The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 7.29 NEW VIRAL CHALLENGE Sparked So Much Backlash & Debate, TikTok, Josh Richards, Demi Lovato

Episode Date: July 29, 2020

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Sup you beautiful bastards, hope you have a fantastic Wednesday. Welcome back to the Philip DeFranco show, buckle up, hit that like button and let's just jump into it. And the first thing we're gonna talk about today is challenge accepted, which if you haven't seen is the new viral trend. It involves women posting black and white photos of themselves with the captions usually involving some sort of message about empowerment or the importance of women supporting other women. And a ton of people have taken part from everyday folks all the way to Olivia Munn, Kristen Bell, Khloe Kardashian, Florence Pugh, Jennifer Lopez, Demi Lovato, just to name a few. It's just a huge trend right now. There are over 5.5 million posts using the hashtag

challenge accepted. A question that popped up with this trend is where did it come from, right? What prompted this? And that is actually a pretty good question because the roots of this challenge have actually kind of gotten lost and it's unclear exactly what sparked this.

You had some pointing to AOC's recent viral speech where she condemned the sexist remarks made by Representative Ted Yoho about and to her. Others thinking it's just a lighthearted way for women to uplift one another. And most recently, you have a lot of people paying attention to this hashtag because you have people saying that it stems from Turkey,

where women are posting black and white photos to raise awareness for the high rates of femicide in the country. And we will touch on this later, but right now it is actually worth noting that while that is an important topic, this viral trend appears to be separate from it. Right, you had New York Times reporter Taylor Lorenz

saying that Instagram actually confirmed to her that the resurgence of this challenge in the United States is actually unrelated to the trend in Turkey. Also saying that versions of this trend have actually been spreading since 2016. In the past, it's been used to raise awareness for cancer or just spread positivity in general. With Lorenz actually discussing this matter further

on TMZ Live, saying that this version is kind of just a hollow trend that overall is acting like a form of female empowerment while actually doing nothing to empower women. You know, just posting, wow, I'm posting this beautiful photo of myself to support other women. That doesn't actually do anything to move women forward or actually advocate women.

It's not highlighting impressive women. It's not helping your company hire more women. So it's ultimately pretty meaningless. So they're arguing, you know, what is seeing yet another pretty photo of a celebrity actually do for women? Not a lot. That mindset is also why you have the likes of people

like actress Emmy Rossum asking, how is it empowering to other women to post a selfie? Would it not make more sense to post snaps of other women who empower us? But also with this, you have the likes of Taylor Lorenz going on to note that yes, the captions on these posts could really make a difference. Right, some, like that of Rashida Jones, are using it to call for justice for Breonna Taylor. Others, despite this being a separate trend after thinking that it originated in Turkey, decided to use it to raise awareness about women in Turkey.

So actually, with this story, let's actually dive into that issue. Because, once again, whether it be the intent of the resurgence of this trend or not, it has now done a lot to raise awareness about this issue. With a ton of people posting infographics about what's happening, explaining the femicide is a very serious issue in Turkey, one that is getting increased attention because of a recent murder. Specifically, people are sharing the story

of a 27-year-old woman who was brutally murdered by her ex-boyfriend, which has led to protests, calls for something to be done about the high rates of violence against women in the country. In fact, according to The Guardian, 42% of Turkish women between the ages of 15 to 60 years old have suffered some form of physical or sexual violence by their husbands or partners.

Also in 2019, 474 women were murdered there, mainly by partners and relatives, which was the highest rate in a decade. And numbers there have been increasing every year and are expected to get even higher this year because of coronavirus lockdowns. As we've discussed on previous shows, we have now seen because of the lockdown, an increased rate of domestic violence.

Also with this story, you have many pointing towards efforts to protect the Istanbul Convention, which is a Council of Europe treaty designed to protect victims of domestic violence and other forms of violence against women. What's interesting here is that Turkey was actually the first to sign that treaty, but it now faces renewed threats. Right now, basic human rights for women in the country are in jeopardy under Turkish leaders, with some trying to roll back on these kinds of legislation. Some, in fact, even lobbying to change the Istanbul Convention, which is why we've seen some stars

who participated in this challenge now actively refocusing on this issue, like Florence Pugh. Right, and again, while Instagram says the challenge accepted here probably had nothing to do with Turkey initially, you also have a ton of people now, including Pugh, saying, oh, let's change this. Right, so we've seen more and more people doing that.

You also had people like Natalie Portman sharing articles about femicide, Demi Lovato sharing other related information and her stories. But ultimately, that is where we are with this story. And, you know, I do want to pass the question off to you. You know, now that the situation in general has turned into a learning experience,

it has put a spotlight on a very big global issue, I then want to jump back and ask you about this trend in general. This idea of challenge accepted, posting a black and white photo of yourself and then in the comments tagging other women. Do you believe that it was something that promoted good? It was a great movement in that, in its own right.

Or do you think it was kind of just this empty social media thing? Kind of like a chain mail-esque excuse to post a flattering selfie. Any and all thoughts you have on this, I'd love to know because looking online, people are very passionate about this. Again, let me know.

Then let's talk about some. Again, let me know. Then let's talk about some internet-y, social media, business news. To start, we're beginning to see a lot of money being thrown in the fight for a 15 to 60 second video. We're seeing reports come out that Instagram slash Facebook are trying to poach TikTok talent with hundreds of thousands of dollars in either exclusive

or first look deals. This reportedly to exclusively post on, or at the very least post first on Reels. And a part of your response to all of this thus far is, what is Reels exactly? Though that may change in the near future as Reels is released in more countries. But yeah, the oversimplified version of it

is it's Instagram's version of TikTok, which you can actually include as videos on your Instagram profile, but on a specific tab and or story. With Instagram also reportedly offering to help fund creators' costs of production for videos to help sweeten the deal. Looking at this it appears that TikTok is aware of these outside threats. I mean last week we saw them announce a 200 million dollar fund to help creators. As of right now it is unclear how those funds will actually be dispersed but it appears

that the company is serious about trying to keep creators on the platform. But I will say I think the idea in general is smart because it's not just Reels that is threatening them. You also have the likes of YouTube announcing back in April that they would be making a feature for their platform that essentially does what TikTok does. Then in late June, actually beginning to roll that feature out on mobile devices for some creators. And you know, to a certain degree, it makes sense for a Facebook or a YouTube

to go after this massive market, even though yes, they do have larger user bases themselves. You know, looking at the numbers, TikTok has an estimated 70 million monthly active users in the United States. According to some reports, over half of those are under the age of 30. YouTube easily surpasses that,

something like 81% of 15 to 25 year old Americans use the site, also nearly as many 26 to 35 year olds as well. Instagram, similar story with an estimated 107 million US users as of 2019. Though notably, TikTok globally is incredibly impressive, while on its way to approaching a billion monthly users despite India's ban,

though the other platforms still dwarf it. Instagram has over 1 billion, YouTube has over 2 billion. But also there is the question of how much is the TikTok audience up for grabs? And I also mean that regarding the two potential worlds we live in moving forward. There has been more and more talk about potentially banning TikTok in the United States.

When those stories first started coming out, we saw a lot of the user base on TikTok freaking out, very scared. Many at that time quickly downloading and creating their own accounts over on Byte, which is technically a TikTok competitor and more importantly, US owned. And that's notable because most of the criticisms

that we're seeing leveraged against TikTok have to do with them being owned by ByteDance, that they're hosting data in China. So when I say there's two worlds, there's one world where TikTok isn't banned and it just goes on to make sure that users don't go to competing apps. Then there's another world where TikTok is banned

and the big players get an influx of users. Even newer players like Byte would likely get a chance to really grow because people just wouldn't have TikTok in the US anymore. You know, if it got banned in the United States, which the people over at TikTok are obviously doing everything they can to try to make that not a reality. Though one thing I will say is it feels like more apparent

in the last one to two years that creators realize their value. With that not only showcased in the exclusive deals or kind of windowing deals that we've talked about, but also the news we've seen come out in the past 24 hours, you have massive TikTok creators like Josh Richards becoming chief strategy officer over at Triller, with the likes of Griffin Johnson and Noah Beck

also joining as advisors. Notably, there is equity at play. And that news coming out as we also learned that Triller is trying to raise 200 to $300 million. But at the same time, you also have people pointing back to YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, saying they potentially have their own issues if their initiatives to get a successful TikTok clone

out there succeeds. The argument being that they might be stifling competition, which leads to concerns that these tech companies are just too big. As a matter of fact, the CEOs of Google, Facebook, Apple, Amazon are all testifying before Congress right now. Some lawmakers and campaigners saying that these companies are just so large and powerful

that they actually kill competition, which ultimately leads to worse deals and options for consumers. Right, so there's arguments that launching features to their sites and apps that could possibly kill TikTok doesn't help the tech giants case that they aren't building monopolies. Though I do wanna know that antitrust actions

are extremely rare, but they do happen. And in recent-ish history, there have been attempts at using them against tech giants. Yeah, ultimately we'll have to wait to see what happens both with these hearings as well as with TikTok. And I guess the question I want to pass off to you to go back, what are your thoughts around these TikTok competitors?

All right, for the portion of the audience that's been like, ugh, TikTok, I hate it. Do you think you'd be more likely to use those features on maybe a platform that you're more established on or have more fun on like an Instagram? Before Instagram essentially ripped off stories from Snapchat, I was definitely one of the naysayers, like that would never work.

Obviously I was wrong, market share was king there. And also for those that use TikTok, if one of your favorite creators moved platforms, would you actually follow them? Yes, no, why, why not? Any and all thoughts, I'd love to see in those comments down below. And then let's talk about the huge news around DACA, right?

The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. And some quick background, of course, DACA is the program that President Obama created through executive action back in 2012. This to help young immigrants who were brought to the United States illegally before the age of 16. They're also known as DREAMers. And under the program, DREAMers are protected

from deportation and given work authorization as long as they meet a series of standards. But then what we ended up seeing is in September of 2017, now President Trump announcing that he was going to wind down DACA and block all new applications, with him claiming that all of this was unconstitutional because Obama acted outside of his executive powers by creating the program without congressional approval.

That decision then faced a ton of legal challenges with numerous judges blocking the move before it eventually went to the Supreme Court. And actually the last time we talked about DACA was last month when the Supreme Court decided in a five to four vote to reject Trump's attempt to end DACA. But the reasoning for this was extremely important.

Words matter, but it also matters the most when it's the Supreme Court, because they specifically did not say whether or not DACA was legal or illegal. Instead, what they actually did was say that Trump could not end DACA because the administration did not give adequate legal reasoning to justify scrapping the program.

But very notably, the court did not prevent the Trump administration from getting rid of the program if it came up with more sound legal reasoning. And so after all of that, you still had Trump saying he wanted to end DACA, but still most legal experts believe that the SCOTUS ruling meant that the program, which had been diminished under Trump, had to be restored to its full version

before Trump rescinded it in September of 2017, which would not only mean that the nearly 650,000 Dreamers whose futures had been in limbo for nearly three years would now have security, it would also mean that the Trump administration would now have to reopen DACA applications for the estimated 300,000 young immigrants who qualified for the program,

but were unable to apply since Trump blocked new applications in 2017. But next thing we see, about a month after the Supreme Court decision, we see reports that the Trump administration was rejecting new DACA applications, which then resulted on July 17th, US District Judge Paul Grimm,

ruling that the Supreme Court decision meant that DACA had to be restored to its full status before Trump tried to scrap it. So as a result, the Trump administration must accept new applicants. But in a court hearing this last Friday, Trump administration officials said that for the first time they had not granted nor rejected any applications,

but instead had put them all on hold while the administration figures out the future of the DACA program. But at the same time, they also said that some applications were rejected, this because of an error like a missing information or an incorrect fee. So in response to that, we see Judge Grimm

criticizing the Trump administration for not explaining to applicants why they were being rejected and also for not updating the website of US citizenship and immigration services, which now over a month after the Supreme court ruling still said that the government was not accepting new applications.

To which the Trump administration said that the website having outdated and inaccurate information did not reflect their current policies. To which Grimm responded, that is a problem. As for the inaccuracy on the website that has to change and that should be able to change very quickly. It creates a feeling and a belief that the agency is disregarding binding decisions by the appellate

and the Supreme Court, with Grimm also ruling that the Trump administration must clarify the status of the program in the next 30 days. Which finally brings us to the reason we're talking about this today, the Trump administration has done just that. In a memo yesterday, Acting Secretary of Homeland Security Chad Wolf said that he was,

"'Making certain immediate changes to the DACA policy "'to facilitate my thorough consideration "'of how to address DACA in light of the Supreme Court's decision. With him going on to outline the three major changes he is making in the interim while he evaluates the policy. Including rejecting all new DACA applicants, rejecting almost all requests for advanced parole,

which allows DACA recipients to travel outside the United States, except in exceptional circumstances. And requiring current DACA recipients to renew their deferred action and work authorizations every year instead of every two years. While Wolf did write that he was determined to give careful consideration to whether the DACA policy

should be maintained, rescinded or modified, he also said that based on the evidence he's seen, I have concluded that the DACA policy at a minimum presents serious policy concerns that may warrant its full rescission. At the same time, I have concluded that fully rescinding the policy would be a significant administration decision

that warrants additional careful consideration." Then going on to outline several reasons why he believes the program is problematic. First saying that he has serious doubts about the legality of offering undocumented immigrants protection from deportation. Also arguing that Congress should be responsible for deciding legal protections for immigrants

and that the executive action that created DACA should not be considered permanent. Going on to say that he was worried about sending mixed messages on the enforcement of immigration laws, adding, "'DACA' makes clear that for certain large classes of individuals, DHS will at least tolerate, if not affirmatively sanction, their ongoing violation of the immigration law.

I am deeply troubled that the message communicated by non-enforcement policies like DACA may contribute to the general problem of illegal immigration in a manner that is inconsistent with DHS's law enforcement mission. And also arguing rescinding the DACA policy may further DHS's efforts to discourage illegal immigration involving children going forward.

By contrast, I am concerned that retaining the policy creates some risk of communicating the contrary message and encouraging such illegal conduct by suggesting a potential for similar future policies." So this is a huge deal. It also represents the Trump administration's first official swing on DACA since the Supreme Court ruling. Also because what we're seeing is going directly

against Grimm's ruling. It almost certainly faces legal challenges. With Mark Rosenbaum, who's one of the lawyers who argued against the Trump administration's move to get rid of DACA and Supreme Court saying, we obviously have no choice but to go back to court. It was illegal the first time and now it's a constitutional crisis.

It's as if a Supreme Court decision was written with invisible ink. But there, Trump administration officials are already on the defense, giving different and even at times contradictory explanations to different media outlets. With one reportedly telling the Wall Street Journal, "'The interim rules don't violate

"'the recent Maryland court order "'because they constitute a new DHS policy "'that replaces the DACA cancellation "'invalidated by the Supreme Court.'" But then you had another administration official telling CBS News, "'The memo did not create a new program, "'but rather serves as an intervening action

"'while the administration conducts its review.'" But also when asked by the New York Times, administration officials declined to say how long the review would take or whether it would be completed before the general election in November. And the timing there is also very important because many experts say that this move

clearly positions DACA as a key immigration issue in this fall's election. But that could also go both ways for Trump. Immigration issues in general is a tent pole issue when it comes to Republican voters. But at the same time, you see things like a Pew Research Center poll last month, finding that 74% of Americans said they support the program.

And that's actually with 54% of Republicans in agreement. And that's not a new thing either. DACA has been historically very popular, even among conservative voters, which is also why most experts say that Trump is likely not to make a final decision on this until after the election.

As the director of the ACLU's Immigrants Rights Project told The Times, "'I think they made the calculation that by deferring the final blow to DACA until after the election, that they would be able to escape taking the hardest hit.'" Right, so in part, the thought around this announcement is that it pushes the issue.

Trump can still energize his anti-immigrant base, while at the same time avoiding at least some backlash from those who do support DREAMers. Also on the note of Trump regarding this topic, yesterday during a press conference he said, We're going to make DACA happy and the DACA people and representatives happy, and we're also going to end up

with a fantastic merit-based immigration system. With him also claiming that the Supreme Court's DACA rulings actually gave him more power, though it is unclear exactly what he is talking about there because the decision itself said nothing about extending executive powers. But it is an important thing to note because in the last few weeks,

Trump has also said that he will deal with DACA through an executive order on immigration. Yeah, honestly, it is all up in the air right now and anything could happen in the next 96 days before the election. And that is where I'm going to end today's show. As always, thanks for being a part of these daily dives into the news.

Also, if you're looking for more to watch, maybe you missed one of the last two Philip DeFranco shows, you can click or tap right there to watch those right now. 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. I hope you liked the video. Subscribe if you like it.