The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 4.4 Prince Harry's Fortnite Ban, New Rushed Censorship Law, Trump Pulls Back On Border, & More

Starting point is 00:00:00 Sup you beautiful bastards, hope you're having a fantastic Thursday. Welcome back to the Philip DeFranco Show and let's just jump into it. The first thing we're going to talk about today is in the same week that gave us the very odd pairing of the Department of Justice and Netflix, we have Fortnite and Prince Harry. The reason for that is Prince Harry found himself on Twitter's bad side this week after he made comments about the dangers of social media and Fortnite. The comments were made on Wednesday during Harry's visit to the YMCA in London and there he met with mental health organizations working with teens and young adults, and at that conference he said, quote,

Starting point is 00:00:27 Growing up in today's world, social media is more addictive than drugs and alcohol. Yet it's more dangerous because it's normalized and there are no restrictions to it. We are in a mind-altering time. And along with his comments about social media, Harry also angered Fortnite fans by saying, quote, A game like Fortnite, for instance, may not be so good for children. Parents have got their hands up, they don't know what to do about it. It's like waiting for the damage to be done and kids turning up on your doorsteps

Starting point is 00:00:47 and families being broken. That game shouldn't be allowed. Where is the benefit of having it in your household? It's created to addict, an addiction to keep you in front of a computer for as long as possible. It's so irresponsible. Now of course, this topic of video game addiction isn't new. I mean, we talked about it before, just last year,

Starting point is 00:01:00 the World Health Organization added gaming disorder to the list of mental health conditions and its international classification of diseases and that listing was added in an effort to help clinical professionals define the point at which the hobby of playing a video game becomes an issue. And so looking at that the ICD defines the disorder as quote, a pattern of gaming behavior characterized by impaired control over gaming, increasing priority given to gaming over other activities to the extent that gaming takes precedence over other interests and daily activities and continuation or escalation of gaming

Starting point is 00:01:26 despite the occurrence of negative consequences. And they say for the gaming disorder to be diagnosed, the behavior pattern must be clear for at least one year and must be quote, of sufficient severity to result in significant impairment in personal, family, social, educational, occupational, or other important areas of functioning, according to the definition.

Starting point is 00:01:41 However, it's important to note that the World Health Organization itself did note the study suggests that the gaming disorder only affects a small proportion of people who engage in digital or video gaming activities still because of its massive popularity Especially with a very young audience fortnight has become the face of this conversation for example I mean even earlier this month There was a doctor that made headlines for prescribing an 11 year old boy a two-week ban from computer games like fortnight and Minecraft And there are other things like according to divorce, a UK company that offers divorce services and resources,

Starting point is 00:02:06 there were 200 divorces in the UK from January to September of 2018 that mentioned addiction to Fortnite and other online games as one of the reasons behind the relationship breakdown. However, not all researchers believe the game is addictive. For example, you have people like Andrew Reid, a doctoral researcher of serious games at Glasgow Caledonian University.

Starting point is 00:02:21 He, for example, told the BBC that people found the game hard to stop playing, but he warned against using the term addictive, with Reid arguing that using that term could stigmatize just regular video game players, and he added that some research actually showed positive characteristics of play. And part of the reason I include that background isn't because it's my opinion, I mean my personal experience with games is that they are not addictive. I personally find them to be a fantastic short-term escape from reality that allows me to reset. I wanted to give a little more background rather than Harry said this thing and then people reacted. But that said, Harry did say those things

Starting point is 00:02:47 and then people reacted. Social media users did not react well to Harry's claims. Many also finding the timing odd since Harry just joined Instagram a day earlier. An account that, by the way, broke a world record by grabbing a million followers in the fastest amount of time ever, five hours and 45 minutes.

Starting point is 00:03:01 And that was according to Guinness World Records. I mean, ultimately that's kind of where the story ends. It's not like he's pushing forward legislation to actually ban the game. He has his personal take on the matter. You have a lot of people who disagree or find it to be hypocritical given his recent action. But one of the main things that I was really interested with this story was your personal opinion on it. When you look to certain games, whether it be Fortnite or whatever, when you look to social media, do you think there is a danger there?

Starting point is 00:03:21 I mean, as I mentioned, I think it was about two weeks ago, I've deleted social media off of my phone. I only have it on work devices now that I use at designated times. And I will say, it has made me a lot less anxious. But I also have a very complicated love-hate relationship with everything that I do. Yeah, with that said, that's why I wanted to know what you thought. Then, in quickie money news, there was news around Jeff Bezos, Mackenzie Bezos, and Amazon. They, if you don't know, are having one of the most high-profile divorces I've ever seen. I mean, it's a situation that's been thrown in the news by the President of the United States.

Starting point is 00:03:47 There were whole reports around blackmail. And ultimately it all led to today where we saw what happens when the richest man in the world gets a divorce. And the end result came in a tweet from Mackenzie Bezos, or whoever typed this and then posted it to her account, Happy to be giving him, Jeff Bezos, all of my interests in the Washington Post and Blue Origin and 75% of our Amazon Stock Plus voting control of my shares to support his Continued contributions with the teams of these incredible companies. So with the divorce she's not getting half but I'm sure she's more than happy with 25% of their shares in Amazon because that currently leaves her with 35.6 billion dollars in Amazon stock. So if I were to guess I'm pretty sure she's happy and on Jeff's side

Starting point is 00:04:22 I'm sure he's happy it wasn't a larger percentage and he has voting control. So it's not something that could potentially throw the company into chaos. So yeah, there we go, another end result of allowing the government and lawyers into the love of your relationship. Fun times. Then in industry slash internet-y news,

Starting point is 00:04:36 there's been a lot of people this week talking about a campaign that was launched as tens of thousands of signatures calling for the removal of a YouTuber on this platform. And that YouTuber is the most subscribed youtuber on the platform PewDiePie aka Felix. The petition in question along with mentioning his past controversies also seems to put a lot of blame on Felix for the New Zealand shooting saying in the wake of the most recent mosque shooting I believe it is time to take action as a community and remove white supremacist content from our platform. Also saying that Felix is

Starting point is 00:05:02 a creator with one of the largest platforms for white supremacist content. And the petition also seems to believe that even if Felix changed, that it wouldn't be enough. The person that started this petition saying, even if PewDiePie cleaned up his act, his comment sections are still a cesspool of white supremacist activities and commentaries. But truly quick before continuing, regarding the monster

Starting point is 00:05:19 that killed all of those people in New Zealand, it is a widely held belief that he mentioned PewDiePie's name, right, He embraced the meme to get notoriety, to help gain traction, to help get his name out there, right, essentially just to manipulate the media. And Felix has specifically condemned the shooter. Also, I will say, it's very hard right now to see how much support this petition actually has.

Starting point is 00:05:36 And the reason I say that is, yes, while you have over 70,000 signatures, some of the top comments under reasons for signing include, this petition is stupid, ban SJWs instead, not signing because I agree with you signing to tell everyone Reading this to report the petition for slander. Thank you Also looking through the comments it appears that some people legitimately think that he is a bad person that needs to be removed and so it Appears it's why some PewDiePie supporters have started a counter petition urging change.org to remove Maria Ruiz the person who started the petition

Starting point is 00:06:00 Against PewDiePie as of recording this video that has over 8,000 signatures So there was that then something I've seen this week as we had people requesting we talk about Donald Trump and the southern border. Part of the reason we held off on covering it is it was something that was being said. I wasn't sure if it was actually going to happen. If you're unfamiliar with what I'm referencing here, Donald Trump over the past few days has threatened to close large sections of the US-Mexico border. That is unless Mexico immediately stops all illegal immigration. Now he said similar things in the past, but this time he actually set a deadline, saying they needed to do so by next week,

Starting point is 00:06:27 and tweeting, this would be so easy for Mexico to do, but they just take our money and talk. Besides, we lose so much money with them, especially when you add in drug trafficking, et cetera, that the border closing would be a good thing. And what follows, you get a lot of people talking about the confusion and the devastating impact this could have on the economy.

Starting point is 00:06:41 But that said, the reason we are talking about this today is today when Trump was speaking with reporters, it appears that he kind of walked back his threat, saying, we're going to give him a one year warning. And if the drugs don't stop or largely stop, we're going to put tariffs on Mexico and products, in particular cars. The whole ballgame is cars. And if that doesn't stop the drugs, we close the border. And so for now, that's what the situation looks like, although, I mean, anything is possible. But given that the prospect of a border closure

Starting point is 00:07:12 didn't have the support of Republicans like Senator Ted Cruz, who said, "'Of course we should secure the border, we must. "'Our broken immigration system and years of unwillingness "'to secure our southern border has produced a security "'and humanitarian crisis.' "'But the answer is not to punish those "'who are illegally crossing the border.

Starting point is 00:07:24 "'The answer is not to punish Texas farmers farmers and ranchers and manufacturers and small businesses. Closing legal points of entry would harm American commerce and legal transit between Mexico and the United States, and leave coyotes and human traffickers to roam free in the wilderness of our unsecured border. Right, so you have a Republican senator of a massive border state saying that, so it's not the most surprising thing that we're seeing this pull back. And based off of what a lot of experts are saying, this kind of ratcheting down, it's a good thing. But yeah, we'll see.

Starting point is 00:07:48 And then let's talk about the news today in Australia, where lawmakers have passed legislation that will criminalize internet platforms that fail to remove violent content from their site. The bill states that this new law will, quote, "'Address significant gaps in Australia's current "'criminal laws by ensuring that persons who are "'internet service providers or who provide content

Starting point is 00:08:03 "'or hosting services take timely action in relation "'to abhorrent violent material that can be accessed using their services. This will ensure that online platforms cannot be exploited and weaponized by perpetrators of violence." And if you were wondering, yes, this legislation was created as a response to the attacks in Christchurch, New Zealand. In part, the attack was live-streamed on Facebook, it was viewed by thousands of people. Since then, Facebook has worked to remove 1.5 million versions of the video. And of course, Facebook was not alone in their fight against the reposting of this video. And the attacks are mentioned both in the bill itself, as well as in the readings by Australia's Attorney General, Christian Porter. Who opened his remarks by paying tribute to the victims, and then he went on to say, Together, we must act to ensure that perpetrators and their accomplices cannot leverage online platforms for the purposes of spreading their violent and extreme fanatical propaganda.

Starting point is 00:08:44 These platforms should not be weapon platforms for the purposes of spreading their violent and extreme fanatical propaganda. These platforms should not be weaponized for evil purposes. And according to the bill, what constitutes as violent content ranges from anything containing images or audio of terrorist attacks, to murder or attempted murder, and torture among other things. And as far as the punishments, companies who don't take down these kinds of materials from their sites could end up with penalty fines of up to 10% of the corporate body's annual turnover. And individuals found responsible could land in jail for up to three years. Now the legislation was first introduced by Australia's Prime Minister last week, and many have been critical not only of the content of the bill, but the speed in which it is passed. With some calling the process rushed, you had the Law Council of Australia releasing a statement saying the bill,

Starting point is 00:09:18 quote, And the Council's president, Arthur Moses, said that this could lead to increased amounts of censorship, saying, As we know, laws formulated as a knee-jerk reaction to a tragic event do not necessarily equate to good legislation and can have myriad unintended consequences. Whistleblowers may no longer be able to deploy social media to shine a light on atrocities committed around the world because social media companies will be required to remove certain content for fear of being charged with a crime. And adding, it could also lead to censorship of the media, which would be unacceptable. We've also seen some tech company leaders taking issue with the law.

Starting point is 00:09:48 Sunita Bose, for example, the managing director of the Digital Industry Group, Inc. They're an advocacy group that represents companies like Facebook and Google, told the New York Times that a lot of work has been done to find a solution to this problem, saying, with the vast volumes of content uploaded to the internet every second, this is a highly complex problem that requires discussion with the technology industry, legal experts, the media, and civil society to get the solution right. That didn't happen this week.

Starting point is 00:10:09 And so right now, that's where we are with this. I mean, as far as my personal takeaway, I think most people agree that we do not wanna have a system that can be weaponized by monsters like the person behind the New Zealand attack. But at the same time, I think that there are valid questions as to does this create a weird, free speech, slippery slope? If we, for example, on this channel, right, we cover a story about an attempted murder.

Starting point is 00:10:27 There's footage of it, we cover it, we're trying to raise awareness, maybe the person, they're on the run. Is Australia going to require YouTube to remove my video, otherwise they get a 10% of their income fine? Does intent matter? Also, should there be a copy of the thing made? Since there are numerous situations where something that is horrible, that is caught on video, that is uploaded to social media is evidence. Right, you're looking at the complexity of the situation and you're like, they put this together so fast. I personally understand the concern. But that said, that's the story, my personal takeaway,

Starting point is 00:10:53 which really is a lot of questions, and of course I pass the question off to you. What are your thoughts around this? And that's where we're going to end today's show. And if you liked the video, you wanna support the channel, be sure to hit that like button. Also, if you're new here, be sure to subscribe, click that bell to turn on notifications.

Starting point is 00:11:05 Which on that note, if you missed the last Philip DeFranco show, the last morning deep dive, you can click or tap right there to watch those. But with that said, of course, as always, my name's Philip DeFranco, you've just been filled in. I love yo faces and I'll see you tomorrow.

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The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 4.4 Prince Harry's Fortnite Ban, New Rushed Censorship Law, Trump Pulls Back On Border, & More

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