The Daily Zeitgeist - President Bush Is Haunted, Gaming Increases Intelligence 05.20.22

Episode Date: May 20, 2022

In episode 1252, Miles and guest co-host Matt Lieb are joined by comedian and host of The G Word, Adam Conover to discuss… The continued disconnect between legislators and health workers, Freudian Slip of the Century, TOLD YOU SO MOM - video games INCREASE intelligence? And more! The continued disconnect between legislators and health workers Freudian Slip of the Century TOLD YOU SO MOM - video games INCREASE intelligence? LISTEN: Golden Green by Emma-Jean ThackraySee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I'm Jess Casavetto, executive producer of the hit Netflix documentary series Dancing for the Devil, the 7M TikTok cult. And I'm Clea Gray, former member of 7M Films and Shekinah Church. And we're the host of the new podcast, Forgive Me for I Have Followed. Together, we'll be diving even deeper into the unbelievable stories behind 7M Films and Shekinah Church. Listen to Forgive Me for I Have Followed on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Gianna Pradenti. And I'm Jemay Jackson-Gadsden. We're the hosts of Let's Talk Offline from LinkedIn News and iHeart Podcasts. There's a lot to figure out when you're just

starting your career. That's where we come in. Think of us as your work besties you can turn to for advice. And if we don't know the answer, we bring in people who do, like negotiation expert Maury Tahiripour. If you start thinking about negotiations as just a conversation, then I think it sort of eases us a little bit. Listen to Let's Talk Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Keri Champion, and this is season four of Naked Sports.

Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. Every great player needs a foil. I know I'll go down in history. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Clark and Reese have changed the way we consume women's sports. Listen to the making of a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Presented by Elf Beauty, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports. I'm Keri Champion, and this is Season 4 of Naked Sports. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry, Caitlin Clark versus Angel Reese. People are talking about women's basketball just because

of one single game. Clark and Reese have changed the way we consume women's basketball. And on this new season, we'll cover all things sports and culture. Listen to Naked Sports on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio apps, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Black Effect Podcast Network is sponsored by Diet Coke. Oh, hello, Internet, and welcome to Season 237, Episode 5 of the Daily Zeitgeist, a production of iHeartRadio. This is, this is, this is a podcast where we take a deep dive into America's shared consciousness.

It's Friday. It's Friday. Thank you, Satan. May 20th, 2022. It's NASCAR Day, If you're so taking that kind of thing It's also International Red Sneakers Day I don't know what that means And also National Rescue Dog Day Shout out to Rescue Dog shout out my dog Rimby Rescue Dog So good since that rescue

My name is Miles Gray aka Miles his eyes Are 2010 He can see better than miles his eyes are far too good he can see better than better than better than you okay shout out to uh who was that melisande and also calmarian on the discord because yes i got got the LASIK. Yes, my vision is 2010. Yes, I'm seeing shit on the moon. That's just how it is.

So thank you for, you know, honoring that in the form of song. And today I'm thrilled to be joined by my guest co-host. You know, one of my favorite homies to get on the mic with. You know, somebody who's a hilarious comedian, a writer, an actor.

The iconic podcast, Pod Yourself, a Gun the Sopranos podcast, is in its final season. That's right. Because it's a watch-along show. There's only so many things you can talk about. There's a finite amount. Exactly. It's the final season, the final countdown. Please welcome today's guest co-host, Matt Lieb.

Hey, don't stop. Matt Lieb. Hold onhost, Matt Lieb. Hey, don't stop, Matt Lieb. And hold on to that Matt Lieb feeling. That's a shout out to both myself and the final episode of The Sopranos, which we're going to be covering next week. Yeah, man. I'm so glad. And he died. Well, that's the question, isn't it?

It just goes black. Screen goes black. Okay. When you watched that last episode of Sopranos, what did you do? I hit my fucking TV and I called my cable provider. Yeah, I did that too. The whole world did the same thing. No way.

They hit their TV and they were like, no, fuck, fuck. And then they saw the credits come up and they're like, this is impossible. up and they're like this is this is impossible that david chase and hbo would end the greatest series of all time with a prank is the most insane thing that you can possibly think of for an ending but that's what they did and you know what god bless them god bless them for doing that because there's something about disdain for your fan base that speaks to me and my soul. You know what I mean? Right, right, right. You don't let the fans control your art.

You control your art and you let the piggies lap it up. That's what I say. And so, yeah. So good for David Chase ending the show with a prank. Let the piggies lap it up. Isn't that what Rembrandt said? That's what Rembrandt once said. Yeah.

That was what Oscar Wilde once said. Well, guess who we've got in our third seat? Who? Finally. Finally, finally, finally, this person is coming to the stage, the metaphorical stage. Somebody who I've known for a minute. And I was like, why do we need to come on Daily Zeit, guys? is coming to the stage, the metaphorical stage. Somebody who I've known for a minute, and I was like, why do we need to come on Daily Psych, guys?

Well, the planets so happen to align. And today's guest is a wonderful human being who loves to share his infinite knowledge with the people and make things, maybe the most complex things, much easier to understand. Maybe take something you like and may have straight up fucking ruined it for you. Who knows? You may know him from the show, Adam everything i know i do you may have known him from the college humor days or maybe you turned on netflix today you saw what is this

the g word with adam conover uh okay i guess that is today's guest please welcome the brilliant adam conover hello hello oh my gosh it's so wonderful being here. What an introduction, Miles. I know, man. Incredible. Straight off the dome. Straight off the dome, Adam. Straight off the dome.

What do you expect? How are you, man? I'm doing pretty good. I'm doing pretty good. The show just came out. I'm like, this podcast is a nice break from me name searching on Twitter to see what people are saying about the show, which is what I're going to be doing for the next week. Are you really searching your own name like that?

Of course I am. Of course. Who doesn't do that? There's literally, there's not a person in the world who does not name search themselves, who has even the smallest public persona. I'll tell you this. I did it when I had a YouTube channel. I used to do it, and I couldn't.

I got so in my own head reading other people's words about me i was like oh this doesn't help me at all so i actually i've i've i've like cauterized that part of my ego it's terrible to that good for you terrible and there are many there are many times that i have cut myself off from doing it and i have stopped doing it but right now the show is coming out yeah Yeah. And I'm also specifically, honestly, trying to build more on social. I'm doing TikTok. I'm on a TikTok diet. I'm making myself make TikToks every day.

Oh, God. Because I'm good. I'm good on there. My shit works on TikTok. I'm like, fuck. Now I have to invest time in TikTok because if I do, I will become measurably more famous. And so I like have to spend time on there. And so I'm just having to do it.

At some point, I'm going to have to detox. But you want to know the sickest thing I do? This is not even what I'm here to talk about. You want to know the sickest thing that I do? Yeah, you know it. Obviously. I will search. You know how people, when they want to talk about someone,

but they don't want that person or their fans to find it out, and they'll put stars in? Yeah. You're doing permutations? I name search myself with the stars in to see if people are talking shit about me when trying to not find out that I am.

And guess what, you fucking anime avatars, you furries. It's people on the deep, deep part of Twitter who are doing this. And they're not saying anything. People almost never have that strong of an opinion about me that they want to do that. But yes, I'm a true name search sicko right now.

Hopefully in a month I can take a break and stop doing it. I say keep it going, dude. Keep it going. Yeah, keep it going. We might as well. You got to know what the piggies are saying about you. That's the thing. Yeah, slop, slop.

I mean, I'm a stand-up comic. You know, a stand-up comic, you expose yourself to the audience's judgment, whether they laugh or not. So that's what got me into this in the first place. And so name searching on Twitter is the closest you get on social media to seeing if you got a laugh. I put a Google alert of myself that I've had on for years now. And there's this other Matt Lieb who's like a really good high school athlete and he gets a lot of press and i'm getting kind of tired of his ass so yeah the famous matt lieb play i think he was playing baseball i was gonna say that sounds like a baseball name yeah yeah

for sure there's no there's no matt yeah you're a baseball player number one draft pick of the nba matt lieb yeah i have that too. There's a guy, an Adam Conover in I think Iowa, who is like a champion pig raiser. He was a high school student who was winning competitions, blue ribbons for his pigs. And I followed his whole career because I would get alerts for him. And then eventually he

joined the pork board of Iowa or whatever. And now he's like a big muckety-muck in the pork raising industry. Wow. Good for that Adam Conover, I say. or whatever and now he's like uh you know a big muckety muck in the pork raising industry wow yeah good for that adam conover i say it's kind of a i really like that adam conover i gotta say i mean just the raising pigs is that he's raising them to kill them this man has killed a lot of pigs well sometimes you gotta kill the pigs man you know it says that boils down but yeah uh i mean we're gonna get to know you better, Adam.

Going to talk about the new show. We're going to obviously talk about, you know, just some things you've been looking into. But first, we got to tell the listeners what we're going to be talking about today on this Friday. First, just want to, you know, the continued disconnect between legislators and workers continues. But in this context, talking about the pandemic and everyone insisting like, well, hospitalizations are low. That's fine. Completely unaware or just ignorant of the fact what is actually happening with health care workers? What is the last two years?

What has that been like that for them? And maybe our system is already past the point of being strained. But again, we use these interesting metrics to soothe ourselves. So we'll look a little bit past that and look at the, I guess the human reality of that all. Uh, we'll also obviously got to talk about the Freudian slip of the fucking century from George Bush too.

Uh, cause my goodness. Oopsie. Yeah, seriously. I'm 75. A million dead rackets. Hey, man, war crimes are there's there's a statute of limitations if you're 75 and slip up.

OK, so that and we'll also talk about a fucking new research study that's come out that I want to just use to dunk on my mom and all my teachers that told me video games or rob my brain. OK, studies showing it actually can increase intelligence. More brain. Yeah, exactly. What that is and what that isn't. But first, we got to ask you, Adam, what's something besides your name and all the permutations using asterisks have you been searching recently?

Oh, my God. That was what I was going to use for the answer to this question was because I saw that they said, Hey, you got to be ready with a Google search. I'm like, well, I named search. And then I happened to just drop it too early and ruin my entire answer to this question. I have once again ruined myself. Here's my problem. I don't use Google.

I use DuckDuckGo and DuckDuckGo does not remember your search history. Okay, think back. Think back. Come on. This is a good thought experiment. All right. All right. Let me find.

What's the last thing you DuckDuckGo'd? I'm going to look it up directly. I'm going to find out exactly what it was. Okay. I'm working on a, the last, the literal last thing i searched for was i'm working on a new pitch a pitch for a new television show i can't talk about what that is but for the pitch document i had to write in some funny trivia team names it's a game show is the idea we're pitching a game show and there's going to be teams and they're going to pick names for themselves and

so for the pitch document i looked up i was, give me a list of funny trivia team names. And I found like a whole, just like SEO shit pile of like websites. You would not believe would have trivia team name lists, parade.com, scary mommy.com. And they're just full of shitty, real,

really terrible, offensive, racist, like trivia team names for, if you, if you have for pub trivia, you're like, I need to offensive, racist trivia team names. For pub trivia, you're like, I need to come up with a funny name, and there's all these fucking lists. That was literally the last thing that I

searched for. You were trying to get inspired? Yes, I was trying to get inspired. I was trying to rip off the work of some unfunny people for my pitch deck. I love the idea that there's people like, alright, the winner is the greedy Jews again. I don't know why you guys insist on naming your team, the greedy Jews, but they're really good at trivia.

I know it's spelled juice. The previous thing I searched for to give you one more was I was trying to find the most effective climate charity. And I was looking for websites that evaluate climate-related charities because I was looking at my charitable giving. And I was trying to figure out what climate group I wanted to donate to, and I was trying to find that. Did you find a good one? Yeah. I found some pretty good recommendations. The recommendations from a group called givinggreen.earth, which tries to use metrics to figure out which are the most effective.

Their recommendations are, let me pull them up. There's one called Evergreen Collaborative. They used to recommend Sunrise Movement, and I'm a fan of Sunrise Movement. And so I was starting to dig into their criteria. Why are they no longer recommending Sunrise Movement? Why are they now recommending these other groups? And then I was like, wait, I have actual work to do. I can research this later.

And I closed the tab. Right, right, right. And that's what I did earlier today. I like that. Are these good answers or is this extremely boring? You've learned something about me. Exactly. We learned that you, look, guys,

if you want to fuck with Adam Conover, just start doing some bullshit tweets with his name. Yes. He might search them. Write some random shit. And put all the asteris if you want to fuck with Adam Conover, just start doing some bullshit tweets with his name. Yeah. He might search. Write some random shit. And put all the asterisks you want. He will find you. He will figure it out.

Yeah. I'll try. Let's do an asterisk on the second A. Let's do an asterisk on the first A. Yeah. Right. Every single permutation. Yeah.

Nine factorial. Exactly. Man, luckily you got that legendary hairline, Adam, because they might start putting you, Adam, comb over if shit went south. Yeah. Whoa. You alright? It's creeped up a little bit, but I don't think it's going any further.

Look, I saw you in person, man. I was looking dead at your hairline the whole time. I was like, god damn it, he's still got it. Yeah, you do have magical hair. Thank you. Yeah yeah it's crazy it's my one feature as well the one thing you got going for i mean aside from all the other great things don't play uh what's something you think is overrated out of oh my god something i think is overrated the first okay it's so like cliche of me to say this,

but I used to enjoy the Marvel movies. I used to like them. And I finally saw the Spider-Man movie. And I was like, this is what, this is what people were excited about that, that Dr. Octopus from the previous movie showed up.

I enjoyed seeing Dr. Octopus, but then he had nothing to do in this movie. He's just stands around and goes, ah, I'm mad to be in a cage, and that's about it. And then, the other two Spider-Mans show up. We got two other Spider-Mans, and they just

stand around doing schtick. Like, they're just like, they're just like doing fucking a duo comedy act, and like, that's it. And they do that for like 45 minutes. They just stand around in a living room and go like, you're-man hey hey and they just do like fucking banter i clap the whole 45 minutes i clap whole time because that's spider-man from all spider-mans do you remember but you remember first spider-man it's the meme it's the meme where they point at each other point each other yeah

i mean it's like turning the turning the little bit of fan service that's fun into the whole movie like that's not a whole movie the actual the movie itself had no story whatsoever the story was peter parker is upset that his friends didn't get into the school of their choice yeah and so he went and bothered dr strange he just was like being annoying at dr strange and then caused a big tragedy in a story you want the problem to be caused by the character's fatal flaw right like whatever their character problem is and then that causes the story to start And then they have to work through that flaw in order to solve the problem. In this case, the problem was caused by Peter Parker.

Can't shut up for 30 seconds. Great. Nice little bit of comedy, but that's what caused the whole thing. There's no story. Instead. They're just like, Hey,

look, look, look, we got Andrew Garfield. Oh, wow. You got Andrew Garfield. I'm so fucking impressed.

He was self-aware. He knew that his Spider-Man was worse Spider-Man. So, it was fun because he knew. Was it? Was it fun? I mean, look, I was on like a 10-hour flight and it ate up two and a half hours

of the flight. And so, I'm not mad at it for that reason. But in your mind, you're like, what would you like to have seen? If you're directing it, you got three Spider Mans, three Spider-Mens. You have endless Spider-Mans. What would you make? Are they fighting together? I wouldn't have made that

the new Spider-Man movie. They just fucking did that into the Spider-Verse. They just did it. They just did the multiverse and other spider-mans show up and now they're doing that again and then the new doctor strange movie is again we're doing multiverse like these motherfuckers made the same movie three times what is the what is going on right like you know the marvel movies at their best what i'm impressed by is that was when they

surprise you with what they're doing like the first Taika Waititi Thor movie I'm like oh wow that felt original and fresh I still have concerns about you know the overall consolidation and like media control of like creativity that like great people are exposed to Taika Waititi not in his original work but in his you know in his use of Thor right but hey at the very least I was like oh wow this has a lot more character this is interesting compared to all the other Thor movies. Right. At least let him make a movie with his own artistic choices. Whereas I don't think they've let a single director do that since.

Well, you know what they did was Rian Johnson with The Last Jedi. Right. Oh, yeah, that was great. I enjoyed that movie. If someone else says they don't enjoy it, I have no problem with that. But at the very least, Rian Johnson was empowered to make choices in the movie. Right. And to like do some shit.

And then he made that movie and they were like, no, we don't want people to do that anymore. And they were like, everything that he said didn't happen. It all was, um, they,

uh, some people, there was a wormhole and none of that happened. And, um, uh, Rose Tico, uh,

she doesn't exist. She, uh, she was shot in the head. She doesn't exist anymore. And, and now, um, okay. And all Tico, she doesn't exist. She was shot in the head. She doesn't exist anymore. And now, okay, and all your friends, they all show up at the end, and Chewbacca's there, and everybody shows up to help at the end. Is that good?

And nobody liked that either. Well, that's the thing is that the problem is, and I've said this before, I'll say it again, don't listen to the piggies. The piggies are there to eat the slop. They are not there to judge the slop. They are there to eat the slop. They are not there to judge the slop. They're there to eat the slop. Throw the slop out. Exactly.

I'm tired of people being like, oh no, the piggies are mad. We should make the slop more to their liking. It's like, they're never all going to agree on the slop. They're pigs. They need to find their inner Will Ferrell in that dog food sketch from SNL when he's like, oh, that's right, you're a fucking dog.

Exactly. Who gives a shit? That is the best take on this I've ever heard. That is the best take on this I've ever heard. The pigs are running the slop house. The pigs are running the slop house. This is why I live by that. That's why I like the Sopranos.

David Chase, he he said fuck you piggies we're just gonna end with a prank well i think that's a bigger discussion about art right too is like you there's some artists who clearly express their artistic vision and that's what they do they said here's my work respond to it react to it how you will others are clearly making art as a response to what they see and odd how an audience is going to take that in right and that's typically not the the kind of art that is the most you know uh impactful you know usually these true expressions of artistry that wow people like everything everywhere all at once yeah there you go like that and people like wow look at that i don't think the piggies are running that slop house they just did that shit and everyone's mind was blown.

You guys see the new Matrix? Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is the perfect counterexample because the new Matrix is Lana Wachowski saying here is what the fucking movie was about and I'm going to tell you this is what I was trying to do and I'm going to have a direct conversation with you, the audience. Hey, remember you?

Remember this movie I made? Remember this movie? Like you love this movie, didn't you? I love making the movie, but Hey, guess what? We're 20 years older now, right? Things are looking a little bit different. And a lot of people misunderstood the movie, but here's what it was actually about. And here are my thoughts on it now. And I'm going to share it. And here's my thoughts on the fact that I'm making this fucking movie at all. It's kind of bullshit that I'm even making this, but you know what? here's what i believe about the world and here's what i believe about life and this is my statement and she said that so directly i've never felt a director more i've never felt more on the same page of the director where they were like here's what i'm

about and i was like i hear what you're about i see it thank you for telling me about it and you know what that movie didn't do as well as it needed to for the they gave her so much money to make that movie and it did not make the money back and thank god like yes thank god that that's what happened because that's how it should be we want messy auteurs when people you know everyone now is reevaluating the star wars prequels and saying oh the pre the george lucas prequels were better than we than what we are getting now. And the reason is George Lucas completely forgot how to make a movie when he was making those. He was like, just like he is like, how do you make a fight scene? I don't know. He just forgot.

But at the very least, it was just one weird dude and his weird ideas, you know, just like going going nuts, going like I want, you know, Jamaican parody character. And I want to like all this horrible shit. But the very least, it was unique. You you know what i mean it was lumpy it was it was an auteur going nuts and that's what we want we don't want all this you know like over focus tested shit you know right you want to be able to yeah watch a film and almost be like from the feel of it be like oh it's this director yeah absolutely you know and we and now so many times you look i'm like i don't there's so many there's such a lack of like discerning traits in a lot of like mainstream cinema that you're like i don't know that's why the room is

like another two hour long thing oh yeah is like one of the worst movies ever made and it's so wonderful to watch because you know it's coming direct from this guy's warped mind yeah and it's so wonderful to watch because, you know, it's coming direct from this guy's warped mind. Yeah. And it's like, at least it's that. It's not this, like, mass-produced, you know, thing. There's no, there's no, he's not trying to make a general audience do anything but, like, see his weird thoughts. And they're bad. And it's wonderful.

Yeah. And I think that's why I like, yeah. Demolition man. I'll always point to that. Marco Brambilla, the director of that is an artist. He's a visual artist. And that was the one film he made,

but because the studios were trying to like get butt in on everything, he's like, I'm an artist. What the fuck are you doing? This is the movie I'm trying to make. And then they're like, all right, well,

demolition man was pretty cool. You want to do another one? He's like, no, I never want to make a film with people again because i'm an artist and now he does like amazing visual like video installations that are cool fucking breathtaking like if you're ever i always talk about it if you're ever at the standard in new york if you look in the in the elevators you'll see like this animated thing of like stitched together

film clips as you go up or down the elevator they're either ascending to heaven or descending into hell that's a work of marco brambillas but it's usually done on a much larger scale like he's doing like you know 30 foot by 16 foot high like video projections that are in 3d that are absolutely ridiculous so if you ever have the chance to encounter any of his work absolutely check it out and be like, yeah, that fucking guy made Demolition Man and called it quits. So, moving on. Underrated. Adam, what's something you think is underrated? I probably should not

go on at such great length about these things because it's you know, you have a lot of show to get to and I'm ranting and raving. No, this is the show. We're talking. We're chatting. People want to hear from you. Thank God. What is underrated that I really enjoy?

It's just because I'm in the middle of watching it right now. Better Call Saul is better than Breaking Bad. Better Call Saul is a better show than Breaking Bad. Than it ever was. It's subverting Breaking Bad in a really interesting way. The characters are much more interesting. It surprises you at every turn.

They're really deep into it now. Like a tenth as many people are watching it as watch Breaking Bad. But like the whole Walter White thing, let's be honest, kind of sucked. Not that interesting. It was all the other stuff that they were doing on the show that made it special. And they're doing it all on Breaking Bad. It makes like Better Call Saul makes like the worst asshole of America. Suburban like Arizona or no,

New Mexico, excuse me, suburban New Mexico looks so interesting. And, uh, I love it. Incredible productions, design,

incredible performances. I would kill for Kim Wexler. The, yes, I'm only up to episode four. So if something bad happens to Kim Wexler, don't tell me. Okay.

And, and don't write it in a review of the Netflix show either to try and yeah don't spoil it for which I will find out do not put it in ad star m c star nover Adam Kim Wexler dies don't fucking tell me that don't say that yeah I think it was like I remember when it first came out I was all in because I like Breaking Bad right and then I was like damn this has got like we're getting some real depth now. Yeah. Behind everybody.

Like before you're like, man, look at Odenkirk. He's a hilarious scumbag. Yeah. Breaking Bad. And then you're like, fuck. Okay. Like really giving us a much darker character. Yeah.

Yeah. The best episodes are just him doing lawyer stuff. Like there's a bunch of episodes where it's just like, somebody's got a problem. And it's like, I would love to see the version of better call Saul. That's just a lawyer procedural show where it's just like a scummy defense attorney,

like gets people off and it's just law and order style. No arc, you know? Right. Because that's really entertaining to me is just seeing him like, you know, try to try to help people in a somewhat selfish way yeah enjoy it yeah good one i like that one yeah i haven't started the latest season yet but because i i get

like really impatient and i've always waited for the season to end so that i can just fly right through it because that's that's i do the same thing i because i I'm going to binge And there's nothing worse than Hitting that wall Yeah you hit that wall and you're just like What do I do with my day And then you can't find the thing to do with your day And my luck is always Now that severance is over I'm like freaking out

I need more severance In my life Whenever I binge a live show my luck is always The last episode I watch is like The day after it aired. And I fully have like one week to wait until then. I'm like, fuck. Yeah, yeah.

Wow. Why this fucking timing is like this? All right. Well, let's take a quick break. We'll be right back to talk about these news things. I'm Jess Casavetto, executive producer of the hit Netflix documentary series Dancing for the Devil, the 7M TikTok cult. And I'm Clea Gray, former member of 7M Films and Shekinah Church. And we're the host of the new podcast, Forgive Me For I Have Followed.

Together, we'll be diving even deeper into the unbelievable stories behind 7M Films and L.A.-based Shekinah Church, an alleged cult that has impacted members for over two decades. Jessica and I will delve into the hidden truths between high-control groups and interview dancers, church members, and others whose lives and careers have been impacted, just like mine. Through powerful, in-depth interviews with former members and new, chilling firsthand accounts, the series will illuminate untold and extremely necessary perspectives. Forgive Me For I Have Followed will be more than an exploration. It's a vital revelation aimed at ensuring these types of abuses never happen again.

Listen to Forgive Me For I Have Followed on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Gianna Pradente. And I'm Jemay Jackson-Gadsden. We're the hosts of Let's Talk Offline, a new podcast from LinkedIn News and iHeart Podcasts. When you're just starting out in your career, you have a lot of questions. Like, how do I speak up when I'm feeling overwhelmed? Or, can I negotiate a higher salary if this is my first real job?

Girl, yes. Each week, we answer your unfiltered work questions. Think of us as your work besties you can turn to for advice. And if we don't know the answer, we bring in experts who do, like resume specialist Morgan Saner. The only difference between the person who doesn't get the job and the person who gets the job is usually who applies. Yeah, I think a lot about that quote.

What is it like you miss 100% of the shots you never take? Yeah, rejection is scary, but it's better than you rejecting yourself. Together, we'll share what it really takes to thrive in the early years of your career without sacrificing your sanity or sleep. Listen to Let's Talk Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. But in a new, hopeful season of my podcast, I'll share what the science really shows, that we're surprisingly more united than most people think. We all know something is wrong in our culture, in our politics, and that we need to do better and that we can do better.

With the help of Stanford psychologist Jamil Zaki. It's really tragic. If cynicism were a pill, it'd be a poison. We'll see that our fellow humans, even those we disagree with, are more generous than we assume. My assumption, my feeling, my hunch is that a lot of us are actually looking for a way to disagree and still be in relationships with each other. All that on the Happiness Lab. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. along for the ride. Woo-hoo! That would be me, Devin Simone. And then there's me, Davon Rogers. And we're here to take you behind the scenes of...

Drumroll, please. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. The Challenge 40, Battle of the Eras. Yes. Each week, cast members will be joining us to spill all of the tea

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So join us every week as we break down episodes of the Challenge 40 Battle of the Eras. Listen to MTV's official challenge podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back. The continued disconnect between the people who make the laws and the humans who have to do the work continues because we constantly hear about how the pandemic actually isn't that bad anymore right now it's over dude didn't you hear chill you can take your mask off in planes you can yell at people wearing masks it's great yeah exactly do what you got to do and you know again the message is sort of like there's nothing to fear nothing's going on sure we don't know much about long covid or haven't really funded

the pandemic response to this point but it's all to to the G. Y'all just trust we. And the main thing that they point to is that, oh, you know, hospitalizations aren't going up. That's a good thing. Case numbers may be going up, but the thing we're really looking at are hospitalizations because the last thing we want to do is overload the hospitals and cripple the health care system. And we don't want to overwhelm the people that are working there. Well, even though that figure may hold in some places, we're starting to see hotspots in the US where hospitalizations are increasing. So as much as it's nice to remind ourselves of how low

things may have been at a certain point previously, I think the biggest thing that is being missed, and Ed Yong at The Atlantic, who's won a Pulitzer for his coverage on the COVID pandemic, really points to the fact is like, yeah, sure. You're talking about that. He's like, for people who are really looking at this situation, you're completely missing the point, which is the health care workers and where morale is and what that looks like, the state of the health care system. And the morale is absolutely it's catastrophically low right now. I'm just going to read from Ed Yong's piece here. Quote, even in quieter periods, healthcare workers are scrambling to catch up with backlogs of work that went unaddressed during COVID surges, or patients who sat on health problems and are now much sicker. Those patients are more

antagonistic, verbal and physical assaults are commonplace. Now, healthcare workers can also still catch COVID keeping them from their jobs while surges elsewhere in the world create supply chain issues that keep hospitals from running smoothly. All of this on top of two years of devastating COVID surges means that healthcare workers are so exhausted and burned out that those words have become euphemisms. That's the state of the people who, like, you know, remember in the beginning of the pandemic, there were countless selfie videos of stressed-out healthcare workers on the front line saying, y'all, please, this is not a fucking game.

Please take care of yourself. Miles, I went outside every single day with my pots and pans, and I banged those motherfuckers. All right. So I don't know why you're getting on my ass now because I did my part. I banged the pans. It's not the pan banging, sir. We also said as health care officials, please use social distancing.

Please wear masks. And I'm not doing all that shit. No, but I will slap my hands together at seven every night for the healthcare workers or the Lakers, depending on which is on first. Depending on what time of the year it is and if it's the postseason. Nope, never mind. So I guess I'm just slapping for the healthcare workers. And it's just a very, like, you know, many of us are doing the thing. We look at line graphs and we're like, yay, line go down.

Or like line flat. And, you know, sure, for right now. But many health care workers, they're still dealing with this two year nightmare they've experienced of constant traumatic experiences of counting or of zipping up countless body bags while screaming at the public and pleading with people. body bags while screaming at the public and pleading with people. They're saying, y'all are living your outside world life, but the in-hospital world is a completely different one. And we're trying to get you to connect to the humanity of it all. But I mean, he goes on in the article to talk about how disconnected a lot of healthcare workers feel from just the regular world, like very similar to combat veterans, where they only feel that other people in healthcare actually understand the ordeal and how difficult it's been

when they're saying like, man, it's so easy. Like, and we're actually the ones that are going through the, like a really hard time having to repeat this over and over again. Yeah, no, it's really serious, but I have a, like, i do have a little bit of a beef with how especially on social media people have the conversation about the pandemic is over no it's not right because people who are going oh the pandemic's over everything's fine right that's not true there are still really serious problems like right right but there are also people who are go who go no you're wrong the pandemic's not over how dare you go, no, you're wrong. The pandemic's not over. How dare you go outside? How dare you spend time with your friends?

Or how dare you go back to work, right? And they turn it back on individuals and they say, as individuals, you guys should be behaving differently. You should be social distancing like me. I still don't go to the park without wearing a mask, right? And I think that is the wrong thing to say, because the reality is, if you look at what public health experts, every public health expert said at the beginning of the pandemic, social distancing and, you know, staying away from other people, that was a way for us to buy time for the vaccines

and for all the other treatments that we were developing. Right. And no one thought that we could continue to, you know, social distance indefinitely. It's impossible to do. It's impossible to. It's not just like the fact that, oh, it shut the economy down. It's literally people just simply will not do it. If you look at the public, if you look at public health, you have to look at what people will agree to do. And like the public will not do it on a mass level. And so, you know, saying to people like just individually wagging your finger at people and saying you shouldn't be going to the mall anymore, you know, like you're you're you're having too much fun drinking with your friends. Right. Right. Is really, really unproductive. We should be yelling at the people who have designed our health care system, the people in power who are letting these workers down the fact that we have eviscerated you know our local public health departments which is something we talk about on my new show the g word out now on

netflix it's like most thank you i'm good with the segue we haven't mentioned the show in like 20 minutes so i have to bring it up oh yeah uh we you know we do a whole episode on what the u.s fucked up about the pandemic and the big silent thing that we fucked up that most people don't know is that we spent the last 30 years cutting the budgets of our local public health departments that could be providing support to all those healthcare workers. You know, we've been, we've broken the backs of the healthcare unions, of the nurses unions that would, you know, protect those workers and advocate for better conditions for them. All those sorts of things that, you know, Congress won't pass a COVID relief bill. Those are the issues. But we have become so focused

on individual behavior that even the folks who are reading Ed Young's articles, we are often taking the wrong lesson and yelling at everybody else about their individual behavior rather than yelling at those in power about saying, you need to fix the systemic issues that are causing this. I'll get off my podium, but that's something that no and that's absolutely correct right because the way we talk about workers in this like abstract is the story is like man shout out to the frontline workers shout out to the the heroes and things like that but meanwhile like the attitude is almost like they want these people to have like near like mythical levels of grit right where they're like shout out to you we're gonna fucking grind you down to dust yeah like yeah thank shout out to their their strength

without saying this whole this whole situation is fundamentally fucked up like you're while you while you insist on like thanking the health care workers like hold the line you're actually doing nothing that acknowledges the humanity of those people and the fact that they aren't invincible. They have limits that people are leaving the profession that veteran healthcare workers are leaving in higher numbers too because of just pandemic burnout.

And that's creating a generational knowledge gap that other people who work in healthcare, like it actually, it's wild when you don't have these veterans here, they can't pass that information on. And when they're replaced, it's usually with inexperienced people and things aren't going to run so smoothly because we'd have these, like just these, the nuances of the continuity of people having their careers is completely gone out the window in service of like, well, whatever, man, these reckless policies that we do to please the

chamber of commerce is just going to fall onto the healthcare workers, but they're okay. Shout out to their grit. Yeah. Shout out to the, to all the firefighters out there as I'm lighting matches and throwing them in a dry rush. They're like, oh,

so brave. It's like, well, hold on. He's like, look, I got a brand to deal with Zippo. I got to throw.

I got to do this. The content needs to come out. So the thing that is interesting though, I was actually going to, you know, very naturally pivot to your show, Adam, like the g word watching the first two episodes the thing that i and i told you after watching it i was like man i really like that you're humanizing what what the you know what the government is because we think about the government in this abstract and we just go

yeah nancy pelosi and mitch mccarnell but that's those are two fucking people. You know, when so many people are employed by the federal government, and the series is based on the Michael Lewis book, The Fifth Risk, Undoing of Democracy. And in it, what I think is really important is that people begin to understand that there are actual human beings doing all of this work day to day for a lot of this shit that we take for granted. And we get so caught up in this binary of like Republican or Democrat

sometimes that we also forget that like, they're just people who are going out every day doing the simplest things like checking that the meat that we eat isn't completely fucked up or knowing, you know, how to alert people to inclement weather. Yeah. I mean, like I I'm sure for you being inspired to do the show you saw that there is a need for i guess getting

people sort of in touch with sort of how this relationship works yeah absolutely i mean the whole theme of the show the whole purpose of the show is that we spend you know know, years, like two years every four years arguing about who's going to run the government. Almost none of us know anything about what the government actually does or the people that make it up. And so, like you say, health care workers, like the people who are inspecting our meat, we go to a Cargill meat processing plant and meet the folks who are there every single day checking your meat from the USDA. They're mandated to be there in the plant. They're standing there on the line and they're checking every single piece of meat that you eat to make sure that it's safe. And like, what are their lives actually like, you know, and what is

it like to do that work? You know, USDA workers like got COVID at a massive rate because the, you know, the meat inspection workers were considered essential workers because we have to make sure the food supply keeps going. But they were in a very cold environment where, you know, they're indoors. It's a perfect environment for for covid to spread. And they all got covid. And we're talking, you know, April and May of 2020, like way pre vaccine. There were like serious outbreaks. A lot of people died. Yeah. But that is like a fundamental government service that was put into place, you know, at the beginning of the last century or like 100 years ago because people were dying left and right of poison meat all across America. And, you know, the government. Shout out to Upton Sinclair.

Shout out to Upton Sinclair, my boy Upton. Incredible dude. You know, Teddy Roosevelt passed the Federal Meat Inspection Act. It mandated the USDA had to have representatives in every single meat processing facility. And they check all the meat. They have a big button they can hit that stops the line whenever they see something that's wrong. And that's like a fundamental service that government provides that like most people don't know that it's doing. And people certainly don't know that like your fellow Americans are doing that work and they are in there so that you will be safe yeah like i had no idea of the people who like volunteer to help like

keep our weather reports accurate yeah you know how we're privatizing weather reporting it's like you're just fucked up way too i mean the show is really dope because you really dive into these things and in the open like for people who don't know this is a co-production with higher ground which is the obama's production company and at first like i'm not gonna lie adam i'm like okay so what does that mean for what you talk about you know because you have the idea of a ex-president who is making content and you're like how critical is this going to be? How sober of an analysis will this actually be about the government? And there's I mean, people just people should watch the opening. Just watch the show because you kind of address that up top that there's really nothing off the table. And I was even like, what about drone strikes?

Talking drone strikes in this Obama produced a production. And we do it. We do a segment on drone strikes and this Obama produced a production. And we do it. We do a segment on drone strikes in episode four. And yeah, I mean, look, I knew. So here's how the show came about. Obama's company had optioned this Michael Lewis book, The Fifth Risk. I had read the book the previous year and I was like, this book's incredible. Like, I want to do stories about this.

I wish I could do this book as a TV show. And then like six months later, I get a phone call from my manager. Hey, President Obama optioned this book and they're looking for a comedian to adapt it. You want to go pitch what you would do? And I was like, hell yeah, I do. I went and I pitched the angle.

I want to do a comedy investigation of all the things the government does, both good and bad, introduce them to the people who make it work, talk about systemic problems. And they said, great, let's do it. Netflix said, let's do it. But I had to say to them, hey, this is going to be a conflict. If people are going to know what's going on, the audience is smart and they're

going to be worried that like, hey, is this, could this possibly be impartial when a former president's name is, you know, executive produced by Barack Obama. And so I need editorial independence on the show. This needs to be my show, not Barack Obama's show. I'm not going to be saying what he wants me to say. I'm going to be saying where my investigation takes me. And they said, yes, that's you. You have that right. You can do that. Fantastic. But now I need to communicate that to the audience. And so we wrote a whole scene at the beginning where I made that very clear. And specifically, I then looked for topics I would do that I knew people would think we would not be able to do. Right. That's that's my approach to doing television. When I was on True TV, I did episodes that were about gigantic advertisers

that people would say, hey, if advertisers are paying your salary, no way that you can you touch this on the show. And we went for those super hard. We also did entire episodes where we took apart the network's relationship with advertisers and how that affects the show and went really deep on it. And that, to me, is the best I can do. I take the approach, the cliche of your first night in prison, go punch the biggest guy in the nose. That's what I do, is I say, what is the biggest fight that I can pick that will enable me to do shit that people think I won't be able to do, and then I'm going to go to the

mattresses for it. So you chose Obama, which is, that's pretty dope. I like that. You're like, who am I going to punch the nose? Obama's drones program! Got Feats Lamanna of the TV making out here being like, you motherfucker! So yeah,

we did a segment on drone strikes and how, you know, they went up 10 times in the Obama administration. That was when that program really went nuts. And it is an incontrovertible fact that it led to the deaths of many, many, many moral hazard that it allows, you know, those in power going all the way up to the president to order strikes that they would not order otherwise because there's no risk to an American pilot because they're unmanned. Right. You wouldn't send a bomber. You wouldn't send a fighter jet because you don't want, you know, Bobby from Ohio to crash land in Syria. But you would send an unmanned drone because you don't care as much. And so as a result, we end up using those weapons a lot more often. A lot more people die and specifically a lot of civilians die. And, you know, I did not work with Obama directly on the show,

apart from his appearances. But the people who work for him, who I work with, were like, oh, are you sure you want to do that? And I was like, uh-huh, I do want to do that. And they were like, well, it's going to be pretty tough. And I was like, uh-huh, I do want to do that. And they were like, well, it's going to be pretty tough. And I was like, bring it. You know what I mean? Like, if you guys got a problem, you got to tell me. And, you know, but the thing is, everything that we talk about on the show is a completely mainstream analysis. We are using, you know, independently reported facts and figures,

you know, from like fucking people who research military technology and research civilian deaths. And so they didn't honestly have anything that they could argue with and uh you know it was made apparent to me that barack obama disagreed with our segment but they they knew they couldn't come to me and say well you can't do it right because then it would undermine the entire premise of the show they were they were smart enough to know that hey we granted this guy editorial independence so he has it and as result, we did the segment as scripted. And it's to their credit that they gave us space to do that because they knew that this show, in order to be credible, needs that space to survive. Right. Exactly. So for that reason, I hope that people, when they watch it, see that. And by the way,

we're very transparent about all of this on the show. I hope that gives when they watch it see that and by the way we're very transparent about all of this on the show I hope that gives people confidence in it you know and that's the best we can do making content under capitalism the best you can do is fight as hard as you can and be transparent about your process with your audience and try to do it with integrity and at the end the audience gets to tell you whether or not you did a good job

but at the end of the day that's how I sleep at night is by knowing I fought as hard as I could nice well I mean it comes out in the show so yeah thank you man anybody who's interested and if you've liked any of adam's past work there's there's no way you wouldn't enjoy this one oh government yeah that's the g word yeah i thought it was god i was waiting for you to get there i was like when is this gonna be about god man obama yeah i get it blah blah blah and god and god government is the other it's a little bit look the title is the g word we don't want to talk about it no one likes to talk about the

government we're going to talk about it that's the title exactly see matt's a little matt's a little slow on me it takes me a little time i like like when there's more. How many Spider-Men are in the show? Andrew Garfield's there, but he's playing me from all dimensions. And he's like, oh, are you? I'm me. Oh, okay. I'm sorry. I love that.

I'm just being a cutesy. Am I Spider-Man? Are you Spider-Man? Do you guys look at the camera and wink at me? I hope you wink at me. By the way, how funny was it? Andrew Garfield is just funny. You know what he's doing? He's doing a Ben Schwartz impression. That's what he's

doing. He's doing Ben Schwartz. I just realized that is what it is. Handsome Ben Schwartz. It is super Ben Schwartz. Tobey Maguire's trying to keep up. I don't know if he was on, if he took a Xanax or something. He's just sort of blissed out and like, hey guys, how's it going? He's it going whoa look man i've been gambling all night man yeah yeah

fucking leave me alone he's like me and leo have just been having sex with models for the last 10 years i don't know y'all do your spider man in joke i've been i've been inhaling vape smoke for seven years straight like it was a fucking scuba tank. All right. Speaking of presidents, you got to got to touch in really quick with George Bush. The two. Wow. My man that brought hundreds of thousands of lives. I mean, basically killed because the invasion killed hundreds of thousands of people.

Man, he's a goat, huh? I told death and destruction to an entire region. I mean, he knows a bad invasion when he sees one. And when he was speaking recently at his own foundation, he really just wanted to let people know he wasn't born yesterday. He sees what's going on. So let's just hear the president weigh in on what's happening around the world. In contrast, Russian elections are rigged. Political opponents are imprisoned or otherwise

eliminated from participating in the electoral process. Doesn't happen in the U.S. No. The result is an absence of checks and balances in Russia and the decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq. I mean, of Ukraine.

What? Iraq. Anyway. 75. Hundreds of thousands of fucking people died but oh god that's rough that's the that's the biggest punch line of all all the dead iraqis like oh what that's a wild i don't know i mean like what was that weird line he grumbled after he realized? I think he said Iraq 2. 75. That leads me.

Iraq 2. Anyway. Wait. Iraq 2. Anyway. Oh, he said Iraq 2. Iraq 2. Yes.

Wow. Which that leads me to believe that he's actually very self-aware that the person he was describing as like you know the decision of one man's unilaterally you know invade a country uh you know like he knows that's him that's him yeah he's very aware and it very well may haunt his dreams which makes me feel better about the about that was what i got from this My question to the panel now is, he haunted? Because in my mind, I thought he was buying aquifers up and shit, like it was nobody's business doing watercolors.

He didn't absolutely fuck up the whole part of the earth. I think that's why he does you know watercolors and right paintings and shit i think it's because he is i think he is haunted by it because if there's one thing about george w bush that i you know in all fairness remember rather than just like yes he's a war criminal yes he is legitimately the worst president of our lifetime but he also was someone who didn't seem like necessarily a sociopath but someone who seemed like he just desperately wanted to please the people around him yeah and i completely agree with that the guy she called uncle yes yeah people he grew up with who just he just wanted to impress them. You know, people literally ran all the gears of government, you know. Yeah. And I think when he was in office, he was just like, people around me are saying we got to go after Iraq.

Let's do it. Fuck. Yeah. Colin Powell's here. Here's Dick. You know, they're all saying, OK, guys, I mean, if you were in that situation situation maybe you would have said the same thing if you had been born into where he you know if you put yourself through all that right not to not to defray his responsibility at all but like yeah he's like you know sometimes when i watch him i'm like he's just kind of a sweet dumbass you know that's right that's like why people when they they're like oh he's painting now because you sort of see a little glimmer of a personality. Yeah. Now that he doesn't have power.

Yeah. Yeah. However, it doesn't change the fact that he's like a, as you say, a war criminal. Yeah. He is. Yeah. He is a war criminal and he is, you know, like for all the bad that Trump has done, it's like the Trump never did a unilateral invasion of, uh, of a country while he was president. Not that he wouldn't have loved to do it if, if there had been political

will to do it. Um, he just happened to be, you know, uh, the president at a time when people were so sick of going to war for no reason. I mean, the invasion of Russia's invasion of Ukraine is, there is practically no difference to find between the mean the invasion of russia's invasion of ukraine is there is practically no difference to find between the united states invasion of iraq apart from the fact that united states was not trying to literally like annex the country and make it a state but apart from that like you know we i guess we just didn't finish the job like we didn't make it a full colony it was like all right now we're gonna leave and you guys do whatever the fuck you all right everybody get their uh infrastructure contracts and pump their gas all right we're out of here yeah exactly but like yes it was a it's a unilateral

invasion of a country almost no international partners right a couple tony blair bring them along but apart from that you know and it didn't cause as much of an outcry as russia because we are more powerful or we're more powerful or we were more powerful at the time than Russia is now. Yeah. And that's it. That's the only white supremacy was working in favor of that, too, because it's only because the victims are looking European that suddenly they're like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, it happened to white people. Like, what are you you no proper person could you could run the tape back like 16 seconds and find some cool stuff too that you could get outraged about but that's yeah yeah but but george w bush i find his post-presidency interesting because i agree with you he seems like he seems not traumatized but just sort of like i can't i can't do it like he doesn't like he seems like a like a broken man he has this childlike demeanor where versus okay let me tell you about obama a little bit because i shot with obama right yeah and to shoot with him it's like you've got we had one hour in his schedule and he and it was in his office in dc

and it's like you know the middle floor of this anonymous office building and you know it's like we had our crew of like eight people ten people um who were who we were shooting with and it's like okay you guys are gonna his people are okay you're gonna wait here in the lobby and then at exactly like 1001 you're gonna take the elevator upstairs when you go upstairs you're gonna go down the hall you're gonna go in the room on the left and you're going to stay in there. Make no noise because he's on the floor.

Okay. Then he is going to, he is in the presidential office. He is going to walk down the hallway and Adam, you will be standing in the hallway here. You will shake hands with him when it comes and then you will enter the set

where you will shoot. And it was like, it was like his, his movements are being scripted around. Like they were like, we don't want the crew. He's doing something else in the other room and we don't want him to like,

the crew to like walk by him. You know what I mean? It's very much like to the point where like one of our PAs, this hilarious dude, evens, wonderful dude. One of our PAs accidentally was in the hallway when president Obama walked in and it was so impressed upon him that that should not happen. evens goes oh shit and runs away like makes eye contact with him and is like oh shit and runs but like so he's living his life as though he's still the president you know like he's got in addition to having secret service detail it's just his movements are so scripted right george w bush is not living this way no you know no no is just like chilling out on a porch somewhere and like

people are wandering in and out. I'm sure. In fact, do you mind talking to him when he comes into the hallway? Yeah. Just trying to get people off the street. Like, hey, did you guys know I had an institute? I have one. I'm gonna make

a library too. It's gonna be great. Okay. I have one. I'm going to make a library too. It's going to be great. Okay. That's fine. So yeah, he's like, you know, Obama literally left office and he's like, how can I continue using the power of what I am doing to do the things I want to do in the world? You know, he's like, really, he's got his communication strategy. He's got his policy strategy. He's thinking about it in such a focused way.orge w bush left office and he was like i'm

done i i'm not doing it i'll do the library but like i'm yeah i'm gone i'm taking a bath right you know it's like oh wait you're not going to direct any more movies like i only did it because my dad's michael ovitz and i don't want to do it anymore like it's like that same like where nepotism is like yeah it got me in the door i don't even really know if i want to do it anymore. It's like that same, where nepotism's like, yeah, it got me in the door. I don't even really know if I wanted to do this. That's why you don't really see me engaging with it after the fact.

Plus, I'm haunted by all the dark shit I had to do. And maybe that's my karma. I don't know. Hey, Ellen, check out my watch. Is this cool? Yeah. What a life. And yeah, does Jenna Bush still call dad?

I don't know. A friend of mine in college pointed out to me while this is during the george w bush administration but they were like at one point george w bush was like part owner of the texas rangers if you remember that and my friend was like you know george w bush is an alternate universe where he just becomes the commissioner of baseball and he would be such a good commissioner of baseball he would get to make jokes you know what i mean go to baseball games don't we all want to live in that universe like oh that'd be something he'd be good

at yeah we wouldn't be responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people right and donald trump is just a bitcoin bro yeah like i love that universe that would have been the fucking perfect one everyone should ape in ape in drink the slurp juice get your slurp juice and yeah some people pointed out maybe it's neo-nazi semi semiotics who knows i mean yeah it is let's be real let's be real i'm not dumb you know what time it is i'm trying to mainstream white supremacy all right i'll be right back uh all right let's take a quick break and we'll be right back to talk about the strength of video new podcast, Forgive Me For I Have Followed. Together, we'll be diving even deeper into the unbelievable stories behind 7M Films and LA-based Shekinah Church, an alleged cult that has impacted members for over two decades.

Jessica and I will delve into the hidden truths between high-control groups and interview dancers, church members, and others whose lives and careers have been impacted, just like mine. Through powerful, in-depth interviews with former members and new, chilling firsthand accounts, the series will illuminate untold and extremely necessary perspectives. Forgive Me For I Have Followed will be more than an exploration. It's a vital revelation aimed at ensuring these types of abuses never happen again. Listen to Forgive Me For I Have Followed on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Gianna Pradente. And I'm Jemay Jackson-Gadsden. We're the hosts of Let's Talk Offline, a new podcast from LinkedIn News and iHeart Podcasts.

When you're just starting out in your career, you have a lot of questions. Like, how do I speak up when I'm feeling overwhelmed? Or Or can I negotiate a higher salary if this is my first real job? Girl, yes. Each week we answer your unfiltered work questions. Think of us as your work besties you can turn to for advice. And if we don't know the answer, we bring in experts who do, like resume specialist Morgan Santer. The only difference between the person who doesn't get the job and the person who gets the job is usually who applies. Yeah, I think a lot about that quote. What is it like you miss 100% of the shots you never take? Yeah, rejection is scary, but it's better than you rejecting yourself.

Together, we'll share what it really takes to thrive in the early years of your career without sacrificing your sanity or sleep. Listen to Let's Talk Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Dr. Laurie Santos, host of the Happiness Lab podcast. As the U.S. elections approach, it can feel like we're angrier and more divided than ever. But in a new, hopeful season of my podcast, I'll share what the science really shows, that we're surprisingly more united than

most people think. We all know something is wrong in our culture, in our politics, and that we need to do better and that we can do better. With the help of Stanford psychologist Jamil Zaki. It's really tragic. If cynicism were a pill, it'd be a poison. we'll see that our fellow humans, even those we disagree with, are more generous than we assume. My assumption, my feeling, my hunch is that a lot of us are actually looking for a way to disagree and still be in relationships with each other. All that on the Happiness Lab. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you listen to podcasts. MTV's official challenge podcast is back for another season. That's right. The challenge is about to embark on its monumental 40th season, y'all. And we are coming along for the ride. Woohoo! That would be me, Devin Simone.

And then there's me, Davon Rogers. And we're here to take you behind the scenes of... Drumroll, please. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. The Challenge 40, Battle of the Eras. Yes. Each week, cast members will be joining us to spill all of the tea on the relentless challenges, heartbreaking eliminations, and of the tea on the relentless challenges, heartbreaking eliminations, and of course, all the juicy drama.

And let's not forget about the hookups. Anyway, regardless of what era you're rooting for at home, everyone is welcome here on MTV's official challenge podcast. So join us every week as we break down episodes of the Challenge 40 Battle of the Eras. Listen to MTV's official Challenge podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back. Video games have been very important for me throughout my life. Adam, I know they're a huge part for you.

Matt, were you a big child of the game i i played video games um when i i played pc games when i was in high school and college uh and now i play uh ps ps4 there you go so i love i love video games i love them they're great adam i play everything man i play all the time. I'm still working through Elden Ring, which is enormously long. But yeah, I mean, I follow video games more closely than I follow anything else I listen to. Probably spend more time listening to podcasts about video games than I do playing them. But, you know, I've started collecting retro video games. I got a fucking CRT monitor in here.

So I play old race theory monitor. Okay. I didn't know they made the critical race theory monitors. You turn it on and it's like whiteness is false. Whiteness does not exist.

It doesn't display white at all. Shades of gray. So I don't know if I definitely heard this growing up in the you know being a growing being born in the 80s and in the early 90s i've always from my mom and like grandparents i'm like don't look at the tv it's gonna rot your brain you're playing video games all the time it's gonna rot your brain why are you playing super nintendo why are you playing mario paint i'm like because this shit is dope okay and it came with a mouse that i plug into my super nintendo fuck with me mario paint's incredible but oh yeah i mean mario taught me typing thank you do you guys ever at school do mario teaches typing i had that on my on my mac when

i in like 1993. Yeah. Yeah, man. Okay. Not an official Nintendo release, so I kind of object to it, but yeah. Okay, gotcha. It's not canon.

Yeah. Bunk licensing deal. But yeah, I think we've, for a while, I think that was like sort of like the accepted thing that parents would get

really sort of nervous about. Right. Too much video games is actually bad for you. Yeah. Well, guess what? The Karolinska Institutet in Sweden has conducted a pretty lengthy study on thousands of kids in the U.S. to see how playing video games affected their intelligence.

In this case, it's their general cognitive abilities, not like their vocabulary expand or whatever, just testing their general cognitive abilities. did their vocabulary expand or whatever, just testing their general cognitive abilities. So they looked at 9,000 kids around age nine and 10 and had them do a battery of tests just to sort of set a baseline. Then they followed up with about 5,000 of these kids about two years later to run the tests again and to see if there were any differences that they could find. And here's something they found, quote, on average, the children spent two and a half hours a day watching TV, half an hour on social media and one hour playing video games. And here's something they found. positive or negative of TV watching or social media. So they said, okay, that maybe that tracks me because TV, social media seems pretty passive. Now, not to say who knows the toll that takes on

someone's emotional wellbeing, because they do say, look, we were, we were not checking for the effects of things like on things like physical activity, sleep, wellbeing, or school performance, very narrowly on their cognitive ability. But the results seem to be in line or are in line with other studies that claim that screen time doesn't impair children's cognitive abilities. And in fact, gaming can help it boost those things. Yeah.

I have a theory about this study. Yes. But first of all, it comports with my own experience. Because one thing that I read years and years ago is that the main thing video games help you do is that they teach you how to navigate human designed software systems, right?

So when you play a video game, right? If you're used to playing a video game, you don't generally need to read an instruction manual, right? You can turn the game on if you've played them a lot and you're like, okay, what are the verbs that the game designer gave me? How can I use them? And then, you know,

you're in a level and you're like, the game seems like it wants me to go this way, right? Like you start to understand this is a whole playground that someone has created for my benefit. Here's the goal. And so I can poke around and figure out how I'm supposed to achieve the goal, right? Oh, there's two paths. One of them probably leads to a treasure chest. The other one probably takes me towards the final boss. And that's the critical path. You need to understand things like that. Right. And so the theory that I read years ago was that taught myself video editing on Final Cut Pro. And I was in a college sketch group and I became the post-production guy, you know, who did all the video editing. And I just taught myself video editing by like, all right, let me pop open the Final Cut and like start rooting around those menus. What does this menu do?

What does that control panel do? Like I'm not scared of it. I don't need someone to teach me how to do it. I can just sort of figure it out. I read the manual too. I'm not scared of it. I don't need someone to teach me how to do it. I can just sort of figure it out.

I read the manual too, but you know, so it, it gives you that sort of fluency and that's something that like comes in really handy in America nowadays. And especially, I bet that helps you do better on an IQ test. Now IQ tests are bullshit. I did a whole segment about them on Adam ruins everything. They don't measure, you know, any sort of like, you shouldn't take them as an objective measure of intelligence they're they're measuring how well you do on that particular test but they're not measuring like anything inherent about you however i have taken one recently and it's a whole lot of like how quickly can you fit the you know can you like what are they called tangrams or tessellations or something where you fit like the little polygon pieces like into a

square yeah stuff like that how well can you remember numbers backwards things like that and like if you've played a lot of video games it's very video gamey stuff you're like oh okay this is what it's trying to get me to do this is the challenging part i can if i focus on this i should be able to you know do better on it oh i really enjoyed doing the iq test for the same reason i like playing video games. And so I feel like this is, I feel like it's not making you more intelligent, but I bet it does make you, if you play a lot of video games, I bet you do better on an IQ test. I think it's more like in line with playing an instrument, right?

That you grow up playing an instrument, you're in, you're gonna, you're just developing different skills than if you weren't. Like music, there's timing, your hand hand eye coordination to read music, to know music theory and like the relationships between notes and things like that help a lot. And I even just even subtly, right. I just noticed for me, like I, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm also Japanese. So growing up in the, in the U S the, my, or my Japanese education mostly came from my mom speaking to me and mostly only speaking to me in Japanese to build my ability to speak two languages. Reading was a little bit different because when I turn the TV on, it's always English. And like I would I would have to seek out Japanese material to begin reading.

When Game Boy came around, they were like and I was playing Japanese Game Boy games. So, you know, because back in those those days, like there was no spoken audio dialogue that played out of the TV. It was all text you had to read and hit A to continue the fucking dialogue. And that very quickly got me to begin reading Japanese at a much quicker pace than I did if I was using a book or whatever. Because I was so inherently, rather than being like, I don't know what this says or whatever. I was like, fuck it through the repetition of trying to read this over and over. It gave me those skills. So there's these little things that you do pick up. Now, I don't know if that's necessarily the secret to the, you know, having a, you know, having super brain, but it, like I, like we're all saying, like we can all connect these little dots to little things that

we picked up or skills we picked up. I'm so jealous of you for having that childhood experience with Japanese because I mean, obviously I grew up like so many American kids did with Japanese imported culture being, you know, just like video games were like the entry point. And then also, you know,

anime and everything else. But like, God, do I've had the ability to play japanese video games growing up like oh it also made me an insufferable prick because i was like y'all are late to pokemon y'all are late to power rangers y'all are late to this and i'm like i'm on to the next shit y'all are late to hentai y'all are late y'all are late to yeah so many so many watching women have sex with octopuses exactly oh also y'all are late for old enough too that shit is old as fuck yeah see them kids do

them chores decades ago kids are fucking 40 now fuck out of here but yeah it it is a it is like an interesting thing that video games also were like like a motivating force for me because because my mom insisted or my parents are like you gotta focus on studying i'm like i'm doing fine in school if i can do fine in school let me play video games and that's all i want like my you know my parents weren't would never buy me video games like and they were only they only came around every report card. If I did, if I had straight A's,

then they're like, fuck it. Fine. You could have one game. You could rent, you could go rent a game. And that sort of feedback loop was sort of my way of being like, Oh,

I'm getting this fucking game. The diehard trilogy just came out on PlayStation. Watch me Merck my fucking tests. And so, you know, there was a bit of a, wait, that's a game you wanted to play?

Die Hard? I've never even heard of that. It was so bad. Oh, man. It was like a three-part game. It was like a multi-genre game where the first level is like a shooter. And then I think the first two levels are like shooter games, like sort of like Area 51 style shooters.

Oh, yeah. And then the Die Hard with a vengeance a vengeance like node within the trilogy game was like a crazy taxi kind of thing where you were like driving around new york exactly and like like the worst sam jackson voice act like actor is like you know saying all kinds of wild shit but i remember at the time i loved die hard with a vengeance so i was like sure i need this game meet this game yeah and it was terrible that's how I know who Chester A. Arthur was and what president. He's 21st president of the United States. Learned that from Die Hard movies.

Let me offer a cautionary tale for any parents or future parents out there who are like, video games are bad. TV is bad. It's all going to rot my kid's brain. My parents took out our TVs when I was in fifth grade because my brother started getting bad grades and my grades also and my sister's grades were starting to suffer a little bit. We had no TV from fifth grade until 11th grade, until 9-11. 9-11 was the day we got our TVs back because 9-11 had happened and my parents wanted to watch it. So sad day for America.

Good day for the Leib family. But I in that intervening time, I didn't get to play video games. I didn't get to watch. I had to go to other friends houses to like fucking watch, you know, TV and shit. I came to everything late. it. I came to everything late. And I will say what instead happened is I just discovered drugs and started in like sixth grade, I started smoking weed. You know, I started doing harder stuff a little bit later. Great. After the TV was gone, TV was gone. And I was like, well, so what do I what's left to do? And I was like, I'll just hang out with friends.

And a lot of times those friends had weed. So we started smoking it. And I'm just saying, I think that more harm was done to me by not having TV and video games in my life than when we actually, you know, yeah. So I'm just saying. Sure. The TV made me, I think, you know, not as dumb as the drugs made me. So keep that in mind, everybody. I mean, look, also look, you knew who the 21st president was not because of school, but because of that actor who played

that trucker in die hard with a vengeance. That's right. I know who Justin A. Arthur is cause of TV keep the TV's in. What about the little jug challenge that simon had him do in central park with the filling up the water jugs i was even i was playing along with them being like how do they get that and i learned i learned all sorts of shit can we also say the most popular games for kids right now right let's go through what they are. Minecraft. Incredibly wholesome. Biggest video game of all time, Minecraft. Incredibly wholesome.

It's fucking Legos. It's like the best thing ever. And you play it with your friends. You build a world together. It's unbelievable. Minecraft. Fortnite. Another game about building, full of secrets, right?

Fortnite has so many secrets basically designed for you to talk about with your friends. kids play it with each other it's a social game right and then among us was another huge game with kids intense intensely social right and it's learning how to like figure out which one's the alien which is something i think we all need to be able to do yeah you need to find the liars in your life exactly you and it teaches you how to do that like all of the liars in your life. Exactly. And it teaches you how to do that. All of the liars and snatchers. Right, exactly. So when I get a fundraising text from Nancy Pelosi, I'm like, this is sus! Shit is sus!

And none of those games, by the way. How does $14 help you codify a row? Please help me understand that. And even if you played video games, you're like, I don't understand if I pay the $14, do I get the codified row power up? Yeah. No,

you get a banana suit. Yeah. Good enough. Yeah. Here's some poster board. And also don't forget. And here's a mail-in ballot. Don't forget us in November.

Okay. All right. Well, Adam, thanks so much for coming on the show, man. It's always a pleasure speaking with you. And I'm glad you were finally able to stop by. Cause you know, we see each other in real life constantly. So

this is a great moment to bring it all together. It was wonderful to be here. The new show is called The G Word. Can I just give a proper plug? Well, I'm going to tell you right now. I said, where do people find you, follow you? Where do they see you? And also tell us the tweets you like. So the new show is called the g word it's all about the federal government six episodes they are on netflix right now please watch them just so you know if you want to support a show best thing to do on netflix is watch all of it as fast as you can if you watch just just even if you don't watch the last two episodes just fucking hit play and let them just finish because then then I get Netflix points. Basically.

Um, that's what they want to see as people, as people finish the show. So, um, please watch it. Uh, if you want to watch my old show, Adam ruins everything,

which I'm very proud of. It's all available on HBO max. Uh, all 65 episodes are available there. Uh, I do a podcast called factually where every week I interview a different, fascinating expert about all the shit that they know that I don't know and that you might not know. We have some of the best

non-fiction writers, journalists, incredible people on. I break down all of their incredible research in a really digestible way, make it really funny. I'm really proud of that show. It comes out every single week. It's called Factually. You can get it wherever you get your podcasts. And I'm at Adam Conover, wherever.

Follow me on TikTok. I post funny informational videos on TikTok basically daily. There it is. There it is. Wait, do you have any works of Twitter that you liked recently? Oh, my God. My own or other people's? Anyone. I want to talk about my own.

Is that okay? I had the most viral thread I ever did on Twitter recently. Okay. And it was about Rick Caruso running for mayor of Los Angeles. Oh. Oh, dude. What does he do? The Americana.

And the Grove. He gave us that. And he's Mr. Private Property over everything. Yeah. So this guy is a, real quick, this guy's a billionaire real estate developer. He's running for the mayor of Los Angeles. He's flooding the town with ads. You can't watch a Dodgers game or any other. You can't watch Jeopardy without seeing like tons of these ads. He looks so love L.A. and I want to clean up L.A. Now, that sounds really good if you don't know much. But if you know the history of right wing politics in California, you should be pretty scared of the phrase clean up L.A. This guy's anti-abortion. He's donated like hundreds of thousands of dollars to Mitch McConnell and shit.

And his homelessness strategy is building like gigantic warehouses to like force all the homeless people into rather than building like permanent housing and like working with people one by one. He wants to like he's like literally literally his homelessness plan is build. You can look at on his website. This is what it says. He wants to build a gigantic shelter out in Palmdale and like fucking force people like way out in the middle of the desert. Horrible dude. He spent 30 million dollars so far on ads. And what people don't realize is he could win the election in June because if he wins,

because of LA's weird rules, if he wins over 50% in the primary, he goes straight to the office that he skips the general. So it's really important people vote for anybody but Caruso. I'm sorry. I know you don't, I don't even do political shit like this that often, but this guy is, well, you do in LA. I mean, we know you and your, your vote. I mean, if you're in, if you're in LA politics, we know you're pretty vocal about LA politics. So we, yeah, I am. I am. And that's by the way, part of what we talk about on the G word, local politics, you can have so much more impact than on national politics.

I just ignore Nancy Pelosi and I focus local. So anyway, I did a tweet thread about this guy, most viral tweet that I've ever done. And so that's my favorite tweet lately is me trying to get the word out about this motherfucker who we got to stop. Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, don't forget, like many of the land developers in the in the city of Los Angeles, they usually end up becoming the, you know, the commissioner of the L.A. Police Commission. Yeah, this guy, this guy's the commissioner of the L.A. Police Department.

But by the way, also, why do we have homelessness? The housing crisis. Why do we have a housing crisis? Housing has gotten so expensive. This guy's a luxury real estate developer. Why would we elect the dude who caused the problem to solve the problem? He makes malls with choo-choo train. Yeah.

I like malls with choo-choo train. Turn LA to mall with choo-choo trains. Yeah. I like malls with choo-choo trains. Turn L.A. to mall with choo-choo trains. That's what I want. I want Katsuya near me now. Look, I go to the Americana, and I go there to see movies at the AMC. Shitty fucking projection. The movies look terrible at that movie theater.

The food sucks. The food sucks. That's Rick Caruso's fault. All right. So don't get, if you want to sin a bun, you can go give him money if you like, but don't for the love of God, don't vote for him for mayor. Please don't. No, please don't.

Matt, what about you, man? Where can people find you, follow you and check you out? Well, you can follow me on Twitter or Instagram. Twitter, at Matt Lieb. Instagram, at Matt Lieb Jokes. And you can please listen to my Sopranos Rewatch podcast, Pod Yourself a Gun, the world's only Sopranos podcast. This is our last season. And not only do we just watch the episode and talk about it, but I do parody songs.

Basically, I just take a song and I do the synopsis of the Sopranos episode in the style of that song. It sounds lame. I know. But it's actually great. And Miles has been on. He had a great time. Anna's been on. Jack's been on.

I mean, just like Jack was on. Yeah. The whole the whole Zyke crew has been on so uh check it out before uh you know we finish and um yeah pod yourself a gun and uh broadcast which is our regular podcast in which we talk about movies tweets you like what are you liking on the twitters um i really liked this from crotto soprano uh at uncle june he wrote, Ezra Miller is the Ralph Cifaretto of Hawaii. Wow! Which I really liked.

Ralph Cifaretto on The Sopranos he was just kind of a wild card. He would just do random acts of violence and kind of laugh about it. Gleeful random acts of violence seems to be Ezra Miller's thing now. Yeah.

Let's see. A tweet that I like is Animax of violence is seems to be Ezra Miller's thing now. So, yeah. Huh. Let's see. A tweet that I like is from Sean Johnson at sex with your uncle. OK. Well, you are for your tweeted. Imagine if Oasis said basketball instead of Wonderwall. I think that would be cool. That's so stupid.

And James Hamblin at James Hamblin tweeted, before you criticize Elon Musk's politics, remember, he's the reason we have the Hyperloop train that gets you from LA to San Francisco in one hour. Yeah, I'm not. We do not. You can find me at miles of gray on twitter and instagram also check out the new basketball podcast mad boosties uh we had robert orion this latest episode my laker heart imploded in into itself and i couldn't stop like asking so many

dumb questions that's amazing oh and he's the nicest he's the nicest man the nicest man i'm gonna tell you more about it after this uh and also check out 420 day fiance if you're into 90 day uh you can find us at daily zeitgeist on twitter we're at the daily zeitgeist on instagram we got a facebook fan page and a website dailyzeitgeist.com where we post our episodes and our footnotes footnotes there it is oh shit yeah i did it came through came through uh where we post obviously all the articles we talk about as well as the songs that we write out on this week we are writing writing out on this track called golden green by this artist emma jean thackray t-h-a-c-k-r-a-y she's a multi-instrumentalist, vocalist, which I love. I love when people are like, you know, one-person bands,

and they have such a dope sound. This is one, like, if you like bad, bad, not good, you know, and you like kind of like that newer, new jazz kind of style, but also, you know, you like a little hip-hop in your life or something that feels like it would have been sampled by Mobb Deep, then check out her work because it's really, really good, and it's all coming from Emma Jean. So check that out.

So check that song out. Right out on that. And we'll see you later to tell you what's trending. Until then, bye. Bye. I'm Jess Casavetto, executive producer of the hit Netflix documentary series, Dancing for the Devil, the 7M TikTok cult. And I'm Clea Gray, Devil, the 7M TikTok cult.

And I'm Clea Gray, former member of 7M Films and Shekinah Church. And we're the host of the new podcast, Forgive Me For I Have Followed. Together, we'll be diving even deeper into the unbelievable stories behind 7M Films and Shekinah Church. Listen to Forgive Me For I Have Followed on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. you can turn to for advice. And if we don't know the answer, we bring in people who do, like negotiation expert Maury Tahiripour. If you start thinking about negotiations as just a conversation, then I think it sort of eases us a little bit. Listen to Let's Talk Offline

on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Keri Champion, and this is season four of Naked Sports. Up first, I explore the making

of a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. Every great player needs a foil. I know I'll go down in history. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Clark and Reese have changed the way we consume women's sports. Listen to the making of a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Presented by Capital One, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports. I'm Keri Champion, and this is season four of Naked Sports. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry. Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Clark and Reese have changed the way we consume women's basketball. And on this new season, we'll cover all things sports and culture.

Listen to Naked Sports on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio apps, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Black Effect Podcast Network is sponsored by Diet Coke.