The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 2.21 WHO IS LYING?! We Need To Talk About Nex Benedict, MrBeast, Bobbi Althoff, Alexander Smirnov, & More

Episode Date: February 21, 2024

Lets start with what we know for sure amid conflicting reports... Use code “PHIL” for $20 OFF your first SeatGeek order & returning buyers use code “PDS” for $10 off AND your chance at weekly $500 prizes! https://seatgeek.onelink.me/RrnK/PHIL Daily Dip newsletter subscribers can win up to $1,000 in SeatGeek credit so make sure you’re subscribed: https://www.dailydip.co/ Step into Spring with Vessi at http://vessi.com/pds for an automatic 15% off your first purchase at checkout + free shipping to CA, US, AU, JP, TW, KR, SGP. Buy the new https://BeautifulBastard.com Drop! 6 new items just went live and even more to grab  –✩ TODAY’S STORIES ✩ – 00:00 - What We Know — and Don’t Know — About The Death of Nex Benedict 06:07 - Bobbi Althoff Says Viral Leaks Were AI 09:23 - MrBeast Sparks Debate After Stocking Walmart Shelves Himself 12:21 - Sponsored by SeatGeek 13:24 - Two More People Charged After Kansas City Tragedy 15:26 - Biden Bribe Accuser Was Given Info by Russian Intelligence Agents 19:03 - NASA Accepting Applicants To Participate in Mars Simulation 20:51 - Sponsored by Vessi 21:54 - Major Outlets Show Bias Towards Israel in Gaza Coverage 29:03 - Your Thoughts on Yesterday’s Show ——————————   Produced by: Cory Ray Edited by: James Girardier, Maxwell Enright, Julie Goldberg, Christian Meeks Art Department: William Crespo Writing/Research: Philip DeFranco, Brian Espinoza, Lili Stenn, Maddie Crichton, Star Pralle, Chris Tolve  Associate Producer for Israel/Palestine Media Bias: Lili Stenn ———————————— #DeFranco #BobbiAlthoff #MrBeast ———————————— Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sup, you beautiful bastards. You're watching the Philip DeFranco Show, and we got a lot of news to talk about today. We need to talk about the death of Next Benedict, the fallout from the bombshell that an FBI informant was working with Russian intelligence. We've got Mr. Beast and Bobby Althoff controversies. We now know what happened at the Kansas City parade shooting.

We need to talk about the mainstream bias we've seen with Israel and Gaza. And then there's even more. So buckle up, hit that like button to let YouTube know you like these big daily dives into the news, and let's just jump into it. Starting with us needing to talk about the death of Nex Benedict. And I'll say right at the top, there are a lot of unknowns,

and this is still a developing situation. Let's break down the information we do have to go off of. Because over the last 24 hours or so, there's been a lot of news and social media attention around this non-binary 16-year-old who died on February 8th, notably just one day after being injured during a fight in a girl's bathroom in Owasso High School in Oklahoma. Now initially there were conflicting reports about the student's name and pronouns,

with this due in part to the fact that the obituary in a GoFundMe for funeral expenses referred to the teen by their birth name and gender assigned at birth. But Sue Benedict, the student's biological grandmother who raised them and adopted them a few years ago, has since cleared that up, telling the Independent that she provided Nex's birth name by accident, and saying, When you're going through something like this and you lose a child, you're not thinking right. We're getting a headstone done, and Nex will be on there. Also adding that while she sometimes struggled to understand the nuances of Nex's identity, the teen was teaching her and was always understanding.

Also explaining that the family, who traced some of their roots to the Choctaw Nation, promoted openness and discussions about gender and identity. With Sue going on to describe a high school sophomore who was a straight-A student who loved drawing, reading, video games, and their cat, saying, I was so proud of Nex. They were going someplace. They were so free. Nex had a light in them that was so big. They had so many dreams. I wanted their light to keep shining for everyone. Sue also echoed those sentiments in an update on GoFundMe,

where she apologized for deadnaming Nex, and adding that all the money left over from the funeral fundraiser will go to other children dealing with the right to be who they feel they are in Nex Benedict's name. And yesterday, as the news began to spread and gain national attention, we saw law enforcement and school officials issuing statements on the death and altercation that preceded it. Notably there, neither had identified the student who had been killed. And in a statement posted on its website, Owasso Public Schools said it sought to address, quote, speculation and misinformation surrounding the case, and quote, particularly statements that call into question the district's commitment to student safety and security. Though also noting that some of the aspects could not be

disclosed due to federal privacy laws and an ongoing police investigation. As far as what they could provide, they said that a physical altercation had taken place at a restroom in the high school on February 7th, saying the students were in the restroom for less than two minutes, and the fight was broken up by other students who were there, as well as a staff member who was supervising outside of the restroom. And according to this statement, after the fight was broken up, all of the involved students walked under their own power to the assistant principal's office and nurse's office, with it then going on to say that per district protocols, each student was given a health assessment by a district registered nurse. Now, very notably here, the statement also said that

while it is protocol for students who need more medical help to be moved to a medical facility by an ambulance or a parent or guardian, quote, it was determined that ambulance service was not required. But added, out of an abundance of caution, it was recommended to one parent that their student visit a medical facility for further examination. And in a separate statement posted on Facebook, the Owasso Police Department confirmed that it had been summoned to the hospital for a student who had been involved in a physical altercation at the school. But also very significantly here, OPD noted that, quote, no report of the incident had been made prior to the notification at the hospital. Now, the school district, for their part, tried to explain this

by claiming that it is protocol to inform parents and guardians when students are involved in altercations and then let them decide if they want to file a police report. There, many people have expressed outrage that the school had not called an ambulance or police, this including Sue Benedict, who actually told the independent that not only did the school fail to take either of those actions, it also suspended NEXT for two weeks. Beyond that, Sue also provided the outlet with a number of other details that were not included in either of the official reports, saying that Nex had actually been bullied at school for being non-binary and that bullying had specifically started at the beginning of the 2023 school year, notably just months after Oklahoma's Republican Governor Kevin Stitt

signed legislation forcing public school kids to use bathrooms that match their sex assigned at birth. And actually, according to Sue, Nex had told her about the February 7th altercation, saying that they and a trans student had been in a fight with three older girls in the ladies' bathroom, saying that Nex had been knocked to the ground during the fight and hit their head on the floor. And as The Independent reported, when Sue was called to the school, she found Nex badly beaten with bruises over their face and eyes and with scratches on the back of their head. The outlet describing the teen's head injury as severe. And after picking Nex up, Sue took them to the hospital where they were later discharged and sent home.

But then the next day, when Nex was getting ready to leave the house, they collapsed, with Sue calling an ambulance. But when the EMTs arrived, they found Nex had stopped breathing. And just like that, this 16-year-old was declared dead at the hospital that evening. And that account also appeared to be confirmed

by the police statement, though it also noted, it is not known at this time if the death is related to the incident at the school or not. Saying the police were conducting a thorough investigation and awaiting an autopsy report and toxicology results. Also adding that their findings will be sent to the Tulsa County District Attorney's Office for prosecution review and final cause of death will be determined by the state's medical examiner's office. And with this, you also had a police spokesperson telling reporters that all charges will be on the table once the cause of death is confirmed. So there you have people pointing out that all charges are in fact not on the table because Oklahoma law doesn't recognize hate crimes based

on gender or sexual orientation. That's really important here because many LGBTQ plus advocates and people on social media have said that Nex's death amounts to a hate crime. With the advocacy group Freedom Oklahoma saying in a statement, we want to be clear, whether Nex died as a direct result of injuries sustained in the brutal hate motivated attack at school or not, Nex's death is a result of being the target of physical and emotional harm because of who Nex was. And going on to directly blame Oklahoma lawmakers, saying, This harm is absolutely related to the rhetoric and policies that are commonplace at the Oklahoma legislature, the State Department of Education, and the governor's office.

And that blame is something that has been echoed by many, many others. And this is Oklahoma has been a major hub for anti-trans policies in recent years, and especially ones targeting young folks. Right, in addition to the public school bathroom ban, the state under Governor Stitt also banned the use of non-binary gender markers and IDs and restricted gender-affirming care. I mean, hell, less than two months into 2024, legislators proposed over 50 anti-LGBTQ plus laws.

That's more than literally any other state. And this is Oklahoma isn't a stranger to LGBTQ plus controversies going viral. With a number of the stories connected to the account and the owner of the account of Libs of TikTok, who by the way, I mean, just in the last month, Oklahoma is openly anti-trans superintendent Ryan Walters. He put her on the Oklahoma Department of Education Advisory Board, even though she literally doesn't live in Oklahoma and has no experience in education. But bring this back to next. We're gonna have to wait to see what comes from this investigation. And then what's going to follow that? And in the meantime, of course, I want to pass the question off to you.

What are your thoughts here? And then y'all remember when Elon Musk was like, I'm gonna get the bots off of Twitter. And then there was like a week where I was like, wait, did he actually do it? It feels like I've seen less bots. And then it just got astronomically worse from there, but also from wherever it had ever been. I feel like every time I'm on that health site, I'm like, oh, this is actually a really interesting thing. Let me go and look at the replies, see what people are saying. Almost every time now, it's like, hey, here's a vagina.

Here's a random porn reply that's trying to funnel you over to OnlyFans. Oh, did you find that post about those puppies really interesting? Here's a video of someone being murdered. But also, like, in addition to that, it feels like it is the place to be for some new celebrity nudity scandal of the week. I mean, what? Even just recently, there was the alleged Drake video. There were those Taylor Swift deep fakes. And now it looks like creator and podcaster Bobby Althoff is now the latest victim of non-consensual AI porn. Because if you hopped on yesterday, you might have seen that she was trending on Twitter.

Tons of people talking about, oh my God, the Bobby leaks. People joking about it. People going like, who had the best leaks? It's just a fucking wild conversation to see play out on social media then eventually you had a handful of people and outlets going wait a minute looks like these videos may actually have been done with ai then bobby herself even having to address it sharing on an instagram story i hate to disappoint you all but the reason i'm trending is 100 not me and it's definitely ai generated saying in a video i saw that i was trending and i was like oh my god that's that's a first I'm trending on Twitter you guys must really love my podcast wow uh so I clicked it and I was like um what the f**k is this

uh and I didn't really like I felt like it was a mistake or something like that it was like bots or something I didn't realize that it was actually people believing that that was me until my whole team called me and were like, is this real? I was like, you guys. You guys. Anyway, not me. Sorry to disappoint. But what the f***?

No. That was so graphic, too. I was like, oh, my God, I need to cover my eyes. And so with this, there's been a lot of reactions. People of course finding it disturbing, saying there should be consequences of whoever's making and posting these things. Noting this is not a problem

that's gonna go away anytime soon. Because this is probably done with one of those easily accessible face swapping things and AI regarding just video creations getting better by the day. It becomes this very weird world where like, I'm thinking about it from like two different ends. We're now entering a world where there can be a video of you doing something and you can just go, no, that's fake. But even if it happened to

be real, I understand I'm not talking about like what's happening with the Bobby situation, right? But looking at the bigger picture of all this is now something that anyone could do if they wanted to deny something. And then completely without your consent or like you having any control over it, anyone can make you appear to be doing anything against your will. They can not only view you, but also promote it to so many other people

without you being involved. They can now depict you in any way they'd like, no matter how demeaning or disgusting. And they can just get it out in an instant to millions of people. And so that's why with this, you have people looking to places like the MIT Technology Review,

which recently explained the different ways we can try to fight against deep fakeake porn. The thing that there are some tools that can create essentially a shield around photos by altering the pixels so that when they're put into an AI app, they won't look realistic. But the thing there is that these tools only work against the current generation of AI models. With stuff like this, you're playing a game of whack-a-mole. So yeah, until someone figures out some sort of a silver bullet, this is our weird new reality. And then Mr. Beast and his company Feastables have found themselves in a bit of a controversy. Though I imagine nice for him,

this one not illegal, controversy more of just a public opinion one. Because over the past few days, you've had the biggest content creator in the world addressing some concerns from fans. Fans saying they can't find his Feastable candy bars at stores like Walmart, with them even visiting multiple locations, but still walking away empty handed. Notably with this story, part of the reason that there's been such an increased demand to try Feastables is that in addition to changing their branding, they also revised their recipe. Which I will say, on that note, I'm going to be very real here. I try to not go out of my way to be negative about other creators in the space when they're trying to do new ventures.

But now that it's been fixed, I just got to say this. Feastables candy bars were one of the most mid-sl mid slash meh candies I had ever tasted in my life. But whatever they did in this revised formula, I snacked their peanut butter flavor. I can't speak to the other flavors. That is one of the most delicious candies I've ever fucking had. I've put on like five pounds in the past week because of these stupid fucking candy bars. You know, that's why there's this renewed demand and interest. And you have Jimmy saying, in addition to doing everything he can to restock, he also said that there's only

so much he can do, right? I spent 15 hours yesterday visiting Walmarts and Targets and seeing if they had inventory in the back and helping them put it out. The store was doing zero sales. And when I visited, it had zero product on shelf. I found these in the back room and had them scan them in and I placed them on the shelf. The store then started selling a bar an hour. Most products don't have velocities like ours, so you have to stock the shelves more frequently, or they sit empty and people don't have anything to buy. Learning a lot. Random showing shelves at stores experiencing similar problems. As well as a chart to show just how much sales increase once the product is finally moved onto shelves. Noting that some stores have empty shelves because they're fully running out of

inventory faster than they're supposed to. And him explaining, the reason I'm doing all this investigation is I had tons of Feastables promo planned, but I don't want to send people to stores if shelves are empty. Don't want to send people to stores if shelves are empty. I don't want to waste people's time. After four days of restocking shelves, I've concluded I should chill on the promo for a bit to not waste people's time. Right, and so one big aspect of this is I think it was an interesting look behind the scenes about sales and retail, about all the logistics that impact what customers have access to, the marketing, and many found it interesting. But also at the same time, it sparked a kind of controversy and debate.

Because while some were impressed that Mr. Beast went to all this effort, saying that it showed what a hard worker he is to be at the top of the chain and still willing to do the bottom of the ladder work, you also had others calling him out. With outlets like Kotaku saying, just what overworked and underpaid retail workers need, a YouTuber being annoying. And others saying, imagine working your lousy $13.46 an hour Walmart job and then in comes this half a billionaire to insist you restock his chocolate bars right now. Extremely punchable behavior in my opinion. With others saying, you know, the people at Walmart, they're doing a million different things with a million different products. They aren't really concerned with promoting one specific brand of candy. But then you had others pushing against that. So,

you know, a lot of large companies have representatives who do this regularly. Going on to argue that Mr. B's wasn't trying to be rude or like shame the retail workers and saying he just said that he helped them restock. Knowing him, he probably actually did help them restock, but we literally don't know either way. You know, ultimately, I would actually love to know your thoughts on this specific story. Because, you know, with Mr. Beast having the level of fame that he has, it feels like no matter what he does, like, there's a controversy. But, you know, all controversies aren't the same. There are levels to this thing. And so my question to you is, where does this specific one land for you?

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Because last week, just after the parade had wrapped up, gunfire suddenly erupted, killing one woman and wounding 22 others, many critically. And at the time, we didn't know why people started shooting, just that it was possibly some sort of argument. But now, as people are starting to get charged, the details are coming out. The two juveniles charged last week

on resisting arrest and gun-related offenses, and now two adults have been charged with second-degree murder and lesser offenses, with those two being 23-year-old Lindell Mays and 18-year-old Dominic Miller. And so with those court documents now unsealed, the county prosecutor was free to lay out her version of events to reporters yesterday, saying that the first person to draw their gun appears to have been Mays, with them apparently getting into some sort of verbal argument with someone else at the rally whom he had no history with or connection to,

and things then just rapidly escalated to the point of violence, though it's unclear exactly how. We had a witness reportedly telling police a group of four males approached Mays, and one of them asked him what he was looking at. And then, according to a probable cause statement, video shows Mays approaching them in an aggressive manner, also pointing at them before pulling out his gun. Allegedly, he told police he did that because someone said, I'm going to get you. We also allegedly said he did it because he thought his female friend was going to get shot. Except he reportedly started shooting while his target was running away and apparently unarmed.

And he allegedly said he randomly picked a target to shoot at. And he also allegedly said he was, quote, just being stupid when he advanced on the group. But either way, that is the moment when then other people drew their guns as well and everyone started shooting. The prosecutor is saying that evidence points to Miller, not Mays, being the one whose bullet struck the woman who died. And he reportedly told investigators there was this man shooting at him, and so he returned fire, estimating that he let off four or five shots from his nine millimeter handgun, and that he wasn't certain if he had hit or missed. But regardless, he was apparently also shot in the chaos, tripping over a cone while shooting back, then fleeing the scene. Meanwhile, this whole time you have bullets flying, they're weaving through a dense crowd of innocent

people, including a bunch of children. So now, in addition to all these other people that got hurt, you have these two in the hospital recovering from their wounds. When they get out, they will be facing up to life in prison. But a big thing is that all of this, as the investigation is still ongoing, and the prosecutor has made it very clear that more charges are coming. So for now, we're waiting for more updates. But I mean, even with what we know now, it should be shocking, but it isn't how stupid and avoidable all of this appears to have been. And then, yikes, yikes, yikes, the Republican Party is once again being accused of being a Russian mouthpiece. And this after their accusations against Hunter and Joe Biden started falling apart around them because they had heavily relied on

what they referred to as a star witness, Alexander Smirnoff, who was an FBI confidential informant with ties to the Ukrainian energy company Burisma. That's the same company they said allegedly funneled millions to Hunter and Joe Biden to benefit Ukraine. Now, Smirnoff's credibility has been completely destroyed. With this last week, seeing the notably Trump-appointed special counsel in charge of investigating the Bidens accusing Smirnoff of providing false evidence to the FBI. And then yesterday, court documents revealed that Smirnoff admitted that officials associated with Russian intelligence were involved in passing a story about Hunter Biden. And the big issue for these Republican politicians is that their crusade against Hunter and Joe heavily relied on these two things from

Smirnoff, both of which Trump's special counsel says are Russian lies. Ray Smirnoff claimed he had knowledge of Russian intelligence using a Kiev hotel to record conversations with Hunter Biden that, quote, proved he was taking money. And then the other claim is that Smirnoff told the FBI in 2020 that both Hunter and Joe got $5 million from Burisma back in 2015 and 2016. But the big problem with that is that prosecutors say that Hunter Biden never actually traveled to Ukraine. So there's no way that he was or could have been recorded in a Kiev hotel. And then to top it off, Smirnoff's claims that he was directly told about the bribes in 2015 and 2016 were clear lies, right? Since he didn't even start any contact with Burisma until 2017. And quote, In short, Smirnoff transformed his routine

and un-extraordinary business contacts with Burisma in 2017 and later into bribery allegations against Joe Biden, the presumptive nominee of one of the two major political parties for president, after expressing bias against Biden and his candidacy. One of the reasons we're now finding out so many details about all this is because prosecutors actually feared that he was a flight risk due to his extensive contacts with foreign intelligence agencies and having millions of dollars in cash on hand. So they gave this information to the court in an attempt to keep

him behind bars pending their charges. So there, his team actually convinced a judge that he should just be under electronic monitoring in exchange for surrendering his U.S. and Israeli passports. With this, prosecutors also wanted to emphasize just how dangerous this false information was and wrote, he is actively peddling new lies that could impact U.S. elections after meeting with Russian intelligence officials in November. And quote, it targeted the presumptive nominee of one of the two major political parties in the United States. The effects of Smirnov's false statements and fabricated information continued to be felt to this day, which appears to be a clear reference to the shit still going on in Congress right now over Hunter Biden's time with Burisma. And of course, all of this

is notable because Republicans have been trying to use this as an angle to attack Joe Biden. And Smirnov's supposed evidence was key in this, as it was a direct accusation that the Bidens got cash for influence. Yet despite this bombshell, the Republicans are charging forward. The House Judiciary GOP tweeting, four key facts will never change. One, Hunter Biden sat on Burisma's board. Two, he was unqualified to do so.

Three, Burisma pressured him to get DC to act on policy issues in Ukraine. Four, Joe Biden did just that. But of course we saw that get immediate pushback. People responding, your star witness is a Russian asset and you knew it all along. And did you clear this with the Russians before posting it? As well as tell me what Jared and Ivanka's qualifications were

and then I'll take you seriously. And this is Democratic Representative Eric Swalwell said, there you have it. James Comer and Jim Jordan have been doing the work of Russia's intelligence service. Although there, Swalwell isn't without his own controversies right now. With him being accused by those on the right of using campaign funds for personal travel and resorts. Though, speaking of Comer and Jordan, there are some thoughts out there that Hunter Biden could go after them for defamation.

Although there, I will say proving defamation in court is extremely difficult. But also, I mean, let's be honest, none of this is going to stop Trump and the Republican Party from shouting Biden crime family. I mean, all of this has now come out, and you have Jim Jordan just kind of repeating that House Judiciary GOP tweet, but in real life saying it doesn't change the fundamental facts and reporters having to push back going, yes, it literally does change the facts. Because what so much of this specific area was based on is not true. And it very much seems like he does not mind pushing Russian disinformation if just if he can do it effectively enough to his base, it can help him. And then do you think that you could actually handle a trip to Mars?

That little red planet. And I ask because you could actually be gearing up for a trip there next year. Because NASA actually just put out a job listing titled Martians Wanted, and announcing that they're now accepting applications for a year-long simulated Mars mission. And if you ended up getting picked,

you'd be part of a four-person team living and working inside of a 1,700-square-foot 3D-printed habitat in Houston. With the goal being to help prepare NASA for an actual mission to Mars sometime in the future. Because after it puts an ex-man and first woman on the moon and builds a permanent base there, they plan to use the lunar surface as a springboard for an eventual flight to Mars. And of course, if humans go there, they have to live there because they can't come home for a very long time. It'll take six months to get there, then at least two years before Mars and Earth's orbits align again, and then another six months back.

So the simulation is meant to mimic life in those harsh conditions for no more than half that time, just 12 months, which is why, although it might sound like a fun adventure at first, you should know what you're signing up for. Pain and stress. Because NASA's going to put you and your team through resource limitations, equipment failures, communication delays, and pretty much every potential stressor you can think of. During that year, yeah, sure, some of it's going to be fun, but also some not so fun. Things like performing simulated spacewalks

inside a sandbox full of red sand, growing crops like tomatoes, peppers, and leafy greens, exercising regularly just like astronauts have to on the ISS, and operating robots and maintaining the habitat. And part of the good news here is you will not be the first guinea pig. And that, because this is actually

the second of three planned simulations. The first, currently more than halfway through, and so far it seems pretty successful. With a second mission set to kick off in spring next year, and the deadline to apply is April 2nd. And as far as if you qualify, things we know, you got to be healthy, you got to be a U.S. citizen or a permanent resident and speak good English. You also can't smoke, can't have a criminal background, can't be younger than 30 or older than 55. But then also, and this is where the pool starts trimming down, there are also these standard qualifications for prospective

astronauts. Things like a STEM degree, several years of professional experience, and or pilot or officer training. So if that applies to you and you've got about 12 months to burn, look into it. And then, most of you know that one of my favorite things is hiking. I am the annoying guy that has mastered fitting hikes

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That's what was revealed in a quantitative analysis by The Intercept, with them going through the coverage by The Times, The Washington Post, and The Los Angeles Times in the first six weeks of the conflict. Looking specifically at the period between the October 7th attack by Hamas that killed 1,139 Israelis and foreign workers and November 24th, which was when both sides had agreed to a humanitarian truce to enable the hostage exchange. And during those six weeks, 14,800 Palestinians were killed, including 6,000 children. And of course, those numbers have only grown since. Now, there is one thing I want to clarify right off the bat

before we dive into this. I am in no way contesting the fact that October 7th was a massacre or a tragedy, nor am I saying the lives of innocent Israelis are less worthy than any other lives. I'm just emphasizing that the Palestinian lives lost have not been treated with the same level of emotive coverage. And so for this analysis, The Intercept pulled more than a thousand articles from these three publications, and they tallied up the usage of certain words like Palestinian, Gaza, and Israeli. And a very key thing here is this did not include editorial pieces or letters to the editor, which would obviously be biased. This exclusively draws from what's supposed to be objective news coverage. But despite that, The Intercept says

that the tallies reveal a gross imbalance in the way Israelis and pro-Israel figures are covered versus Palestinians and pro-Palestinian voices, with usages that favor Israeli narratives over Palestinian ones. And we should dive into the specifics to really understand this, because The Intercept outlined four key findings from their analysis, with the first being the disproportionate coverage of Israeli and Palestinian deaths. Right across all three papers, the words Israeli or Israel appeared more than the word Palestinian or iterations of it. And this, even as the number of Palestinian deaths began to surpass Israel deaths by a huge margin. The research specifically finding, for every Palestinian

deaths, Palestinians are mentioned once. For every Israeli death, Israelis are mentioned eight times, or a rate 16 times more per death than that of Palestinians. Second, The Intercept found that the three publications use highly emotive terms like slaughter, massacre, and horrific pretty much exclusively to describe Israeli civilians killed by Palestinians, but not vice versa. In articles that they looked at, the word slaughter was used 60 times to describe the killing of Israelis, but just once to describe the killing of Palestinians. Similarly, horrific and massacre were written 38 and 120 times respectively when talking about Israeli deaths, but only published four times each when discussing Palestinian deaths. And to really illustrate the

discrepancies here, The Intercept provided specific examples. Like with what it called a typical headline from The Times, it was published in mid-November for a story describing accounts of the October 7th attack. With that headline reading, they ran into a bomb shelter for safety. Instead, they were slaughtered. And then by contrast, here's the headline of what the Intercept dubbed the most sympathetic profile of Palestinian deaths in Gaza that the Times printed. The war turns Gaza into a graveyard for children. But then even there, the word graveyard is a quote from the UN. And the story about all those children's deaths used no emotive terms comparable to the ones in the story about the October 7th attack. And then there was also another one.

The Post utilized the term massacre multiple times to describe the events of October 7th, like with this lead in an article 10 days after. President Biden faces growing pressure from lawmakers in both parties to punish Iran after Hamas's massacre. Meanwhile, a story on November 13th about the stunning fact that the war had killed one in every 200 Palestinians never once used the words massacre or slaughter. Instead, the outlet just saying that the Palestinians had been killed or died and often while using the passive voice. And this, even though the Post explicitly noted that most of the dead are women and children. Which then brings us to the third key point, the lacking coverage of the killings of Palestinian children and journalists. The Intercept reported, despite Israel's war on Gaza being perhaps the deadliest war for children, almost entirely Palestinian in modern history, there is scant mention of the word children in related

terms in the headlines of Article Survey. In fact, only two headlines in the 1,100 articles that this analysis looked at mentioned the word children in regard to Gazan kids. And that's even as they continue to make up a disproportionate amount of the debt. And similarly, this war has also been one of the most deadly in modern time for journalists, and in particular, Palestinian journalists. But the word journalist and variations like reporter only come up in nine of the most deadly in modern time for journalists, and in particular, Palestinian journalists. But the word journalist and variations like reporter only come up in nine of the 1,100 headlines. Even though 48 Palestinian reporters had died in the six-week period before the truce,

just four of those nine articles were about Arab journalists. And as The Intercept explains, the lack of coverage for the unprecedented killing of children and journalist groups that typically elicit sympathy from Western media is conspicuous. For example, far more Palestinian children died just during the first week of the Gaza bombing alone

than in the first year of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. But this is those three major publications ran numerous stories sympathetic to Ukrainian children fleeing the war during the first six weeks of the incursion. And in the same vein, these outlets also published multiple pieces focusing on the risks that journalists face in the Ukraine war during its first six weeks,

a period where six reporters had been killed, which by itself is already six too many, but also is a fraction of those who died in the Gaza war during that same length of time. Even just the words used to describe children killed in Gaza are slanted. But The Intercept specifically noting instances where both Israeli and Palestinian kids are being discussed in the same context. And Israeli kids are referred to as children, but Palestinian kids are called people under 18 or minors. Actually, here's another stark example. In an article about the hostage truce, The Post wrote, President Biden said in a statement Tuesday night that a deal to release 50 women and children held hostage by Hamas in Gaza in exchange for 150

Palestinian prisoners detained by Israel, with no mention of the Palestinian children and women who were also included among those 150. And then finally, the fourth major takeaway from this analysis that The Intercept outlined was that the three outlets provided much more coverage of anti-Semitic acts in the U.S. while focusing less on racist attacks against Muslims. During the first six weeks of the war, which notably was before the whole campus anti-Semitism debacle in Congress, the newspapers mentioned anti-Semitism 549 times and Islamophobia 79 times. And even though there were increased incidents of both anti-Jewish and anti-Muslim racism, 87% of mentions of discrimination were about anti-Semitism while only just 13% was about Islamophobia.

And so then taken all together, The Intercept argues that it's clear that these findings show that the deaths of Palestinians are not given the same coverage or emotional weight as those of Israelis. With it noting that Hamas's killings are painted as a cohesive, targeted strategy, while the killing of Palestinian civilians is presented as a series of one-off mistakes made thousands of times. And that is massively significant, because these outlets play a huge role in shaping public perception of the conflict in the states. And those perceptions, they're no small matter. And this is something that The Intercept explains incredibly well and very powerfully. Writing, the stakes for this routine devaluing of Palestinian lives couldn't be higher. As the death toll in Gaza mounts, entire cities are leveled and rendered uninhabitable for years and whole family lines are wiped out. The U.S. government has enormous influence as Israel's primary patron and weapon supplier. The media's presentation of the conflict means there are fewer political

downsides to lockstep support for Israel. And some of these examples might seem subtle at face value, but they contribute to a much broader network of coverage that paints a picture that rarely humanizes Palestinians, which makes it harder to evoke sympathy from readers. But also, despite that, polling has shown a major shift in sympathy towards Palestinians among Democrats. So notably, there is a huge generational divide there, with younger Democrats almost entirely driving the change. And very, very notably here, that is due in part to the fact that younger folks are increasingly turning away from these mainstream papers and getting their news of the conflict from TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, and others. And this is at the same time, older Americans are getting their information

about the war from print media and cable. And according to The Intercept, biased coverage in major newspapers and mainstream television news is impacting general perceptions of the war and directing viewers towards a warped view of the conflict. And all that has created this situation where you have politicians and talking heads trying to discredit the shift in pro-Palestine views among young folks as social media misinformation. Even though in reality,

this analysis shows that they're getting a slanted picture from their sources. With all that said, I now want to pass the questions off to you. What are your thoughts and experiences with really any aspect of what we're talking about today? Especially with like, what have your experiences been with different generations or people that use different news sources? Because while it's always been the case to a certain degree, it does feel like more than ever, people have a drastically different understanding of what the reality is.

It feels like more than ever, people are fragmented regarding even what like the starting reality of a situation is. And then finally today, let's talk about yesterday today, where we dive back into yesterday's show to see what y'all are saying, doing, what are your reactions, which also I just got to start with a big thank you. Thank you to all you beautiful bastards who made this new mini drop that just went live over at beautifulbastard.com, our most successful of the year so far. A new take me first in the classic, don't be stupid, stupid are currently fighting for that number one sales spot.

It's all still available. I just wanted to say thank you. Then, as far as the comments, a lot of it was focused on the Alabama IVF situation. With people like Eva saying, As someone currently working in an IVF clinic and training to be an embryologist in the UK, the Alabama law just screams of legislation that's been made by people who have no clue what we do in our labs. Loss of embryos is part of the normal treatment process as not every fertilized egg makes a good embryo. At the end of the treatment, we will dispose of these as they have no chance of creating a viable pregnancy.

Would this disposal of non-viable embryos be considered child murder? Or inappropriate disposal of a body, seen as how the embryos are effectively dead anyways? And saying disposal of unused viable embryos for our cryo storage is an almost daily occurrence. And you can pause to read the rest, but ending. All in all, this legislation has been made by people who have no clue how the IVF process works and what it entails. If I was an embryologist in Alabama, I would be leaving the state and going to a place where actual science, not God, informs the legislation. Right? And that part of there always being multiple embryos, that was a big thing that people touched on. It was something y'all like, hey, squirrel sharing. As an IVF baby, when I

was implanted, it was with three other embryos. I was the only one who took. They did that because at least at the time, it was the only way to increase the odds enough that maybe one would attach, and it worked. But in no universe do I consider those embryos my siblings. And then going on to share, unfortunately, I've always been aware of the crazies against IVF. Saying a boy in middle school once told me

I was destined for hell because my existence, being an IVF baby, was unholy. And I'll never forget back in high school, Mitt Romney choosing a running mate who was against IVF. But then the final thing that I'll mention here is that there was a lot of conversation around the Billie Eilish situation. She was at the People's Choice Awards. There was that clip of her. Some people saying, oh, she was like annoyed that the fact that TikTokers were here. Well, there was some back and forth. I saw some people in the comments and then also people on social media showing a clip from the People's Choice Awards involving a specific creator. And that being a kid that I'm unfamiliar with by the name of Harry Daniels, who posted a video from the carpet where he was asking these

celebrities, gay son or thot daughter. And one of the clips of that video blowing up on Twitter with someone saying, and there's a reason why Billy was like, why are there TikTok influencers here? Y'all aren't funny nor real journalists with any professionalism. There's only a select few I can think of who earn their keep, but most of y'all, ugh, gross. Right. And people saying, imagine getting to talk to America Ferreira and this is what you ask her. Right, and so there were plenty of people in that camp, but then also, like, if you go to his TikTok, for example, while there are some mixed reactions, you do have a lot of people, like, loving the messiness and trolly nature of this. With Harry actually even sharing a video of his interaction that he had

with Billie Eilish. Not you. Girl, we, girl, we have been, you know, you know, you, we go way back, sis. No, no, no, no, no, no. Again, I think all of this is stemming from a kind of big nothing situation in a space where people were just like, we need shit to talk about today. Though it will be interesting if this does affect anything in the future. Right, regarding who gets access to these things, right? Does the People's Choice Awards see all this talk and they go, hey, people are talking about us. Let's keep it up or lean into it. Or do we go a different way?

That could be interesting to see. But that is where we're going to end today's show. And hey, as always, remember, my name's Philip DeFranco. You've just been filled in. I love your faces. And I'll see you right back here tomorrow.