The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 4.12 BLACKMAIL EXPOSED! Ethan Klein Scandal Gets Nasty, John Oliver Privacy Controversy, & More

Starting point is 00:00:00 Is blackmail bad? Sounds like a weird question. What if it wasn't for a nefarious reason? What if... It's not about money. It's about sounding famous. That's exactly what's happening with John Oliver right now. Last week, tonight's host is actively and publicly blackmailing U.S. politicians. Because John realizes the very unfortunate truth. If it's happening to you, who gives a fuck? But if it's happening to me, this is serious business. Interestingly, the one time that Congress has acted quickly to safeguard people's privacy

Starting point is 00:00:40 was in the 1980s when Robert Bork was nominated to the Supreme Court and a reporter walked into a local video store and asked the manager whether he could have a peek at Bork's video rental history, and he got it. As soon as Congress realized there was nothing stopping anyone from retrieving their video rental records too, they freaked the f*** out. And lo and behold, the Video Privacy Protection Act was passed with quite deliberate speed. And John referenced back to that situation because of the current hellscape

Starting point is 00:01:10 that is the data and privacy situation that we're all living through. The sheer number of negative possibilities just off of basic browsing is mind-blowing. We've got shady data brokers with virtually no oversight collecting your data and building profiles that can track who you are, where you are, and what you are most likely to do or buy.

Starting point is 00:01:26 You cannot edit this dossier, and others from cops to reporters to your own abusers can find and use this information. Which brings us to the blackmail. We could, for example, use data brokers to go fishing for members of Congress by creating a demographic group consisting of men age 45 and up in a five-mile radius of the US Capitol who had previously visited sites regarding or searched for terms including divorce, massage, hair loss and midlife crisis. We could, we could call that group Congress and Cabernet and then target that list with ads that might attract those men to click, like, marriage shouldn't be in prison,

Starting point is 00:02:05 or can you vote twice? We could also throw in, do you want to read Ted Cruz erotic fan fiction, just to see what would happen. And if anyone clicked, we'd be able to harvest even more data from them, which we could then theoretically take steps to de-anonymise. Now, am I saying that we're actually going to do that?

Starting point is 00:02:26 Collect all that raw information and store it in, let's say, a manila envelope somewhere? Well, I am sorry to disappoint you. We are not going to do that. Why would we when we have already done it? All that raw data is currently right in here. And honestly, this whole exercise was fucking creepy. With Oliver detailing, they got a lot of clicks from a lot of people, including three that appear to be in the Capitol. They have the IP addresses, the device info, tons of other information.

Starting point is 00:02:56 With Oliver ultimately closing. And if you happen to be a legislator who is feeling a little nervous right now about whether your information is in this envelope and you are terrified about what I might do with it, you might want to channel that worry into making sure that I can't do anything. Anyway, sleep well. But ultimately you and me will have to wait to see if he sets this info free. While we collectively do that, let me know your thoughts in those comments down below on John Oliver's blackmail. You love it, you hate it, why, why not? But on that note, sup you beautiful bastard.

Starting point is 00:03:28 Welcome back to the Philip DeFranco Show. Hit that like button and let's just keep this thing going. Keeping with the theme of something you did online potentially having a negative effect on your real life, we should talk about the latest creator controversy and apology, and that because you had the massive YouTuber and podcaster Ethan Klein coming under fire for something he did with James Charles.

Starting point is 00:03:44 James recently uploaded a video about makeup on Amazon and in it you can see adult diapers in the buy again section of James's Amazon homepage. But Ethan then speculating, right? Is it a medical condition? Is it maybe for an older relative? But then quickly making a joke about James's sexuality. It was like small size, like twink size.

Starting point is 00:04:00 He has some anal leaking. Now we were saying, well, if he's getting blasted in the hard enough, potentially, you may need to wear a diaper. Maybe he's just got railed real hard the night before. Or maybe it's for his boyfriend. With a meeting later running an audience poll about why James bought these diapers, and he made Powerbottom one of the options.

Starting point is 00:04:22 And even immediately in the live chat, people started correcting him on the terminology of power bottom, with a listener named Matt even calling in to correct him and kind of call him out. Not just on the way that Ethan used the terms top and bottom, but also the stereotypes. So it doesn't just have to do with how he used them while referring to James Charles, but Ethan's use of these terms in general.

Starting point is 00:04:37 I know often you feel inclined to describe someone where you think they might be a bottom. And I think that that's often a misconception that like bottoms may be passive or the well i just mean that he likes the partner i just mean that he likes to take it up the butt correct and but how can you know that about someone with matt saying that ethan throws these words out in stereotypical ways and adding that you can't just tell who is a top or a bottom To which Ethan says you find it offensive if I say by being like oh, he's a he's probably a bottom Is that the problem to make?

Starting point is 00:05:14 Absolutely arguing that gay men have to already deal with all these stereotypes when it comes to femininity and masculinity Saying this term implies some sort of level of passiveness and using it in these ways is not productive Ethan then starts to ask if Matt is a top or a bottom, but he declines to answer and Ethan eventually says, Can I guess what is your preference? You can. Will you tell me if it's right if I guess right? No. Ethan then joking that he can already tell which one Matt is, which Matt says he just hopes that Ethan has learned and understands. It doesn't appear that that ship has docked for Ethan. To be honest, I don't really.

Starting point is 00:05:45 I'm trying, but I don't, I don't, I mean, I get it. And then closing the show by he and parts of his team dismissing the criticisms. Of course you were right. And honestly, just so over these people. Shut the up. Shut up! I mean, I was just trying to make the call fun.

Starting point is 00:06:01 Yes, it's a entertaining show. Shut the up. Someone says, I don't know what's up. So disappointing. Someone said f***ing entertaining show. Shut the f*** up. Someone says, I don't know what's up. So disappointing. Someone said, I don't know what's up with Ethan today,

Starting point is 00:06:12 but something's off. Bad vibes this episode. Shut the f*** up. Unsubscribe. Go away. I think this, with peace and love, you might be too sensitive

Starting point is 00:06:21 to watch this show. Yep. And in the live chat, of course, you had people laughing at Ethan, but others sticking up for Matt, saying Ethan shouldn't have asked about his sex life.

Starting point is 00:06:27 In the comments, you had people saying things like, Matt tried to explain, but Ethan would not register anything. Arguing that it was cringeworthy how Ethan never let up, and it was just uncomfortable to listen to. Arguing that Matt was just trying to explain that when you throw that term around, it can be an insulting way to belittle someone. People on Twitter adding to the conversation, saying things like, why is Ethan Klein incapable of making his disgust of James Charles known

Starting point is 00:06:42 without making it homophobic? And James Charles is an evil person, but Ethan Klein doesn't get to use him as a vehicle to mock us. Hurts to hear him use gay stereotypes, mock gay men for having anal sex, demand to know intimate details about a fan's sex life, tell fans to shut up when they try to educate him.

Starting point is 00:06:55 And hey, we also saw a fair share of fans and people saying, you know, people these days are just too easily offended. But ultimately all this backlash resulted in Ethan apologizing, writing, "'To my LGBTQ plus fans, "'I am sorry for comments on today's show. Sexualization of gay men in the grouping of tops and bottoms is a stereotype that I will be trying to unlearn, and adding apologies to the caller too, who I shouldn't have pressed inappropriately. Hope you guys know I always mean well. But ultimately, that is where we are with this story, and so I want to pass the

Starting point is 00:07:18 question off to you. What are you thinking and why regarding the story itself, as well as the public reactions we've seen from people? Then, I promise you this is random happenstance, I wanna thank the fantastic sponsor of today's show, NordVPN, and more specifically, nordvpn.com slash phil. You all know I've been a Nord customer for years, and I'd like to remind you about the importance of being protected. You know, I've talked about how Nord's threat protection,

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Starting point is 00:08:08 an additional month free. So what are you waiting for? That is NordVPN.com slash Phil. It's all risk-free with Nord's 30-day money-back guarantee. And then, do y'all remember when this video went viral about a year ago? Show me the proof. Show me the proof. Are you kidding me? You better get on. Let's go, kid. I'm sorry. Better get on we have what you see you see two black people no i'm not letting him walk away with my phone

Starting point is 00:08:32 the internet named her soho karen you'll name mia poncetto she accuses this 14 year old boy of stealing her phone despite there being no reason to believe he did, so she lunges at him, she tackles him, then famously realizing, oh I left my phone in the Uber and I just attacked this child for no reason, resulting in most of the internet calling her racist, then she decides to do an interview with Gayle King. I imagine to try and calm things down, does the exact opposite. Yeah, the footage shows me attacking his son of attacking him how? Yelling at him? Yes. Okay, I apologize. Can we move on? You're saying, look, I'm 22 years old. You're 22 years old, but you are old enough to know better. So I will say you're 22. I get it. Enough. So just

Starting point is 00:09:17 an absolute mess. But you know, one of the things with stories like this is they kind of just go away. We often don't know what happened. Where are they now? Well, the big news today is she did not just face social consequences, she is now facing legal consequences. With her ultimately pleading guilty to aggravated harassment and unlawful imprisonment as a hate crime. Now the big thing, she is not going to jail. She's agreed to two years of probation,

Starting point is 00:09:35 also following the probation terms of a separate case. But if she fails to comply at any point of this, she faces up to four years in prison. And ultimately, I guess the end of this story is to Soho Karen, if you actually get your act together, I bid you adieu. May you be a less shitty version of who you are and just stop bothering people

Starting point is 00:09:53 and just disappear into obscurity. And then, even though this story is gonna have to be somewhat short today because it's a breaking, developing situation, we need to talk about this horrifying situation out of New York, where during rush hour this morning at around 8.30 a.m., A gunman released a canister of smoke and opened fire at the 36th Street subway station

Starting point is 00:10:08 in Brooklyn Sunset Park. The man reportedly put on a gas mask before firing shots that hit people on the train and the nearby platform. Authorities saying 16 people were injured, including 10 by gunfire, and five of the victims are in critical but stable condition. Reports saying no life-threatening injuries at this time, which is the only good news so far.

Starting point is 00:10:23 Really, as of recording, not a lot is known. As far as the suspect, he's believed to be a male around five foot five tall with a heavy build, wearing a green construction-type vest and a gray hooded sweatshirt. Notably, the police commissioner saying that the attack is not currently being investigated as terrorism, but adding that she was not ruling anything out.

Starting point is 00:10:37 Also, a big note, because there were a lot of reports about this this morning. They're saying that fire officials and law enforcement sources had said that several undetonated explosive devices were found at the scene. But, police have actually now debunked that claim. So right now the focus is on the victims and finding the person responsible.

Starting point is 00:10:50 And honestly, they cannot find this monster soon enough. And then, in economic news, the White House's inflation report this morning said the prices have risen 8.5% over the past year. With the most concerning and drastic jumps being the prices of food and fuel. With the latter being a significant sore spot for Americans in the Biden administration. The average price of gasoline rising 18.3% just in the last month, and other energy sources rising by as much as 32% over the year.

Starting point is 00:11:10 Now Jen Psaki and the Biden administration have tried to get ahead of that, claiming that the war in Ukraine fueled the major price increase, which is without a doubt partially true, and it's led many countries that rely on Russian fuel to try and get it elsewhere. But regardless of the reason,

Starting point is 00:11:20 the administration is taking steps to try to tackle it, setting aside certain environmental regulations and allowing gas stations to sell different blends of gasoline over the summer, despite the fact that they're technically dirtier, the administration claiming this will lower the cost by 10 cents per gallon, but many doubt it will actually have any impact whatsoever,

Starting point is 00:11:32 with senior energy trader Rebecca Babin saying, "'Allowing the sale of higher ethanol gas to tame costs "'is a political gesture more than a real solution. "'The impact will be minimal from the perspective "'of medium-term price relief.'" But it serves as another talking point for the Biden administration. Also on top of this, the Federal Reserve is moving

Starting point is 00:11:45 to raise interest rates throughout 2022 and 2023 in order to combat inflation, which, hey, it has worked in the past, but it also comes to the cost of making it much harder and more expensive to borrow money, which is a thousand percent its own big bag of worms. Now, with all that said, economists still don't expect that this sudden inflation will lead to a recession,

Starting point is 00:11:59 especially as there are other indicators that show the economy is improving, especially if you consider that the biggest factors in why inflation seems so high being food and fuel. But if you remove those, prices have largely stabilized. Though, you really can't oversell how important food and fuel are. But if you take the price of things like used cars,

Starting point is 00:12:13 which seems weird, but they're actually a big indicator of how things are going, since the pandemic, their price skyrocketed. But over the last month, they finally leveled out and have actually begun to decline. Same with the cost of durable goods, and possibly more importantly, trucking and shipping capacity has increased. And that last part is absolutely major because for years now,

Starting point is 00:12:27 right? Not just a little bit. For years, it served as a bottleneck and helped lead to prices rising. Yeah, ultimately, time will tell. But ultimately, that is where that story and today's show ends. Thanks for letting me be a part of your day. I love your faces. If you want some more news, you can click or tap right there. But yeah, I'll see you tomorrow.

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The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 4.12 BLACKMAIL EXPOSED! Ethan Klein Scandal Gets Nasty, John Oliver Privacy Controversy, & More

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