The Daily Zeitgeist - Weekly Zeitgeist 260 (Best of 1/30/23-2/3/23)

Episode Date: February 5, 2023

The weekly round-up of the best moments from DZ's season 273 (1/30/23-2/3/23)See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey, I'm Gianna Pradenti. And I'm Jermaine 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 Jess Costavetto, 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. 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. Hello, the internet, and welcome to this episode of the Weekly Zeitgeist. These are some of our favorite segments from this week, all edited together into one nonstop infotainment laugh-stravaganza. So, without further ado, here is the Weekly Zeitgeist.

Please welcome to the show, the brilliant, the talented, Mangashatikador! Mangashatikador! What's up? What's going on i feel like that was uh too nice an introduction but i know man you know we fuck with you heavy man big fans over here big fans her majesty hold the baby for another day yeah you could be here hold on hold on let me look at it if this document is right now full disclosure her majesty had the pregnancy salad which is this thing in la that supposedly like induces labor but like it's just like a tmz like la myth basically hey but it's funny when you go they make you sign a book and shit they're like oh you're having this okay you got to fill

out the book then and it's just wild i'm like they like have a book and shit. They're like, Oh, you haven't, okay, you got to fill out the book then. And this is wild. I'm like, they like have a God complex about it. They're like, put your name in the book of life. Right. Like leave your inscription upon the wall for the other travelers that are curious.

But it's such a scam to me. Like, yeah, because you're dealing with something too. And it also didn't work. It's just, it's, but I,

it's brilliant. Right. Because for people who don't know, there there's like this thing it's like the pregnancy salad and what it's supposed to do people come like when they're around the time they're expecting they have it and supposedly would induce labor but like you're already dealing with people that are like very close to having a child anyway so you could ascribe it to fucking anything you know what i mean like you'd be like it's like la water you know what i mean hey take two sips of la water every day but is there anything special about the salad like is it spicy or is there like no i man guess i fucking downed like a couple like i was like hey bring some extra dressing real quick because i wanted to know because all i know it's the dressing right

yeah there's something in the dressing it's a straight up vinaigrette it's just a vinaigrette. Yeah, that was the rumor. It's the dressing, right? Yeah. There's something in the dressing. It's a straight up vinaigrette. It's just a vinaigrette. I'm like, what the fuck is this? That's something like, this is genius. This is genius. They don't know. But you put a placebo effect in people's heads. I love that.

And they're just making bank off. There were so many other pregnant people there. It was wild. Yeah. I misunderstood what the pregnancy salad was. And I ate just bushels of that shit trying to get a junior situation. Yeah. I thought it would have been good for the show's visibility yeah and did not work out disappointed a lot of people that

day including me I was like Jack that's not how it works man I don't know maybe it's like a big type situation where you interact with this magical mundane thing and the impossible happens yeah these are exciting, terrifying times. So glad to spend them with you, Miles. Yeah. And I guess you're also daddy.

Uh, what, what's, am I, am I ever going to not be nervous in anticipation of this child coming up? Or were you cool, calm and collected? Cause everything I'm,

I was telling Jack earlier, I'm like, I'm just a wreck right now. It's like, when the fuck is it? When's it coming? I was, I was telling Jack earlier, I'm like, I'm just a wreck right now. When the fuck is it? When's it coming? I was I was so anxious, but I was also trying to, like, finish all these like like we had a cover story and the author dropped out or the writer dropped out. I ended up writing it.

I was like I was like trying to get Lizzie to, like, hold off, like having this kid until I was finished. So but but yeah, I mean, I was so but um but yeah i mean i was anxious the whole time i was anxious the whole like first few months it's crazy it's like you have an alien in your house yeah i'm cool with that i've always wanted an alien in my house so i went on this uh this uh astrology for the reporting for the show i went to india and visited all these like crazy astrologers and things and like one of these guys told me that like he was talking about black magic and all this black magic that had been put on him and like how he found this amulet and he burned it and reversed the curse on these people and then he was like and also tamil's the most important

language in india it's the only language aliens understand that's a big swing i was not expecting any of this but particularly that part just like tamil hubris coming at me yeah the one true language yeah the show seems amazing and it sounds like the the research has been pretty a journey i guess to say the least yeah it's been wild i mean like it's it's one of those things that like i did it kind of as a lark because i knew that astrology was ridiculous but also like a part of my life like my parents were only married because their um charts matched and and like and my mom's chart had something that said, like, she couldn't have a mother-in-law or her mother-in-law would die. And, like, my dad had lost his mom as a baby.

And so, like, they got paired up as a result of that. And they were like, maybe we like each other. And so, like, they went on dates and wrote letters and all this stuff and then decided they did like each other. But, like, so, like, I'm here because of astrology, whether or not I believe in it, you know? But, but like we met the first uh astrologer who was on cnn like in the early days of cnn they were just trying to figure out like how to get ratings so they put an astrologer on like wow like uh uh there's that page in the newspaper and we're a news channel

so fuck it let's give it a. Should we also have a crossword puzzle? But she was like, all these anchors would deride me on air and then ask me to do their charts right after. Yeah, that's the fucking thing. I feel like that's the thing. My brain doesn't want to believe in it, but then all these things happen in my life and I'm like, man, like so I can't admit like we're going to cut this shit. I'm not. I think I told you this when you were telling me that you were going to do this show that like my three best friends and my wife are all born within a day of one another oh yeah yeah like all the first people that i hired at cracked were all like born in the same week

and like all the shit that you know i'm not i'm obviously not checking for but yeah it's checking for me whether you like it or not jack it's it's coming for you. Well, I mean, the crazy serious thing that happened to me was like, I went in as a lark and my friend AJ Jacobs, who's this writer, he was like, you should just like follow everything the astrologer says to the word. So like hire someone. And when the astrologer is like, that person isn't right for your show, then you got to let him go. And it's like good tape or whatever. And during our reading, it was like all a really nice reading. And, and except he said, like, your dad is gonna fall ill and might not make it through this year. And then like, 20 minutes after our session, I was like, hanging out with my cousin at the shop. And I got this

text from my dad that was like, I have metastatic cancer. We didn't realize this spread through my body. And it's like, yeah, I mean, it was awful, but it's also like one of those things that like, there are things that are just so eerie that they're hard to discount, you know? And so like, you don't want to believe in something. And at the same time, like once someone said something, suddenly it gains this new truth or something, you know?

Yeah. Wow. Pregnancy salad, you know yeah yeah wow pregnancy salad you know chart readers we had somebody we had somebody who was going to tell us what the sex of our second child was going to be based on the rolls of fat in our first child's thighs and she like had an amulet like we didn't like go to her or like hire her she was she's our baby nurse for our first child and she had it like put an amulet over him and like went back and forth and was like oh it's a it's a girl for for certain and we she was like talking us

through it and she was like except sometimes it's the And she was like, except sometimes it's the opposite. I was like, you know, there's only two options here. It could be though. It could be the opposite of what I said too. Yeah. There's this story I heard about this guy in the Middle East who is a sonographer and he looks at baby's palms in utero

and then tells rich moms the exact moment that they should have a C-section so that their baby will have the like perfect birth going forward. And so like, I talked to OBGYNs about this in India and they're like, yeah, people come in and they're like, I need my kid delivered in this exact 90 second window. And like, and they have to do that. And otherwise they lose business or whatever. Right. And so like, it's this craziness around babies, but I was asking him, I was like, what about this guy who reads palms in utero? He's like, first of all, like I have the best sonography equipment in the world. And like, you can't read a baby's palm in it.

And secondly, most babies hold their palms and fists. And so there's no determining it. So I love that. Yeah. I'm a baby palm reader they're like how you gonna see their palms i do oh you know to ask i've seen them i've seen them don't you think that uh that salad place should be just like selling its dressing though like they do like you can buy it i can like it's just i think with, like whether it's astrology or pregnancy salads, there's always a fun to think that there just might be something that we can't quite fathom that has like a power that we can tap into. So I get that. But just me looking at like just the grim nature of our like capitalist economy, I'm like, holy shit, you can start a fucking racket with a bunch of things.

It's like, yo, dude, you have this boba, right? Oh, my God god you'll go give birth within at least four weeks of that but you gotta have it when you're 36 weeks pregnant and it's like sure the math there works out but also you know we all do what we got to deferred result you do like your eat this salad and your child in their 30s will have the greatest run of luck ever. Right, right, right. I feel like, yeah, that might work. Like just very specific things.

Yeah. Yeah, like a $1,000 Ivy League salad, right? Oh, fuck. There it is. That's, oh, shit. Okay, exactly. That is the kind of dumb shit that would like happen in like New York or LA. Yeah, 18 years. You had an 18-year window. Right, right, exactly. That is the kind of dumb shit that would like happen in like New York or L.A. Yeah. Yeah. 18 years. You had an 18 year window.

But also, you know, the way that Ivy League schools work is actually, you know, if the family has enough money to spend on a thousand dollar salad, they'll probably like. Jack, don't read into the data too much. It's causation. That's right. Causation. What is something from your search history that is revealing about who you are? I recently Googled martini glasses, specifically Nick and Nora glasses, because I broke one in the sink. And I'm a big martini drinker.

And I found a set of four from the Museum of Modern Art in New York's website. I don't know why the MoMA is selling martini glasses. They have like a whole like home goods store connected to that museum. Yeah, it's just like an Ikea if you walk far enough. And I kind of like some of the stuff and then I feel bad for liking it. It's kind of fucked up that they're horning in on Ikea and Target's whole thing. Like, I don't think Target's going to start showing mark chagall paintings you know what i'm saying i don't think they're gonna start getting sculptures from damien hirst at ikea this is not appropriate let's stay in your lane here

dare you the art at ikea is incredible and magnificent and i could stare at it for hours getting lost there yeah yeah i i understand what you're saying i i get that but i'm talking about fine art not just you know like a tableau of a bowl of fruit or something or a magic eye do they have magic eye paintings at ikea what is the art at ikea that that actually is a really good question it's very generic and it's like i feel like them and like the people who put art in hotels have to link up. You know what I mean? Like, I feel like they're on the same wavelength. A black and white photo of a guitar.

Triangles everywhere. I'm guessing there's like live, laugh, love stuff too, you know? Oh, for sure. Right? Yeah. Although that does feel like a little bit outside of ikea's wheelhouse the live laugh love that's more of a target walmart right something in that font you know what i mean yes yeah i'm trying to say like would it be okay i'm looking there's a

sander patelsky photograph of a uh pool so like they have like I'm sure they have like somebody who has good taste like buying art for them at Ikea. Yeah, we're just dogging on this person. You know, basically the MoMA is Ikea without the meatballs is what I'm here to say. The art at Ikea is just

as good as the art at the MoMA as long as you're not a materialist who cares that the, it's not, they're not originals. I am always at the MoMA screaming, where are the meatballs? You do do that. I do that a lot. Yeah.

Yeah. One could say that that Lincoln Berry sauce is artistic. It is an expression of humanity's greatest achievement in my opinion. Yeah. I do sometimes wonder that, like when I talk about the Cheesecake Factory menu being like the thing that will be remembered from American, like America's contribution to like civilization, they'll just be like marveling at our ability to put that much food together and like put it put it out and you know just get it

all together i don't think it's about the menu itself i think it's about attempting to read the menu in a poorly lit room yeah yeah yeah it's the experience it's performance art that engages the audience it's funny that you say that paulaallavi, because the people that eat at Cheesecake Factory tend to have very bad eyesight because of their elderly nature. I don't know if only old people go to Cheesecake Factory, but I think it's predominantly people who maybe should have some lights on. Maybe we should crank that dimmer a little bit so that we can see what we're shoveling in our mouth. Crank that dimmer. dimmer a little bit so that we can see what we're shoveling in our mouth. Crank that dimmer.

When you're in Florida, you'll occasionally see people with little flashlights on their key chains, like the elderly, like have little gadgets that I'm not aware of. But we do it with our phones, right? Yeah. For sure.

They've got little like squeezy flashlights. I want to show up to the Cheesecake Factory in a full on fucking like helmet with a flashlight on it like i'm going big ass yeah like i'm a minor yeah like i'm gonna go rescue some thai children and also some mozzarella sticks i really want some mozzarella sticks but i do wonder like will ikea be remembered will that be a thing that people look back on because it is like the predominant thing from our it will be the like when they're digging around in the rubble of the U.S., mostly what they're going to be finding is probably IKEA furniture, right? Yeah, I think maybe I think that there's there's a real serious point to be made here, guys, that the abundance that we all enjoy today,

all the furniture, all of the food, all of the things that we have that we take for granted are going to be not possible in the next 100 years. So people will look back on the just pure greed and avarice of our society and be like, how did they do this? People lived like this? They got to they

got to get an appetizer and a main and then dessert yeah unbelievable they're gonna be shocked so yeah i think that ikea and cheesecake factory and sizzler and hometown buffet and costco are all going to be considered like these quirky relics of a different time. I don't know if it's sad or not, but it's going to happen. The way we view Great Gatsby, the way people are like, we're having a Gatsby party. They'll have that. IKEA parties? Yeah.

With three meatballs to be like, we did it. Like Kylie Jenner's great-grandchildren. Right. I learned this week that IKEA is a non-profit. Did you guys know that what no that feels like a tax scheme that feels like a tax dodge exactly i feel like it is and it's but it's technically a non-profit yeah ikea is technically a religion like Scientology they don't have to pay taxes i heard warren buffett is donating his entire fortune to Ikea. Ikea.

He's such a good guy. That's so cool. He's my favorite spiritual leader. What is something that you think is overrated? This is a very basic high school opinion of mine. But waking up early, having had to... I'm a new dad. And for the last five weeks, I have been alone with the baby and have had to every single day be the only person waking up when the baby wakes up. And

now that my partner's back and we're splitting the duties, I'm like, I don't want to go back to that. That is not pleasant for me. I know some people get a lot done there. I was waking up early and still not getting as much work done in the morning as all these morning people say. Like, I tried it for six weeks straight. It did nothing for me. All my work happened after 11 a.m. I'm famously on the Mark Wahlberg schedule where I wake up at 2 a.m. and get a full, just absurd workout in just to make sure that I know that I have the mental edge over my fellow humans, aka competitors, because I view everybody else as a competitor. And yeah, first breakfast at 6am, second breakfast at nine.

You cook five different meals a day. Yeah. Can't podcast without the pump. Yeah, you got to get your pump on before rolling. Yeah, no, I don't have that either. I've tried it and yeah, I'm mostly through the very early waking up with the baby portion of fatherhood. But it's, yeah, I just can't wait to sleep in until nine one time in the future and be like, wow, I don't even, I'm not waking up in a panic wondering what has happened that has allowed me to sleep until nine. Right. Yeah. This might be similar to y'all's fatherhood journey, but I just have a dog who wants to go out, but I have a very, and this is, you know, if this were a human being I was talking about, I think I'd be called, you know, child protective services would be called on me but i have i get to make the choice of like

look it's only going to be some p if i i can in exchange for sleep i can know that i will have to clean up p and then i can make that decision then which i guess if i can't do with the child yeah yeah i don't know yeah we just we just let the pee ride with our kids. Yeah. We let them sleep in it for, you know, the night. Hopefully, if they sleep through the night, that's good. They had to have slept through a little bit of pee to do that, and that's actually better than the alternative.

That's some sound sleep. For them and for us. What's something you think is underrated? My cats. My cats are underrated. I think. Yeah. What's your cat's called?

Cindy and Archie. They're sitting right here. They're cool. Oh, Cindy. I just want to shout, shout out to them. How long you had them?

A few years. Cindy's younger than Archie. He's a big boy. Oh, okay. How many, how many cans? How many cans are we on? How many cans? I, this are we on? How many cans?

My friend Kat sat for a cat that had two full cans of cat food per meal. So ate four cans of cat food per day. Holy shit. No, we don't give them that much. Yeah, and this cat was like an abomination. I remember being like, this is fucking abuse. Yeah, sometimes it's like, what are you doing? This is not good for the cat.

But they're like, well, they just like to eat that much and i'm like you are in charge of the giving of the food and they like the cat was like declawed too so like when it was like hungry it was like bat the door like in this like very percussive way but there were no claws i'm like this is like has torture just spelled oh no there's nothing worse than like being around people who are kind of like not treating their pets well or like yeah nothing worse than that there's nothing worse the worst thing on earth thank you is someone who buys a dog from a puppy mill next anyway yeah just shout out to them they're cool they support me are they named for anything in particular cindy named after Cindy Crawford because she has a little

mole right there. Oh, amazing. And she's a little model. Okay. And Archie's a redhead, so I named him after Archie Comics. Oh, okay. I'm a little weird. My first crush was Cindy Crawford because I'm a freak. Whoa, that's a

alternative taste. I thought she was very pretty. And that was before the Pepsi. Is she Pepsi or Diet Coke? Pepsi. Was she Pepsi just straight up?

She was claiming she drank full sugar Pepsi? I don't know if she was Pepsi or Diet Pepsi, but she was definitely Pepsi. Oh, yeah, man. Yeah, I was definitely pepsi wow oh yeah man yeah calm yeah i was definitely alt too jack i was alt af in 1992 when this came out oh yeah the cutoff shorts yeah wow she's drinking a soda by a convertible full sugar pepsi full sugar pepsi she didn't Sugar, Pepsi. Full sugar, Pepsi. She had a spit bucket right next to her. Nah, not my queen, Cindy. She downed every single can, every take.

What a time when people drank Pepsi. What do you mean? I drank Pepsi when I was like eight. I remember coming back from a baseball practice. It was the summer and I was like eight, I was like, I remember coming back from like a baseball practice, you know, it was like the summer and I was so thirsty. And instead of drinking water, I just drank like three cans of Pepsi. People do drink that when they're just thirsty. Like I find myself doing that sometimes and I'm like, what the fuck am I doing?

I mean, the fact that I remember it, like have a sense of memory of it, you know, it's it's it works. Was it your brand? You know, it's more even even stupider. I think it lit up all the like cocaine sensors in my brain. Probably. I didn't like when the Bloods and Crips like real like, you know, gang war was real serious in L.A. I was like at the time I was always I was always looking at my clothes as a a kid even though i wasn't living near that shit but i was like oh what do i you're like do i like more and in my mind i'm like i'm a crip i'm like i like blue so then when

pepsi when pepsi came out in the blue can i was all over that shit because i was like miss me with that fucking red can even though there was like a little bit of red on the pepsi kit i don't know why and like that was driving my subconscious push towards pepsi as a kid and then very quickly i was like this is whoa that's fascinating yeah just i was just remembering that right now because in this picture of cindy crawford it's like the old school red can with like the blue and uh red on it but then in my mind i was like no i was downing those blue cans i remember like a fucking fiend yeah and it was all because of my perceived allegiance during a gang war i hope that yeah i hope fake allegiances yeah yeah and then i think it was just more fashionable i was like well i

guess snoop is and schoolboy q all my favorite rappers are yeah all right let's take a quick break and we'll come back and talk about some dystopian shit. Oh God. 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 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 Jimei 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 percent 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 Keri Champion, and this is season four of Naked Sports,

where we live at the intersection of sports and culture. Up first, I explore the making of sports and culture. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry, Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. I know I'll go down in history. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Every great player needs a foil. I ain't really near them boys. I just come here to play basketball every single day, and that's what I focus on.

From college to the pros, Clark and Reese have changed the way we consume women's sports. Angel Reese is a joy to watch. She is unapologetically Black. I love her. What exactly ignited this fire? Why has it been so good for the game? And can the fanfare surrounding these two supernovas be sustained? This game is only going to get better because the talent is getting better.

This new season will cover all things sports and culture. Listen to Naked Sports on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Black Effect Podcast Network is sponsored by Diet Coke. And we're back. And we're back. And this is, I mean, the title of the article, In the New Yorker is What's the Matter with Men, probably that feels as close as a New Yorker title has come to being also the title of like a, you know,

Donahue, like, you know, like the old 80s daytime talk show thing, or also a Fox News, like a Tucker Carlson, Chiron, like probably on a biweekly basis. So, I mean, it is hard to cover the subject without seeming like you're claiming cancel culture has changed the rules and it's too mean to boys or, you know, whatever. There's a lot of answers given to this kind of preemptively by the Fox News of the world and the right and Tucker Carlson. But, you know, my take on that would be that,

like, culturally, we are seeing just the barest minimum start to fixing an imbalance and structural inequality that has been pervasive, like, for many, you know, across many human civilizations. And, you know, now that the thing, the interesting things that I don't think I fully understood the extent of is that in academic performance, both in the United States and in countries around the world, we are seeing boys underperform girls, like, drastically. Like, in a way that is, like, not statistically, like, insignificant. Like, you can't, there has to be something going on there

and they say it's like both with advanced countries that still struggle with considerable sexism such as south korea and in notably egalitarian countries like sweden and yeah it's just you know in 2009 american high school students in the top 10 percent of their freshman class were twice as likely to be female. In the United States, women are close to or girls, you know, are close to outnumbering boys two to one in undergraduate and in colleges. Whereas at the start of the 80s, it was more like one to one. So go ahead, Joe. No, yeah. Well, I mean, you know, I like this article and, you know, I know you have to write a headline to get people on the Internet to pay attention. So, you know, whatever. I just tend to dismiss headlines and just actually look at what's going on there. But it feels like you started to

hint at two things that this article, I think, does a nice job of navigating, which is one is, you know, there's a problem with men in the sense that all the ways in which they've traditionally been allowed to behave are cultural norms are changing. And that's where it gets into cancel culture and, you know, all these other things. And that's, you know, for better, but it's fraught. You know, there's complications to explore there. And then there's this other thing which you described, which is, you know, men and boys are falling behind in in lots of ways that we can start to measure and see. And I'm not sure if those are necessarily like related or part of the same conversation, like just because we told Louis C.K. he can't behave a certain way doesn't necessarily mean that then like eighth grade boys are worse at math. doesn't necessarily mean that then like eighth grade boys are worse at math. Right.

And so I just want to sort of identify that there are lots of swirling and interconnected, but not necessarily causally related things going on with men. Yeah. And I think what's really important is to think about how now men's rights and women's rights are somehow diametrically opposed from each other. But originally during there was a men's rights movement. The original men's rights movement was very much pro equality, which meant men needed to sort of take that self inventory and say, okay, how are the ways like, how are we oppressed, quote unquote, right? What, what causes us pain, and that also causes women pain at the same time. So those movements were kind of like married to each other until slowly they unwound into this sort of battle against each other, which is really sad because there's lots of reasons that we should look at the problems

that men experience. That's not somehow anti-woman, right? It should be something that we're moving forward with consciously on both sides. And it's really a bummer that it's become such a cesspool of horror. That's right. Chelsea, I mean, you know, that's, it makes me think of this article in the New Yorker as a review of a book. And, you know, the book is written by someone who comes from a background of studying inequality and the kind of like myth of opportunity, which I think is so related to all this. Because I think to your point, like when you set yourself up to define opportunity as a zero sum game, which I think for a lot of men, but I think for a lot of Americans in general is the way that we've seen it. Then you lead to this sort of competitive notion of equality or, you know, gender, the relationship between the genders. Whereas if you can kind of like start to rethink what it means to have opportunity or to succeed and think

of it as more collaborative, then you maybe start to find some of the answers in the way that you're describing. But I just think it's like a really fascinating lens through which this person is taking on this question because it is so related to, you know, almost like most things in life. It's about like the disconnect between expectations and reality. Right. And we set up the expectations to be that men get sort of get it all handed to them on a platter. Then you end up with that frustrating disconnect for a lot of men. Definitely. Yeah. I mean, there's one of the things that points out is that there's still

a great deal of structural inequality. So, you know, we're seeing these differences in performance metrics, like at the educational level, but the C-suite is still, you know, largely male, even though it's moving in a more equal direction, but like there's still a pay gap. And it does make me wonder, like the structures of masculinity that we've created across cultures, like Chelsea, you talked about the original men's movement. And I know people like there seems to be a resurgent thing of like these like men's groups and, you know, meetings that are men's meetings that are designed to undo the toxic like things that you were taught about what it means to be a man and like that seems to be the way to attack this and not absolutely yes yeah going back to the unequal way like i i i talk about how when it comes to like white supremacy as well like there is like the the people who benefit from these structures that kind of encode or enforce inequality, like at some level, they even recognize,

like maybe it's not their conscious mind, but at some level, they, I think that's where a lot of the anger and the self-hatred that like comes out as like outward hatred comes from is a recognition that like they're not superior you know right exactly they're benefiting from this narrative that is demonstrably not true and like that's where a lot of this like kind of conflict and violence comes from as well as the fact that you know so so many of the structures of masculinity that still like you know are still around like my kids just pick up an interest in guns and shit like that

just through osmosis through like school books and stuff like it's violence is part of this structure that still hasn't been like rooted out. Am I being naive, though, that I do feel like it is changing the language around masculinity? I don't know. I just feel like for, you know, most of the people I know under the age of 25, I just kind of marvel if I'm being honest, you know, and I run in certain circles or whatever, but I just feel like, you know, the level of sort of language and empathy and openness with emotions and, you know, ideas about what consent means, like it is so much more expansive than when I was growing up. And, you know, I would think I was like progressively minded and tried to behave in

all the right ways, but I just didn't have that language wasn't even handed that the culture wasn't sort of really pointing me in the right direction in a way that I don't know, maybe I'm maybe I am being naive or overly hopeful, but it does feel like there has been some real shift around the way that that young men talk about being young men that I yeah, that I find kind of hopeful. And I think that that's a good point. Because in our cultural moment, everything feels like the worst that it's ever been. But you just go back five years, 10 years, 15 years, 100 years, and there is a steady movement toward progress and undoing toxic qualities in all ways. And I think we have to sometimes stop and value that we are making progress because it's so easy to see these individual things happen day by day.

And I think in some ways things are getting worse than they were five years ago. But generally, by and by, we're kind of doing okay, which is hard to remember. Well, you know this better than anyone, but there's always a backlash, right? Oh, yeah. And so that's the thing to guard against. I mean, there's always... It's a pendulum. Yeah.

Yeah. backlash, right? And so that's the thing to guard against. I mean, there's always... It's a pendulum. Yeah. Yeah. I'm working on a series about Hollywood history. And in it, we do an episode about Errol Flynn, who was like an awful, awful person, you know, treated women terribly, was accused of raping people and, you know, sort of like lived in a 30s and 40s era of very toxic masculinity. But then he like hung around for a long time. And, you know, in the 50s and 60s was like still kind of like hanging around and hadn't been quote unquote canceled in any sort of hateful way. But the thing that I realized from there was that like every generation

of men can tell themselves that, you know, they're put upon and that they don't have it as good as the, as the boys from the, who were 10 years older, who could have, you know, were boys 10 years ago, boys could just be boys. And now we have to put you know deal with all this bs and that's like that's the most consistent thing is that men feel aggrieved and put upon and then they just get to act however they want to act exactly if you're a victim then anything you do is uh retaliatory right you can do anything if you're a victim yeah yeah i think there's a built-in fragility to a lot of the structures of masculinity that men are kind of taught to just... Yeah, there's an interesting quote in the article when they talk about like a manifesto from the 30s and the author of the manifesto, Beauvoir, is it Jacqueline Beauvoir? But writing that the most mediocre of males feels himself a demigod as compared with women. And just that, like, to actually go around believing that on a

day-to-day basis and be coming into contact with evidence that it wasn't true constantly. And then just having to double down. It makes sense to me that there would be some damage, some baggage from those structures. That, though, I think is something that has genuinely changed in the last five, eight years or so. Totally. Which is the appetite for mediocrity, I think, is no longer there. And people are just willing to call it out, see through it, you know, not accept it for themselves. You know, obviously, there will always be people who, especially white males, who fail

up and kind of skirt by and slough off all the hard work. But I do really think that that has genuinely shifted in some meaningful way. I think it's definitely shifting. genuinely shifted in some in some meaningful way i think it's definitely shifting but i think what at least part of what we're seeing with this kind of the some of the struggles that we're seeing are echoes and you know past generations still being around and you know educating and yeah so i think i'll just say really quick that if you guys are interested in this topic, we did. We put our heart and soul into an episode called Men's Rights of American Hysteria. And it really looks at the whole movement of men's rights starting back in the 70s up until the modern day and try to take not an impartial look because we can't do that. But, you know, just really try to understand sort of the emotions and and thinking behind that movement through the decades.

We will link off to that in the footnotes, but that sounds wonderful. Also, you just did an episode about how high school students used to have to swim in the nude. We did. Not really related to this subject. Yeah, yeah. It was up until the 70s, many, many, many public high schools, boys swam naked. And that was just totally normal. And it has to do with hygiene, blah, blah, blah. But we actually interview Robin Washington, who's a reporter and someone who had to swim naked in high school. And he gave us the lowdown.

And yeah, Lawsuit City is what he calls it now. All right. Let's talk really briefly. So the Biden White House is going to let the coronavirus public health emergency expire in May. And so, you know, around 500 people a day are still dying of COVID. It's currently become a top 10 leading cause of death among children. And imagining this was a decision made in consultation with public health experts, but it seems at least the narrative that's being portrayed in the media is that it is being motivated by political maneuvering. The Republican House, I believe, was about to introduce a bill called the Pandemic is Over Act, which we don't name them like they used to. Pandemic is Over Act. Is there just going to be

a fuck you, Joe Biden act at some point? Like, are they just going to go right there? Yeah. And then he did it and they were like, yeah, well, that's what we're going to say to do. So it's good to see that he's taken our lead. And there's just a bunch of, you know, pissing contests happening. But one of the major changes that could come about as a result of ending the state of emergency would be the end terminating Title 42, the public health measure that has limited the inflow of migrants at the border. But of course, the Republicans are in favor of keeping Title 42 restrictions and arguing Title 42 is not tied to the PHE. So I don't know.

Biden, meanwhile, is attempting to controversially expand the powers of Title 42. So it just seems this is kind of what I had in mind when I heard that he was going to, like, from his strategists that look for a pivot to the center coming in the second half, we after the day after the midterms, we were like, wow, like, how are they going to cover or fail to cover the fact that, you know, Fetterman won and, you know, beat somebody who was like more of a mainstream Democratic candidate and like was kind of a big DNC hopeful. mainstream Democratic candidate and like was kind of a big DNC hopeful and then and Conor Lamb and then defeated, you know, a very well-funded candidate that had the entire power of Trump and MAGA behind him. Like, how do they cover that without being like it seems like there might be a genuine appetite for left of Democrat policies. And they've just kind of, I don't know, they've kind of ignored it. But Jack, declaring that the pandemic has moved to a different phase should not be related to these conversations, right? It should not be a political act. It should not pull in all of these other things. I mean, there's plenty of other places you can

point to the Biden administration and be like, well, I'm curious to see, you know, if we're going to see their true centrist instincts revealed here. But like, this is, you know, another example to me of just kind of like how much the well was poisoned, especially with the pandemic and politicized. And, you know, I mean, it's so strange to me that every conversation about the pandemic doesn't start with the simple fact that like Donald Trump was president when it first happened and that cast a die that we're still living with and that everything is politicized as a result, because this was a man who from the very beginning saw no other incentive, but to politicize, you know, like day two, the guy was like, oh, well, if we just don't count the cases that there won't be any cases, you know? And it's like, so, and, you know, so then to like criticize or look for political positioning within decisions in the constant, I mean, it's just so, we're just so far around the bend on making sensible, reasonable decisions around COVID.

It's like, it is so dispiriting, but But the pandemic is in a different place than it was a year ago, six months ago. We know that, we see that. And so I would be open to the idea that the pandemic emergency might be over, but we're just so lost at sea in terms of being able to really evaluate things like that without it completely getting screwed up

in all the ways we're describing. Yeah. I do feel like the the timing is yeah unfortunate yeah but yeah i will we'll be keeping an eye on it to see how consistent this pivot to the center is but yeah i don't know hearing that that was their takeaway from the midterms was pretty, pretty frustrating to me. Well, yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'd be curious to see how much, you know, DeSantis is going to go all in or at least half in on like a bunch of sort of pandemic related grievance stuff. And I'm curious to see what the salience of that is. You know, I wonder if he's out there a year from now, just railing against masks, whether people are just going to be like, eh, like really? Like I'm not, I got angry about that in summer 2020,

but like, I don't know. I'll be curious. Yeah, we were talking about how like there isn't that much like content that really resonates with people about the pandemic at this point. It doesn't, it seems like people are just like, yeah, we're moving along and don't want to talk about that anymore.

I don't know if that will apply to them being still furious that they ever had to wear a mask in Publix or whatever. Yeah. But we'll see. All right, let's take a quick break and we'll come back and talk subtitles. subtitles. 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.

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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, where we live at the intersection of sports and culture. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry, Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. I know I'll go down in history. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game.

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And we're back. And so Sprouts will now have an ugly section for their produce in California. Like in addition to organic, there will be an ugly section where just misshapen off color over or undersized. Let me see which fruits they actually named. Cause it totally, they named potatoes, onions, grapefruit, lemons,

oranges, pears, carrots, Kiwi, and bell peppers. Just the most fucked up dish you've ever had. Exactly. But basically, there's a sorting process

that happens before produce reaches grocery shelves and they get rid of any that have visible imperfections in favor of whatever looks like the platonic ideal of that fruit, essentially. And so people have kind of had the idea for a while now, actually, that this is probably contributing to the fact that the USDA estimates that as much as 30% of the U.S. food supply goes uneaten. So it's, we'll talk in a little bit, but so Whole Foods, a couple other places tried to start a similar movement in 2016, but like really couldn't get consumers on board. And there was a recent study that said that just the natural human assumption

is that ugly food is actually worse for us, even though it's not like it's completely incorrect. But a University of British Columbia School of Business study found that people assume ugly produce is less nutritious and less delicious than its better looking counterparts, which is a bummer because it's not true. I feel like it says such bad things about humanity that like our idea of, I mean, you say platonic ideal. I'm like, basically, we can't process any food that doesn't look like a five-year-old drew it. This is like apple, but it's exactly like shaped like this let me search

in my emoji yeah what apple is supposed to look like and typically the one that looks the most like an apple has all the flavor bread out of it yeah you don't like the red delicious you're you're you know platonic ideal of what an apple should look like and it's don't get me started on red delicious is terrible and we i you know this that you know article that my wrote about i wrote this article about um the mango market on whatsapp and mangoes in america are very beautiful and the ones that come from india pakistan asia are these like bruised little soft messed up things and you and they're like covered it can be covered in black spots and they are literally 10 times better than any like people like all your you know asian parents are going to be like mangoes in america aren't mangoes and they really

are when you try them it's like it's like they like taste like apples you know the tommy atkins and like all they don't have that kind of like caramely sweet goodness that and so like this article that i wrote you know back in that was it 2021 now 2020 is like about how people will pay eight dollars a mango um because they know how much better they can be and i think it comes down to people just uh not really being very educated about seasonality the other thing that's crazy about that is when i have heard about this, they're like, it'll be January. They'll be like, can I get some mangoes? I'm like, you think mangoes grow in January?

They do not. They only grow for a couple of weeks in the summer. It's a season. It's not something you can get. But here in America, you can actually get mangoes literally every month of the year because we're importing from all sorts of different places yeah so on the misfits thing i'll just say one thing which is if food waste is the primary problem then the misfits thing is like a really small part of it because even still yeah all of the stuff that's coming to the market like they plan to make a profit on it to charge as little as they do, that half of it is going to be thrown out. Like they just want you to, you know, it's a model already built on waste. And yes,

they're slightly, supermarkets are slightly reducing their wastes, but it's really probably not as sustainable as supporting a local farmer or CSA, which is, you know, they're trying to still get you in the door and support their overall very bad for the climate. So I'm a little skeptical of these misfits, Mark. Yeah, I am too, because I mean, one of the, even in this article in the takeout that covers it, they mentioned that like when the food gets sorted before it's delivered to the grocery stores, it's not just like thrown in a can and picked up by the garbage truck. It's actually used to feed animals or fold it back into the soil to add nutrients to the soil.

So yeah, it doesn't feel like this is the thing that's driving food waste. It's not the primary thing. The whole supermarket model in general is just a huge contributor to food waste. They're just trying to kind of launder their reputation

a little bit, I think. And even these subscription boxes, I'm not sure, sure, like, you know, sure, you're eating the wasted stuff. But if it's being, you know, driven on a gas-powered, you know, massive truck, like, or delivery van, like, is that really more sustainable than just, you know, not doing that? I don't know. Buying from a local farmer or something. But to be fair, buying CSAs, those things are expensive. I've tried and I waste a lot of my CSAs. So, you know, I'm calling the pot,

calling the kettle black over here. Right. Yeah. I mean, we have a very productive lemon tree at my house. Love that for you. I love it. It's one of the greatest gifts in my life. But it produces, I'd say like 10% of the lemons

it produces look like H.R. Giger designed them. There is some wild shit, which I feel like is actually cool. Like if I saw some lemons that looked like that at the grocery store, I think I have to be be on board with that you know a lot of zesting surface area if you want to do a lemon zest with that has like cthulhu tentacles coming out of the top of it oh yeah have you ever seen an overgrown zucchini by the way have i ever seen an overgrown oh because they grow like little like Night King horns, right? If you don't cut them by the time

they become like that perfectly like even shape, they just become these giant bulbous like creatures that are just horrifying. And it's like, I wouldn't know that unless I like my sister had like a summer of trying to grow zucchinis. Like I had no idea that like

there was a perfect time to cut a zucchini off the stem where it like looks nice and after that just becomes so scary that like you don't want to eat it obviously like probably like the water content is too high in those bigger ones that's probably why people harvest it at that time but it's like yeah and plants are it can be really scary looking sometimes and they're still we would eat those giant zucchinis it would be really hard because they'd be huge but yeah i feel like there's other stuff about the you know to your point about even if this isn't true our snobbiness around how pretty the fruit is like kind of works against the ultimate product

that you're getting with like the isn't bananas are all clones of the same banana that have like yeah lost a lot of their because the thing every other banana is better than what you think is a banana right because when you're designing the fruit which all fruit is like designed in a lab essentially like at this point like when you look at what corn used to look like it like it wasn't on a big dick shaped cob it was like it looked like a little garden weed for for a long time and then farmers were like no this should look more like a big dick i think covered in corn yeah well there's there's an interesting balance some of them do look good on a shelf but we've also seen improvements like i don't know if you have like this brussels sprouts thing where

like everyone was like we used to hate brussels sprouts and part of the reason that is is because they bred the bitterness out of brussels sprouts so like the 90s so the brussels sprouts we're eating now are much better so that's why they're so like so much more delicious so it's like it's interesting like the balance of like consumer education versus like the scientists like sort of like sneaking a vegetable in by improving like sweet corn also used like many varieties of sweet corn would like stop being sweet within like a minute of harvesting them or something like that like you have to like literally just grab them and put them on the grill so you know it's interesting how sometimes you get a benefit from that scientist another time it's like why don't you just make the fruit taste better? Like our fruit in general

in America is awful. Sorry to say, I can't think of many fruits that I'm very fond of, especially in the American supermarket. Yeah. Is mango the number one that people need to go try when they're outside of the U S I have had a, I was in Guatemala last year and had a scoop of mango that tasted like ice cream. It tasted like it was made in, you know, by a candy company. It was the most delicious thing. And that it was a consistency that I've never had in any sort of fruit. Like it was just so buttery and sweet. Custardy.

Delicious. I'm going to throw out persimmons. Persimmons for your asses. Oh, persimmons are so good. The best persimmon I had this year, I picked it up and I bruised it with my, like, almost went through the skin with my fingers. It was like, basically like a water balloon. Yeah. Well, remind me when May or June comes around, I'll try to hook you up with my mango dealer.

And if you're willing to spend $8 on a mango, $40 for two kgs, you might have a life-changing experience. You might not ever be able to go back. But yes, I would say mangoes are definitely something you need to try when you're outside of the U.S. I'm not that familiar with the South American ones, to be honest,

but it's a similar situation to what you're describing with the bananas, that all of the ones in North America, much like coffee, like South Asia, East Asia is like coffee beans in Ethiopia, which is like there's more genetic diversity there. So there's like a lot more varieties there. So I'm not that familiar with the South American ones, but I know that they're better than the American ones. The American ones that come over the border from Mexico are not really designed for flavor. There are some good Mexican varieties, but it's like not the ones you get at the supermarket. Yeah, I think Americans assume that because of American exceptionalism and, you know, shit like that, they're like, well, we have to have the best.

And it's like, no, they're designing this product for you, a not very well-informed consumer. So, like, they just know that you're going to, you're going to be okay with it. And that it's available in December and January and February. Like when it should not be available. Yeah. I forget what berry it was, but there was a kind of long read article about a company that designed its berries to be like it, the berries that we have now were designed to be pickable by robots essentially because like that that is why it's that way it has nothing to do with how good it tastes it's like it looks good in a cart when you're going around the grocery store and it a

robot can pick it without destroying the fruit right all the all the energy goes into yeah harvesting and trucking and if it tastes better that's a maybe a brussels sprout i feel like brussels sprouts is just the anomaly yeah the other thing i'll say about those box sunny mangoes is that they try to get them in supermarkets but they go bad within two days yeah so like they the supermarkets are like, the consumer doesn't want these ugly things, you know, that are like brown all over and getting soft. And it's like, well, they're better than any mango

you've ever had access to, but it's like, they're not willing to pay the price for that. I mean, it's also very expensive to fly them from Pakistan. I mean, that's also like a terrible climate change story that like Pakistanis, like myself, are so wild about it that they're willing to like myself are so wild about it that they're willing to like load it up in an airplane and get it blown over here that's not so good for the environment so yeah that's i wonder if brussels sprouts where it's like a story where it's just

they hit such a deep dark bottom ands where it was like they were just synonymous with gross. Someone's going to spit this out if I try and feed it to... And so the people at Big Brussels Sprout really had a come-to-Jesus moment where they're like, we need to actually make

these taste good, I think. The Brussels Sprout mafia was like, broccoli is over there and they're laughing at us! The kids are eating their broccoli! But if they won't touch us... If it's just bitterness, it feels like genetic variation just naturally is gonna... Look, they couldn't be more bitter.

So if you just randomized Brussels sprouts for a couple generations, they almost have to taste better. There's no other way. Yeah. Right. They actually had been designing them in the 40s and 50s to punish children. It turns out they were just like, we need a food that tastes like shit that we make these kids. Yeah.

Make sure they know that God doesn't love them. You know? All right. Let's talk about Beyonce. Let's talk about Ticketmaster. All right. Let's talk about Beyonce. Let's talk about Ticketmaster. Beyonce is about to go on tour. And in addition to just general concerns that the tickets are going to cost the same as black market organs, a lot of fans are worried that Ticketmaster is going to totally screw this up. For some reason, I don't know where they're getting this concern from. Oh, yeah, that literally just happened with Taylor Swift.

So Ticketmaster was just the subject of a Senate Judiciary Committee meeting, which didn't seem to solve that much, except it gave a platform for politicians to quote Taylor Swift lyrics in a just wildly cringy fashion. This will get me on Twitter.com, right? All right. Here we go. Twitter.com. Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said, Ticketmaster ought to look in the mirror and say, I'm the problem. It's me. Amy Klobuchar said that consolidation within an industry is a problem the United States knows all too well. They should be forced to sing this shit if they're going to do this. Yeah, absolutely. Senator Mike Lee characterized restrictions on selling tickets as a nightmare dressed like a daydream. Oh, God.

Yeah. I'm excited for them to bring out the Beyonce lyrics when that comes around. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And so the president of Ticketmaster's parent company, Live Nation, apologized to Taylor Swift fans, claimed it was just the damn bots that are responsible for the terrible consumer experience saying they'll quote do better in the future but it's that that may be the case that may be like the problem they are failing to solve but from from the outside it really appears to be that ticketmaster is a monopoly and so when their website breaks, there's not another website

that you go to and be like, well, Ticketmaster sucks, so we'll go buy the tickets over here, which is pretty straightforward. Like, it feels like we end up having to explain the dynamics of capitalism a lot to capitalists, you know?

Is there a reason why it's a monopoly is it just the artists are like it's easier just to give all our tickets to or the venues i guess technically sell the tickets wasn't that the merger with live nation or something no maybe that's a long time ago i mean yeah i think that's one of the ways that that i think a lot of things happen, you know, and there's just not the appetite to push back against corporations. It's, it's, so they, we allow these massive mergers to go through. We're coming off of like 40 years of deregulation being the operative word in the U S and it's like, this is what you end up with. You end up with like broken systems

that like don't work because they like a corporation naturally wants to be a monopoly. You can't can't just like passively hope that it's not going to be one like that is a massive advantage for them because they ultimately just want to make as much money as possible while spending as little money as possible. And, you know, that's bad. And like the bots don't seem to be bad for them. I mean, they want like the sneaker drops, like they want their sneaker drops, the ticket, like all these companies benefit from the bots.

It seems like to me, yes, their public opinion goes down, but if there's no alternative, right? If you have one place that does good alternative, if you have one place that does good bot protection and you have one place that doesn't, you're going to go to the place that has good protection against bots. But if it's a monopoly, they want... They're not going to see a hit to their pockets

if the bots are taken down. They want their tickets to sell up. I mean, the resale maybe even benefits them to some extent because it becomes even more highly valued so they can charge more and more so like yeah i don't buy it but they end it and it benefits like the bots benefit ticket master because ticket master has agreements with the reseller sites yep that they get a cut of every resale so they are just making money on

top of the initial money that they made. And so they've been busted, like actually like making deals with resellers. You know, I mean, they get they get a cut a portion of like, every ticket that gets resold on one of these like other official resellers. But in 2019, the company's president of U.S. concerts was literally caught sending 90,000 Metallica tickets to a broker who Live Nation was directed to hire with the participation of Metallica's ticket consultant. And just like, we didn't notice that one because nobody gives a shit about Metallica, I guess. Well, there's also like literally, what are you going to do? I mean, every artist, every ticket master, every venue, their response to any of this is, what are you going to do i mean every artist every ticket master every venue their their response to any of this is what are you going to do yeah like a little bit

it's like huge artists like offloading the being a bad guy to ticket master ticket master doesn't care that they're bad like it's just like creates a layer of the the service that ticket master provides is creating a layer of plausible den that Ticketmaster provides is creating a layer of plausible deniability to artists to say to their fans I don't know it's Ticketmaster's fault Ticketmaster's like I don't know who cares right yeah that that really seems it's good for the artist because there's it creates demand it creates a story about how hard it is to get the tickets to their show it's good for ticket master like the only people it screws is the consumer and this is just i feel like this

is naturally what we'll be seeing more and more unless there is a actual concerted like political movement to push back against consolidation and deregulation and like these massive mergers but we just haven't seen it in any real way yeah in our lifetime you know like that yeah this this is what was happening in the like end of the 19th century early 20th century where like the robber barons were just consolidating all their power and then things had to get like really fucking bad for there to be like a massive pushback. And it seems like that's where we're headed. Is there anyone you would brave the Ticketmaster chaos for? What would be yours that you would be willing to do this for?

Probably Frank Ocean. Yeah, I would do it for Frank Ocean. I really like Frank Ocean. I'm too out of it to ever... I only ever know these things are going on sale when people start complaining that they couldn't get tickets on Twitter. Right. Yeah.

Yeah. How about you? No, I think everybody that I would have done it for is probably not somebody that I would want to buy tickets from anymore. Let's just say that. Probably the biggest concert I ever went to was Kanye back in the Yeezus era. That was one of the rare times I was like,

okay, I'll pay a lot of money to go see that. And now I don't want to do that anymore. Why would happen? We haven't actually been there. And music hasn't been so good. I didn't realize. I live like, I don't know, five blocks from Dodger Stadium, and i did not realize

that night that elton john was doing whatever his like last show ever at dodger stadium and i you know popped out to go get a taco and literally like was just stuck on sunset for like 45 minutes oh man oh wow i took the turn i was like oh no and then i looked on twitter and everyone's like going to elton john i was like well i guess i live here now yeah this is just where my car is going to be yeah you could have but i also like grew up in that like very midwestern punk ethos where it's like a place selling more than 20 like they're selling tickets for more than 20 dollars like i'm not going like was cool that. That was right. We were right back then. We were like talking about bands selling out and talking about like, you know, we're,

we're skeptical of Ticketmaster and there was a big like fuck Ticketmaster movement and it just kind of went away. But like, and like the idea of sellouts just like went away at a time when I feel like we need that protection, that sort of natural fan based skepticism, because it's it's bad. But on the other hand, I'm like, wow, like, yeah, of course, like you want all ages to be able to access the show and like under $20 ticket is great for that. But it's like, how do these bands survive that are not, you know, who are who are who are selling tickets for? that are not, you know, who are selling tickets for. I've actually made a concerted effort to go to a couple of like $25 to $40 ticket shows of bands that I'm like slightly interested in. I don't have to be like the biggest fan. And I'm just like, yeah, this doesn't seem like a lot of people for this to travel the

country for. It's a hard gig. So maybe like now that I'm older, I'm like, I would actually give these bands like $50. You know what I mean? Yeah throw throw them a bone yeah they're not getting a record deal that's gonna their spotify streams are not paying the bills let's just say they make their money off of all those lucrative spotify streams right yeah that's it yeah the tenth of a cent yeah by by a the um my my friend tony who is my podcast co-host, you can see us now. She has a rule, which is like, if you listen

to an artist on Spotify whatever number of times, buy their record on vinyl. Because also, they can never take that away from you. That's right. I just got a record player to do that very same thing. I have never been a vinyl person.

I fear it'll be a dangerous habit for me but i do feel like i want to throw some throw them some money because yeah not a huge concert person yeah and then ticket master is going to buy all the vinyl production just get the corner of the market it's all right man i'm listening to tapes uh which are made of oil. So shell. All right. That's going to do it for this week's weekly zeitgeist.

Please like, and review the show. If you like the show, uh, means the world to miles. He, he needs your validation folks. Uh,

I hope you're having a great weekend, and I will talk to you Monday. Bye. Thank you. I'm Jess Casavetto, executive producer of the hit Netflix documentary series Dancing for the Devil, 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. 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 caitlyn 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 caitlyn clark versus

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