The Joe Rogan Experience - #1938 - Mariana van Zeller

Episode Date: February 8, 2023

Mariana van Zeller is an award-winning investigative journalist, and host of Nat Geo’s "Trafficked with Mariana van Zeller." www.nationalgeographic.com/tv/shows/trafficked-with-mariana-van-zeller

Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out! The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast by night, all day! And we're up. Hello, good to see you again. What's happening? Great to see you too. Good to see you alive and well. You scare me sometimes with your dangerous adventures,

like real boots on the ground investigative journalism. Yeah. Oof. We've been all over the world. I think last time I was here was two years ago. Yeah. Last time you had just gotten back from the cocaine manufacturing in the jungle, which was wild.

And then you took a backpack with the stuff and traveled with the... That's right. Oof. Backpack with the stuff and traveled with the... That's right. Oof. And since I've reported on a lot of other drugs and other crazy situations. And we're now doing, actually already filming season four. Wow.

Season three is coming out. Tell people where to get it and what it's called. So yeah, it's Trafficked with Mariana Vanzella. It's on National Geographic. Next day on Hulu. And it's on Wednesdays at 9 p.m. And it's about black markets. So it's illegal markets around the world,

whether it's drugs, guns, fight clubs, I mean, anything, surrogacy, illegal surrogacy. The craziest one to me was the getting the guns in America and transporting them to Mexico, that that is going on and that it's going on with cops. It is. For me that it's going on with cops. It is. It is. For me, it's always been.

I think the first story I did on guns in America was about 12, 15 years ago, where I was able to buy an AK-47 out of a Taco Bell parking lot in Arizona. Where else? Where else than in Arizona. And then the funny thing that happened. I meant where else but a Taco Bell parking lot. Oh, yeah, of course. Both those things.

Of course. And then we went to a bar to sort of celebrate the fact that we just filmed this crazy thing that just happened. Because we knew it was possible that people were doing this, but we wanted to show it with our camera. So we had sort of secret cameras filming, and then I went out. And I bought it, and we went out to a bar after. And I ordered a beer, and I forgot my driver's license. So they didn't give me a beer. That's hilarious.

Isn't that funny? So no beer, but I could go out with a naked 47. And a few days later, we bought a 50 Cal out of a guy's garage that we went out into the desert and filmed. Women like it when they get carded. Of course we do. Yeah. Unfortunately, I don't get carded as often nowadays. It's just ridiculous.

You know, come on. I guess they have to. I mean, but whatever. Oh, it's ridiculous. I know. 21? Come on. I know.

Look at me. But this was 12 years ago, so it's possible. Possible. Yeah. How hard is it to buy an AK-47? It was so easy. We went online at the time. I can't remember the name of the website.

Backpage. At the time, there was a website called Backpage where you could essentially buy anything. I don't think that website exists anymore. But it's not even on the black market, regular online website. And we went there. And I think we spoke to the guy 20 minutes before. He said, meet us here. We went there. It was him and his girlfriend were there. He was high on drugs. there. It was him and his girlfriend were there. He was high on drugs. And he had two and he had an AR-15 with him as well that he was also wanting to sell. We ended up buying the AK. But yeah, so I've been fascinated with sort of how easy it is. How do you know he was high on drugs? Because you could tell. I've reported enough on drugs. Meth, you think? At the time, probably. He was very jittery. Yeah. It was definitely an upper. I'm sorry. Jesus.

And and then, yeah. So then we decided to do this for the first season, actually, of Traffic to Story on Guns and how American guns are winding up in the hands of the cartel in Mexico and how it's responsible for so much of the violence that's happening there and sort of this cycle, which I don't think most people think about how then the violence leads people to immigrate to America, and then they come here. And, you know, so it's like a cycle of violence and immigration, it's all and guns, and it's all sort of connected. But whenever we do a story on guns, and we just won another one that I did on ghost guns was released last week on National Geographic. And it is the most sort of controversial issue, the hot topic that we can always. So I immediately start getting messages of people saying that I should go back to my country. And what am I doing?

And I'm trying to take away people's rights to own a gun, which is absolutely not the case. And it's, yeah, it's devastating. Many of the people wouldn't want to know that police officers are confiscating guns and then selling those guns to the Mexican cartel, that you as a legal law-abiding gun owner in America wouldn't want that exposed. Yeah, absolutely. And that the guns that people are buying, and particularly with this last episode on ghost guns, which is the fact that the guns that are now these untraceable and licensed guns are so easy to make. And so many of them are ending up in crime scenes across America and on the hands of gang members and, you know, militant groups and anti-government groups.

And it's scary. government groups. And it's scary. And that's all what we're trying to do as a journalist myself, when we decided to do this story is because I started hearing from people talking about how these guns are ending up in the wrong place. And how do they make a ghost gun? It is, I'm happy you're asking that, because I think it's the biggest, people don't understand out there, they think that when you talk about ghost guns, that it has to be 3D printed. It's not. A ghost gun is an untraceable gun.

It doesn't mean that it has to be 3D printed. However, nowadays, it's basically a gun that doesn't have a serial number. And it could have had a serial number, and the serial number was scrubbed. And maybe they put a new fake serial number in there. But what happens is because of the 3D printers, it's now super easy to just print a gun or gun parts at home. So there are all these companies out there who sell 80% kits that have everything to build a gun except for the receiver. But there's a company, for example, called Defense Distributed, ran by Cody Wilson, who was the first one to use a ghost gun or a gun, a 3D printed gun. Actually, it was called the Liberator. And he got in all sorts of trouble. The Liberator.

Yeah. And he's a strong believer in, he said he wanted this, his company to be sort of the WikiLeaks for guns so that everybody could have access to guns. So he sells these kits that are 80% kits. And it's all, everything you need to buy a gun except for the lower receiver, which is what the ATF and the government actually considers to be the gun. What part is the lower receiver? It depends on which weapon, I believe, but it's the bottom. On the guns that he's selling, it's sort of the bottom piece. Oh, okay.

There's the liberator. Yeah, that is a liberator. Yeah, so this is all 3D printed. And he showed me... So that's an actual gun, that is a Liberator. Yeah, so this is all 3D printed. And he showed me... So that's an actual gun, that plastic thing? That is. Somebody pulled that on me, I'd be skeptical. And this was several years ago.

It's evolved a lot. It's evolved a lot since then. Yeah. A ghost gun. Wow. So that's a real gun, that plastic thing? Yeah. And so...

But yeah, but if you want to see some of the new ones and what they're making, yeah. These are also ghost guns. And some of that is metal. So where do they get the metal parts? It can be all 3D printed. Some of it is metal. So you can buy it from companies like Cody Wilson's. These 3D print metal? Oh, nowadays, yes. You can have a, it's like a polyamor, what's the, I can't remember. Polymer? Polymer, sorry. Polymer material that is, yeah, that's what a lot of the guns are actually made of. Like a carbon fiber or something?

Because I've seen carbon fiber barrels for hunting rifles. They make them very light so that people can take them into the backcountry when they go deep into the woods. Those are all the kind of parts you can make with 3D printing metal stuff. Oh, one of the craziest things we filmed for this ghost gun episode was actually these teenagers that were also making 3D and ghost guns. And they came to the desert with us, and we spent a whole day with them shooting guns and showing us what they build. showing us what they build. And they were also making drop-in sears, which are little pieces that transform a gun from semi-automatic to fully automatic.

And they're illegal, actually, in America. You can't buy that at a gun store, but they're making them for 50 cents. Yeah, it's a crazy world. How much of an education are you getting in how fucked we are by your show? Because I would be very pessimistic if I had gone to all the places that you've gone to and seen all the chaos that you've seen. I'm not. I'm not pessimistic at all. I think one of the biggest surprises for me filming this show has been finding out that even the people, not all, but the majority of the people that I've met involved in these illegal activities around the world, that they are very much people just like you and me.

And it is more often than not because of a lack of opportunities that they end up involved in a life of crime. And I think, you know, there is the idea that no matter how far I travel to the edges of our society and that I can still find people who are relatable and redeemable makes me actually have a very optimistic view of the world. Of course, that doesn't apply to everyone. You know, when I'm interviewing white supremacists who talk about, you know, wanting death for minorities or, you know, other people that I've interviewed. Have you done that? You've interviewed? Yeah, we did. We did an episode. Is that on this season? It's on season two, last season on white supremacy. Where did you go? We went to Denver. We interviewed a— Denver? Mm-hmm. There is a—we interviewed a couple of people in Denver, one of which was a 28-year-old, I believe.

He was a—I can't remember what he was by day, but he showed up wearing a swastika. But he showed up wearing a swastika and he was talking about a race war and he was going to do everything he could to make this race war start. And he was part of Atomwaffen, which is a big white supremacist something that they find that they can they can find a bunch of people that are energized about a very specific cause and then they find that if they align themselves with this group there's like a camaraderie and a brothership in this cause even if it's ridiculous and disgusting i think a lot of them yeah i think the vast majority of them actually lost people yeah and it's the and disgusting. I think a lot of them. Yeah. I think the vast majority of them actually. Lost people. Yeah.

And it's the danger of the internet, right? Because it's a loudspeaker. Unfortunately, it's a place where you can find that community, but that community is not always good. It's a danger of psychology too, right? The people are easily manipulated and they want to belong to a group. And especially if they think that it's like some sort of a secret group that other people don't know about and that they have this cause they think is, you know, valid or just. Or make sense of the world.

Maybe if the world is, if they feel like the world is not as unjust towards them, they feel like there has to be a reason behind it. So maybe it is. Did you ever see when W. Kamau Bell went and interviewed a bunch of KKK? He's great at that because he's such an easygoing, likable guy. He's so nice and so smart that when they're with him, they're like, hey, you're different. And I'm like, hey, man, you need some black friends. There's a lot of people like that out there, you fucking idiot.

It's like these poor, sad, lost people. And then they're committed to this thing, this horrible idea. I know. So much of it comes out of ignorance. Yeah, most of it. Yeah, I know. And foolishness. And it's just so disheartening that that's prevalent.

It is. It's very sad. Yeah, that sense of community is really missing for a lot of people. But, you know, unfortunately it leads to a lot of hate as well. So those were the people that for me were really difficult to empathize with. Yeah, I would imagine. What did you do this season? We did Ghost Guns.

We did one on LSD, psychedelics. It was my first time ever doing a story on psychedelics. It's a great episode. We basically spent months and months trying to get an interview with an LSD chemist. There's only a few of them out there. Yeah. There's only like five or six in the whole country, which is crazy. I know. I just found that out recently. Yeah. It's really, really hard. And we kept hearing about these hermit chemists who live out in the forests and are hidden. And, I mean, we interviewed so many people and talked to so many people to try to get access to.

And in the end, we got access to a chemist who is no longer a chemist, but it was one of the most powerful interviews we ever did. So he quit after you interviewed him? No, he got in trouble. He was an LSD chemist and he did time in prison, basically, in the UK. But he's American and he's now living in Montana. And he actually lives out of school bus in Montana. And it was a really powerful interview because, you know, I spent so much time reporting on drugs and talking to people who do it because of the money. And with psychedelics, we've filmed a lot of people involved in the psychedelics business selling mushrooms and LSD. And not one single one of them was doing it because of the money.

They all told us how they were doing it because of the power of the drug and how LSD has changed them and transformed them. And they really believe in the power of the drug in terms of sort of liberating and raising consciousness in the world. And he was one of them. So here I was finally in front of a chemist who spent, you know, years of his life making LSD. And then, and he started crying, bawling and talking about how, when I asked him, do you think, do you know other active chemists out there? And he told me, look, I do, but I would never give you that name because I would take away from them what has been taken away from me. And he starts bawling, talking about what LSD meant for him, what making LSD meant for him and how he was robbed of his life's meaning. It's really incredible. I was not expecting it. So he felt like his life's meaning. It's really incredible. I was not expecting it.

So he felt like his life's meaning was to provide it. To provide it and to allow people to experience what he experienced at a young age. Did you have any preconceived notions when you went into that that were dissolved? Absolutely. Again, I think the financial component. Most people that are involved in drug trafficking or the making of drugs do it because of money. And, you know, I don't use drugs, never have, because I'm afraid of losing control. I have tried weed, of course. I tried hash. Oh, one of the episodes we have for the upcoming season is actually about hash because it's the first drug I tried when I was growing up in Portugal.

It's decriminalized in Portugal. It's decriminalized. Portugal has an amazing success when it comes to drugs. Well, that's part of the problem with illegality, right? When things are illegal, only criminals are selling them. And then law-abiding people are prohibited from taking them. That's right. And one of the guys, the people we interviewed, was a former military suffering from PTSD, a young kid who had been in Afghanistan. I believe, yes, Afghanistan.

And he was part of the bomb-sniffing crew that goes looking for IEDs. And the car that he was in, actually, there was an IED that exploded under him. But it was all protected, so nothing happened to him. He suffered a concussion and was out for a few minutes and then was rescued. But there was still incoming shooting coming at him. It was like a whole situation. And he was suffering from PTSD. And he told us he was incapable, and he tried everything,

all the medication that was available for him by the traditional medical community. And nothing was working. And he says he was having trouble waking up in the morning. He was suffering, again, from PTSD. And then he tried LSD. And it changed, he says. It's completely changed his life. And he started doing LSD with a therapist, with somebody that sort of a shaman, I guess.

A shaman who helps him. And we filmed one of his first sessions with a therapist, with somebody that sort of a shaman, I guess, a shaman who helps him. And we filmed one of his first sessions with a person. He had done it before, but it was one of the first sort of guided sessions. And it was fascinating to see. And he's now in school. And I'm not sure if his life is all perfectly fine, but he's doing much better, according to him. Well, whose life is perfectly fine? Yeah, exactly.

It's life. Yeah. But that is one of the best therapeutic uses of it. Did you speak to anyone at MAPS? We did. Actually, up in Canada, too. We spend time in Vancouver as well. It's big there.

We spend time with some people who are using it as therapy. And it's, yeah, it was, again, as somebody who hasn't done a lot of work with psychedelics, it was really, really incredible. And I have since micro-dosed on mushrooms, and I really like it. Yeah, it's great. I'm a fan. Yeah, it's great. I'm a fan. To me, it does what I think I thought people tell you weed does, which is it makes you sort of relax and laugh. That's what microdosing does.

Oh, microdosing does that way better than weed. Right. Because weed, for some people, it gives you that paranoia that they don't like at all. Yeah, that's what happens to me. I think it's if you are more like me who want to always be in control, the weed doesn't work. But microdosing on mushrooms, I've tried it three times during the pandemic. My position on that is that you should lose control. That feeling of wanting to be in control is ridiculous because you don't have any control anyway. And that you really should embrace the paranoia that comes with it because i think what it is is an expanding of your awareness and just how insanely bizarre life is life is

you you can decide that life is normal if you do the same thing every day and you have a limited amount of variability you know everything you drive to work the same way you work with the same people you do the same thing come home to the same family, and life seems okay. And then you get really high and you're like, oh my God, this is crazy. It's true. But for somebody who already lives in the uncomfortable side of life constantly for my work, I'm always in places that usually people would make them feel out of control. Sure. You know what I mean? That's your psychedelic experience. That is my psychedelic experience. Exactly. I don't need another one.

I see your position. I mean, I see how people are. And I have very good friends that don't like pot. And I'm a pot evangelist. It's changed me. It changed who I am as a person. It changed the way I feel about things. It changed the way I treat people.

It changed the way I look at life. Yeah. I think it's a person. It changed the way I feel about things. It changed the way I treat people. Changed the way I look at life. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's a, it's a tool and I had a joke about it. It's like any tool. It's like a hammer. You could build a house with a hammer or you could hit yourself in the dick if you're crazy. And that's the problem with anything. And things are open for abuse. Everything's open for abuse. Gambling, food, everything, sex. Yeah. People are, you know, we have a problem with discipline and with structure and with an objective analysis of life. And so when you add things like marijuana or mushrooms or LSD or anything to those, you could. There's also people that have legitimate psychological and mental health problems. And for them, it's very dangerous because

I had Alex Berenson on, I don't know if you know who he is. He was, he used to be with the New York Times and he wrote a book called Tell Your Children. And it was about marijuana and the dangers of marijuana. And I had him on with Mike Hart, who's a doctor from Canada who prescribes marijuana. He's a pro marijuana doctor. And I was actually more on Berenson's side, even though I'm a marijuana advocate. I think it's for me, it's been very valuable, but I also know people that have lost their mind. I 100% know people that used to be okay and did too much pot and got really, really deep into it and lost their grip of reality and became either marijuana triggered schizophrenia or they had schizophrenia already. But it was manageable, you know, that it's probably variable in its intensity and what happens. And then their experiences with marijuana push them

over the edge. And I think that's a real possibility. Yeah. But I think you can apply that to a lot of things. Yeah, certainly with alcohol. Certainly. Yeah. With gambling. So there's a yeah, it's but again, that's a yeah, people have a hard time, you know, keeping it together. Yeah. And when something like marijuana comes along, but that doesn't mean that it should be illegal. That means there should be some real counseling and there should be places that people can go where they can talk to someone and therapy and there should be a way to make it legal. I 100% agree. I mean, one thing we know is that the war on drugs hasn't worked. The billions of dollars that the United States has spent on the war on drugs has actually had the reverse effect. And as you know, well, the biggest drug epidemic in America's history was created right here in

America by the pharmaceutical companies. Yes. Well, that's how I found out about you from the OxyContin Express. That was so eye opening. And when you did that, what channel were you guys on back then? Current TV was Al Gore's television channel. It was Al Gore's? That's hilarious. It was actually a really interesting experiment. So it was right before YouTube started. And basically they were trying to, the idea was democratizing television. It was giving young kids out there a platform to go out there and explore the world and come back with these stories. So that's how I started. What year was this?

This was 2005 or 2006. Oh, wow. 2005 was when I started, yeah. So a long time ago. And then YouTube came around. It turns out that YouTube was a bigger success than going TV. But I really – the show that I worked on was called Vanguard. And it was all these young journalists who, most of us had just graduated, but they basically gave us cameras.

And in my case, my husband at the time was my boyfriend. We both applied. They hired us both. And then we traveled all around the world. He would film. I would be on camera. And then we'd come back. I'd edit.

He'd write. We'd do these stories together. And one of the stories we did was the prescription pill story, the OxyContin Express, which is how we met, because he tweeted about it. Well, I think your work really changed the way people were aware of that problem in Florida. And it changed the laws, because they didn't have databases back then, which was 100% on purpose. Yeah. So you could go doctor shopping. You could go from pill mill to pill mill or pain clinic to pain clinic to buy prescription pills. The amazing thing is my husband is still reporting on this. He actually had a film on CNN that's coming on HBO Max in April.

And it's called American Pain. So I don't know. Do you remember the twins that were running American Pain. So I don't know, do you remember the twins that were running American Pain? It was the biggest pill mill or prescription pain clinic in South Florida. It's called American Pain. And it was run by these two twins who were born, they were born conjoined twins at birth. And then they ran a steroid business and they got in trouble. And then they realized that actually they could make a lot more money from selling Oxycontin than they could from selling steroids. So they opened this little small strip mall pain clinic. And as you saw, people started coming in from all over the country and

buying and the doctors wouldn't even look at them and they were prescribing pills like it was Tic-Tacs. And we found out about them because we were reporting in Kentucky and we were the sheriff who was, you know, overdoses all around them, people, you know, dying, devastating his community. And a lot of the pill bottles had this name, American Pain. And we started, we went down there and we took out the camera and my husband took out the camera. And we, the first shot we got immediately within minutes, this big SUV came with two big guys who were threatening us and started yelling at us and telling us to leave, that we weren't allowed to film. So we drove off and I'm driving. And this is actually in the film.

But I'm driving and my husband's filming and they're right behind us. And we decided to film this as the last thing. We were heading to the airport. And we're driving down 985 to head to the airport. And they start following us. And then I realized I have very little gas. So I stop at the gas station and they stop right behind us. And they come out of the car.

And these were big guys. And the day before, we'd been watching The Sopranos. So in my mind, they were coming out guns a-blazing and they were going to kill us both. So I drove off. I was us both. So I drove off. I was so nervous. And I drove off. And they continued following us. And I didn't put gas in the car.

So we're at 995. And we called 911 and said, hey, we're being followed by this car. And to explain the situation. And then I ran out of gas. Oh, my God. As we were filming. And I pulled over to the curb. But they were so sort of surprised, shocked.

They had no idea, confused by what was happening, that they just parked behind us and came out of, and they never came out of the car. And then the police arrived. And then they made up an excuse that they thought I was an old girlfriend or something like that. But my husband took down their license plates and found out their names. And it was the George brothers, Jeff and Chris George, who are running the biggest prescription or pill mill in America's history. They were making, I think, something like $40 million a year out of this small little pill mill, you know, strip mall clinic. And it was incredible. And then a year later, one of them just left prison, and the other one was still in prison.

So those were the guys that were following you, the guys that owned the organization? They owned American Pain. Our organization was just a strip mall clinic, pain clinic, with thousands of patients that would come in and out and tons of doctors writing prescription pills. And when we were working at the time where we'd been interviewing off the record, a DA agent who didn't want to go on the record, that we later found out was actually investigating them and they had wiretaps. So in Darren's movie, he got his hands on all the wiretaps. So you could hear them. And part of it, there's a part where they talk about us and our film and how we were

trying to look into them. So it all sort of came. That's it. South Florida Pain Clinic. Yeah. So South Florida Pain Clinic. And then they changed to a new location, a bigger location, and called it American Pain. What a great name, by the way.

Yeah. American Pain. And those are the two brothers down there with the fish? Yeah. That's the two brothers. Those are the guys that were chasing you? Yeah. Wow.

Well, they found a loophole. It's a crazy story. So they're in prison and Darren, he sends them an email and says, hey guys, remember that guy that you chased down in 1995? I'm doing a film about you. Do you want to be interviewed? And they did. It's a great film. What did they say?

Did they just spill the beans about what they did? They talked a lot about sort of how they grew up and why they did it. It's, yeah, I think it's interesting. They'd already gotten in trouble, so they had really nothing to lose at that point. But wasn't what they were doing legal? No, it was, what they were, so that is the difficulty. And that's why actually so little people, so there should have been a lot pharmaceutical executive that has been gone to prison. The pharmaceutical companies are the ones that were actually making the big money, right? And it's not just the Sacklers of Purdue. It's also the generic companies that were making even more. And nobody was actually, I mean, nothing practically happened

to them. No one did time in prison. And it's so sad when you find out how many people lost their lives and how many people, even if they're alive, their lives are destroyed. I mean, Joe, having traveled and reported on this, the opiate crisis for so long, it's whole communities that have been devastated. It's horrible. It's the biggest sort of outrageous um thing that has happened in america and uh and it was made here again we can blame others but it was made here and because we allowed it to happen it's just amazing the deception that was involved too they they tried to claim that they weren't addictive and and they were just passing them out to people and it's i mean i um I had talked before about this.

I had my nose fixed. I had a deviated septum. And when I got out of the operating room, I was kind of shocked that it wasn't painful. I was like, this is fine. This is just a little mildly uncomfortable. And the doctor tried to give me two different prescriptions for opiates. And I was like, I'm not going to use those.

Because I had had knee surgery and I also didn't take pain pills. I don't mind pain. What I really don't like is feeling stupid. And when I took, I think it was, I don't remember if it was Percocets or Vicodin. I don't remember. But one of my first knee surgeries, they gave me one of those and I took it. And I remember being on my couch when I lived in New York and just sitting there watching TV like this, feeling so stupid and thinking, oh my God, I'm never taking this shit again. Like whatever this is doing to me. First of all, I don't think it really stopped

the pain because I remember getting up because I had to go to the bathroom and it was like liquid fire was going through my knee. And I was like, if it still fucking hurts like this and I'm dumb as shit, like I am not taking these anymore. I know. It's the ease with which they were dispensed and are still being dispensed to some degree. My doctor was trying to force me to take them. He was like, you really should take these. You're going to be in pain. I go, well, it's just a little pain. Like, is it worse than this right now? And he goes, it could be. I'm like, how could it get worse?

Why is it going to get worse? Like if it doesn't, if it just is mildly uncomfortable now. And like, so the doctor was just like, you should take this. And I was like, why would I take that? But I don't, I wasn't, I didn't understand why. understand why. Like, couldn't I come back to you if I'm in pain? Like, if I'm not in pain now, why do you want me? It was this weird conversation where it was like, I don't know if he was incentivized to try to prescribe them, if he felt like it would be good for him. I didn't understand it. Like, couldn't he just, if you wrote the prescriptions and I didn't take it, like, what do you care? But he wanted me to take them.

Yeah. It was weird. So strange. I mean, that's what was happening with OxyContin. That's what was happening later on. We did another story on fentanyl. That was what was happening with fentanyl, too. You had a company and we investigated one particular company.

And I think it's the only CEO of a company that he's now in prison, actually, for what he was doing. But yeah, he was bribing, essentially. And he was charged with bribing. He was bribing doctors. And there was a quota. And he was basically telling them, if you prescribe more of our product, which was fentanyl, a spray fentanyl called Sapsis, if you prescribe more, we will give you more money. He was paying them out and taking them on trips, luxurious trips around the world, and telling them not only to prescribe this medication to people who have headaches and back pain, a medication that is made and FDA approved

only for breakthrough cancer patients, but yet you go to the doctor and you say you have a headache, and this guy knows that he can get a kickback from the company. And so, oh, you should take this drug. How much of a kickback was it? It was significant. It was in the thousands of dollars. Some doctors got hundreds of thousands of dollars. And so they were incentivized. Yeah, there was a big incentive to do it. Yeah. And they were also invited to these luxury

vacations and to go to speaking fees. What they said is that they were paying them for speaking fees, which basically was bribes. Yeah. I have a good friend who used to be a pharmaceutical representative and he explained to me how it works, that he would not just know the doctor, but he got to know, he knew who the doctor's kids names were. He would show up at their baseball games and he would give them gifts. He would take them out to dinners. And it was all about cultivating these relationships and that it was all about like,

I'm your friend. And you know, like they wanted to have this sort of weird cronyism, weird sort of relationship where even if it wasn't illegal, like clearly he was influencing them to sell more pills. It's so crazy. Yeah. Yeah. It's crazy and it's crazy that it's still happening. And it's just shocking that not more people have gotten in trouble because of it. What has changed in Florida? Because they did change and they made a database, right? Yeah. There's a database right now,

which was the biggest thing that didn't. So you could go to 10 doctors in one day and get 150 pills from each doctor. At the end of the day, you'd have 1,500 pills and no one would know about it. And then you'd grab those pills and go and sell them to other places of the country where you could get 20 times more for the same drug. Yeah, so the database is, it's just much harder. I think there's one of the things that I remember that we reported on, that you shouldn't be able to prescribe and dispense at the same location, because it's a conflict of interest, right? If you have, if you're going to make money out of the selling of those pills, you shouldn't,

it shouldn't be at the same place where you're prescribing them because then there's an incentive for you to prescribe because you're making money from the sale of those pills. So that was happening in Florida as well. And it's not allowed in a lot of other states. And then the horrible truth is that a lot of those people became addicted and then they had to get it on the black market. So then they were getting fentanyl, laced heroin and massive amount of overdoses. Yeah. The progression was Oxycontin and then it was heroin and then it became fentanyl-laced heroin and massive amount of overdoses. Yeah, the progression was OxyContin, and then it was heroin, and then it became fentanyl. Yeah, and it's still out there. And yet, you know, we talk about drugs.

One of the episodes we did this season that's coming out soon is about MDMA. And we also looked at sort of the therapeutical side of MDMA. But one of the reasons why I became interested in reporting on MDMA, I grew up with going to parties that there was ecstasy all around me, never tried it. Knew some friends actually that tried it and it didn't go so well for them. They still have, like you were talking about your friend with the weed, how they went off the deep end a little bit. Oh, they went off the deep end with MDMA? Yeah. One, one friend I know that used to

go to these parties and I knew her well and she, um, yeah, she went off the deep end. Um, I haven't been in touch with her for a while, but it wasn't, it wasn't a good, it doesn't hit everybody the same way. Well, not only that, I think a lot of people were doing it almost every day. There was a lot of people that I had heard of that were going to these parties and raves, and they just couldn't wait to get back to that state. Because that state of being high on MDMA was so wonderful and so lovely. And just so, you know, everyone was like dancing and touching each other's hands and hugging. Have you tried it. Yeah. It's the love drug, right? It's called the love drug because of it. It removes all of your inhibitions.

You have zero inhibitions and you feel so nice and feel so, yeah, you feel so, it's like you don't worry about anything. You just feel with love. You know, it just, it just fills you with i guess dopamine and serotonin right yeah yeah and you're just overwhelmed by and i was thinking like imagine if you could if this could be engineered where humans could have an elevated level of this all the time you would have the most wonderful world, but probably nothing would get done. I was going to say, I'm sure there's a flip side to that.

There's a flip side to everything. But if there was a way to, I was thinking like, if there was a way to maintain that state where you had an elevated level of serotonin, like people would treat people so much differently. I'm sure, yeah. There's a real, again, it was one of those drugs that when the episode we did, there was a lot of people who are real believers in MDMA and talk about it, how it's being used therapeutically. But obviously, there's a flip side to that too. So the reason we decided to investigate MDMA was because I got an email from my son's school in L.A. And it was from basically warning parents

that there had been a kid in a school close by, a high schooler who died thinking they were taking an ecstasy pill and it was laced with fentanyl. Really sad story. But it got me thinking, so who's making ecstasy? Where is it being made? How is it being made? How is it getting here?

And then I found out that the biggest, I don't know if you know this, but sort of the center, the best MDMA is actually coming from the Netherlands in Europe. And the drug business there have sort of transformed the country into what many people call a narco state. So there was a very high profile crime journalist called Peter R. DeVries who was killed as he was on the streets of Amsterdam as he was coming out of work one day. who was killed as he was on the streets of Amsterdam as he was coming out of work one day. Lawyers that were representing this guy that was a whistleblower for one of the big drug leaders was also killed. So there's insane things happening in Holland right now, and a lot of it because of the drug trade and partly because of MDMA. There were videos of torture chambers found. The police did a raid on a place that was being used as torture chambers for rival groups. It's crazy.

We had heard about that. Who brought that up recently, Jamie? Someone brought that up about Moroccans and the Netherlands. Who was it? Peter Zion. Was it? I don't know. I'm not sure. It was fairly recently. Yeah. But yeah, that's terrifying. And that's what you get when things are illegal. You get organized crime. That'sized and why it was such a success is the rates of incarceration went immediately down. The rates of AIDS went down. People are basically given an option whether they want to go to rehab or if they're caught with a certain amount over a certain amount or if they want to go to prison. Of course, most people just choose to go to rehab. Right. And, you. And the rates of addiction have gone down. There are safe places for people to use drugs. And it really has been an incredible success in Portugal. And I keep telling everyone who wants to listen to me that we should emulate

that or at least try to. Yes. But I think we already are so deep in this problem in the United States is that the cartels are bringing these drugs over here in such high numbers. And they obviously have a very ruthless organized crime business. And even if it's decriminalized, they're still going to be controlling the supply and demand. It's true. And that happened with weed in California. So an episode we did last season was about weed and how the black market for weed, the illegal weed market, is actually three times bigger than the legal market, even after it's been legalized in California. And that is because the government has made it so difficult for people to get a license and so costly that people just decide to continue running their weed business illegally. Well, not only that, but they've also made it so that growing marijuana, even with an intent to distribute, is just a misdemeanor. So if you are,

so there was a man named John Norris, who we had on the podcast, who wrote a book called Hidden Wars, and he was a game warden in California. Oh, I listened to that book. It was really good. Really interesting, because his original job was just to find people that were violating fishing game laws, like catching too many fish or something like that. And they found a creek that had dried up and had been diverted to this illegal grow up on national land and that these forests. Yeah, we filmed some of them. And it's crazy. You're out. We took – the police went in. We went on a big raid with the police.

They went in. They were rappelling down helicopters. We had to hike in and it was hours and hours with all our gear to try to get to this place. It was in the middle of nowhere. And it was, you know, fields and fields of illegal weed. And it was all controlled by the cartel. We actually managed to speak to one of them that was there as a worker. And that's the really sad part of it. Oh a lot of them are just getting paid nothing for it.

Yeah, and they're risking their lives, and they're camping out there. Yeah, I have a friend who works on a ranch in California who discovered one of those. Oh, wow. Yeah, they stumbled upon these pipes, these plastic pipes. These guys had carried these in 15, 20 miles on their backs and set this up. And he was like, if they were doing something legal, maybe these guys are hard workers. Like you would say like, this is a guy I'd want to hire. Like how much ingenuity, how much hard work and discipline to carry these things so deeply and to set this all up. But that's the thing with all the black markets, I feel like I investigate,

that there is so much entrepreneurship. Yeah. You know, they're really smart. And, again, I think that a lot of them, if they were given, again, not all, but a lot of them, if they were given the legal route, they would have been amazing members of our society. Yes, a lot of them. Not all.

The people at the top, though? Oh, no. No. I mean a lot of them. Not all. The people at the top, though? Oh, no. No. I mean, they're probably too far gone. But the people at the top wouldn't be at the top if they didn't have people working and making them money. Yes. Those are the people.

Yeah. And yeah, that's the real problem with poverty, right? The real problem with poverty is like it incentivizes people to do crime because they're so desperate. Yeah. Their life sucks so bad. They're willing to do illegal things just to try to get by and do something to better themselves. It's the inequality is the number one reason why these black markets exist. I always say that.

But another interesting thing, going back to weed, a scene we filmed, which still blows my mind, was we filmed and this was a guy at the top he was running a many million dollar worth uh illegal weed business and he was running it or at least he was selling it out of the top floor of a building in downtown LA um which was a garage sort of an open garage and he was it there for, I think, two hours. And there were dozens of cars that were coming in and buying bulk, like huge bags of all illegal weed. And he had his security guys with guns. And this was out in the open on the top floor of this downtown apartment, high rise. It was insane.

So crazy. Yeah. I mean, supply and demand, right? There's always going to be someone that comes along that's willing to take a chance. Yeah. And he had a real estate business, apparently. And he told us that he was making a lot more money from his illegal black market weed business than he was from his real estate business. Is that guy still out on the streets? The last time we spoke to him was a year and a half ago, and he was doing great. Yeah. He was doing great. Yeah.

He was doing great. Yeah. And then they have to figure out a way to launder that money. Yeah. Oh yeah. You know, it's, I started being,

I started asking now almost everybody we interview because I'm fascinated by that. Like, what do you do with your money? Right. If you know, we interview one of the episodes we did this season was about crypto scams. And we spent time with these like three 20-something-year-olds who made millions of dollars out of crypto scams. Have you heard of rug pulls?

Rug pulls? A rug pull? No. So they would put out these tokens. They would invent this token. Imagine we'd call this token the Joe Rogan token. And they would get people and they would start with a certain seed money that they'd put in. And then they would, this is

in the DeFi market. Do you know anything about crypto? A little bit. Yeah. So there's the DeFi market, which is more unregulated market. And where you have all these tokens, which is not Bitcoin or Ethereum. It's another, it's more unregulated. And you have these tokens and you can go and buy these tokens. And there's PR people that are out there telling you that this is the new hottest token and you can make money overnight. So you build, you set out, you launch this Joe Rogan token, you put some seed money on it, you start, you get a PR person to go out there and get celebrities, you know, putting out social media posts about how this new Joe Rogan token is the shit and you should

absolutely buy it. And people start buying it. And after a few weeks, they basically sell all their shares and the value, the price goes down. But they've, what they made, they invested, I don't know, like a hundred dollars and they've made millions of dollars and so people are left with nothing yeah it's a rug pull and these kids told us that they were making you know millions and millions of dollars um and so yeah one of the biggest questions i had so what are you using how do you launder this money how you because obviously and i mean they were flying private they rented a huge mansion in Dubai. They were there for the crypto convention. And, yeah, they were investing heavily in real estate and in other businesses, restaurants and businesses like that. It's really fascinating.

Yeah, the crypto market is very bizarre. You know, this whole FTX thing with Sam Bankman Freed, I'm just fascinated by that. Me too. Fascinated by it. And I was reading a thing today about the new CEO who was hired to untangle it and find out what was going on. And his depictions, he said it was just 100% old-fashioned embezzlement and that these people had none of the fail-safes and none of the protection that you would normally give to people investing their money. And they were just moving money around and they were all on speed and just having sex with each other all together in this one house, nine of them, just wild. Oh, my God. There's a documentary being done.

We looked into it because I am fascinated about him. Yeah. Right now, I think. He's fucked. Yeah. They're going to make an example out of him. Yeah. And what's crazy is that they were the number two donor to the Democratic Party.

So by doing that, they, you know, thought they probably had some sort of protection, probably would have if that other guy from Binance hadn't sank their battleship. Yeah, it was crazy. It's all wild. Did you invest in crypto? No, no. I have a little bit of Bitcoin, very little. But it's like I watch it go up, I watch it go down. I'm like, what do you do with that?

You know? Yeah. Same here. Yeah. We sold a lot of it or cashed out a lot of it to give to Fight for the Forgotten. It's a charity that one of the guests of my podcast, Justin Wren, had created to build wells for the pygmies in the Congo. So it went to good. Oh, that's great.

I just came from the Congo. Did you really? What were you there for? Yeah, doing a story on ape trafficking and actually spent time with the pygmies. Ape trafficking? Yeah. Apes are being trafficked. So people are selling them?

Gorillas, chimpanzees, they're illegally being snatched. Baby gorillas go for tens of thousands of dollars. What do people do selling them? Gorillas, chimpanzees. They're illegally being snatched. Baby gorillas go for tens of thousands of dollars. What do people do with them? They sell them to private zoos and people who just want to have animals in their houses. A lot of them end up in the UAE. And it's very, very sad. Private zoos? Mm-hmm.

People who don't know what to do with their money and they like exotic animals. And so they own chimpanzees and even gorillas. It's crazy. I remember when I had Mike Tyson on, he was explaining to me how he got into lions. Lions and tigers. And tigers, yeah. And it was basically, I think, wasn't he saying he was talking to a guy about cars? And the guy was, you know, like what kind of cars he wants to buy. And the guy was like hey you want a lion really and that's how he got into it mike had tigers yeah i remember yeah which is just insane and apparently when you have a tiger the tiger will listen to you but no one else which is terrifying so you have this enormous predatory animal that you don't let kill things and has these deep genetic desires to catch things and kill them. I mean, that's literally what it's like

taking. I mean, it's taking a creature that has a genetic propensity for a very specific thing and denying them that thing and then hoping that they don't revert. for a very specific thing and denying them that thing and then hoping that they don't revert. Yeah, it's insane. It's everything that's wrong. Well, it's crazy. Do you know that there's more tigers in captivity in Texas than there are in all the wild of the world?

I do. We did a story on tigers, too. Texas has the number one population of tigers in captivity in private collections. It's crazy. We visited the Doc Antle. What's that? The Doc Antle. Do you remember? Did you watch Tiger King? I did.

So we were filming with, we talked to Joe Exotic and Doc Antle. Do you remember Doc Antle? Which one was he? Is he the guy that ran the sex cult? He's the one that has the safari kind of, yes. Is he the guy, the weird guy with all the girls? He's the one with several wives or girls. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, that's the one. So we or girls. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the one. So we were filming that before Tiger King came out. And actually, Tiger King was great because a lot of people wanted to watch our doc because Tiger King

became so popular. But we did, yeah, we did an episode about that and it all started because the idea that there are more tigers in captivity in the United States,

in Texas, to be even more precise. I didn't know that it was just in Texas but in the U.S. Well, they have them in Oklahoma, but Texas has some pretty wacky laws when it comes to the ownership of animals. In many ways, it's a success story for some animals.

Like there's animals like oryx that are endangered in their natural habitat but are prevalent and hunted in Texas. It's very strange. Like I went to a ranch in South Texas recently to hunt a wild white-tailed deer and an animal called Neil guy, which is an Indian animal that evolved around tigers. This is a crazy animal, really bizarre looking animal, but they're all over the place they have so many of them here and they they just have these enormous ranches tens of thousands of acres and they have all these animals from other countries there like you we were driving around we saw let ways and oryx and all these like bizarre exotics that they're all over Texas.

And the thing about them is there's no hunting regulations in terms of like wildlife conservation will put limits and tag limits on animals because they're controlling the population and they want to make sure that the populations are healthy. And so like if you're in an area, like say if you want to hunt mule deer in a very protected specific area, there's thousands of people apply for tax, but a very limited number of people get them. And there's a very specific area you can hunt in. And this is all done. And that money all goes to wildlife conservation. It all goes to park rangers and protecting habitat. And it's a very successful and really well-organized and well-funded plan.

In Texas, there's none of that. It's private property. So you can hunt these animals 365 days a year. Wow. And they're owned by the people who own the property. But again, in many ways, it's a success story because by giving these animals value, they have an incentive to keep their population strong and healthy. And so you have this enormous population of these exotic animals here. Right, which is what they're trying to do in places like the Congo and Rwanda, where you can still find gorillas, for example, is giving them value.

So instead of hunting them, there is money going to the people who are currently hunting them, hopefully. The Pygmies was an example of that. It was really sort of sad, because we spent time filming with them, and they are involved in the hunting of gorillas and chimpanzees. And their story in particular, I mean, they are from a lot of these protected parks. And since the parks became protected, the government is telling them that they can't live anymore there. But this is their life. This is what their, you know, generations and generations before them, this is what they did. And it's not as if they can go to the cities and find a job either. So there is obviously an enormous incentive for them to hunt illegally and kill and sell some of these endangered animals.

So I think, you know, one of the things that you see that are examples of success are when you make them conditions for tourists to come in and see and spend time with these animals. Going and seeing the gorillas was one of the most incredible experiences of my life. I recommend it to anyone if you're remotely interested in traveling to Rwanda or Congo. It was incredible. So you saw them in the wild? In the wild, yeah. So you hike and you don't know exactly where they are. We went with park rangers. We left at like 6 a.m. in the morning. They knew where they had been the day before, but in the meantime, 16 hours have passed, and they have no idea where they are. They're not tracking them with trackers or anything. So then we start hiking up this mountain, and these are lowland gorillas, eastern gorillas. They're an endangered species, beautiful animals. And we're tracking them, And then they start seeing,

they start from the place where they had seen them the day before. And then they sort of follow their trace. And they, you know, see where they have pooped and where they have eaten, broken branches. And it was, I don't know, three hours with all our heavy equipment tracking them and trying to see until we finally, there's a moment that for us is completely exhilarating after you're hot and you're bitten by mosquitoes and you're exhausted. And we're unsure, maybe we're not, maybe we're going to be the only people who are not going to see gorillas. And finally we get to this corner, this place, and the park ranger says,

oh, completely nonchalantly says, oh, it's right here. says, oh, completely nonchalantly, he says, oh, it's right here. And right behind a bush, there's a gigantic silverback, a male gorilla, and a family, the female and a bunch of little babies, including a little baby that was born two weeks before. And we were the first ones to ever film the little baby. And it was a, yeah, my mother carrying the baby around. And then there was that one moment we were all together and you have to sort of be quiet. Obviously, you don't want to start yelling next to gorillas because you can scare them.

But yeah, we were from here to you, me to you right now. That's how close we were to the gorillas. How dangerous was that? They had never suffered any attacks by the gorillas. The gorillas have sort of gotten used to having people around them. There's obviously rules. You can't start jumping in front of them or you shouldn't try to touch them. And it depends on there's different sort of responses that you should have for different gorillas.

With the lowland gorillas, I can't remember. I think with the lowland gorillas, you actually have to be, you can look them in the eye. There's the other gorillas that are in Rwanda that you shouldn't look them in the eye, that you have to look down. And I actually had experienced that before as well. So I'm incredibly privileged that I've seen gorillas twice. But with these gorillas, you're actually supposed to look them in the eye. I think that's right. But yeah, it's really, it was an amazing experience. But obviously you're not supposed to go up to them and the eye. I think that's right. But yeah, it's really, it was an amazing experience.

But you obviously you're not supposed to go up to them and touch them or, and as we were filming, our producer was sort of behind me and he was a little bit on this open trail or this patch that was, you know, the gorillas had gone through. So it was kind of no brush there. And suddenly one of the big girls that we had an idea was there, came behind him and was fast and fast approaching. He had to jump out of his place and it was a really close encounter.

But he wasn't coming to attack him or anything. He was just trying to pass through. But they're massive animals, massive. But yeah, they have never suffered any attacks and it's really a spectacular experience there's a video that i saw of these uh men that are in this gorilla habitat and this gorilla walks through and grabs one of the men and just drags him like you would pick up a laptop bag and just move it a

little bit it just almost like just letting them know like hey man i'll just drag you a little bit. Just almost like just letting him know like hey man I'll just drag you a little bit just to let you know. We all joked that my producer This is it. Oh yeah. So this gorilla walks up I mean this is

Silverback and look at the size of him. I know. So he grabs this man by the leg and just drags him. It's a park ranger yeah.

And just lets him go and look at his face like okay okay okay I mean you imagine the feeling of one of those things grabbing a hold of your leg and just pulling you like you weigh nothing. It's insane, yeah.

We all sent around this video joking that our producer is called Paul and he was the one that got the closing counter. I think that was next time we go. Could have been you. So people are taking those gorillas and stealing them. Stealing them and, for example, chimpanzees are super protective, as are gorillas, of their families and their kids. And so what happens is that a lot of times you have to kill the mother in order to be able to take the baby. So when you're stealing one, it's not just one. Sometimes it's the whole family that dies so that you can take the baby with you.

But these chimps can go for tens of thousands of dollars. And so there's a real incentive there. And we ended up speaking with a guy who bought the chimps from the hunters and then was selling them, was sort of a middleman, and was telling us how he carries them, how he transports them, all of it. It's really horrible. How much of a demand is there for these things? Apparently a gigantic demand.

Really? And there's videos out there that you can see on Instagram and YouTube with people, a little less now, but it still exists. But a few years ago, people posting photos of them with their private gorillas and chimpanzees that they just bought. And a lot of it is UAE you were saying? A lot of it is UAE. Yeah. Right now the trade is a lot of it is UAE or something? A lot of it is UAE. Yeah. Right now, the trade is a lot of it is UAE and, yeah. And they have private zoos.

Did you visit any of these private zoos? We tried. We got denied access. We didn't get a visa to go to Dubai, unfortunately, to film it. We wanted to, but we didn't get a visa. So in Dubai, they have these private zoos? We know of a few of them that we heard and and we wanted to go visit and ask questions and continue our investigation to find if any of them had come from the Congo. And who are these people that have these private zoos?

Just really, really wealthy people? Some are not even public zoos, so it's private, so it's just for them and their friends. So it's private. So it's just for them and their friends. There are others that have parks, you know, a little bit like Doc Antle's Safari Park, where people can come and pay and visit the wild animals. Yeah, also it's, and some people like to post it on Instagram and, or people pay to go and take selfies with these animals, which I'm still, I cannot believe that this is still a thing that happens today.

People pay and want to take selfies with wild animals. It's very sad because it's incentivizing the trade is what it's doing. Had you heard anything when you were in the Congo about those extraordinarily large chimps, the Bondo apes? No, the Bondo apes. Yeah, there's like a subspecies of chimpanzee that's enormous. Yeah, there's like a subspecies of chimpanzee that's enormous. They're much larger. And the locals have two categories that they call the smaller chimps tree beaters because they're up in the trees.

And the bottom ones they call lion killers. And they nest on the ground like gorillas. And they're huge. Oh, wow. Yeah, there's a, I think he's from switzerland a wildlife photographer named carl amon and he was one of the first people to to definitely document these things because there had been old photos from like the 1920s these black and white photos of these ones that they had killed that were huge. And there's one famous photo of these two men that are at a, see, that's one of them.

Oh, wow. But that's not even the biggest one. There's one, that one up there, that one. Look at the size of that thing. Wow, that does not look like a chimp. I know. It's enormous. That one they kill, they call it the Beely Ape, the Bondo Ape.

And they have a crest on their skull like a gorilla does. And so initially they thought they were a hybrid. That one is one of them that was walking upright, that photo to the left of that, Jamie, the one down, down, down below that, right there, that one. That one was a photo that they took with a camera trap. So it walked by upright. And they saw this one walk across the road. And they said it's six feet tall. A six-foot-tall chimpanzee that was hundreds and hundreds of pounds.

Endangered? Well, they don't know how many of them there are. And there was a lot of speculation as know how many of them there are. And there was a lot of speculation as to whether or not they even existed. But now they have bones. They have tissue. They know it's a chimpanzee. And they have video of these things.

And they have video of one of them eating a jaguar. No way. Yeah. Or, excuse me, a leopard. That is crazy. Because it's in Africa. Yeah. So they don't know if it killed it or if they found it dead and they were eating it. Wow.

But they call them lion killers. But can you imagine a chimpanzee that's six foot tall, you know, 400 pounds? They're super aggressive. They can be. Chimpanzees in general can be super aggressive. They're like us. Yeah. Closest to us. They're closest like us. Yeah. Closest to us. They're closest to us. Which is really fascinating because then you have the bonobos that are also really closely related to us. They're all about sex.

Yeah. There's peace and love. And they only exist in the Congo. Yeah. I didn't know they were all about sex, though. Well, they have so much sex with each other. They have sex to solve problems, to resolve issues. So they're like chimps on MDMA.

Yeah, something like that. I mean, I wonder what's different about them. It's really interesting because they're like the peaceful chimps. But the mother will not have sex with her son. That's it. The father will have sex with the daughters. The father will have sex with the sons.

The sons will have sex with the brothers and sisters. They'll have sex with each other, but the mother will not have sex with her sons, which is very fascinating. Really fascinating. They have rules like, get out of here, kid. I didn't know that. Yeah. Yeah, apes.

It's a really fascinating. But I would think that that animal in specific, you were a super wealthy individual and you wanted to get one of those giant chimps for your collection. Yeah, because the rarer they are, the more you think you're special because you own this very rare animal. So is it mostly chimps and gorillas or is it orangutans and monkeys as well? Our investigation was into the great apes. Yeah, so chimps, gorillas, bonobos. And they are in high demand. And again, they go for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

in high demand. And again, they go for hundreds of thousands of dollars. And yeah, I think we tend to usually point the finger at the hunters and the middlemen, the people that are catching these and killing. But I think the finger should always be pointed at where the demand comes from and who are the people. Because those are the people that, you know, it's to me, I do not understand somebody who just wants to have a wild animal that came from the wild in their backyard. But I do understand why a pygmy or a poor guy without any other opportunities in the Congo, when given the chance to bring money for their families, they would do so. Of course. Yeah, I mean's just, it's such a disturbing part of human nature that they would be willing to do that, especially to an animal that they know is so endangered that they'd want to have a giant park in their backyard where they keep these things.

It's, I don't understand it. But the fact that it exists here in the U.S. too, again, we can say it's all happening in places like the UAE and China, but we have these safari parks and these private zoos here. What about public zoos? Yeah. I mean, I talked yesterday on the podcast about going to a zoo once. And it was the saddest thing where this monkey was wailing, just screaming. And I was like, oh, my God, this is like going to a prison.

And there's someone alone in their cell just screaming. It's because there's this tiny little cage that's about the size of this room and you have this poor monkey that's just trapped in there. It's horrible. Yeah. It's horrible. Just regular zoos are fucked. Yeah. I'm not a big fan either.

We went to a few like sanctuaries for chimpanzees and apes in the Congo and we had the chance of spending time with some baby chimps. And they're adorable. But one of the things, and they'll jump. They basically jumped on me and my whole crew. They were hugging us. So they're really sweet. So you understand why people maybe would think that, oh, they really like to spend time with human beings.

They would love to be our pets, but that's just not the case. Especially when they get older. Yeah. Then they get very dangerous. Yeah. And then they kill them or sell them. So this market, like how many people are out there that have the means to do this? That's what's bizarre.

To purchase them? I can imagine if like one really rich guy wanted to do that, but the fact that it's an actual market. Oh, it is. I think that once you have your big house, once you have your exotic cars, then you're thinking what else you can get. I think that's the case for a lot of them. And unfortunately, again, the idea that you're taking all these photos and posting them on social media, I think, unfortunately, social media has had a terrible negative effect on this because people think it's fun to take photos with all sorts of exotic animals. And then they think, you know, once you have money, oh, I'm going to own this. I'm going to buy this and put it in a cage.

And when my friends come over, they're going to be impressed by the fact that I own this tiger or this lion or this gorilla. But I imagine it would be very dangerous for you to be exposing that. It always is with all the stories we do. There's always a component of a lot of people there that don't want us to do those stories, for sure. Yeah, I mean, gaining access to these worlds is the hardest part of my job. Do you worry about coming on shows like this, that you're going to become famous?

Like, have you been spotted? Has anybody ever said, oh, you're that lady from the TV show? All the time, yeah, yeah. It happens a lot. Particularly in airports for some reason, I think they associate that track. Well, that's better than the Congo.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's true. I'm huge in the Congo. So in airports you get noticed? No, but it actually, it's funny that you say that because it has helped me in some way where I get a lot of messages from people who want to be on the show. So they send me videos of their guns and their drugs and the illicit businesses they are involved in.

Oh, boy. They're all messed up and going, hey, I'm going to contact Mariana. Uh-huh. Absolutely. I want to get famous. Yeah. I want to be on your show. Oh, gosh.

Or you have no idea. And then there's also the people that say, you should do a story about, you know, all the conspiracy theories that exist out there. Or people who tell me, like, I have a story to tell. And I share my email. It's like, okay, great. And it's really, and then it's, you know. Like, what are the crazy ones? Oh, it's the government and the CIA is after me. And they're checking me out.

And all of our information is, which actually is true. It's true. I'm totally crazy. But I think people who have, you know, who are not all there. That's the problem with conspiracies is so many of them are real. Yeah, I know. But I think we started this conversation with this story about guns. That is the one story that whenever I do anything about guns, I get a lot of hate.

A lot of hate. I'm sure. And it's threats and it's people saying, you know, really mean and evil things. Yeah. And yeah. Have you seen the video? There's a video that's going around now. It was shared on Twitter a lot yesterday.

It was some people in the 1970s when they started making laws about drinking and driving that you couldn't drink while you were driving. And these people are like, they're going to turn us into communists. You know, like these people were defending like drinking and driving. Yeah. You have come on work 12 hours. I want to have a few beers and drive home. And it's like I remember the same thing happened when they.

See if you can find that video. I was going to pull it up earlier when you guys were talking about something else. That's so great. Have you seen it? No, I haven't. It's like early Trump supporters. Yeah. It's like people that don't know like where QAnon comes from and where, you know, distrust of the government comes from. These unsophisticated people.

Watch this. No worries. Unsophisticated people. Watch this. No worries. It's pretty crazy because you're like, oh, those people, they exist right now. Like this is 50 years ago. But these people are alive and well. Here is viewed by some as downright undemocratic.

It's kind of getting common is when a fellow can't put in a hard day's work, put in 11, 12 hours a day, and then get in your truck and at least drink one or two beers. They're making laws where you can't drink when you want to. You have to wear a seatbelt when you're driving. Pretty soon we're going to be a communist country. It's incredible. Pretty soon going to be a communist country. Making laws, you've got to wear seatbelts.

It is incredible. It's pretty funny. Yeah, it is incredible. There's a lot of those people. Yeah. They're always going to exist. Always going to exist. They've always existed in the past.

And, you know, Trump fucking, he's their king. He found like a population that was like, yes. Yeah. I don't care what he does. He's our guy. He's our guy. Yeah, I know. I get a lot of that.

I get a lot of people say i used to love your show but now i saw your gun story and now i realize that it's all fabricated and it's all you pay actor oh that's what i get all the time is people thinking that my show is fake because it looks really beautiful because we have an incredible cinematography team behind us who's actually a lot of the people that work on the Bourdain show on Parts Unknown before. So they're incredible. It's a National Geographic, so it has to look good. So yeah, but I always say my life would be so much easier if I could just script this

and pay people to do this. And unfortunately, that's not how it goes. No, you're 100% legit. And there are people that do shows like that where they do have fabricated stuff. Unfortunately, there's a lot of nonsense out there. Yeah, not I mean, the amount of time, the amount of trips that I've done halfway around the world to wait for people that don't show up or the amount of back alley meetings that I've had with people trying to convince them to be on camera. And eventually they say no, even disguise. So there's yeah, there's just an incredible amount of work.

Have there been subjects that you tried to investigate, but you couldn't get access and you couldn't do a story on? Yes. And it doesn't mean that we're not going to. I'm still trying. A lot of them take months, sometimes even years to investigate. And then we only start once we get access. Then we start. Like what subjects?

LSD was one of them. Finding a chemist. And I think that at the end, the whole premise of the show became me trying to find a chemist willing to go on camera. And that at the end actually never happened. We found a former chemist, but not an active chemist. But I think the show is equally powerful with or without. But that took months, months. And I think we started investigating even the season before. And we were wondering if this was something we should do because obviously the access wasn't there. We thought if we gave it more time, there would be more access. There's another episode we really want to do on Dirty Bombs.

Dirty Bombs. And we started looking into it. And we had a team that traveled to a country. I can't tell you which country it is yet because I'm hoping we can go back. And I'm afraid if they hear it, then they're not going to let us in. But it's a country. I can't tell you which the country is yet because I'm hoping we can go back. And if I'm afraid if they hear it, then they're not going to let us in. But it's a country and we were hoping we could get access. And then everything failed. And then they said we were being watched by the government. So they had to leave. But that's still an episode I want to do. So the government is protecting dirty bomb. Yeah, it's radioactive material that can be transformed into radio

into dirty bombs. It's actually explain a dirty bomb to people that don't— It's when, for example, Chernobyl, the massive nuclear explosion that happened, accidents that happened in Ukraine. There's a lot of radioactive material still left there, and it's really difficult. You know, you can't—there's sort of security perimeters around it. You can still get really sick if you go in there. And it's really difficult. You know, you can't, there's sort of security perimeters around it, you can still get really sick if you go in there. But there's actually still people giving tourists an underground tour, black market tour where you can go and visit Chernobyl. So there is a way in. So there it is actually pretty easy to get your hands on radioactive material and then transform it into dirty bombs,

which are really powerful bombs that have enormous devastating impact on a lot of people. And so there's a real fear out there that, you know, groups like ISIS are getting their hands or were getting their hands on radioactive materials and making dirty bombs. And we started looking into it and we still haven't been able to get the access we want. So it's a bomb that sprays this radioactive material? Yeah, it's a radioactive bomb, yeah. And the idea is that it's just going to make a huge population sick with radiation poisoning? Yeah, and it's very, very dangerous.

Has that ever been implemented? Has anyone ever detonated a dirty bomb? That's a very good question. I mean, the United States detonated a bunch of nuclear weapons during the Second World War. Sure, but I mean, a dirty bomb. But a dirty bomb? I don't think so. So it's theoretical? It's still theoretical, but it's available. It's out there. And I know that there are investigations and that there's a belief that people that are already that they're already in the wrong hands. But again, it's a subject that I, that they're already in the wrong hands. But again, it's a subject that I think we need to investigate a lot more before I can comfortably talk about it. How many episodes did you do this season?

We did 10 episodes. We did eight the first season, but then people really liked it, so we started doing 10 each season. And it's a lot of work. I always say it's the hardest show on television because you're trying to get access to these very secretive organizations. We did one on bikes, motorcycle gangs, or clubs, as they like to be called, the ATF calls them gangs. And getting access to the one percenters was also crazy hard.

And basically we were trying to figure out where their money – they're involved in the drug business and we were trying to figure out how involved are they and if they were in, what's the name of the town that hosts, I totally forgot, that hosts the biggest motorcycle rally, Sturgis. Sturgis. Sturgis, yeah. We were there at the peak of COVID. It was in 2020. We were filming in August at the peak of COVID and there was a bunch of people with Trump flags and COVID did not exist at Sturgis, uh, COVID. And there was a bunch of people with Trump flags and COVID did not exist

at Sturgis. It was, it was such a, for, you know, I'd just come, it was like the second episode we did and coming from LA, very liberal, having heard everything about COVID. And I mean, we were, we were filming our show from the, we spent two months not filming. And then in June, uh, we started filming. So we were very fast and we were traveling all around the world and we figured out a way to make it work but suddenly arriving in Sturgis and not one single person is wearing a mask and there's all

these bars and people partying and it was wild it was really wild but yeah and then we spent time at the Sons of Silence camp it was really fascinating. And what's their philosophy? Like, what are these? A lot of these, so it's really interesting, actually. They are the only, it's the only

sort of outlaw group that was born in America, that was made in America. So unlike the mafia that comes from Italy, right, or the cartel, it's the only group, outlaw group, that is completely 100% American. And it started with a lot of vets from the Vietnam War who basically felt like they lost a sense of identity and community once the war ended. And they came back and they started meeting and then they created these motorcycle groups and they call themselves the one percenters because they say that the rest of the clubs, the 99% are above the law, which means that they consider themselves to be outlaws. And, you know, there are many cases out there. We interviewed an ATF agent who's been involved

in some of the craziest, largest undercover operations in America's history, where he was able to infiltrate a couple of these groups and really fascinating stuff. I mean, he got patched, so he got a patch, which takes years to get. But they believed him. He went through polygraphy tests. How do you call them? Polygraph? Polygraph tests, yes. And he passed them, which is crazy.

Well, they don't work. But then he was lucky. Yeah, polygraph tests, you could trick them. Yeah, well, he did trick them. But the guy on the other side giving him the test had like a gun. And things could have gone south really fast if he had suspected that he was not who he said he was. And so we filmed with him. And then eventually we got somebody from one of the groups telling us how it all goes down.

The drugs and how they make their money. That's Sons of Anarchy, right? The classic thing is these people that infiltrate and then become one of them. Did you watch that show? No. No, I didn't. But I've heard of it. Yeah, it was really good.

I watched one episode. I liked it a lot. Yeah, it was great. But that is, that's, did you ever read Hunter S. Thompson's book, Hell's Angels? I didn't, but I, it's on my list. It's a great book. It's, it's, that was really the book that kind of made him. And it was, I mean, the people that were in the Hell's Angels were very upset because Hunter has this way of writing or had this way of writing where it's like you couldn't really there was a lot of

fiction in mixed in there's a lot of like craziness mixed in with the reality of it and that you know his gonzo journalism this thing that he sort of coined but that was all about those guys that had got back from vietnam and they just felt like society was bullshit and they just wanted to be free and ride motorcycles. And I'm sure a lot of them had PTSD and all fucked up from their experiences and just feeling that they were used by the government and they wanted to be outlaws. Yeah.

We went to the funeral of one of them. We filmed in L.A. And it was the most incredible. It was a Mongols funeral. And it was hundreds and hundreds of bikers that showed up to pay their respect. And then they basically take over a whole freeway in LA. It's hundreds of bikes that follow the cars and it's incredible spectacle. And then we were with the head of the ATF unit that sort of investigates them. So he's recognizable for them.

And we got a lot of middle fingers and people that weren't happy that we were there. Yeah, of course. Yeah. It's a good one. What else did you cover this season? What else? We went to Ukraine. Really?

Yeah. One of the best episodes I think this season is about. We went to Ukraine. Really? Yeah. One of the best episodes I think this season is about. It's coming out this month actually at the first year anniversary of the war in Ukraine. But we went to Ukraine.

Yeah. We did a story. It was a first story about surrogacy. So the Ukraine has become a center for surrogacy around the world. Surrogate pregnancies. Yeah. So people can get pregnant and they basically hire a woman to carry their baby, a hired womb. And it's legal in the United States, but it will cost you between $150,000 to $200,000. So it's cost prohibitive for a lot of people.

So they've turned to places like Ukraine. It's not legal. It's actually illegal in the majority of countries, but it's legal in Ukraine. And they have a strong commercial surrogacy program there, and a safe one before the war. But what happened was when the war broke out, there was a lot of actually American babies that are in Ukrainian wombs and that were stuck in the war. So we managed to actually follow a couple from the Bay Area

as they head into Ukraine. And the funny thing about the whole story, it was the first time. I had just gotten COVID for the first time. And the baby was about to be born in Ukraine. And we knew we wanted to be there when the baby was born because we were following these parents as they were meeting their baby. And it was a crazy experience of having to be at home for five days and sort of waiting and hoping the baby wouldn't be born. And then five days, I finished my five-day quarantine,

and I was able to get on a plane and go straight. And because I got there late, a few days later than my team, my team was all there already. I arrived in Poland, and then I basically drove straight to Ukraine. My bag was lost, and I went in with nothing but went into Ukraine and eventually met this couple and the organization. It's an American organization that's helping them, Project Dynamo. And then filmed them as they go to the hospital and meet the surrogate mother for the first time.

And then holds their baby and meets their baby for the first time. And it was one of the most emotional moments we've ever filmed on traffic. Because, you know, the show is all about these products that are harmful or sometimes even deadly and dangerous. And here we were seeing something that was bringing a lot of love and hope and joy. And it was a really beautiful moment. And then it was them trying to get the baby out of this war zone in time because the paperwork and having to deal with bureaucracy even in moments like that. So it was crazy. And then after that, we basically, because the show's about black markets, we went to Kenya.

And what happens is when it becomes people, like you said, they have to find, they're going to find a way to do what they want to do. In this case, surrogacy. And the people that can't afford it here, and then it became too dangerous to do it in Ukraine, people are finding new places to do it. And in Kenya, it's not legal. It's sort of a gray area and it's definitely very shady there. And we spent time filming, you know, women who are promised all this money to carry babies and then they give birth and then they never see a son. And their families never know about it because they've been hiding. They're sort of imprisoned in these houses for months while they're pregnant and they're carrying American babies. It's such a strange thing. It's common in LA. I have some friends, a gay couple that hired a woman to get pregnant with their,

I think they basically like the couple mixed their sperm together so they wouldn't know whose sperm it was that impregnated the woman. And then they went through the whole thing and then she decided to keep the baby. No. Yeah. Wait, is that allowed? I guess it is. I thought they were, yeah.

I don't know, but they didn't get the baby. And so they had to go through it again. And they went through it a second time. And they got their baby? Then they got a baby. Yeah. It's really sad because there is a need out there for it. It's just that with everything, it's exploited.

It's a very strange situation. Yeah, it really is. It's very strange because this person has this life growing in their body and they become deeply attached to it. And then they have to give it to someone. And this woman was like, I can't do this. I'm keeping the baby. I don't know what she did. And in her case, it was probably her egg, right?

So she was felt like she had. I believe so. Yeah, because it's a gay couple. Yeah. And maybe that's why she was allowed to do it. I don't know. I don't know if they fought her. I don't know.

Maybe they just said, okay. I don't know. But they spent all that money like taking care of her and paying her and the whole deal. Yeah. Yeah, it was crazy. But the whole experience in Ukraine was really, yeah, insane. And then being there, so much sort of depression and sadness at the same time with this couple. It was really special.

What other things did you cover? What other things did we cover? This week's episode, actually, that airs tomorrow, is about oil. So we spent time in Nigeria in the Niger Delta. It's one of the biggest oil producers in the world. And then we went to Lebanon and spent time with Hezbollah. Really? Wow. How do you get connected to Hezbollah? So essentially, the episode was about how oil is financing terrorist groups or groups that the U.S. considers to be terrorist organizations like Hezbollah. And so first we went to Nigeria and spent time.

And there's Boko Haram. You know Boko Haram. They kidnapped the 200 schoolchildren a few years back. And they recently pledged allegiance to ISIS. And they're a very, very scary group that has done very horrific things up in the north of the country. But what we heard is that they're getting their oil, a lot of their oil from the south of the country, which is the biggest oil producing region. So insane. I had been there before, but it's the most insane place in the

world. That's the Niger Delta. It's basically It's basically swamps that are filled with oil, that you've got ExxonMobil and Shell and all these corporations that have been there taking the oil for decades and people living in absolute poverty. And at one point, they decided, fuck this. They're getting wealthy out of our oil. So they started stealing the oil. So there's estimates that anywhere between 30% to 90% of the oil that comes from Nigeria is actually or that that is produced in Nigeria is actually stolen, which is insane. So we went to one of these sites. It took us days and days of months and months of trying to get access and then days of going in Nigeria to different places and getting nose, nose, nose. And then eventually we met with a king who used to be a militant himself. But when the peace deal happened, they gave him the ceremonial

post of being a king. So we visited the king at his palace. And it was a proper palace. And we asked for his permission to film in his land. And once we got that permission, we were able to film one of these huge sites where they're bunkering, they're stealing the oil. And the site that is covered, the floor is covered with oil. It's black, stealing the oil. And the site that is covered, the floor is covered with oil. It's black, black, black. And then you see these areas where they start refining the oil that has been stolen from the pipes. And there's smoke and all the trees that used to be green, because these are swamps, are all black. It's straight out of sort of your vision of hell. Everything is burnt and black and you've got hundreds of people working women who carry the huge bags with the refined oil with the diesel this is it right

here yeah this is it you see that photo up there jamie the one at the top the big one look at that yeah you see so that's where so they're that's where they're refining the oil, the big. Oh, my God. It is really insane. And they're covered in soot and all the smoke. And they don't have, a lot of them are barefoot and they're walking through. This guy has boots. But a lot of them that we saw were barefoot, particularly the women. And they're, you know, covered in oil. What kind of health consequences are these people facing because of this?

Yeah, it's really, and it speaks to the desperation. You know, they're making like less than a dollar a day by doing this. It's really, really sad. So we arrive at this location and we'd finally been given permission to film and it's hundreds of people. started filming, and then suddenly we see a group of people coming our way and yelling and picking up buckets of hot oil and threatening to throw it at my cameraman, Josh. It was a really, really scary moment. We captured it on camera. And we were yelling back, please don't, don't. And the idea was that they thought we were white people coming from an oil corporation that were trying to shut down their operation, which would mean that they wouldn't have that $1 a day to bring back to their family. So I had to spend a lot of time showing

them my press pass, telling them that I'm a journalist. I promise I'm not here as an oil corporation. I'm a journalist. And eventually it sort of calmed down and we were able to film. But it was a crazy, crazy experience. When you're in those situations, is there a self-service where you could pull up a video of your show? Yeah, I usually do Instagram. In that case, there was actually self-service. And I showed Instagram. I showed, you see, I'm a journalist. But also what I get a lot is, I mean, yeah, you could have made that up, which is true.

You could have made this up. But, yeah, I always carry a press pass that says National Geographic and it has my name with me as well. In some countries that actually helps more than whatever is online. So it was definitely one of the sort of most dangerous moments because he was ready to throw hot oil at us. But things calmed down. We were able to film it. And then a week later, we were on the border between Syria and Lebanon with Hezbollah and then with a group that works with Hezbollah and seeing them bringing in unsanctioned oil that was coming from Iran. And that is basically providing jobs and money and financial help to Hezbollah.

How did they steal the oil? They didn't steal. It was given to them by Iran. Oh, okay. So it's sanctioned oil. So they're sanctions, U.S. sanctions. So they're not supposed to be selling their oil to Lebanon. But Hezbollah did this whole sort of PR campaign where they had these huge Iranian tankers with oil and they paraded the oil down the streets of Lebanon. And it was basically a big fuck you to the United States. Here's what we're doing.

And we ended up interviewing a Hezbollah operative. And he told us how what they are not telling us that this was not the first shipment. And they've been getting shipments for a long time. And that Hezbollah is making millions of dollars out of the Iranian oil. And, you know, when I asked him, so why, if I know, it means the U.S. government probably knows this is happening. Why aren't they doing more? And he said, well, you have Syria, you have Iran, and you have Hezbollah. And they would be, it wouldn't be smart for the U.S. to get involved when there's this

much power. And, you know, it could be the start of the third world war which is what he told told us but yeah it was it was uh it was it was insane but you're saying that 30 to 90 percent of this oil that's in nigeria in nigeria was stolen stolen and then a part of it ends up with boko haram which is a terrorist organization in africa and then how are they stealing the oil? That's all stolen oil. The fields that you saw up there. And how are they getting it?

They basically make holes. They are able to take the oil directly from the pipes, the legitimate pipes that exist there from ExxonMobil and Shell and other corporations. And they're able to take the oil out. It's what's called bunkering. It's the stealing of oil. And then they refine it there. And then they put it in these gigantic plastic bags. And the women usually carry these

plastic bags on their backs. Heavy, dangerous, hot oil, diesel in this case, once it's refined. And then they put them in cars and they smuggle them and sell them to everything from gas stations to terrorist organizations. Wow. Yeah. It's an interesting thing because I think we all think of, when you think of terrorist organizations, you think of, you know, how are they getting their guns, how are they recruiting people, but you don't think about the number one thing that they actually need is oil. That's what they need for everything. And then we were actually able, we went to a center

where they were rehabilitating former Boko Haram militants and spent time with them. And they told us, yeah, it's the number one thing that we're always trying to get is oil and how they were planning on getting into an American plane. And, you know, their number one enemy is the United States. Yeah. How much has this affected you personally? Oh, yeah. How much has affected you personally? I mean, you you you get to see some of the worst aspects of human life in a lot of ways. Some of what protects me in so many ways. You know, I think like how my cameramen that I work with who are amazing always say how their protection is seeing it through the camera and it gives them a certain level of protection. But then I don't want to sound too naive, but it is true that the fact that I find so many of these people to be so much like me and so human really gives me hope because, again, it's about what are the motivations, what is making these people do what they do.

And if we can get at those motivations, we can actually do something to prevent these black markets from existing. And I think that's what's missing is that we're always trying to sort of put a cap on these black markets, whether it's the war on drugs, you know, or whatever it is. We're trying to get to the sort of very short minded solution to the to the problem, our short term solution as well. But really, what's at the crux of the problem at the center of all of this is the inequality that exists. all of this is the inequality that exists. And if we provide people jobs, whether it's, you know, the militants that are now with Boko Haram, if we had given them jobs or, you know, the kids in the cocaine trail, you know, all of these people, the vast majority of them, if you provide them a job in the legal world, they would much rather do that. Not the guys at the top, because they're making a shit ton of money. But the guys at the top wouldn't be able to run their operations if they didn't have, you know, an army out there

of people without opportunities. Well, what you do is so important, because if people didn't have access to the kind of footage that you're able to provide by going there and doing boots on the ground journalism, people wouldn't have this understanding of the reality of the world. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, I love what I do, so none of it is a sacrifice, but it does take me away from my family. I've spent half of my time on the road, and I'm a mother, so it's difficult. I can imagine. That's got to be very, very hard.

Yeah. Have you investigated cobalt mining? I haven't, but I have some friend who has in the Congo as well, and I've been wanting to. Did you have somebody recently? Siddharth Kara, who wrote a book on it, and he was over there for quite a long time. In the Congo? Yeah. The footage of it is insane.

These people, what they call artisan cobalt mines, you know, it's basically people with hammers and no protective equipment, women who are like 19 years old with babies on their backs. And they're like digging into the ground, pulling out this cobalt. And, you know, he was saying essentially that there's no such thing as like clean cobalt, like most cobalt, There's no such thing as like clean cobalt, like most cobalt. Like this is these are these cobalt mines. It was insane. And Siddharth, who had risked his life to go there and try to show this and expose it.

What is his book, Jamie? He he just put out a book about his experiences, but having him on was like one of the heaviest podcasts we've ever done. And him explaining that these companies are doing this and they're well aware and that this is a, this is cobalt red. Um, the con how the blood of the Congo powers our lives. Um,

having this conversation with him and realizing that every smartphone has this in it. And this is something that people are blissfully unaware of the source of the material that is powering the most sophisticated electronics that we use to operate our lives. We are, but the owners of the companies are well aware, right? Oh, they're well aware. They must be. You know, he was explaining how Apple and all these other companies that rely, every smartphone has this, with the lithium ion batteries, they have cobalt in them. Yeah, we've been looking into doing an episode on that. I've reported extensively on gold mining also in Colombia, for example, and how it was fueling. Back then it was a civil war and it was FARC who was making a lot of money out of first cocaine and then gold became very

profitable, if not more profitable. And since then it's now the Clan del Golfo, which is sort of the Colombian cartel that is the most powerful cartel in Colombia. And they are all over the gold mining. And I've been to a lot of these illegal mines. And it's, again, so sad because it's the poorest of the poor people in horrific conditions also trying to get gold so that we can wear this. Yeah. That's crazy. But that's not necessary.

Yeah. What's really crazy because gold is not not necessary. Yeah. What's really crazy, because gold is not really necessary. Well, it is actually, because isn't it used for airplanes? I think it is, right? I think so. Jamie? Help us out. Gold is used in phones, too. Gold is used in phones, really?

Yeah. Yeah, all this mining. Yeah, I just think that there's a lack of awareness in general about where the stuff we wear and use comes from. It just speaks to the chaotic existence that human beings enjoy. Great conductor electricity. Yeah. Right, yeah. It's just a lot of stuff.

Yeah. Two metals consider better conductor electricity than gold. Silver and copper, gold connectors are also used for transmitting digital data fast and accurately. Yeah. It's just so crazy that the most sophisticated electronics, like our smartphones, the root of it is someone with a hammer in the Congo inhaling these horrible toxic chemicals. People who probably cannot afford to own the smartphones. No electricity. They have no electricity.

I mean, they barely are surviving off the money they make working 12 hours a day, digging into the ground. Yeah. And horrific health consequences of this as well. Yeah, I really, really, really want to do an episode on that. It is insane. Yeah. What else did you cover this year? This year we have, well, we did one on fight clubs. Oh, you'd like that one.

Fight clubs? Yeah. That was a really good one. There's real fight clubs? Yeah. Really? I know. There are. I've seen some stuff on YouTube where there's like these backyard setups where people- Yeah. So we went to a few of those, but it's a real thing. We did another on organs, but I'll go there in a second. So fight clubs is really interesting. I actually used to love MMA. Used to?

I mean, I don't watch it as much, or I don't watch it ever. But I used to watch it when UFC, the Ultimate Fighting Challenge, came out. Championship. Championship. Ultimate Fighting Championship. It's okay. You would know about it. I do know about it.

I used to really like it. Actually, I think that's the first time I remember hearing about it. I used to really like it. Actually, I think that's the first time I remember hearing about you. But many, many years ago. When was that? It was like 2008? When you've heard first about it? No, when the championship came out. When they did the reality show.

That was 2005. 2005, yeah. The reality show. 2005 was the ultimate fighter. Ultimate fighting? Wasn't it a challenge? No. I can help you here.

The Ultimate Fighting Championship is the name of the organization, and that was started in 1993. And it was purchased in 2001 by the company that I work for. And they were called Zufa. I actually started working for them in 1997. I started working for the UFC when it was very underground and it was only on direct TV. It was actually banned from cable. But that was more of an economic thing. It was like boxing was trying to keep it out.

And also people had like a distorted idea of what it was. And some people like John McCain referred to it as human cockfighting. And some people like John McCain referred to it as human cockfighting. But me as a lifelong martial artist, it was what I'd always wanted to see is stylistically, like, what is the best style of martial art? Because it's a puzzle. You know, people think of it, the way I describe martial arts is it's high level problem solving with dire physical consequences. Which is why I loved it. So it was called Ultimate Fighter, right? Yes, that's the reality show that was on Spike TV.

Which was so smart because it got people like me that I've never even watched or been interested in boxing to become obsessed with MMA. So for a little time, I was really into MMA and I was really into all the, I can't remember one single fighter that I liked at the time. But I promise you I did. Many all the, I can't remember one single fighter that I liked at the time, but I promise you I did. Many years ago, I did. And one of the things that I really loved about it was the youth, how smart it was and how they're problem solving constantly. And I love that part about it. Yeah.

So haven't been a follower since, but having liked it at some point in my life and followed it, I started hearing about these fight clubs and they do exist. And right now we basically, the episode is about one particular league. It's BKFC, Bare Knuckle Fighting. Have you heard of them? And we started the episode actually in Thailand, which is the Mecca for MMA. And we went to a few underground illegal fights there. And it was insane.

Oh, you would love it. It was fucking crazy. Everything is allowed. So we went there. It's sort of this, it was this garage turned into a fight night and you pay to go in. The promoter was a guy called, that we call Jonathan. And he says, everything is allowed. Everything. You can even bite. Everything is allowed. You can bite. You can do anything. Everything is allowed. And if people, because there's not an actual ring, if people come towards us, just push them back in. And it's, I think

it was like 20 kids or something, and they each fight against each other, and some of them come dressed up as clowns or as a businessman. They're trying to make it entertaining, and they come up with names for themselves, and then they go at it. And you can, I mean, you've been to many of these fights, but this, again, no rules. So everything's allowed.

You see people biting? I didn't actually see people biting, but I did see a lot of blood. And there was no medics there and there's no ambulances and there's no medical whatever. And then there were two kids in particular that we filmed that had a lot of blood coming out. And then, so that was Thailand. And we spent time there with BKFC there that is actually run by a guy called Nick Chapman. And he was, two of the fighters that he had for his upcoming big event actually came from these groups, from the illegal, the underground fighting. from these groups, from the illegal and the underground fighting.

And it was a big draw because the underground fight that these two kids had fought had millions of viewers and people loved it. And so then he brought them to the limelight of the BKFC and he had them fight. And then we came to the U.S. and trying to figure out, wait, is this really happening here? Because, like you said, you see these videos on YouTube, but how big a thing is this? But the first place we went was in Detroit. And we went to this. In this case, it was actually an illegal boxing match. And it was a soup kitchen for the homeless during the day. And at night it became a gambling and fight club league.

And and it was boxing again. Lots of kids, lots of gambling. So in this case, it's sort of what is legal and illegal changes in state by state. It's not legal. I think BKFC is actually not legal. Bare knuckle fighting is not legal in half, I think more than half of the U.S. And in Michigan, for example, Detroit, this was boxing. But you can't, if there's gambling involved, they don't have a license. So all of it was illegal and there was gambling involved.

And you're supposed to have paramedics on site and an ambulance on site. None of that happened. We filmed with one of the kids that got really badly hit and he was taken out with his brother, like holding him out into the night. It was fascinating. So it's there. And then we follow this one kid who's 18 years old, the youngest ever BKFC fighter, as he sort of starts going to tryouts and then has his spot. And then we filmed his first fight on the BKFC. And it was, yeah, it was really fascinating. They're doing a lot of what they're doing is they're taking fighters that are sort of

they fought for big organizations like the UFC and didn't do that well. And this is their or they did well, maybe their time is up. And then they offer them a lot of money to fight in bare-knuckle fights. And apparently they're offering them a lot of money. And we interviewed David Feldman, who is the head of the PKFC. And I asked him, so are you recruiting, because I know he's recruiting a lot from former UFC fighters, but I asked him if he was also recruiting from sort of these illegal.

And he said, not so much, but this case, this kid, this 18-year-old, was found out because he was fighting in one of these backyard fights. And somebody saw him, a promoter saw him, really liked him, and then gave him this opportunity. The bare knuckle thing is interesting because I was an advocate for removing gloves in MMA because I think that it gives you a false sense of safety and it also protects one part of your body that is not the best weapon. It protects one part of your body that is not the best weapon.

Like the only reason why your hands are good weapons as a fist really is because your hands protected by wraps and gloves. But hands are very easy to break. Your hand is designed to carry things and hold stuff and pull things and manipulate things. It's not really designed to hit. And to punch someone with your hand breaks are very very common in mma and i would imagine even more so in uh in bare knuckle but you're you're allowed to hit someone with a bare elbow you're allowed to hit someone with a bare shin you're allowed to hit someone with knees and it didn't make sense to me that you would protect the hands because you're getting it. So for me as a martial artist, what I wanted was I was like, well, let's be honest about what this is. You're trying to figure out what's the best way to fight.

And wouldn't that be more honest if you didn't have protection on your hands? Because you wouldn't be able to use the hands the same way. In MMA, guys just swing wildly and hope they don't break their hands, and their hands are somewhat protected by the gloves and somewhat protected by the wraps, but even then we still get a lot of hand breaks. And I was thinking it doesn't make sense you're allowed to kick someone in the face with your shins or knee someone in the face or elbow them in the face, but you had your hands protected. Right. So what he says, which is interesting, is that he kept referring to this study that has been done where they found out that actually there are more concussions in UFC or MMA than

there is in bare knuckle fighting. But there are more lacerations that happen when it's a bare hand. Yeah, that's what I would believe too right but that's also with elbows but elbows certainly can give you concussions but boxing has um far more deaths than mma and uh boxing i would imagine if none of it is good for your brain zero zero fighting is good for your brain zero impact is good for your brain it's all bad for your brain. Zero impact is good for your brain. It's all bad for your brain. But I would imagine if you were just boxing, you're going to get hit in the head more because there's not the option to take someone down. There's not the option to clinch and hold and press them up against the cage. But what I've seen from bare knuckle is this destroying of people's faces, like the laceration. There's a fighter named Chris Lieben, and he was on The Ultimate Fighter season one. And he's kind of a legend in MMA, just a crazy, wild dude who's a brutal knockout puncher.

And he fought in Bare Knuckle towards the end of his career. And he fought this guy, I think Dakota Cochran, I think was his name. And he got one of the worst cuts I've ever seen in all my years of watching fighting. See if you can find Chris Lieben. So this is, look at that. I mean, that's from a bare knuckle fight. I mean, it looks like he got hit with a machete. Oh, my God.

It's crazy. And that's lacerations from kn a machete. Oh, my God. It's crazy. And that's lacerations from knuckles. Right. Oh, my God. And, you know, this is a guy that fought, and that's Jason Knight, who also was a guy who fought in the UFC for a while and then left the UFC and wound up fighting bare knuckle. wind up fighting bare knuckle. And I mean, just crazy lacerations because your skin and your face tears very easily. So are you not a fan of BKFC? Have you watched any? I've watched it. I wouldn't say I'm a fan. Like I don't watch it on a regular basis. I'm a fan of people being allowed to do whatever they want to do. And I'm a fan of bull riding if you want to do bull riding.

I don't want to ride a bull. I don't want to stop someone from riding a bull though. And I think that's probably far more dangerous than this. And there's concussions and deaths. There's a lot of, there's, there's skill involved in bare knuckle boxing. I mean, it is a martial art without a doubt, but the damage that it does to your face is pretty, pretty real. And, you know, there's, there's a woman named, uh, Paige Van Zandt, who's this beautiful girl who, um, was a fighter for the UFC and has really become more wealthy from her only fans and from, uh, her website and just from being hot. And she's fought a few times in bare knuckle boxing too. And, you know, every time she fights, I'm like, Oh, you know, every time she fights, I'm like, ugh.

You know, because I'm just worried about your face getting destroyed. Yeah. Yeah. We saw there was definitely a lot of blood. But I think, yeah, I think it's the balance. What he kept telling us is the balance. Do you want more concussions or do you want more lacerations? Yeah.

Well, you're getting concussions. Everyone, I mean, it's not like you're going to get less concussions. I mean, you're still going to get them. You're literally just punching each other in the face. But I bet it's probably safer somewhat than boxing with gloves on because you can hit someone so much more. It's the thudding on the head and the brain rattling around inside the head that causes all the real damage. It's the rattling around even more than the actual hit, right? Which is the thing with bull riding, one of the reasons.

I did a story on CT and bull riding. CT is when you have a lot of concussions. Yeah, and it was a lot what we heard is the rattling around. CT actually comes often from sub-concussive blows. It's not just concussions. You get it from jet skiing, believe it or not. One of my good friends is Mark Gordon, and he runs therapy for traumatic brain injuries for soldiers and athletes. And he's a pioneer on therapies for people with traumatic brain injuries. And he said that you'd be shocked at how many things cause CTE, which is chronic traumatic encephalopathy. And it's subconcussive blows

that do a lot of the damage. People that play soccer get CTE from heading the ball, believe it or not, which is crazy. Crazy. I don't think people ever associate soccer with CTE, but it's true. The brain is just not meant to get rattled around no matter what happens. So if it's MMA or if it's boxing or bare-knuckle boxing, you can make the argument that it's safer, but it's not safe. It's the nature of what you're doing. You understand it going into it. It's not like you're being lied to.

You're going into it knowing it's not safe. Yeah, and that's one of the things that when we were interviewing bull riders, for example, that they all told us it's not as if we don't know this is a risk, that this might happen to us, but this is still the profession we've chosen. Yeah, and I'm not of the—I don't think you should protect people from their decisions. I think you should be allowed to, but you should be informed. Informed. And there should be, I think there should be some sort of controls in terms of if a person has just had a concussion, there should be a time between when they're allowed to go back

in the ring or go back on people, or on top of a bowl um and and and that's where sometimes in the name of profits and show business yes that's where sometimes um that lacks well there's also the reality of training and that a lot of the brain damage that people get they get from training they get it from sparring like when you're sparring and you're training that's not those aren't like it's not like you only get brain damage from fights. Most fighters, I believe, get the majority of the damage, especially if they're not in a good camp. And there's different philosophies in terms of like how people train. And some people train where they spar hard all the time. And some people train where they very rarely spar hard.

But if you're sparring hard, you're getting hit. If you're getting hit, you're going to get damaged. So if they have a concussion, they're still allowed to train if they want, of course. You're supposed to, if commissions will put no contact rules on a fighter after they have been knocked out or they've been badly damaged. They would say like no contact for 90 days or something like that. But I mean, how do you really know when a person is sparring? How do you stop when the person goes back to St. Louis and they go back to their gym and they got knocked out a month ago?

How are you going to stop them from sparring? I mean, when there's no one in the gym and, you know, they're just working out, how are you going to stop that? There was a story actually today about two women, two athletes. I think one was a cyclist and the other one was a snowboarder or something to do with skiing and snow. And they both committed suicide. One was American. I think the other one was British. And they both committed suicide.

And they were very happy individuals, high achievers, great in school, lots of friends. And then suddenly they had really bad concussions. And then everything turned south. It's horrible. It's really. And particularly in women. I think it's understudied, CTE in women. Because it apparently has even a bigger effect on women. It goes more undetected. Or there's less studies done on how it affects the brain. And concussions have a completely different effect on women than they have on men. And that's what the article was talking about.

Well, what Dr. Gordon describes is the damage to the pituitary gland. It's like the pituitary gland is particularly delicate. And when you get hit, it could be just one. It varies so much. One person could get knocked out a bunch of times and they don't have an issue. And then one person, just one concussion and they're forever changed. And that's the reality of it. And there's also a gene expression.

I think it's called APOE4 that makes someone more likely to get CTE. Yeah. It's really sad. I mean, with the bullfighting, the bull riding, we filmed a family of a kid in Canada who won the championship in Canada for bull riding. He's a loved guy in the league, and his name was Tyler, and he committed suicide, and he was so young.

He was like 24 years old, and he was very happy-go-lucky normal. And then suddenly, you know, and he also, I mean, he had, I think he actually did have a lot of concussions, but it was, everything happened so fast. life and this is, and they want to get back to doing it and they want to try and then it gets worse. And, you know, and then when you're suffering from a concussion and you get repeated concussions and it's compounded. Yeah. And a lot of these people, you know, for example, the bull riders and I think the MMA fighters, I'm certainly in the bull riding community. Once they start feeling like something isn't right they don't um really have they don't feel like it's they don't feel safe or they don't want to talk to other people about it because they think it's not manly to tell other people that they're feeling depressed and they can't figure out why or they're unhappy why are you unhappy just won a championship or you're doing

so well in your life and what's the reason for your depression yeah so it's sort of a cycle yeah there's a lot of there's unawareness. And then there's also the reality of what kind of person gravitates towards that thing in the first place. They have extreme confidence. They also have this belief that they're different and that they especially if they're a fighter, like I know what I am and I'm better than this and I'm better than everybody else. And I'm going to figure this out. I'm going to just keep doing it. Right.

better than this and I'm better than everybody else and I'm going to figure this out. I'm going to just keep doing it. Right. And it's their identity. And there's so many things wrapped up into it that makes them continue down that path. Yeah. And a lot of them, their coaches don't help either. Their coaches, you know, they're, you know, I don't know if the coaches are unaware or if they're not sophisticated about it or they don't care, but they just, they let these guys keep fighting when they should, they 100% should retire. And you know, it's very difficult for me to watch that. It's the number one thing that I'm most conflicted about, about commenting on MMA fights is knowing that some people are gone and they're not the same guy anymore. You see their movement is awkward. Yeah, you see their movement.

Their movement's awkward. Their steps are shorter. They don't have a fluidity to their movement anymore and to their gait. And their neural system, their neurological system is compromised. So what do you do in a situation like that? What can I do? You know, if it's a person that I know, I try to tell them, you have to stop. And what's the answer usually? Most of the time they don't want to stop.

They reject it. They're mad at me. You know, I've seen, I had one very public thing that I did with a very good friend of mine who had been knocked out a bunch of times in the UFC. And I had to tell him on a podcast after he got knocked out I'm like you have to stop you have to stop this is going to keep happening and it's going to get way worse once you've been knocked out a bunch of times

there's also a thing that happens where it's more easy to knock you out you can't take a shot anymore that's right which was the case with this kid Ty he kept on being knocked out and so did he stop? he did yeah my friend did but he was very mad at me for a while case with this kid, Ty, he kept on being knocked out. And so do they, did he stop? He did. Yeah. My friend did, but he fucking was very mad at me for a while. So it was a lot of his friends. Now

he's so happy and he thanks me. What does he do now? He does podcasting. Yeah. But it was a real problem where we were, we were all aware of it, but no one wanted to say anything. But I've just been involved in this world my whole life. And I've seen it my whole life. I've seen people that never had a career in fighting and they just got brain damage from sparring. You know, and I knew that I was on that road myself. Like I remember one day when I was 21 laying in bed after sparring and my head was throbbing and I was just lying on the pillow and my head was beat, just bing, bing, bing. With every beat in my heart, my head was throbbing. And I was like, what am I doing to my brain? Like, what am I doing? And how much damage have I already done?

Because a lot of brain damage doesn't even show up until years after the injury. And, you know, there's just, everything's fucked. Everything's fucked. So is it something you're still worried about? No, not anymore. I'm sure I have some lingering effects. I mean, clearly. Yeah. No doubt. I think it's, it's, there's a certain amount of brain damage that everyone who competes in combat sports has to accept. But it's not even and you don't know. And some people are fine. They've had full long careers and there's nothing wrong with them. They're fine.

And then other people, they're just one or two knockouts and they're never the same person again. And, you know, there was a guy named Meldrick Taylor, who was a Olympic gold medalist, elite boxer. And he had one fight with Julio Cesar Chavez. And it was an absolutely brutal fight where he was knocked out with two seconds to go in the last round by Julio Cesar Chavez, who's one of the greatest of all time. But it was a fight that Meldrick Taylor was winning. And he got knocked out with two seconds to go it was a famous thing because referee Richard Steele he waved the fight off and everybody was so mad at him that he stopped the fight with two seconds to go but Meldrick was never the same again never the same again he kept getting knocked out after that and now there's been interviews

with him where you hear him talk now like he was planning a comeback years back and they interviewed him. And it's the most depressing thing. See if you can find Meldrick Taylor being interviewed because in the beginning of his career, you know, you would hear him talk and he was talking about his training and his this and his that. And it was just normal guy, nothing wrong. And then you see him and he's in his 30s he's young he's fit and he literally can't form sentences he can't get words out it sounds like he just drank you know like five bottles of vodka and you know and you picked him up off the couch and had him have to have a conversation that's punch drunk I mean that's that's why that's right punch drunk. Because it really does sound like they're drunk. Let's hear this. I was very impressed with what I saw. And then Chavez was

a very, everything he did was very solid. He was very advanced at taking his punches and everything was accurate and everything was consistent. I was very impressed with the last couple rounds. He started to pick the pace up and get very strong. This is not too bad. This is after one of the fights. Like, do Meldrick Taylor interview brain damage? Google that because people are super aware of him because he was an Olympic gold medalist. And he was like, that's the same video. See if you can find it.

Just go to videos. Go to videos. And scroll down. Maybe that one. Maybe that tale of Julio Cesar Chavez versus Meldrick Taylor. Yeah. Well, I don't think they're going to have it in this one because this is HBO.

I don't think they're going to show that he... Right. But just Google Meldrick Taylor slurring his words. Try that. But it was really bad. What happened to him, by the way? He retired. But another one is Terry Norris.

I know there's ones with Terry Norris. Terry Norris is another. He actually knocked out Meldrick Taylor. He was one of the guys that knocked out Meldrick Taylor after the knockout loss to Julio Cesar Chavez. And Meldrick Taylor, there was actually a thing because his wife, he's teaching boxing now. And his wife helps him. And he's like really compromised. And Terry Norris in his prom. Here, this is it, this is it.

This. Oh, it's funny, not to me, because the media wrote bad things about me. When all my names hit it, I was washed up. Today at 36. That's, see, that's what I'm talking about. And you see, now he's fighting, you know, play a little bit more of that. Meldrick is the classic. Yeah. So that's Dr. Margaret Goodman. And she's, I think she's talking about he's a classic. And I think I'm going to really excel in this fight. And he's

going to propel me as the best fighter, powerful fighter in the world. It's going to make me a superstar. See, It's not true. So I'm here to prove myself that I'm still the same father. See, that's 10 years. And he's still saying he wants to go fight. This is 10 years later. So this was you go back 10 years, he's fine. 10 years later, he's

doomed. And it's only going to get worse. Get to the point where you literally can't understand a word they're saying. It's so wrapped up in their identity. Yes. It's everything. It's also the most exciting moments of their life. There's nothing like it. The victory and Meldrick was a champion. I mean, he was an elite, elite fighter. So he had trained so hard and dedicated so much to, to be at that level that Meldrick Taylor was,

or that Terry Norris was you, you have to dedicate everything you have to, to be that good because you're beating the best guys in the world. And that it's so much of your identity and so much of the, and you, you haven't done anything else. This is all you've ever done. Yeah.

You've devoted your whole life to being this person and then you're not able to be that person anymore. Yeah. So I don't know if bare knuckle boxing is going to protect people from that. I don't think it is. But it's maybe, maybe slightly, maybe you can't do as many fights because your face gets so lacerated. Yeah, I think one of the as hard. Yeah, I think one of the questions that we were interested in is if there's an incentive for these illegal fights. But I think like everything, boxing, MMA, they all started by getting people from sort of the underground fights. Right? Yeah.

Is this it? Fight Club Thailand. This is Fight Club Thailand? Yeah. So Fight Club is one of the groups that we filmed with, one of the kids. Interesting how they have gloves on. This is just a fight I found randomly on YouTube. Okay, these kids have...

This is just a regular fight. This wasn't that bad. It's just showing you. Yeah. I'm trying to figure out if these were the... Interesting because these guys have gloves on. I think what happened, I'm not sure, the kids that we saw fight, there was a kid called Nassim and Masang.

Oh. Yeah. Oh, this is interesting because they're letting him get up after he gets dropped. So this seems like, are they stopping the fight? So this is like a stand-up fight only or is this uh this is this seems like it's muay thai with uh with gloves on because when the guy went down they actually like gave him like an eight count so they're breaking this is a lot more organized by the way than what we filmed yeah i found another one that seemed a little more organized

too but it was in the middle of a highway overpass. Yeah, ours was not like this at all. In fact, I don't think there's a lot of films out there that depict what we filmed. It was very, it was like in a garage transformed into, and it was a bunch of kids cheering these guys out. these guys out, you know. And one of them actually, the promoter, Nick Chapman, who runs BKFC in Thailand,

had already picked two of these guys to go and fight with him for his league. And then there was another one this day that he discovered and went up to him and asked for his phone number and said, hey, we want you to come and try out with us. How much money are they paying these people? Because I don't know. We never got that information.

The bare knuckle fighting thing, I know they're incentivizing these MMA fighters to stop fighting MMA. And guys who are like elite fighters like Hector Lombard and Diego Sanchez who was on season one of The Ultimate Fighter, he's now fighting for them.

And there's a guy named Mike Perry who was a really good fighter. I think he's a champion over there now. And apparently they have a lot of viewers, a lot of people, a lot of fans, a lot of people tune in to their events. I would imagine. Is it a pay-per-view? It's pay-per-view, right? Yeah, I think it's pay-per-view.

Yeah. And they have their own channel or their own, like, online channel. Yeah. And a lot of people. And even in the Thailand event, there was, you know, thousands of people that showed up that day. It was massive. It's very difficult to put together a successful mixed martial arts promotion. It's very difficult to get elite talent.

It's very difficult to lure people away from the UFC. There's like these UFC and Bellator in the United States, and there's a lesser-known organization called the PFL that pays a lot of money. And they pay a lot of money to try to incentivize people that are thinking about re-signing with the UFC to go over there. And they were on NBC for a while, at least NBC Sports. And then there's One FC, which is an enormous company that's in Asia that gets a lot of elite talent to go over there. And again, it's like they incentivize people with money, but you have to have very, very, very deep pockets

to be able to get these people. And then to put together a promotion that people are willing to pay for is even harder. Like Bellator, which is the number two organization in the United States, I think they've only done one pay-per-view event. I think most of what they do is on Showtime or now the last one they had was on CBS. But because it's costly?

Yes. And people don't want to pay. Like to get people to spend enough money on a pay-per-view where you could pay the fighters millions of dollars is so hard to do. Right. If you're getting those kind of fighters. But if you're getting fighters like from the street fights of Thailand, you're not paying them. You're paying them $2,000. And I think there is an inbuilt. That's what we saw is that there's an inbuilt. They already have inbuilt followers because people are fascinated. This had had millions of views this fight between these two kids these street fighters um and so that's what he used this the already following that these guys had to promote this big event well that was what i was getting to is that one

what bare knuckle offers though is a different even more hardcore image it's like these guys don't even have gloves on and so maybe you can get people depend spend money to see that on pay-per-view where they might know some of the fighters they some of the fighters have names but To fight to see them fight in MMA be like well you're watching I Don't mean to disparage, but this is the hardcore fans perspective. You're watching second-rate MMA, which is not really fair because a lot of those guys are first-rate fighters. They just chose to fight in Bellator, and they make more money there. So it's complex. So it's like to be able to put together a promotion like the UFC has, there's really only one UFC in America.

It's the only one that has a pay-per-view every month, a successful pay-per-view every single month. Right, and they're all trying to be UFC. Yes, they're all trying to compete with UFC or be that legitimate. From what I heard and saw, there is some sort of appeal to the fact that it's bloodier. I think a lot of people want to watch fights because it's promises, blood and... Knockouts is what people want to see.

Yeah, and there is... More even than blood. They want to see people get knocked out. Yeah, and I think there's a certain idea that they all want to be Kimbo Slice. Yes, yes. We hear that a lot. And this idea that it's some sort of,

it's a little bit underground still or some of these fighters are fighting in the underground. There's an allure to that that attracts people, I think. What did you feel when you were watching that, like the people being exploited? Like, what did it feel like to you when you were there? Did it bother you? No, I think that there is, one of my biggest questions was about the incentive, right? Basically, if you're getting these kids and offering them money, once you see them play or fight in the underground, you're basically incentivizing these fight clubs to exist. But I think that can be

applied to many other forms of fighting. What I did see was that these kids were given an opportunity to be completely fair. They were given an opportunity, to be completely fair, they were given an opportunity that they would never be given. They're fighting anyway. It's Thailand. It's in their blood. They're out there on the streets. We saw some of these kids fighting out on the streets and training on the streets, and it's craziness. So they're going to be fighting anyway. These street fights, there's one called Fight Club, the other one's called Street Fight. They're like big rivalries, and they put on shows that are unpaid and they just do it for the support of it. So at least they're giving them an opportunity with an American company to pay them some money.

The problem for me, or perhaps not the problem, but the big question that I raised was, was it incentivizing fights like what I saw in Detroit, what I saw in Florida and some of these places because they know that they're being watched, that these videos are going to go on YouTube, that there are promoters out there that are looking for. So kids are willing to do crazy things in places that don't have any medical support, no ambulances, no medical tests, nothing, no support for these kids. So I think that is the biggest question that they would say is that every single league, whether it's boxing or the UFC, they all started by picking or plucking from the underground. And that's how you know, that's not true. Not the UFC. No, I mean, there's a few fighters like Kimbo Slice, but Kimbo Slice, he actually became very famous, like the first guy to become famous from these backyard fights and became hugely famous. And then eventually went on The Ultimate Fighter and lost in The Ultimate Fighter. My favorite show. To Roy Big Country Nelson, who was a skilled grappler who took him down and beat him up on the ground.

And it showed that someone who is a bare knuckle fighter really has, they're missing some skills that would allow. Because people are like, Kimbo, Slice can beat anybody. But then you see, no, this big fat guy takes him down and beats the shit out of him and you're like oh there's levels to this right and then Kimbo with his incredible courage decided to continue to learn and grow and try to fight in the UFC and he had a bunch of fights and he fought for a company called Elite XC which was a CBS startup where they were trying to do the same thing and recreate what the UFC had done. It wasn't that successful.

But Kimbo was their main guy because he was so famous. So there's him. But other than that, most of the people come from amateur organizations. And they come from small shows like the LFA and lower tiered mixed martial arts organizations. The level of talent is extremely high now. So because of the the incentive to get into the UFC or Bellator, any of these big organizations where you can make a lot of money, you're getting like very skilled amateur wrestlers, very skilled kickboxers like you're not they're not all pulling from these backyard fights.

That is true. But if you don't have an opportunity to fight on an amateur level, and if all you can do is fight in the backyard and there's somebody filming, and there is an example of a Kimbo Slice out there, I can guarantee that there are hundreds of kids out there willing to take those risks because they think they might be able to be the next Kimbo Slice.

Perhaps. And I think the same thing applies to BKFC. The fact that they put on shows with these kids, and I'm not saying that's right or wrong. I'm saying that this is happening. I think the same thing applies to BKFC. Perhaps. The fact that they put on shows with these kids. Yeah. And I'm not saying that's right or wrong. I'm saying that this is happening. And whether it should be allowed or not is not my place. I'm saying.

What I'm just saying is that it's a small percentage of the fight. Yeah. Of the fights. When you're dealing with someone like something like the UFC, the vast majority of these fighters are coming from legitimate gyms. vast majority of these fighters are coming from legitimate gyms. Because to be able to compete at the highest level, you have to have a full comprehensive set of skills. You have to be very good. And you're seeing guys who compete in the UFC for the very first time that are world-class talents because they fought in these other organizations and successfully built up their skills until they're ready for the UFC. Right. They went up the ladder. But I think BKFC would probably say the same thing,

that the vast majority of their fighters are also skilled and they come from other leagues and other places. But some of them also come from the underground. I think BKFC is probably the best example of that sort of underground thing. As far as I know, I think they take care of things medically and they have EMTs on staff. They have people ready. Yeah.

So it's different. They absolutely do. It's different than this underground backyard things. Yeah. Just BFC. Very different. BKFC is illegal in a lot of states, but it's legal in like Wyoming. And that's where they were having a lot of their fights and some other states that are like, fuck it.

Yeah. Give it a shot. Come on. And I don't think that's necessarily wrong. I think you should be allowed to do it if you want to do it. And I have friends that do it. Backyard fighting? No, bare knuckle fighting.

Oh, bare knuckle. Yeah. So it's like, I know these guys. I have to say, we went to the event both here and in Thailand, and it's really, as a huge fan of MMA myself, no, it is really, really, I mean, it was really entertaining. Yeah, it's entertaining. Watching people beat the shit out of each other, unfortunately, is very entertaining.

I would agree. But I think for the casual observer, it can give the sport a bad name because people think of it as just being this awful fight club type thing and this is what it's all about. It appeals to the worst aspects of human nature. Yeah, and particularly if people are making money out of other people's risking without any medical support. risking without any medical support. Again, that idea is bad. And if there's gambling involved and these kids are not being paid or they're only paid if they win. But again, no medical support.

That's all questionable. Well, the UFC actually recently outlawed gambling in terms of all of its fighters. No one's allowed to gamble anymore because there was a scandal. What was the scandal? a scandal because one of the fighters apparently was injured and it was revealed on an online forum in some way. And this is all, I don't know the full details because it was currently an investigation. So the coach was suspended. The fighter who was in question was suspended and everyone from that gym or that coach train is no longer allowed to compete in the UFC so everyone from that gym had to leave that gym and go to other gyms because these are

professionals that relied on that gym for all of their training and they're they're planning their career so these people have to relocate they have to move they have to do something different and then this fighter or this trainer rather is in deep shit like there's a real serious investigation as to whether or not they told people that this guy was injured and he was gonna take a dive and then a bunch or that he was no way he was gonna be able to win the fight and then a bunch of people bet on his opponent and there was some so late money informed money Wow and then they came in and he won and everybody lost their money.

Exactly. No, no, no, no, no. He came in and he lost and everybody won money because they knew he was going to lose. Oh, so they were betting on him losing. They bet against him. Got it. Yeah. Yeah.

But why were they telling people that he was going to lose? So then the odds would be- Because they could bet on it. But the odds would be less against them, for them, right? No, they wanted to make money. They're not trying to prop him up. Let me explain it. Let me explain it.

What they were doing was the fighter who was injured, when they have these gambling forums and they discuss this, the fighter who was injured, everyone knew this fighter was injured. This coach had apparently informed people to bet against this fighter. Because he was injured. Because he was injured. And then he goes and wins. No, he. Because he was injured. Because he was injured. And then he goes and wins. No.

He lost. He was injured. He was informing them correctly. So this guy went in and essentially he had no chance. And all this informed money on the fact that this guy shouldn't have been fighting in the first place bet against him, bet on the opponent, and made a lot of money. The bookmakers found out about this. The odds makers found out about this. The odds makers found out about this. And it's akin to cheating because they knew this guy was not going to be able to really

fight. What would have been even smarter because then the odds would have been more in favor of him as if he had told a large group of people that he was injured. And in fact, he wasn't injured and he went there and won. And then everybody was betting against the opponent and there were less people betting for him. So they would win more money. That's what I thought you were saying.

No, you could do that, but then you would have to still. Actually win, make sure you win. Yeah, you'd have to actually win. And then when you're dealing with an organization like the UFC, these fighters are well matched. So the odds of him just being able to win and lie about it, there's no guarantee anyway. He could still get knocked unconscious

even if he says, hey, I'm injured, but he's not. You can guarantee a lose, but you can't guarantee a win, right? Right, that's it. So if a guy's injured and you know he's going to lose, then people pushed all the... There was too much money that was being bet and that's what triggered the investigation and then people found out that they had discussed

the fact this guy was allegedly discussed the fact this guy was unable to really compete and fought. So now no one's allowed to bet in the UFC. You can't even bet on yourself, which I think is kind of fucked. is going to win, like, let's say if your win bonus, your show money and win money is like $100,000 to show and $100,000 to win, which is often the case. A fighter could say, I'm going to bet $100,000 on myself because I'm going to fuck this guy up. And then he wins. Maybe he has good odds. And then you could bet on yourself. You can gamble. And guys have done that. And it's kind of exciting. Now you can't do that anymore. Can you bet in boxing? I do not know. I do not know. That's a good question.

I don't think boxing is regulated the way the UFC is, where there's not a primary organization. In boxing, you have a bunch of different promoters. So you have Golden Boy and Top Rank. You have all these different promoters so it's not like one organization controls all the fighters that are in this league right that's what the ufc does the ufc is itself famous it's like the nfl or the nba it's itself famous whereas in boxing that's not really the case in boxing it's all about who is the champion and champions will change promoters they'll move to different organizations but it's still canelo alvarez it's all about who is the champion, and champions will change promoters.

They'll move to different organizations, but it's still Canelo Alvarez. It's still Floyd Mayweather, and that's what people pay to see. With the UFC, the UFC is the biggest name. Right. And that's what's different. So the UFC, as an organization, said, you know what? We are going to ban all gambling because of this so no one can gamble, including, I think, me. I think even commentators aren't one can gamble, including, I think, me. I think even commentators aren't allowed to gamble, which is interesting. Yeah, I'd assume not. If no one else

is, why would you be able to? Yeah, but I mean, I can't affect the outcome. That's the thing. It's like, you know, if I am just calling a fight and I see the odds, I'm like, these odds suck. Like, I think this guy is going to beat this guy. Did you're wrong. Yeah. Yeah in the early days because the odds were so terrible In the early days when I first and then I stopped voluntarily myself in the early 2000s I'm like this is kind of fucked because I was worried that I was giving biased commentary based on bets Wow, but there was never big bets It was like a hundred bucks or something like that But I had a business partner of mine and and i would give him all my picks and we were at 84 at one time wow where he won 84 of the bets

it was crazy like we calculated it up over like multiple cards but it was a lot of it was because you were getting these guys like anderson silva who's this elite fighter who came over from fighting in japan and then fighting in England. Remember Anderson? I remember him. Oh, my God. In his prime, he was the GOAT. Yeah. And so, like, when he first came to the UFC, I was like, bet the house on him.

Brazilian. Yeah. I'm like, bet the house on Anderson. And he actually fought Chris Lieben in his UFC debut. And I told my friend, I'm like, bet everything. This is a fuck. This one's a shoe in. There's a few fights like that where guys will come over and people don't realize how good they are.

And then when you see them for the first time, you're like, okay, this is a champion. So you like gambling in general? Nah, not really. I mean, I used to gamble on pool. I used to play pool for money. But not seriously. I'm not like a gambling addict. We just worked on an episode on gambling, underground illegal gambling.

It is fascinating. Yeah? Fascinating. What's fascinating about it? That there's been an explosion of gambling or illegal gambling during the pandemic. Casinos were closed. It's a huge addiction. As we all know, there's a lot of – it's very addictive.

A lot of people couldn't go to casinos. So they started either online gambling or going to underground poker games and underground casitas, which are all over the U.S. We went, we visited a few, but they have these like machines called the fish game where they spend hours and hours. This is sort of the cheaper gambling, but they put in $10 and $20 and they spend hours and hours. All of this is illegal and there's drugs. The fish game. The fish game. It's these machines and people gather around them and they basically try to kill the fish. It's very rudimentary.

But they try to kill the fish and then the more hits you get, you get money out of it. But the machines in many ways. We interviewed one of the guys that runs one of these casitas. And I got tipped into this because I was working with the L.A. Sheriff's Department on another story. And they told me, have you done anything on these casitas, these illegal gambling operations? Because a lot of, like, there's cartel involvement in it. There's Asian gangs involved. And so we started looking into it.

And eventually, after many months, we got access to one of them. And the guy was saying how whenever people actually start winning from these machines, he goes and disconnects the machine and then connects it again. He basically rigs it in his favor, which is very much how casinos work in general. And then the poker game. So we went from sort of the low $20 games to the Beverly Hills poker game. So I got access with a friend of mine. Have you heard of a guy called Mickey Mace? No.

Actually, his online name is Dirt Goth Boy. Dirt Goth Boy? Do you know him? I've seen his videos. He apparently makes a lot of money and is really good at gambling. What is he gambling on? He's really well known for poker.

He's really well known for poker. And he's got celebrities and rappers who go up to him and tell him, can you play my money or can you help me play? And yeah, that's him. And so? And so we basically filmed this and we filmed with him and he took us to a few places. And it was really fascinating to see. Stack of cash. Yeah. To see sort of the illegal underground poker games through his eyes was really fascinating.

Illegal underground poker games. It's basically people who don't have a license. So whenever the house is made, whenever there's a person taking a fraction of what is being made that day and you don't have a casino license. You can have a poker game at your house. But if the person that is running that game is making money and you don't have a casino license for gambling or a casino license, that is immediately illegal. Okay. So like we could have a poker game. Yeah.

And we could put in our money and that's legal? But if Jamie was making 10% of our – that's illegal. Yeah. And we could put in our money and that's legal. But if Jamie was making 10% of our that's illegal. Interesting. And we went to games in high rises in LA and in Beverly Hills. How much did you see people play for? Hundreds of thousands of dollars. Yeah. I'm telling you a lot about what's coming out in the next season. This is actually one that we're filming right now, but it was really good stuff. Wow. So this fish game. Can you show me a video of this game?

Yeah. Oh, okay. Oh, I've seen this. I've seen this game, but I didn't know that people gambled on it. They do. They put in money, or they have these chips that they buy. The one we visited, we arrived, and the guy told us, welcome to Vegas.

And then there's a bunch of guys around these tables playing. And we went on a raid with the sheriff's department, the LA sheriff's department, where they were basically raided a few of these casitas and got a bunch of these. But then on the flip side, a few weeks later, we actually got in with the owner of one of these casitas who showed us how they do it. And he doesn't do it, but a lot of the people that run these games also sell meth for really cheap because meth makes you play for longer. Oh, boy. Yeah. That was always a problem with pool, with gambling in pool. They were all on amphetamines because they would play until someone quit.

And so they would play for 24 hours, 30 hours. And they would just gamble and spend thousands and thousands. I watched some of those games when I was a kid, when I was hanging out in pool halls. Guys would be on all kinds of drugs and they would play. Yeah, there's a huge incentive there for people to sell meth cheaply. Yeah. Because they're making money out of it. But the illegal gambling, what other things were they gambling on?

So dice. We also went to a couple of dice games, which was also really fascinating. And a lot of it is sort of in more immigrant communities. But we filmed it both in L.A. and New York as well. It's just fascinating. There's all these worlds. That's what I love about my job is you find out about these worlds that sometimes are happening just 10 minutes from your house. Yeah. about my job is you find out about these worlds that sometimes are happening just 10 minutes from your house, thriving games and trades and black markets, and you know nothing about them. And

they're happening every single day, you know, dressed very, you know, in your own backyard, and you have no idea. So the privilege of being able to gain access to these worlds is, and yeah, gambling, I think, was fascinating. It makes sense that it would explode during the pandemic when they shut the casinos down. In general, I would say that all black markets exploded during the pandemic. Guns, drugs, sex trafficking, but gambling, yeah, as well. And one of the things I think that the poker games in particular, what they're giving people is they hire like Michelin level chefs to cook for the guests. They have girls that stand behind, you know, scantily dressed women that massage you and then can go into a

private room with you if you want to in some places, not all, but some of them. And so you're given the VIP treatment that, you know, some people are given in Vegas or at least used to be given in Vegas. And plenty of drugs, lots of drugs available for everyone. And, yeah, you're treated like a king and you have everything at your disposal. And it's, you know, once or twice a week you're hanging out with your friends and you're eating amazing food and you have these beautiful women and you're, you know, spending millions of dollars. Oh, wow. It's fascinating. I would imagine that that makes sense that gambling would explode during the pandemic.

But why the other things? Why sex trafficking and guns? Well, guns, I think partly because everybody thought that the government was going to go after your guns. So whenever there's a Democratic president, the gun sales go up. Also the riots. As well. The riots, the fear of pandemic, the moment of crisis, all of that.

Drugs, because a lot of people were at home, were bored, and also because of the scams. One of the episodes we did this season, actually, that I haven't mentioned was about cyber piracy and the online, you know, ID theft scams that exist. Data right now is more valuable than gold or oil or guns or drugs or anything, our data. And it's out there and it's online and it's not very hard to find. So we

spend time with a woman, for example, who's a single mother, a woman that we called Becky in Miami. And before she met me, she decided she wanted to find out what she could find about me online. And she found and she told me and she found out a lot about me that was unsafe that I prefer if she hadn't found. But what she does, she goes online, she goes on this website called Vice City and and buys a credit card number and a name that comes with a name and an address. And then she puts that information, there's a little machine, she puts that information into a gift card, and then the information with the credit card number. And then she goes with that credit. Oh, and it's a customer guarantee. So she goes with that gift card that now has imprinted the credit card information.

And she uses it. If it doesn't work, she will get her $8 back from the website. And we saw her get this gift card, get somebody, you know, John Smith from somewhere from Colorado, his information on his credit card stolen, information on this gift card. And the next day, we saw her trying it out first in one of those snack machines and just make sure that it works. And it did work. And then the next day we saw her go out and purchase a bunch of things at the store with this card. So super, super easy. And then we escalated from there and spent time with the Crips, with a member of the Crips who used to deal with drugs and now exclusively does ID theft online.

But in his case, he was using the money that was given out by the government during COVID. And he, particularly in Illinois, it was really easy to give out a name and an address and they would send you unemployment funds. So these kids, I kid you not, they made millions and millions of dollars. This one kid made over a million dollars and he showed me his bank, his online bank statements and I could see it. He wasn't, it wasn't all bravado. It was real. He showed me. Um, and, and then, and we saw him actually going online and, uh, with, uh, with this fake information and ID, he was able to purchase $25,000 worth of music equipment that he wanted shipped to a place. Um, and it was crazy. So there was a lot of disposable money, is what I'm saying, during the pandemic that

went into purchasing, you know, things on the black market as well. What happens to these gambling places now that the casinos are open again? Does their business drop off? One of the things we heard is that people prefer not to, I kept on asking, like, why don't you just go to Vegas, particularly if you're in L.A.? You're very close. And they're saying, why? If I can just go to a place across the street 10 minutes from me, why would I go to Vegas? And it's a place where, again, I get preferential treatment, VIP treatment in some situations.

So they just prefer it. And it's also, yeah, they don't have to tell anyone. They can make their money, and no one will know how much money they're making because it's underground. The gambling addiction is a wild one. It is. It's really, I didn't know about it until I got into pool halls when I was a kid. And I remember being around these people, and they were, it was no different than someone who needs pills. It was, they needed that fix. It's the number one cause of apparently of suicide

is addiction to gambling. Really? Particularly among teens. Among teens? Yeah. Yeah. It's really, really sad. They just get too far in the hole and they think their life is over? Yeah. And also because you can do it now so easily online and there's all sorts of gambling. It's very, very, very sad. And then there's legal gambling online too. There's legal and illegal, yeah. And that's another thing that we saw was people showing us, yeah, just how easy it is to gamble online.

You get these WhatsApp groups that give you a link and then you sign it and you get into this thing. It looks so legitimate, but it's all illegal. It used to be that online gambling was illegal. They made it illegal to help the casinos because I think the casinos lobbied to stop online gambling because there was an organization that was, I think it's called the International Pool Tour, and their business model was based on they were going to have these big matches

between elite pool players and people could gamble online. And right when they were launching, they made online gambling illegal. And it destroyed the organization. They wound up owing a bunch of people money. And then the guy who was the head of this whole thing was Kevin Trudeau. I don't know this whole thing was Kevin Trudeau I don't know if you remember who Kevin Trudeau was but he was a guy who would he was arrested and went to jail

for scams and the scams were he would put out books like weight loss secrets they don't want you to know like and he had infomercials that I guess they decided were deceptive, allegedly. And I think he might still be in jail. Is he out now? He's not out, but he's in some other issue. He got out a couple months ago. Oh, so he was in jail for quite a long time. I actually, in my house, I used to have one of the pool tables from the International Pool Tour.

I bought one of the tables after they sold everything off. Oh, wow. But his whole thing was scams. His whole thing was just preying on people that wanted to, oh, there's a weight loss cure that they don't want you to know about. A $37 million fine he got for that. The government refunded many of the purchases of the book, but Trudeau said he was broke and did not explain where the money had gone. The government said he still needed to refund

millions of dollars more. Before halting the case years ago, U.S. District Judge Robert Gettleman said Trudeau would have to explain where the money was. The judge added then, that will be interesting. I'm not sure I'll be sitting here, but I hope to be. He's in court because he's apparently out.

And I think he's just going to flee and go get that money. Right. He stashed millions of dollars overseas. So it was a scam because what he was selling didn't actually do any of the things he did? Or was it a pyramid scam? I think it was a scam in that like he was. It's a good question. Like he was, it's a good question. I think he was being deceptive and he sold all these books on these fake premises that there was this illegal or this, you know, secret way of doing, secret way of, what different books did he have?

It was all they don't want you to know. Natural cures they don't want you to know about. More natural cures revealed. The weight loss cure they don't want you to know about. Debt cures they don't want you to know about more natural cures revealed the weight loss cure they don't want you to know about debt cures they don't want you to know about that was his whole thing whenever there's a they so he had infomercials and he also was

one of the commentators on these pool matches and I actually went to a few of them I actually met him nice guy? he seemed nice enough. I mean, I don't know. And where's the pool table that you bought, by the way? Oh, I sold it.

I got rid of it. But this was early 2000s, I want to say, that this was happening. So at this time, gambling was illegal and there was actually a company called Bodog that was an online gambling site. And the guy who is the head of Bodog was a guy named Calvin Ayers. And he was like this famous playboy, super rich guy who put together Bodog Fight. And it was the same sort of premise that they were going to have fights and then people are going to be able to gamble on it with his bow dog website which became illegal so then he had to flee the country so i believed at one point

in time at least if he came back to america he would have been arrested but he got in a feud with the ufc because like his organization was spending similar to like you know what i was talking about it's like very difficult to create a new online league. But he spent a lot of money, got really big name fighters like Fedor Milianenko and, you know, like these big guys and got them to fight. And one of the events he put and his thing would be like all scantily clad women. And, you know, and one of them they did. I think they did it in Costa Rica. They did it on the beach.

So they had, see if you find bow dog fight on the beach. So they put together these MMA fights, like in these exotic locations where they had these elite fighters fight and they fought like on the beach in the sun and, you know, and they had the ring set up and people were around it is but again his thing i believe was gambling now i think he's involved in some other stuff like cryptocurrencies and stuff but he's overseas perfect follow-up yeah so that was it so this is this is the event so that was bowdog fights and so you know, they had these rings set up in these beautiful exotic locations. And they had elite fighters, too.

They brought in like Chael Sonnen fought for them. Again, Fedor, Matt Lindlund, a lot of like elite, elite fighters, top of the food chain fighters, went over there with the promise of that big cash. But you were saying how it was not legal, but now it is online gambling and sports gambling too. I think a lot of it opened up during the pandemic. I think they opened up a lot of online gambling and then online gambling became, it was an issue with us. Like there was a time where we were advertising for one of these online gambling sites. And then I had to do a gig in New Jersey. And in New Jersey, they had a real problem with the fact that I had advertised for these online gambling things. They wanted to make sure I wasn't still involved with them anymore.

I couldn't work at a casino. I was like, what? Yeah. Of all the things that could be said about those things. Well, you know, they were just upset that this was cutting into their business in some way. I mean, I don't even, you know. Because the gig was at a casino? Yes. Oh, got it. Yeah.

It's just the gambling world is a fucking shady world. I mean, Vegas. So this guy actually says, if you listen to him, Dirt Goth Boy, Mickey Mays. What a great name. He says that because he's made so much money at the legal casinos, he's been kicked out, so he's not allowed to actually go to the majority of the casinos in Vegas. Well, that is a true thing, because Dana White, who

is the president of the UFC, who's very wealthy, he likes to gamble, and he made so much money gambling at the Palms that they banned him from the Palms, so he pulled the UFC gambling at the Palms that they banned him from the Palms. So he pulled the UFC out of the Palms. He's like, well, fuck you then.

And then the UFC wasn't going to have events there. It was like a big deal because, you know, he had won like $7 million playing blackjack. Wow. Yeah. He's a really good player. Yeah. He goes hard. Wow.

But he's lost a million dollars in a night too before. player yeah he goes hard wow but he's lost a million dollars in a night too before just i guess when you're that rich like and you're a gambler you need big thrills it's what you need to make money is money well you also need it needs to be a big number for you to get excited like i could play pool for 20 bucks and it'd be fun but there's guys are like, they're deep into it. They want that crazy rush of, hit me. You know, like, yes! Yes! And they run around.

I want a million dollars! I really, it's a part that I don't get at all. I remember the first time I ever went to Vegas. We were traveling cross country. I moved to the U.S. for the first time. All our shit got stolen in Denver. It was horrible we were so sad my husband and i we went to vegas i put five dollars into a cat machine and i won

fifteen dollars and i was like this is it and and i got like two free martinis as you're playing i was like i'm done that's it well that's healthy but it's you're you're smelling you're sniffing it you know it's like it's a it's a thing where these people that just are in the casinos every day and the people that live in Vegas and are constantly gambling. But again, I feel like it should be legal. And I definitely think that someone should be able to go to a casino and bet money and have a good time and lose money or win money, and it should be fine. But for some people, the allure of it is no different than a place that sells heroin. And actually, not making it.

Yeah, I mean, there's always the thing that we all know, which is by illegalizing it, you're actually creating a black market because it's not going to disappear. It's going to still be there, but it's going to be there with no rules and regulations. Right, and then you don't get Cirque du Soleil. You don't get a buffet. Exactly. The casinos do a great job of incentivizing people to go. Yeah. I mean, it's like casinos are great.

You go there, these beautiful places. It's a business. They know how to do it. And they've been doing it for a long, long time. No windows. You never know what time of the day it is. Yeah. But casinos, that's the weird thing is that if you win legally and ethically, you still can get banned.

That should not be allowed. That's kind of fucked. Totally fucked. They want it rigged. Yeah, of course. They want to make money. And so they reserve the right to kick you out if you're good, which is bananas. Bananas.

The moment you start actually making McBunny, you're not allowed to go there anymore. It's insane. But, I mean, I guess that's the price you pay for having it legal. I mean, I don't know how the laws are structured. I'm not aware of it. It's crazy. Yeah, but I'm aware that people fucking love it. They do.

They love gambling. It's just such a rush to them. Yeah. And, you know, we show odds with most fights. We show the betting odds with most fights. And there's actually online betting organizations that will allow you to bet in the middle of a fight. You can decide where the fight is going and you can bet.

So wait, so betting is still allowed in the UFC, but just not as part of the UFC? Not people that work for the UFC, but fans. Fans. Fans. Of course, fans. If you're going to have online gambling, of course, fans are going to be allowed to gamble on the fight. And it does incentivize people to watch.

I mean, I'm sure there's a lot. Which is why they show yards, I'm assuming. Yeah. And then also the gambling organizations, they advertise on the UFC and they sponsor the UFC, which again, I'm a fan of. I think you should be allowed to do that. But I can do it. I am healthy in that regard.

I don't have a gambling addiction, but I do know people that do have a gambling addiction and it's a real thing. I think, again, it goes back to the alcohol idea. Yes. I mean, I think it should be legal. What else did you cover this season or anything that's like particularly bizarre or disturbing? Yeah, we did one on organs. The first episode of the season was organ trafficking. Oh, my God.

Yeah. That one scares the shit out of me. It was the first episode. And it was, yeah, I think it all starts, we all think it's a rumor and it can't really exist. And it's a Hollywood depiction of stuff going on. Oh, I don't think it's a rumor. But you can't and it can't really exist. And it's a Hollywood depiction of stuff going on. Oh, I don't think it's a rumor. But you can't, that doesn't really exist. But even I, when I started looking into this story, I was like, is this really a thing?

And then we found out it really is a thing. So we traveled to Colombia and Mexico and here in the U.S. And we spent time filming people involved in the trade. And I think one of the most disturbing interviews I ever did was with a guy in Colombia called The Wrecker. disturbing interviews I ever did was with a guy in Colombia called The Wrecker, which his name is El Deshuesador, which means the wrecker or the deboner. He takes the bones. Yeah, it's a horrible name, Deshuesador.

And he works for the Klan, and we got to him. When you watch the cocaine episode, we interviewed a commander in Colombia who was part of the cocaine trade, and it was basically through him and some other contacts cocaine episode, we interviewed a commander in Colombia who was part of the cocaine trade. And it was basically through him and some other contacts that we got an interview with this guy. And it was horrible because he's telling us how he does what he does. And so much of it was so horrific that I had a hard time actually believing what he was saying. Like what was he saying? How he cuts people alive, how he like takes the organ. So I was asking him questions like, how exactly do you take, like if you're talking about a liver, like

how exactly do you take a liver from somebody? I wanted him to explain, but do you have any medical training? And again, you know, one of the difficult things with the show that we do is corroborating what people are telling us. So with him, I kept on asking him, you know, because it takes so long to even get this one person to talk to us. So how do we corroborate what he's saying? So I kept on asking him, like, exactly how do you operate on them? And how do you and all of this is very, I'm very transparent about all of this. And in the show, I talk about not being absolutely 100% sure that what he's telling me is true or not. But he then showed me a video of them with a person and, you know, some body parts, some organs coming out of. But again, it is very hard to corroborate because it could have been a dead body, you know, and they were taking organs from a dead body, which in that case wouldn't be viable for transplant unless it would have just died.

So there's a lot of questions there. The video was really horrific, and we decided not to wear it, even though I sort of talk a little bit about what I'm seeing, but we decided not to wear the video. But it was horrible because, again, with trying to always empathize and understand why people do what they do, this one was impossible. There was no part of me that I understood what he did, and that's why it was so much disbelief. But then we find out that this trade is very much alive. And we eventually landed an interview with a doctor in Mexico who told us how he's part of the whole ordeal. And he is

actually in his case, we were able to corroborate a lot more. And he was a doctor with medical expertise. And then with a patient who had gotten one of these organs on the black market, and he looked me in the eye and he said, I know you're judging me, but what would you do if it was you or your loved one and you know that they would be dying? Essentially in the U.S., there's 17 people every day that die waiting for an organ, 17 people every single day that wait, wait, wait, wait for years. Their organ never happens, never comes, and then they die. So that's why a black market exists, because there are desperate people out there who desperately need an organ and know that they're going to die if they don't have one. And so that's what he was saying, like, what would you do in this situation? I was like,

yeah, 100%. It's a very good question. I have no idea what I would do. Would I buy an organ for my kid if he needed a kidney and he was about to die? Would I buy it on the black market? I think that's the questions that I think are important to be, that I ask and that the show asks of people. Where are they getting these people? So the wrecker, Luis Vizador, said a lot of the people that he, the victims were actually actually migrants. So we spent time right on the south of the Darien Gap. Do you know what the Darien Gap is? No.

It's the most dangerous, lawless part of the world. It's the only part. There's basically a road that connects all the way South America up to Canada. And there's one patch where the engineers will never be able to construct a road, which is this Darien Gap. It's a massive jungle with horrible conditions, very wet, and right now full of cartel members that are preying upon the migrants that are crossing, that spend days, sometimes even weeks, trying to cross. It's uphills and muddy, and people die of dehydration, and they're killed by

the cartel. Women are raped. It's a horrific, horrific journey. So we spent time filming right on the South as they were about all these hundreds of migrants who were about to make their way into the Darien Gap to try to make it to the United States. And that's where he set. And it was really horrible stories, as you can imagine, right? People traveling with their babies, with their kids, and they're about to go through the most horrific experience of their life and dangerous. And, you know, families get separated, kids lose their parents. It's a horrible, horrible situation. And so this, this was, the Lord of the Wrecker was telling us how that's, because if they go missing, nobody reports them. It's like the easy prey, right? And then we

were able to interview a policeman who actually corroborated what we were saying. He didn't want to be on camera because it was too scary for him because he was afraid the cartel was going to go after him. But he told us essentially with a mask, he told us, yeah, I know that this trade is happening right here and that the migrants are the victims. It's really awful. It's horrible, horrible, horrible. So they find these people, they find their blood type. Yeah, they do all sorts of tests on people. And they find out if they're good or bad for the certain organ. And then not all the organs are coming to the US. Some of them stay in Colombia

for whoever pays more in Colombia or Panama or other countries around there, Mexico, and some of them, particularly the stuff that is being harvested in Mexico, either American patients go down there and get their operations done there. Usually that's how it happens. It's not like the organ travels to the United States. The patients go to these places to get their organs. And one of the guys we filmed with was this amazing guy called Garrett Rowe who has a kidney disease and for five years has been waiting for an organ. He's young, 30-something-year-old, married, amazing guy,

and has to spend half of his day linked up to a machine, to a dialysis machine, and can't work, can't sleep well. It's a horrible way to live. And he knows that the maximum, the usual average life is seven years. So you don't live much past seven years with this condition. And so he had like two more years to go if he didn't get a kidney. And so we filmed with him before. And then the good news of the story is that he just got a kidney through a triangle where his wife wasn't able to donate to him

because they're not the same type, but she was able to donate to somebody else who eventually donated to him. It was like a, it's called a, I can't remember what it's called, but a charity donor triangle or something like that, donor circle. And he was able to get a kidney, but he was one of the people we asked, like, would you consider the black market? And he says, if a few more years pass by, if I'm at the edge and I know I'm about to die, 100%. But, of course, there are people willing to donate their or to sell their organs. They don't have to be killed. There are actually people willing to sell their organs.

You go online and you can find people all over the world saying, I have a, you know, I need money. I have a healthy kidney. I'm willing to sell it. Oh, boy. Yeah. Whoa. I know. That's dark.

Sorry. I didn't mean to bring it down. No, no. You brought it down the whole day. I know. That's the nature of your business. This is when the listeners are cutting their wrists. Are there any happy stories other than the surrogates?

Well, the babies. Yeah. The surrogates is the happy story. But I think that ultimately I'm not – I want people to tune in. You know, at the end of the day, anyone who watches Traffic doesn't come out of Traffic saying, oh, my God, that was most horrific, depressing because people keep on watching. We have a lot of fans. Yeah. Because there's also always or a lot of times there is – I'm trying to find the humanity.

Of course, on the record, it's impossible to find their humanity. But again, at the end of the day, I think the message is that in all, the majority of the people that I meet, there is a humanity that can be found and there's a common ground. And I think that is so much that is what's missing from public discourse when it comes to everything. We live in the most divisive era ever in history. It's a horrible time where you can't talk about anything. Everything is politicized. There is so much judgment constantly. There is no incentive or no one is trying to understand. Everybody's always trying to judge. And the show is completely the opposite. We are trying to understand even the people that are the most stereotyped

people in our society, the criminals, the outlaws. We're at least trying to understand because without understanding them, understanding is not condoning, but without understanding them, we will never understand their motivations. And without knowing their motivations, we'll never prevent these black markets from existing. I think what you're providing is a window into a world that most people don't experience. window into a world that most people don't experience. And by looking at it from that perspective, you do get a chance to recognize that if you were in that situation, what would you do? You would probably be involved. If you were one of those kids that's involved in that cocaine trafficking thing that you studied, like what, what did people do? What, what would you do if

that was you? And if you were in that situation with no other ways to get out? Right. That's what I love about the show. It's such a great conversation starter for all of us. What have been the opportunities we've been given and what are we doing with the opportunities we've been given? And what, yeah, what would we do if we didn't have those opportunities and we were born in their situations? Yeah. Well, I appreciate you very much and I appreciate your work. You have a very, very hard job. I mean, it's one of the most difficult and dangerous jobs in investigative journalism. I really think that.

Thank you, Joe. Thank you for being here. Thank you very much. Thank you so much for having me. I always love talking to you. I always love talking to you, too. Thank you. Bye, everybody.