of level of activity. Yeah, Mary, you inspired me a lot this weekend. And I guess it was just useful to have, to see a direction to everyone could just jump in and help with because it's so overwhelming at first where it's like, yeah, we have this voice. Where do we aim it?

It was extremely useful what you were doing. Yeah, that's a tough thing. I mean, the first few days I was really focusing on bail funds just because, I mean, I've had friends who are out protesting and have gotten arrested and they're good people and all they're doing is trying to make a difference and they're not doing anything illegal,

but they're wrongful forces being used against them. And so that's kind of where I was focusing. And then I realized when the momentum started, I was like, oh shit, like I can start directing people to maybe to some niche organizations that won't like, like obviously bail funds are gonna get a money in which they should and people should keep donating to those. But I also wanted to start thinking long term, like right.

So like if like currently bail funds are necessary but what's gonna happen, you know, in November, if like currently bail funds are necessary, but what's going to happen, you know, in November, whenever we have elections again, what's going to happen, you know, in a few years, like how can we help people heal from all of this, this trauma that we've, we've been complicit in, in inflicting. And so that's why today, yesterday we focused on the Loveland foundation. It was started by a woman named Rachel Cargill. And she is amazing. If you are someone who is just kind of starting to be like, okay, I want to actively be anti-racist.

I think that's the term that we need to move towards. Like, because people can say, oh, I'm not racist, oh, I'm not racist, but I'm not racist this, I'm not racist that. And it's not racist, but I'm not racist this, I'm not racist that. And it's not that anymore. We're not allowed to say that. It is, is I am actively anti-racist and doing whatever I can to shut down white supremacy every step of the way. And so Rachel Cargo, she's amazing, she has a lot of great resources, she's a wonderful

writer, but she has this foundation that she started, which was basically like she, I think she started in a nose, initially for her 30th birthday because she was having brunch with her friends and they were talking about therapy and like how good therapy has been for them. And she was like, oh wow, for my 30th birthday, I want to start a fund to help raise money to give therapy to black women who can't either. It can't afford it or they're insurance won't cover it or you know whatever reason. And so she started that a few years ago and it kicked off and so now ever since then

she's just had the foundation and I think she obviously allocates money. And like the thing I like about her the most is that like there's an application process. You don't have to prove your worth to her. You don't have to write an essay about why you deserve therapy and above everyone else. She's literally like, okay, like you're in the cohort now, give me your name, give me your therapist name and I'll just pay them directly, which I think is huge because a lot of people like to, you know, kind of gatekeep resources and whatnot and I think for that kind of thing for therapy, especially, it should be accessible for everyone.

So, and today's focus is Higher Heights, which is a campaign fund that focuses on helping black women get elected into office all over the US and also helps black women get the resources to vote and all sorts of different things and stuff. So, yeah, so I mean, it's been, honestly, it's been, I'm extremely inspired by this community who is like, I mean, we've already known that the majority of the Root's Chief community is fucking amazing

and that they are so giving and that, you know, they will literally like hand over our dollars, their dollars to whatever cause we ask them to and it means so much. And I was hesitant to like start doing this and I didn't even have a plan. I didn't, I wasn't like, all right, I'm gonna start a donation drive

I literally just made one tweet and then I said who's gonna match me thinking one person would do it and I'd move on and then I just kept Happening and happening and happening and I was like oh fuck like people actually care I Not only that it was pretty incredible Yeah, I went to bed last night the last tweet. I saw was one of yours I woke up this morning the first tweet. I saw was another one of yours I want to comment for anybody who's watching live right now. If you're in chat and you can sign up for a free account, by the way, your Twitter profile is pinned,

Jackie pinned it up there. So if people want to see the organizations that you're talking about, they can just look and chat and see it right there. Oh, thank you. Thanks, Jackie. Yeah, she's at Merrill Celecato, just first name, last name. But yeah, so I've honestly, like, and this shouldn't be a controversial opinion, but some may find it controversial, but I don't have time for racism. I don't have time for racist anymore.

And I've gotten to the point where like, I don't care, I don't care about upsetting people, I don't care about making people look dumb or embarrassing people, I don't care about making people look dumb or embarrassing people, I know a lot of people always say, like, oh, like if you have a platform, you shouldn't be sending your followers after people, it's like, you know, you're sending the dogs after them, but like, and I'm not trying to do that,

I'm not saying that I'm doing that, but like I think I said, like don't come for me in my mentions because like I don't have the patience for it anymore and I like, I will do my best to embarrass you. And the nice thing about it. I mean, that's part of the process is calling out racism. Absolutely. And if you're being a fucking racist in our mentions, guess what?

We're going to call you out on it. Yeah. But the nice thing to see is that there won't even like retweet someone saying something stupid to me. It'll just be in my mentions. I won't even retweet someone saying something stupid to me. It'll just be in my mentions. And then I just see the army of rooster teeth community members being like, you're wrong. This isn't a good opinion to have.

And we're going to stand by this. And if you're going to be a racist, we're going to fucking come for you. And that's just so inspiring. And I really wanted to thank the community for coming out so hard because it's making an impact and you're showing people that we care and that we're not going to do this. We're not going to stand for this anymore because this has been going on for entirely too long and we should have done it before but now that we're here, we're not turning

back. I don't know if you saw, well I think it was also over the weekend, Chrissy Tegan had a tweet that she was donating $100,000 to bail relief organization to help people, post bail, and someone had a terrible hot take in her mentions. So she quoted to you to them and said, you're right, she up her donation to $200,000. And I think that's that's that's that's funny. You know, when you use someone's hate to amplify the positivity that you're giving. Late last year, mid to late last year, I definitely had a rash of people coming after me on

social media saying that I was being too liberal. So any time someone came after me like that on social media, I would just make a donation to a Democratic presidential candidate in their name. And I would send them a screenshot of the donation. So I think it's interesting to try to, you know, not let someone's hate drag you down, but instead use it to try to power forward with a positive outcome. Yeah. power forward with a positive outcome. Yeah, and I think also, I mean, an important thing to know and is that like, we have to

be honest with our community and we have to say, and be honest with ourselves and, you know, and say like, hey, if this is who you are, like, are we going to welcome that? You know, are we going to welcome that in the chat? Are we going to welcome that on our comments? Like, what conversations are we having to make sure that we're not just like posting online and what not and doing it for the outside, but also for the inside and not just for the community, but also for the company as a whole. Like, you know, what conversations are we having to make sure that this conversation continues and that we don't just like, oh,

hey, like, that Black Lives Matter didn't, June, but it's July now, so what's going on today? You know, like we need to make sure that this conversation keeps going and that we're not just letting it fall to the wayside just because it's not super like in your face anymore. And a lot of the nice things about the donations page and a lot of the charities we've been donating to

is there is a monthly option. But I mean, then again, it's like, we don't, you don't want to just set it going and forget about it still, but it is nice to have that option. Yeah. And, you know, in a more like active, I don't have a good set way for this. If you, I was talking with a friend of mine earlier who had gone out to some of the protests yesterday here in Austin and he strongly encouraged me to watch live streams of people who are down there either like on Facebook or YouTube because I guess the media coverage you see of it doesn't really show everything that's going on

like the level of violence that's happening at the front. You know, the amount of people getting shot with rubber bullets or the amount of pepper spray being used non-stop. It's, you know, when you view it on your local news or on your read the newspaper, it's very, you know, very high level. A lot of things written in the passive voice. A lot of things written that people got hurt instead of, you know, directly assigning blame or directly attributing fault where it should go. So if there are protests happening, you know, and you should try to see them for

yourself, but if you can't go for whatever reason, definitely see, you know, look online, see if you can find a live stream of protests in your town or somewhere nearby and see, you know, what people are actually experiencing, that way you can see firsthand what these people are going through and not just have it filtered through the media perspective. Right. Yeah, I mean, it's like anything, you know, like with the protests, especially here in Austin, like, you know, I had friends who were on the ground and telling me about it and, you know, saying, like, we've been peaceful. We were, you know, we've basically been marching. And like, I think one of the big things is that they

took over 35 yesterday and hopped up on the interstate and stopped traffic. And we're standing there. And again, inconvenient, but peaceful. And a friend of mine who was downwind and watching up, she was like standing by the police headquarters and she was looking up and they deployed tear gas and rubber bullets and she said that the cool thing, not the cool thing about that, but there was all of a sudden, she saw these like six to eight people or so, like running up towards it, like literally sprinting towards the tear gas and towards the shots.

And it was medics. It was people who showed up with like high viz vests and helmets and we're literally running into it to help people. And that's just such a cool thing that you're literally like people are literally putting themselves in danger to help people because they understand like what what the impact can be. And it's just, you know, I think people always quote, who is it? Mr. Rogers, you know, look for the helpers and there's helpers everywhere. And yeah, and it's just, I mean, here's the thing, like people can't look back at MLK's, you know, pictures of his marches and his protest or the like women's march or like the march for our lives. They can't look at that and then,

and you know, make this different. Like it's people calling for a voice saying like, hey, like we don't know how else to show you so we're gonna come out and mass and shove it in your face. And if we have to stop traffic to inconvenience you so you can pay attention, then like we will do it. But like this can't go on. So yeah, it's. What's the statistic that I think people are saying lately that when he was alive, MLK

was disliked by 75% of the US population. Right. Also, they killed him. Right. It's like the kind of protest that's needed to affect change is inconvenient, right? If it was a convenient protest, then people could ignore it. It wouldn't make a difference. It wouldn't affect anyone's daily life.

It needs to be in people's face in order for them to see it and address it and do something about it in order to affect any real lasting change. Right. Also, in the comments in the chat, JC Goh says, I, I, 35 was built because of racism. I'm glad they close it off. And that's absolutely true.

Like I 35 before East Austin got gentrified, all of East Austin was a black and predominantly black and Mexican community. And now if you go down there and it looks nothing like that. And I 35 was what they used to literally block those people off. And so it's a huge like symbolism to to go up there and say hey like we're up here what are you doing you know it used to be called east avenue and that was like the delineation line in Austin it's like where everyone lived and then when they got rid of it they got rid of east avenue and then just built i35 right over it which was a terrible idea. Yeah.

I had no idea about that. Yeah, it goes all the way up to Minneapolis, doesn't it? 35? Yeah, it goes all the way to the Canadian border. Yeah. Yeah, but yeah, I don't know about it up there, but here specifically in Austin, it was built that way. I'm not sure if it's a lot of neighborhoods in Austin, like that as well.

There were some neighborhoods that were built exclusively to when they were developed, to exclude minorities from living in them. There were neighborhoods that were built exclusively for white residents of the city. And to this day, you still see a lack of people moving around. I think, you know, I-35 is still this huge barrier, although now it's being gentrified. So everyone's, every minority is getting pushed further and further east, it seems like. I was also going to mention a lot of people are bringing this up in chat as well. Another crucial factor in all this is vote, not just in the election in November, but in every

election that you have a say in, which is every election that takes place in your city. I, through all of this, have considered what it would take for me to become an American citizen, so I would have a voice as well. Obviously, the process is pretty long, so I wouldn't be able to get it done by this upcoming election, but I'm I Feel like living in this country and seeing everything going on and not having a voice in that is very infuriating and I don't want to be part of the problem of People not speaking up and not voting so I Feel like that might be a step that I would like to take I vote in every election like no matter how seemingly how minor and A lot of the and you know, a lot of,

you want to affect change locally, that's where a lot of it starts is your small local elections that most people overlook. And I think so few people vote in them that, like, I get people coming by my door trying to contribute a vote for candidates all the time. I get phone calls all the time just because they know it's they know it's just a handful of people who show up and actively do that. If you vote and you convince your neighbors to vote, if you can get your neighborhood or your area to be an area with high voter turnout, then guess what? The city is going to pay attention to you and your neighborhood. If you can just convince everyone around you to take part and go up and

and try to do that. And of course, I mean, I'm sure there's cynical takes as well about, you know, how much can you really change. But it's like, this is the system we have right now. And this is the system where we can try to affect change. So if you don't like who you see there, I mean, try to find someone who does represent your views. Let's try to change that system. I think, you know, we all know that this two-party system that we have here in the United States is really broken and that we need to have more selection. We need to have a wider spectrum. We consider the far left here in the United States would probably be like centrist, or

centrist right in Europe. It's like we really need to have a bigger spectrum of voices that can represent us because I know the vast majority of us probably don't feel represented by the selection that we do have. Do you think the country will be in a good enough state for the November election there? I feel like so many people can't vote. Or like because of COVID and confusing different states rules about mailing in your vote. It's like, how is everyone going to do it? John Oliver did a segment last night or last week tonight about mail-in voting, which I would

highly recommend people watch if they're curious about that. Luckily a lot of states do have mail-in voting and do have the capability for that. But unfortunately, quite a few states do not. Texas is, of course, trying to stop it as much as possible, with, you know, there's rampant false claims about how, you know, there can be voter fraud via mail, which is, you know, about the love the people who are fighting against that. It's utter bullshit. It's utter bullshit. Ultimately, they want to stop people from voting, right?

They want to try to suppress as many votes as they can. And I think that the voter suppression campaign that has been run in the state of Texas against non-conservatives is like textbook between the gerrymandering and convincing people with any liberal viewpoint in the state that their vote doesn't matter so that they don't even bother to go out to vote. It's like, it's like, it's a self-defeating prophecy that liberals in the state that their vote doesn't matter so that they don't even bother to go out to vote. It's like, it's a self-defeating prophecy that liberals in the

state have. I think if everyone did band together and went out and voted, we'd be shocked at the outcome. And if it was easier to vote, if we could actually manage to get people to vote, you know, I think. Yeah. I just feel like politicians are all liars, right? They lie about each other and stuff all the time, but Surely you shouldn't be allowed to lie About the foundation of your position like the president shouldn't lie about The way a president is decided How can that how is that not protected in some? I mean, Twitter obviously did that thing

were they fact checked his tweet? Yeah, and then he tried to write an executive order on it. Yeah, just like you're demolishing your entire position. You're invalidating the entire system when you say stuff like that. Out of everything that could potentially be executive action could be taken on, that was it. Like, this is, this is, this is the fucking hill he's going to put his flag on. Like, great. You know, we have what 40 million people unemployed or 25% of adults capable of working. We've got over 100,000 people dead from a pandemic. Yeah, but he needs to go play golf for exercise. I've been locked in my house for over two months.

You're just locked in a brick box. That's a zit. I sleep right here. This might be a controversial opinion, but at this point, who cares? Do you think that he wants to stop male and voting so badly because he feels like a lot of his supporters can't figure it out? No, I'm a little people send male. True.

Hold white people send male. Yeah, I'm of the opinion that they feel like, you know, they already want, right? So it's like the system that is in place, work to their advantage, changing that system and giving more people access could be detrimental to them. I think a lot of people who are unable to take time off work or have other responsibilities who would otherwise vote in a more liberal campaign would benefit. Of course, I think I've seen studies that actually

neither party benefits one way or another strongly from mail-in voting being accessible, but I think that's the opinion that they operate under, which is why they try to suppress it. But who knows? Or it could just be, he's, I don't wanna say he's insane. It could be that he's losing it, he's lost it. I don't know.

That's putting it so nicely, Gus. I'm nothing if not nice. It's true. I think another thing to notice, I mean, we're talking about local elections. And I didn't even know this was a thing until yesterday, which is kind of fucked up that the city is not telling you about it. But Austin was doing a survey on, I guess, like the Austin City budget. And they're basically asking Austin residents, and they're saying, okay, hey, like, here's our budget.

How would you change it? And I've never seen that before. It's never heard about it before. I only came to my attention because Sam Star, who works in marketing, tweeted about it. And I mean, those kinds of resources are a great way to say, hey, like, I don't like where you're sending your money. Why do the cops have millions and millions and millions of dollars? But public health is such a tiny little chunk of money here.

Like, why can't we make that more even? And I'm not saying, I'll keep what I want to say in my head, but we can do better. And we can see where our cities are being funded and what's being funded. And we can call it out if we don't like it. That's the whole point of having representation. Right? That's their jobs. Their jobs are literally to listen to us.

It's our money. It's our money. They literally, they, they, they,'s, I'm at, at the Texas. You're looking money. So you will do what I tell you to do with it. I was a little concerned though with the, the way they went about that survey. It's posted on Twitter.

So really anybody from any city or state could click on it and vote on it, correct? Well, I think you do have to give information about what district you live in. I mean, I'm not exactly sure what, like, how identifying it is. I can't remember because I was I just remember seeing that and thinking like, this is, I'm glad that they are putting this out there, but it's also, I wonder if that could be taken advantage of in a certain way. Yeah, I mean, obviously they are putting this out there, but it's also I wonder if that could be take it advantage of it in a certain way. Yeah, I mean, obviously, yeah, it could be, but yeah, it was just crazy to see how big of a chunk of budget APD has and how little like public like public parks has, how little public health has like,

well, parks don't have to buy rubber bullets. That's true. Yeah. Parks don't have to dress in Ryan gear every day. I think it was brought up a number of times on social media where people were talking about how these officers and people were decked out in all this military garb and protective clothing and whatnot.

And then you have people working in hospitals, fighting COVID-19 and fucking garbage bags. Yeah. And there's something about that that doesn't seem quite right. I think, you know, kind of jumping off of what you're saying there is, you know, you talk about people, about police and in right gear. And I think, you know, a lot of the core of the issue- That's what I meant, not military, so I'm not quite a gear. A lot of the core of the issue is, you know, seemingly, us versus them mentality, when it comes to police policing the street, you know, instead of being doing things with the community or being

a resource for the community. Instead, it's, you know, that's very much much. Like that didn't blue line mentality. And I think we, you know, we can definitely see better ways to do things a few years ago when I was in because I felt like I saw police everywhere. It seemed like every corner there were, I'm exaggerating, every other corner, pretty much, there were like two police officers standing around, just looking around and talking to each other. And then it wasn't until I was there for a while that I realized that none of the police officers I saw on the street corners were carrying guns. They were all just there, you know, just looking around. They didn't have military vests on. They had like a high v vis vest and a cap,

and they just had their walkie talkies. And that felt like that's a lot less intimidating than the set up we have here. Why can't we have that kind of thing where it's approachable and it's community-based? Yeah. Yeah, I think another thing to notice with these protests is that we had people,

two weeks ago marching on their state capitals in full riot gear, yelling at cops, getting in their faces, and what happened to them. But they are fine people according to the president. Right, they get to go home, they get to go back to their families they get to get back on on Facebook and and share memes from freedom America.org dot Eagle You know and so like

Why what's the difference like why why do they get to show up literally ready for war and And these people who are just saying hey, can you just please stop killing black people? Like that's what we want. Like let's start there. That's that's bare minimum. Let's start there. Step one. And we're refusing to do it.

But yet we let, you know, people hold up protest signs that say, let me out of my house, I want a haircut, versus, hey, here's this list of 100 black people who have been killed within the last few years by the hands of the cops. Like, it's just, it make it make sense, it doesn't make any sense. I think the ultimate issue is so deeply rooted in society and humanity of only caring about what

affects you and what affects your life. And there are so many people in this world who don't see outside their bubble and think, if this is not affecting me, I will not care about it and I'm going to continue living my life in a way that only benefits me. And I implore you to care about other people in this world, because without quality of life for everyone, there's quality of life for no one. And things like this are going to continue happening.

And if you don't show empathy and that you actually care about other people, I have no respect for you whatsoever. And I know that probably doesn't mean a lot to those people because it's hard to get through when you feel that way and think that way. But just know a world exists outside of your bubble. I don't really know. I don't really know. I don't really know.

I think that's the keyword that you use there as empathy is, you know, not only wanting good things for yourself, but wanting good things for everyone. You know, why wouldn't we want to make the world better for everybody? Maybe I watched too much Sesame Street, and Mr. Rogers' kid, I thought everyone was learning those things. You should want everyone to have a fair shot. You should want everyone to have a level playing field. And I don't know if you all saw it a few days ago, Trevor Noah

uploaded a video talking about how, you know, black people in the United States just, you know, they've we've all entered this societal contract, right? It's like we all understand that there's things that we do that society does. And it's just like this contract has been broken repeatedly for for black Americans. And it's like, what can you do? That's why people can see outrage when you see these protesters not following the social contracts. It hasn't been honored for them.

Why should they continue to honor it? When it's a system that's rigged against them, it's just inherent bias. And it just needs to stop. So hopefully we're starting to make that change, to undo that bias. Yeah, there was an activist named Tamika Mallory who is, I think she was actually

one of the heads of the woman's march a few years ago. And she has this video and it's amazing. And literally every day when I feel beaten down about this and I just feel like, oh my gosh, how are we living in this world? How are we allowing this to happen? I watched her video and I get fired up again and I'm like, all right, like fuck it.

Let's tackle racism today. And she has a really good quote that I think people like to shy away from and people like to forget that this country was built on the backs of black people that were looted from another country that our ancestors brought over to enslave. And she says, you know, don't get mad at us for looting, we learn that from you. And like, don't get mad at us for violence, we learn that from you. And so it's just this like super, super

and surviving speech. And first of all, I cannot understand how someone that angry can be so articulate because. All right, it's crazy. When I get mad, I just cry. But watching her and like the fire in her eyes and in her voice and just calling it like it is and saying it's so plainly like,

this has been going on for centuries. And if you want us to do better, you have to do better. Because we've reached the end of the line here. Like, and just the line, you looted us. Like, we learned that from you. Just fucking, it was just like, all right, well, fuck. Let's do it. You know?

And so, yeah, and so it's just, it's just, there's a lot of really, really good people out there to watch and listen to and get inspiration from. And then go out and continue to do the work yourself. Like you don't have to put on a superhero mask to do it. You can just have a conversation with one of your racist uncles or, and you know, and here's the thing, like, some people just fucking suck. They're not going to change. And that's really, it's a tough pill to swallow and it's a tough thing to deal with. But there are people who can change. And, and, and you can change. And, you know, I have plenty of racial biases that I'm still fighting through.

I have my own racial biases. I have homophobic biases that I'm still fighting through. There's parts of me that I am ashamed of that I'm having to actively work towards. But all it takes is sitting down for a second and thinking to yourself and just being like, man, what is my purpose here? What am I really doing?

Am I putting good into the world or am I just letting that happen and not saying anything about it? That's all it takes. It's just a quick conversation that you can have with yourself. Then you decide, okay, do I want to be a person who is bringing good into this world for everybody or do I want to just be complicit and complacent and make sure that my life is good but I don't really care for anyone else. And once you make that decision, then you can go from there and then you can start learning and you can start educating yourself. It also is, it's crazy to me because it really doesn't take much. And so many people are just not doing anything

or choosing to fight against what this movement is about. You know, I think you guys have commonly seen people fight back with the all lives matter quote, which I don't even think I can't address at this point without getting furious, but I will quickly talk about the analogy that probably every single person on the internet has seen so far of Here's my house. Here's your house. Our house is matter. Your house is on fire. Mine is not Which one should I go help? Well, my house matters too, right? Yes, but this one's on fucking fire. Yeah Well, my house mattered too, right? Yes, but this one's on fucking fire. Yeah. And if this one continues to burn without being helped,

it's going to burn every other house eventually as well. So shut the fuck up. You can grab a pillow water. Thank you. So people in chat are saying, I guess Trump's giving an announcement right now. I don't have, I can't find the details. I guess it's still ongoing that he's gonna.

He's gonna be sending the military to states if they don't do enough to stop the violence. I don't know what that means, but I was trying to find some more information. So on this monitor over here, in Google, I just typed Trump to see what would show up. And you know how Google tries to figure out what you're trying to ask.

And it's like people also ask. And it has questions under it. The first question is what is the lowest approval rate for any president? Of course. It's just Trump, by the way. So yeah, I don't know what specifically he said that's going on as we're taping this right now. So I don't want to talk to that because we don't have all the information yet. So I know when this goes up on YouTube, people will ask why we didn't talk about that.

It's because it's literally happening right now, this very moment. Yeah, it's a lot to process for us to address in the moment. All of this is a lot to process constantly. Yeah. I think we should wrap up here pretty soon. I think, you know, we just need to remind people what Merrill said earlier. It's like it's not enough to be to say you're not racist. You need to be anti-racist, you know, find organizations. You can donate too. If you can donate, you need to go out and protest. If you can protest and you know, just start talking to people in your circle, you know, talk to your family, talk to your friends.

If you hear something that someone shouldn't be saying, call them out on it and tell them they shouldn't be saying that. And it's gonna be a long process. These kinds of things don't happen overnight. So, just be ready to keep going. Don't lose steam. And like Merrill said, it's things you're probably already doing if you're activating on social media.

Just use your platform and use your voice to try to spread the message. Anyway, I don't think that's all I got. I don't know if you guys have anything else you want to say. Yeah. I mean, just to continue from that point, continue to show support and be vocal and do what you can to help the progression of this. And you know, it's tough seeing people get really aggressive with everything going on.

But I think that we've talked about it at the beginning of the podcast. Once you've reached a breaking point and nothing is happening, you have to just keep going. And so get angry, fight with people who need to maybe have their minds opened a little bit. And just if you see racist behavior or language or anything of that nature, call it out.

Call them out. Educate people. And I think a lot of this is because so many people in the world, especially in the United States, are not educated enough on the subject, do not have experience interacting with people who are different than them who are maybe a little more close-minded in that sense.

So continue educating people. And that is, I think, one of the biggest things you could do. Absolutely. So. All right. Well, thanks for watching, everybody. It was an unusual podcast. I felt like, you know, we had to say something, we couldn't just take silent about it.

Anyway, we'll see you guys again next week. We love you. We love you. We love you. We love you. Describe this show to a newcomer in a more familiar way. Do you like apples? All right, example.

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