Suggestible - School is a Trap

Episode Date: February 20, 2020

Suggestible things to watch, read and listen to hosted by James Clement @mrsundaymovies and Claire Tonti @clairetonti.Planet Broadcasting v Sanspants Radio Live Showdown (Tickets Available)Terminator: ResistanceMythic Quest: Raven's BanquetDefy Media Video by Mr Sunday MoviesLe Cruset Cast Iron PotsOne Pan Moroccan Chicken and CouscousThe Australian DreamNicky Winmar PhotoRelationship Advice Reddit PostForgotten Employee PostForgotten Employee Post (Update)On the Phenomenon of BS Jobs: A Work Rant by David GraeberFire Fight Australia - Concert for National Bushfire ReliefBBC's MortherlandHatJam PodcastIf you would like to suggest a thing for the podcast, please feel free to ask and follow the show on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook @suggestiblepod and join our 'Planet Broadcasting Great Mates OFFICIAL' Facebook Group. If you want. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Uber Teen Accounts. Invite your teen to join your Uber account today. Available in select locations. See app for details. You just said to me, what did you say? I can't talk. Hello, I'm Claire. This is James West.

I don't know what she's talking about, by the way. I've just entered the room and she's just launched into this. I think she's had some kind of seizure. I don't know what's going on. You said to me, because you're just playing video games, we're married, by the way, and we recommend you things, you get few hours of the day to do things you enjoy. Are you serious?

Your entire job is doing things that you enjoy for many hours. That is true. But I'm talking about something I can just play and not have to think about it or write anything down or scrub through the entire back catalogue of things and watch all the behind the scenes. I know my job is like not a real job. I'm aware of that. So what shooty-shooty gun-gun game are you playing over there?

You know what, clean out of your business. How about that? No, I want to know. I'm playing, ah, there's a new Terminator game. We've talked about it on the Weekly Planet. It's just a solid game and I don't have to talk about it. I've just played something that I don't have to talk about. Didn't you just say you talked about it on your podcast? I did, but now I don't have to talk about it. I've just played something that I don't have to talk about.

Didn't you just say you talked about it on your podcast? I did, but now I don't have to talk about it again. Now you're making me talk about it, which means it feels more like work. All right. Anyway, it's so nice to have you back for our show. Thanks for coming. It's great to be here. Thank you.

Not you, the listeners. I'm just happy to be invited back. Of which most are our mums and friends. That's true. No, we have lots of great listeners. Well, I think we should go back to our usual rule, gentlemen's first. Okay, here we go. You old boot!

Do you want to just quickly mention this is being released on the Thursday, Sandspan's doing a live show tonight. Oh, yes, it's tonight. If you want to see this dynamic live on stage, check out my pregnant belly. Pregnant. The whole Sandspans crew do go on. Nick Mason will be there.

He will. What incentive? Starts at 8.30. Halibut. There's a few tickets left. It's selling out very quick. There might be tickets on the door. There normally is.

A few little cheeky ones. You'll probably be all right. Yeah. Oh, don't bank on that. No, don't bank on that because it is selling out very quickly. I think there were 30 tickets left from my last count. That was a few days ago. Yes, and we'll be there.

It'll be fun. I may be asleep because it's a late night. It's a late night for you. For me, it's when I come alive. There'll be some drinkies. Watch me tank now that I've said that. I'll be like, oh, my God, you're going to see me on fire, and I just freeze up immediately.

Okay, all right. My first suggestion, I recently got us Apple Plus for a year because I got a new phone and you get it for a year. I wasn't going to get it. I don't think. So you're telling me that you got me a gift for free. No, I didn't get. I didn't say it was a gift.

I mean, honestly, you marry someone, you expect them to give you stuff. I got you flowers for whatever the fuck day it was last week. You did actually. They were lovely. I didn't even want them. I recommend Daily Blooms if you're in Australia because they send them to your door so James just had to pay for it on the internet.

Okay, Claire, please belittle my choice. I'm just, I'm trying out here, you know what I mean? There's so few hours in the day, I've got this Terminator game to finish. But anyway, I don't think Apple Plus is worth getting just yet. I don't think there's enough stuff on it. And also, once you go in there, you're like, oh, Parasite, and you click on it, it like, it's 14 bucks. And I'm like, what the fuck kind of

streaming service is this? Where you also have to pay for some things, but not the other. Anyway, there's a new show that came out called Mythic Quest Raven's Banquet. And you might be like, what is that? It stars and is written by some of the people behind It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Rob McElhenney, who you might know as people behind It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Rob McElhenney, who you might know as Mac from It's Always Sunny. Remember he got really fat then he got really ripped? He's that guy. He stars and is one of the creators.

Megan Gans is also one of the writers on that and she's written on a bunch of awesome stuff. Charlie Day, who's also from It's Always Sunny. And like I said, it's starring Rob. And also Charlotte and Nick Day dayo who's australian as well and basically he's in charge of this it's called an mmorpg you familiar with that what that is of course i am james what do you take me for i have no fucking idea what that is i was just i was gonna say what you could have covered it because i was gonna say hey uh let me just explain it for those who don't know i know you know mm, Claire. The MMPARG 1990 bang bang.

I'm not going to say the specifics of what each letter means. Fine. But basically it's an online role-playing game where you get a character and you're in a world and you run around and you interact with other players and there's swords and quests and microtransactions and all that kind of stuff. So it's not actually, because I watched a tiny bit of this with the guy with the fish eyes from Boardwalk Empire.

What the hell? No, that's a completely different show. You're thinking of a different show. You're thinking of that medieval show. Yeah, that's what I was thinking. No, no, no. So this is about the team, the creative team behind a video game. And so if you have any kind of interest in the video game industry,

which you don't, I'm sure, but there's a lot of things like Crunch. I was sleeping. Crunch is this thing in the video game industry where they justify making people behind games work insane hours for little pay to meet a release date. It's this thing in the industry that happens all the time and then after a crunch period they'll lay off all these employees and then rehire them back casually to avoid playing them rates and things like that.

So it's about exploiting game creators and online trolling. It's also about creativity. And it's all about also diversity in gaming, because there is not a lot of that, either in the characters that you necessarily play as or the teams behind them. So it explores all of that. And that's all fine. Like, it's a great show. It is.

But episode five in particular, it's a standalone episode. It's called A Dark and Quiet Death. And it's written by Kate McElhenney. I'm sure I'm saying that wrong, who is the sibling of Rob. And basically, it's about a husband and wife duo in the 90s, played by Jake Johnson, who you might know, and Kristen Miloti. And basically, they meet in a video game store and then they decide to create this small indie video game and it's about slowly how kind of the marketing kind of seeps into it

and it warps into this thing that they that's making a lot of money but they don't like and it's about their relationship and how it impacts on that and so if you don't like video games or any of the things that i've said, that episode alone is terrific and it's the best of the season. It's got nothing to do with the other episodes at all. There's like sort of hints towards it, but you could watch that episode five as a standalone, no other characters kind of come up in it. I'm going to do that.

That sounds awesome. Yeah, you should totally just watch it. Just watch episode five and that's all you need to watch. So it's about a married couple who start something and then hate it exactly and they're trapped in it and they can't escape that sounds familiar that's right we love this that's why i enjoyed it but it's interesting about kind of creative compromise and and it's like to to get further ahead in certain ways and we've also you've seen this with like media networks and that you kind of take on investors and you kind of grow and stuff.

And that's kind of something that we've avoided. We've looked at a lot actually. But it's something that we could have pursued and we decided not to. And maybe we will down the line. Yeah, you never know. But I at this point would rather make less money and be left alone than have somebody being like. That's your entire ethos. Yeah, it is.

Yeah. But I do think that's actually a really interesting thing to explore because we started this whole thing maybe four years ago now, but then even longer you've been doing the YouTube thing maybe even ten years, right? We've sort of seen a lot of companies come and go and networks come and go. You see like major brands fold like Colituma and they're still kind

of limping along for the moment but, yeah. And a lot of different things happen to people who run networks or run channels and the industry is changing so quickly because everyone's making things up as they go along. Even all the MCN stuff that happened. Totally, yeah. The Defy Media which if you don't know about, just Google because it's really interesting, I think, anyway.

I did a video on it. Yeah, you did on YouTube on Mr. Thunder Movies. Yeah, but we've always sort of stuck to the idea, and I think this is valuable, that if you're making something together, we're the priority at the end of the day, as in the two of us, our family, what makes our lives work well and what we enjoy. And if something is going to conflict with that, then we say no. Yeah.

Generally. I mean, obviously, you know, we still work hard and all of those things. Yeah, and you know what? Maybe down the line we will do that when we have more time. Yeah, exactly. And our kids are growing up at some point. Yeah, exactly. But at the moment.

But I think it's important if you're starting something creative at the heart of it to know. And there's also ways to do it, to retain creative control and freedom. Yeah. But there's this thing of like once you take on investors and it's other people's money, the dynamic switches and all of a sudden you're, even though they're like technically like you're in charge and whatever, they can then pull that money out

and the whole thing falls down. It happens all the time. Or if someone buys your channel, which has happened to creators on YouTube, and then like with what happened with Defy Media, they bought creators' channels and then you get paid a wage from that, from Defy, and then Defy goes bankrupt and you end up with nothing. With nothing, that's right. But, yeah, you've always said.

And also in that you lose your audience. Yeah, I guess so. Because even switching platforms or in anything, in any business, if you kind of, if you're found somewhere else, people aren't going to find you. Maybe 10% of people will kind of know that you've switched, but most people will just be like, I don't know what happened to that thing. Yeah. Who's that guy? Where did he go?

Anyway, I don't know if this is interesting to other people who don't run creative stuff. I don't think it's necessarily i think it's anything i think it's any small business yeah or just the way you run your life like sometimes taking a hit financially but for improving your quality of life or time with your kids or time with your partner or you know shortening your commute all of those kinds of things I mean it's also a luxury to be able to discuss this. Well, exactly, yeah. But I do really think it's worth it because sometimes people overstretch themselves and work crazy long hours to earn more and more money

but then end up sacrificing their physical health or their family's sort of health. Which I also understand because some people have responsibilities and, you know, you need to make a certain amount of money for whatever reason. And, you know, and you've provided people with jobs and you want to kind of keep that up. Totally. And it's every family and every person is different in where they're at. Yeah, but I do think it's something worth keeping in mind. Anyway, this is an excellent time capsule for when all this falls down in the future.

People are like, oh, my God. Exactly. They don't know what they're talking about. That exact thing they mentioned happened to them. Anyway, I do love your ethos about what gives you the most creative freedom and ability to pivot and move around. And that's why we've sort of kept PB pretty small and our creators are all pretty autonomous.

So anyway, I don't know where I'm going with this, but do you know what I mean? Yeah, absolutely. Like we've kept it small and in the pan. Anyway, watch that show that I mentioned. Move-a-ling along. Move-a-ling along. Move-a-ling along. Okay.

I think the first episode might be available for free also. What's it called again? It's called Mythic Quest colon Raven's Banquet. I love a colon. And a semi-colon. I like how they named it something that. Not a colonoscopy though. No, very good.

Nobody lacks anything up your bum. Like that name is atrocious. And apparently he did it on purpose. He's like, I wanted the longest name possible. And I respect that. Anyway, what do you got? So we talked about. Cool.

All right. Okay. Well, I've got a couple of things. A quick thing. First, cast iron pots. I know this sounds random. I've been doing a lot of cooking. I have a really cool recipe that Colleen's will link.

And I've got the link here. It's called one pan Moroccan chicken and couscous. I made it the other day. Wasn't it delish? It was excellent actually. It was really good. But the reason I'm recommending this, I have a Le Crochet cast iron pot, but you can get them anywhere.

A what? Can you say it in a normal voice? No, I can't. That's all I can say it in. So it's made in France. So it's a cast iron pot, but the reason it's so good is that it can keep food really hot. They're really good quality.

They'll last you for like 50 years. You can drop them. You can drop them and you can keep them on a lower heat setting so you can slow cook them. With them, you can also put them in the oven as well and under the grill and they'll be completely fine, which means that you can make an entire food meal in one pot. A food meal?

And then serve it on the table and it will keep it nice and hot. So anyway, I've just been using that a lot. I can't argue with that, Claire. Yeah, it's bloody awesome and that recipe is delish. When you first move out or have stuff, it's just like, what pots can I find? Yeah. And it's just nothing.

Correct. It's nice to be like, oh, my God, look at this pot. Yeah, I know. But I reckon you can find even like a cast iron. This pot is real. That's what you always say. I reckon you can find cast iron pots, though, in op shops, all kinds of places, online, on Gumtree or wherever you go to find your,

you know, secondhand stuff because they last forever. And it's just my favourite thing to use in the kitchen. It's super easy and less washing up. The dream. One pot wonders, we call them. One pot, one meal in a pot. Anyway, I love it. Okay, so that's my first random recommendation.

My second one is my serious one. This is a film I watched last night. It's called The Australian Dream. Oh, yeah. It's directed by Daniel Gordon. The writer is journalist Stan Grant, who is an Indigenous man and has a really interesting story to tell. I know Stanley Grant.

You do, yeah. He's often on the ABC, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. He is amazing. And the centre of the story is Adam Goodes who is, for people overseas, we have our sort of football, so the most popular sport, I'd say, in Australia. Think of it this way. Imagine where you're from and the football that you have.

We have a slight variation on that. We do. We do. Though it potentially has some roots in Margrook, which is an Indigenous game that was played by Indigenous Australians who were here for 65,000 years before White Settlement. Anyway, Adam Goodes, who is just one of the most incredible players in our AFL.

He plays for the Sydney Football Club. He was born in January 1980 and he has kind of become somewhat of a controversial figure in Australia, but he is incredible. He holds an elite place in AFL and VFL history because he's a dual Brownlee medalist, which is incredibly difficult to achieve. Yeah, there's a few of them. Gary Ablett Jr., a few others maybe. Yeah, correct, but, you know, a is incredibly difficult to achieve. Yeah, there's a few of them. Gary Ablett Jr., a few others maybe. Yeah, correct.

But, you know, a very small pool of players. He's a dual premiership player as well, which is amazing, which means he's won the premiership more than once. He's the four-time All-Australian member of the Indigenous Team of the Century. And in 2014, he was also given the prestigious award of Australian of the Year for his advocating or advocacy against racism and discrimination.

So he is an incredible guy and incredibly talented. The film sort of pivots around what happened to him. It was sort of, it's hard to explain really. I guess it's an exploration of racism in Australia and there was an incident that happened where Goodes was called an ape by a fan and he asked for that fan to be removed from the stadium when he was playing in a premiership. The fan turned out to be. Was it a premiership?

Actually, no, it wasn't a premiership. It was an Indigenous game. And they just added the Indigenous name. But it turned out that the fan was a 13-year-old girl and she was removed from the game and she since apologised to him and he came and did a press conference about it and talked about how he was sick of Indigenous players being treated the way they are and the kind of racist taunts that are, you know,

called out to them during matches. Since there has been Indigenous players, this has existed and it still exists. Absolutely. But the way that people, there's a lot of like, well, it's just a gentle ribbing and it's sport, isn't it? And everyone gets ripped for stuff. But, I mean, it's got very deep roots.

So this film explores his story and what happened to him after that incident. He sort of became the victim of kind of online bullying and a huge storm started to happen. He then started to get booed during football matches and then at one point he did a sort of, they called it like a war cry on the ground and during one of the matches when he kicked a goal and the crowd then booed even harder and it escalated even further. Yeah, and people were saying like, well, that's offensive.

If anything, he's offending us and whatever. Yeah, correct. Calm down. Yeah, anyway, so the film explores the story behind I guess what happened to him and also more broadly racism and Indigenous culture in Australia. Yeah. One of the things I found so powerful about this is that regardless

of what side of the fence you sit on around the Adam Goodes debate, it's so worth watching because, yes, it's from the lens of Adam Goodes, but there's also strong voices, for instance, Andrew Bolt, who is a conservative commentator. The worst man in the world. Well, anyway, he's a conservative commentator who some people do follow, and Eddie Maguire as well well who is a really senior figure in the Australian football world and he was in trouble for making a sort

of joke about Adam Goodes on radio. But he's also interviewed senior players in the football world like Nathan Buckley are also featured, Nova Paris, who's one of our really incredible Indigenous athletes. Nicky Winmar, who is famous for taking like that iconic photo. He's Indigenous as well and lifted up his shirt while the crowd was taunting him and pointed to his skin and there's this incredible photo of him. And so they look at the history. So ripped.

It looks great. Yeah, they look at the history. photo of him. And so they look at the history. They also interview Linda Burney, who is an incredible activist for Indigenous people and also a politician. And they also talk a lot to his cousin, Michael O'Loughlin, who Adam Goodes has since created a foundation with that sort of supports Indigenous football and youth and does a lot of work with youth in detention centres. So that's just incredibly powerful to listen to, all of those different voices, and Andrew Boltz as well because you kind of get to see the other side of the coin

and where people are coming from with why they were so angry at Adam Goodes, I guess. So I think it's really worth watching. And you never want to tell anyone what to think, but I think when we're exploring these themes of racism and discrimination, it's really great to really deep dive into someone's story and try and understand, you know, different perspectives.

Well, you said also that this show does a really good job of not telling you exactly what to think and even having people like Andrew Bolt who we all agree is the worst, it does offer different perspectives. Yeah. And obviously it's skewed towards him because it's a movie about him presumably. Adam Goodes.

Yeah. Absolutely. But no, it really does give a viewpoint and then you kind of have to examine Andrew Bolt's perspective against kind of the backdrop of Indigenous history in Australia. And also Adam Good's mum features in it. She was a member of the Stolen Generation, which is a really dark sort of part of Australia's history. Yes. Where children, Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families for assimilation basically.

So we've got a very, very dark history in Australia, particularly with Indigenous rights. And I don't think everyone is in any way aware of it. I don't think it's covered enough in schools. And so this documentary goes a long way to exploring a lot of that culture and history and then also celebrates us as a nation and I think is quite hopeful about where we can move forward. Anyway, it just really made me think and it's beautifully shocked.

So I would totally recommend that. It's screening on the ABC on Sunday but you can also get it from Google Play and download it from iTunes, all the places. That's right. You can actually pay money for it. Speaking of, Andrew Bolt is actually trending at the moment because he defended the pedophile who got fired for St. Kevin's and the principal recently had to resign as a result of trying to cover that up.

Basically, this sport teacher was grooming students and allegedly nothing ended up happening between them. But he's like, well, nothing happened. What's the big deal? It's like, I don't know, because grooming's illegal and you shouldn't try and have sex with kids. I don't know. I don't know.

What do you think's wrong, Andrew Bolt? Anyway, he sucks. Okay. All right. I've got the thing. Introducing Uber Teen Accounts, an Uber account for your teen with enhanced safety features. Your teen can request a ride with top-rated drivers,

and you can track every trip on the live map in the Uber app. Uber teen accounts. Invite your teen to join your Uber account today. Available in select locations. See app for details. I've got a thing that, this is kind of a rabbit hole, so just bear with me, okay? All right, okay. There's this Twitter account I follow.

It's called Relationship Texts. And basically they post. Is this a confession time? No. Basically it's people, it's from a Reddit thread and people basically post questions about relationships and all things they've been in and ask for advice and things like that, right?

There's another one that's connected to it that's called Am I the Arsehole? And they basically describe scenarios and then people just decide whether or not the thing that they're doing is reasonable or not, right? Anyway, this one's called Relations I the Asshole? And they basically describe scenarios and then people just decide whether or not the thing that they're doing is reasonable or not, right? Anyway, this was called Relationship Texts and it all spawned from this post that I saw. It said, I, 35 male, have barely worked at my job for the last four years and have been hiding the fact from my wife, 34 female, right? So that's where it starts, okay?

He apparently works this job where he does maybe 20 minutes of work a day and the rest of the time he just does nothing and she's's like a high flying lawyer, right? And she's constantly stressed and whatever. And he feels guilty about it. But it's got to the point where he's been doing it for four years and he doesn't know how to tell her. And then I kind of, I was reading the comments and then I went down this rabbit hole, which posted to this, there's this website called Something Awful. It used to be much bigger in the early 2000s. It was like the early Reddit. Reddit, Claire, because I know you're blanking out, is like a forum. I know what Reddit is. I know what Reddit is. Anyway, there's this post from a guy, which Colin will link below.

It's called The For employee and it's a basic this guy was moved to another department right and then got an email that said all the people that he worked that worked for him in his department have been moved to a separate department so this guy was essentially alone in this job being paid for this thing which he wasn't really doing so he spent years working in this position the main job being trying not to get discovered that he wasn't actually doing anything. So he was this glitch in the system that he would have a computer and he'd go to work and he'd dress up and he'd go to meetings, but he didn't actually do anything at all. The whole thing's there. It's fascinating. Maybe it's not true. Who's to say, right?

But no, it sounds like it could absolutely be true. And that though, spun off onto this. I read this article then that somebody else posted underneath that said, that's called On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs, okay? And basically it talks about how it was predicted in the 1930s that by the end of the 20th century the work week would be 15 hours long, right? And the idea is, and the article talks about, this is in Europe and

North America, and I would say probably Australia as well, because there's a lot of similarities there. People spend the majority of their lives performing tasks that they secretly believe don't need to be performed. And there's this moral and spiritual damage that comes with being in the situation that does nobody any good, including yourself. And you have no sense of purpose because you're just basically a cog in a pointless machine, right? And it's talked about how automation has led to less manufacturing jobs. But as a result of this, you need people to do things in the workforce.

So there's creations of things like financial services and telemarketing and expansion of sectors like corporate law and academia and health administration, human resources, public relations. And then off the back of that, you've got things connected to that like security and technical aspects of jobs like keeping computer servers running and, you know, IT departments. Ticking boxes, filling in spreadsheets.

And then you've got safety inspectors, et cetera, and so forth, and it goes on forever and ever, right? So I know I sound like I'm insane. But then off the back of that, because people are working these jobs, then you have to hire people like dog groomers and food delivery, which impacts the service industry as well. So it's this whole thing, right, that's spun. And I'm not saying all of these jobs are pointless. That's not what I'm saying.

But I'm saying there are industries and within those industries, there are positions that don't actually mean anything. And entire corporations that if you remove them nothing would happen the world would like continue to thrive you know what i'm saying i do know what you're saying guys he's not because of flaring he calls and look i am also believed like we are in that role like i might you could remove us and the world would still run right oh yeah that's fine but look that's the way it is the way that i've justified it to myself is we are making enough money for our family and we're doing a thing that some people sort of like

and also I'm free, my days are mostly freed up to do this thing. I know it's not the most important job in the world. It's probably one of the least important jobs in the world, but that's how I justify it. But that's also, I think, why people in their particular roles could also justify it. Because if you've got, you're doing a job that even if you think is pointless, you're still providing for yourself to survive and potentially others.

I disagree with you on that point. I disagree because I think one of the things about what we do that I've found to be like, I just, I'm so grateful for every day is that I often found myself in other jobs filling in pointless spreadsheets and pointless forms for no reason. When you work for yourself in this kind of way, and we're very lucky and very niche, I honestly, the amount of emails I've got fill up maybe now a couple of hours and then I've got mental space to do all the other things I need to do.

But everything I do generally has a purpose. Yes, but I'm talking about the overall thing in general. need to do, but everything I do generally has a purpose. Yes, but I'm talking about the overall thing in general. Yeah, and I think what we do also has a purpose because we had this discussion the other night that I think humans are designed to be making stuff and creating stuff. Yes, and that's what this posits. That's like creativity is like actually the one sole good thing that exists. And I think that's a bit much to be like, well,

if creativity is the most important. No, but I do think that. Obviously there's like heart surgery teachers and you know what I mean? No, but I don't know. But creativity comes in all different forms. Yes, of course, obviously. Yeah, I know you just want to keep saying what you were saying, but I want to say one more thing.

Just that I think if we're not using our ingenuity and our creativity in different ways to solve problems and think outside the box, then we're not using our ingenuity and our creativity in different ways to solve problems and think outside the box, then we're miserable. And if we're not kind of moving around during that time and getting our hands into things and seeing the tangible effects of what we make, we also leads to more depression and anxiety. Of course. So however, whatever your job looks like, it can be heart surgery or teaching or baking or a plumber or whatever you know creative element of it and yeah look i'm not trying i just found this really interesting i just kind of yeah exactly anyway so basically the article also posits that and again i don't agree with all of

this but i just think it's interesting that people a lot of people work 40 to 50 hours like on on paper that is their role they're nine to five and they go into the whatever and they do whatever the fuck people do right yeah but effectively within, a lot of people are also only working 15 hour jobs, which was predicted in the 1930s. But the thing it's, it's all kind of expanded through kind of milling about and things like you spend your times organizing and spreadsheets and attending motivational seminars and, and all these other things and people and experts come in to talk about whatever. It's a lot of meetings. Exactly.

And that's what I didn't end up liking about teaching at the end because I spent a lot of time sitting in meetings just being like, what the fuck am I doing here? What is the point of this? Yeah. Why is there a person who's turned up with a set of dolls and teaching me how to do a pretend scenario to my class who would not respond to this ad?

Yeah. Getting out Texas and Butcher's paper and mind mapping. And things like that. And I know that's not just teaching. That is a lot of jobs, if not most jobs. So the conclusion of this article is essentially that the ruling class, and this is their words, has figured out a way to have a happy and productive population.

You need to eliminate free time by giving people these responsibilities because then they don't have the time to think about kind of society as a whole and the kind of greater good of mankind. And you're not focusing on politicians and, this is more me now talking, but at billion-dollar organisations which are absolutely ruining the world. And the planet. Yes, and the top 1% of the wealth and et cetera. And I know I sound insane.

I know that. But I get annoyed when they talk about like on A Current Affair where they mention things like, well, the dollar bludgers are taking all the money and whatever, and it ends up being, I don't know, I'd have the numbers off the top of my head, but say a couple hundred million dollars, which is not nothing, obviously. But then you get organisations fleecing literally billions from people all day every day

and that and they own the meat this sounds insane but they own the media organizations and control all the outlets and every and like the flood like the entire flow of the economy paying minimal if not if any tax and i know they're also providing services etc and so forth but i think all of this is connected for for a reason and i think a and I, and the other thing this article talks about is a lot of the people in jobs like this, they know that it's bullshit. People are absolutely aware of it. And I know I have friends like that. I'm in multiple WhatsApp groups where people aren't doing things all day, every day, just on their phone all day, just texting. Right. Which is fine. I don't care. Good. Right. You know what I mean? We fine. I don't care. Good, right?

You know what I mean? We have friends that don't like get to work at 9 but start at 11 because they kind of mill about and they have a small conference meeting, they get a coffee and whatever, you know? And I think it also gets fed, and this is not in the article, it gets fed into schools because school is a trap. And I know that sounds ridiculous coming from a teacher. And I think a lot look, and I think

a lot of students, and I think in particular high school and not all high schools, and it depends on your teacher and your school system, whatever, but schools and mine in particular, and a lot of schools that we know, they basically breed people to live in middle management and do these nothing roles forever. And so you have kind of certain dreams and things that you want to do in school funnels you into these certain situations. And again, this is not me saying I'm better than anybody else because I'm certainly not because again, I do a job that doesn't matter, but I just think the whole system is fucked and the school and school and work should not be five hours. It should be three days work, four days off. I'll take a four, three. We've talked about this before. But I just think the whole thing is fundamentally broken at its core.

It doesn't make any sense and everybody just goes along with it and it drives me fucking insane. There, I got that. Oh, my God. Guys, this is what I've been listening to all week and he gets more and more intenso eyes. Sorry about that. Look, I know.

I know I sound insane and it's very self-indulgent. Believe me, I know. I sound ridiculous. You do make the point, though, that because I think like something you did say that I thought was really interesting as well with all of this, in professions like nursing and teaching and even, you know, medical professions or firefighting, people are on the ground, boots on the ground, having to,

you know, give service to others. They don't get paid anywhere near enough. Exactly. But their days are chockers. Like I remember teaching, I had no time to look at my phone. And your lunch times are spent planning. And like eating over a sink. Or going outside and doing a lunch duty. Yeah. Or you're on first aid duty.

Yeah, exactly. So another of my friends quit teaching and went into a different profession and she said I no longer needed the 12 weeks of holidays a year, two weeks are plenty because I just wasn't physically and mentally exhausted in the same way. And I think that that's the issue as well. Yeah, I don't think all of these jobs, the ones like you mentioned, they're not valued anymore and the money is in I think a lot of these jobs that don't even need to exist in the first place.

Yeah. There's that incentive to get promoted and now it's just kind of like, well, you're a nurse, you know, you're doing this good thing. It's to be expected. Like what do you want? You're doing a good thing. Like, you know, the nurse should be on $200,000 a year. Yeah, completely.

Look, I think the interesting part of it too is that this is an, that's our Australian culture and workplace culture. But I think in other parts of the world, for instance, in Denmark or in China, teachers, and I'm not saying anyone has the perfect system or Finland, but teachers have, I know they always talk about Finland when they talk about teaching in particular because that's my sort of area. You know, the teachers have PhDs.

They're some of the most respected members of the community and they're paid accordingly. And I think the US has this problem with teaching too where teachers have to take on second jobs. It's insane. That doesn't make any sense. Which is insane because to make a proper. As class sizes grow.

I don't listen for a minute. God, you're just bloody ranting. Good luck, colleagues, editing this down. That teachers actually used to have, and in those kind of countries in China and Denmark and lots of places around the world where they have really high capable levels of education in their community and in their student bodies because our results are failing in Australia and the same with the US. They're on the massive decline.

So that means that we're getting our kids are receiving a poorer education because we're not valuing our teachers and our teachers are not as skilled. Well, look, there's lots of teachers who are amazing. I'm not saying there aren't. But I do think that the qualifications, the difference from having a PhD and having someone teaching you science who has a PhD in science is very different to someone who's had two years out, you know, in a teaching program.

I just think it's skewed. It absolutely does. But the results, I know, look, there's also a lot of busy work happening and teachers are under enormous pressure in general. Yeah. All we're saying is the system is broken. All right, cool.

Let's finish on that note. No, can I? We're way over time because James has been ranting about society. All I can hear is George Costanza in Seinfeld going, we're living in a society, And you get the crazy eyes. Yeah. Anyway, you do have a lot of time to think about all this stuff, which is good.

Is it? Anyway, I'm going to leave you guys with something to make you feel better about the whole world and the planet. Is it a gun I can shoot myself? That's not funny. No, it isn't because we don't live in America. It's true. You can get a gun here, Claire.

Don't even worry about it. I don't know how you do it. You can't go to Kmart. Let me tell you. No, you used to be able to. Anyway, the Firefight Australia concert happened very recently. More than 75,000 people packed the stadium in Sydney and over 1 million people watched from home as the Firefight Australia

concert added an exclamation point to the devastating summer of deadly blazes that we've seen burning across Australia. So we have had an extraordinarily difficult summer for so many people for lots of reasons and this concert was hosted by Celeste Barber, who I love, who is a comedian on Instagram and raised like over $50 million for the cause and for wildlife and for families who are affected and farmers and communities. Amazing. Anyway, it is just the most incredible line-up. For the cause and for wildlife and for families who are affected and farmers and communities, amazing.

Anyway, it is just the most incredible line-up. My God. They had Queen. They had Olivia Newton-John and Johnny Farnham, one of our Australian icons. They had Tina Arena, Peaking Duck. They had Jessica Malboy. They had Illy. They had the Hilltop Hoods.

They had Ebola, Peaking Duck. They had Koshi and Mal, two out-of-touch morning show presenters who didn't know what was going on. Anyway, they had Ili. They had the Hilltop Hoods. They had Ebola Peaking Duck. They had Koshi and Mal, two out-of-touch morning show presenters who didn't know what was going on. Anyway, they had Katie Lang. All I can say. Katie Lang was amazing. She was amazing. So if you can, just go because they're talking about it as one

of the most iconic concerts in a very, very long time. It was 10 hours as well and the quality of the music, Guy Sebastian, it was just spectacular. Katie Lang in particular was incredible. She did a version of The Valley and her song The Valley and then also Hallelujah, which was absolutely beautiful, Leonard Cohen's beautiful, iconic song. So I would just go on YouTube and just put in Firefight Australia,

Katie Lang, and also You're the Voice, which is one of, it's a bit of an anthem in Australia, and they did this incredible rendition of it with John Farnham with Indigenous artists. Yeah, that was really cool. It was amazing and really inspiring and uplifting and it made you feel good about humanity. So go on, listen to James' rant, take some deep breaths, worry about his mental health, and then go and watch that on YouTube.

We're not helping anybody's anxiety. And they raised, I think they've raised so far over $7 million. So that's cool. I mean. That is cool. And there's still a lot of good causes out there if you want to donate to. There certainly are. All right.

We've really got to get out of here. We do. This is way too long. This is our longest one yet. I know because you ranted forever. I've just written here, school is a trap. It's just in my notes. School is a trap.

In all caps, by the way. I also think this is from our privileged perspective. Exactly. That's the other thing, isn't it? Because I've had all the advantages of a person could really have in this country. Like I'm, you know, I grew up in a good family and we weren't rich, but we weren't poor. You know, I went to decent schools that apparently I hate. Apparently you do.

But anyway, you can review us in-app if you want to. Or never listen to us again after this episode. Don't listen to us again. Just open it up. Like Cinema Studs did, five stars, and says the topic is you should surf. So I love listening to James and Claire. It makes me want to start a podcast with my wife. You guys are hilarious and make my hump day a little brighter.

And don't go surf. No sharks for me. There you go. Flipped it. Wow. Flipped it all around. What about you, Claire? You got some recommendations?

I do. I have one from Chris Wilshire on Twitter that says, you and Claire should give Motherland a go. There are two series from the BBC and they're so funny. Thanks, Chris. Terrific. What is it? I'll totally do that.

What are the specifics? I don't know. What is it? I'll totally do that. What are the specifics? I don't know. That's it. That's all I've had. The other one I recommend is Hat Jam, which is a brand new podcast on our Planet Broadcasting Network. And award-winning artist, Cav Temperley from the band Eskimo Joe, basically writes a song in half an hour.

Well, it's a five-hour studio thing edited to half an hour with some really amazing guests. To a very listenable slice, yeah. Yeah, correct. And it's really awesome and it's available five hour studio thing It's over but then they Edit it to half an hour To a very To a very listenable slice Yeah Yeah correct And it's really awesome And it's available now on iTunes That's right The first one guest

Is Sarah McLeod From Super Jesus Who are one of my favourite bands You might know their song Gravity I do know that song It's really good It's mostly about gravity

I recommend it Alpha Moms They navigate It's about a group of alpha moms Who navigate the challenges Of parenthood and try to balance their social and professional lives despite the frequent hang-ups and misunderstandings.

Did you say mom? Moms. That's what it says in the thing. Alpha Moms. Mom. Hey, mom. You're saying that wrong. I'm sure you're saying it wrong.

They say roofed. I can't do it. Anyway. Oh, Lord. Okay. Next week, this shit again. See you later, everyone. Goodbye.

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