The Young Turks - Tucker's Racism

Episode Date: March 19, 2021

The cop that seemingly sympathized with the Atlanta Massage Parlor terrorist posted anti-Asian COVID t-shirts for sale last year. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to The Young Turks, the online news show. Make sure to follow and rate our show with not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars. You're awesome. Thank you. All right, welcome to the Young Turks, Jake, or Benjamin Dixon with you guys. I need you guys to understand that we're likely headed towards a preposterously good show. That's our trajectory. We'll see if we arrive, okay?

Will we be coming on a train? I don't know. It's hype. No one knows yet. That's the great thing about this. We don't know how it's going to end. We have a certain sense of it. Are you going to be watching this show on a boat?

You could be. Are you going to be watching it with a goat? You might be. I guess. Okay. Ben, how are you doing, brother? I'm doing great. Jake, you know, I feel like I'm in good company with you whenever you do some of your

dad jokes because that's where I am in life. right now. So everything that you've said so far, I'm laughing, even though I know they're high quality dad jokes. Well, look, I'll take it. I mean, as long as they're at least high quality in any category. High quality H2O. Yeah, and then that state that you described is a perpetual state for me. It's not just a perpetual state of being dad. I'm in a perpetual state of dad joked him. That's where I live. That's where I live. Okay, that's my truth. All right. Mine too.

Clearly, it's my too. You know, Zana says, you do you, boo? But in my case, I've already done me, boo. This is who I am. Okay. All right, before I go even crazier, let's actually do the news. That's what we do on this show. So Ben's going to give us the news.

And oh boy, this can usually be categories. Oh boy. So Ben, take it away. So yesterday in the wake of the tragic murders that happened at the Atlanta spas, there's been quite the controversy that has broken out around one particular comment from one of the sheriffs that were involved in the press conference yesterday. I want to give you the context by playing the video where he said that, well, the murderer had a bad day. Let's start there.

The suspect did take responsibility for the shootings. He said that early on once we began the interviews with him. he claims that these and as the chief said this is still early but he does claim that it was not racially motivated he apparently has an issue what he considers a sex fiction

and sees these locations as something that allows him to to go to these places and it's a temptation for him that he wanted to eliminate like I said it's still early on but those were comments that he made did he discuss any kind of religious

Not that I'm aware of. Not that I'm aware of. Or political. Non-political. I've heard nothing about politics. They got that impression that, yes, he understood the gravity of it. And he was pretty much fed up. And it didn't kind of at the end of his rope. And yesterday was a really bad day for him. And this is what he did. Remorseful? I'm not going to go to, I don't know if he was remorseful or not. So yesterday was a really bad day for him. Obviously, that it was a repulsive comment. that most people quickly identified as sympathizing with a mass murderer. The New York Times picked it up and said the following, quote,

the comments were widely panned on social media with critics characterizing them as callous and pointing to Facebook posts from March 30th and April 2nd of last year by Captain Baker, in which he promoted sales of an anti-Asian t-shirt. The t-shirts echoing the rhetoric of President Donald J. Trump referred to the coronavirus as a quote, important virus from China. And the article went on to say, place your order. This is a quote from his actual social media post, place your order while they last. Captain Baker wrote at the time of one of the posts, he did not immediately respond to request

for comment on Wednesday. So obviously when he said this, everyone's, when he said that he had a bad day, everyone rightly got the sensation that there's something wrong with this Captain Baker. And social media quickly discovered that, well, one of the reasons he may have sympathized with the mass murderer who targeted Asians, Asian Americans, is because he himself is a racist and has racism towards particularly that group. I could bring the image on the screen. You can see right now, you can see the images of the COVID-19 t-shirts in the form of a corona, the alcoholic beverage corona. and then underneath the imported virus from China with the enunciation attributing to Donald Trump. So, Jake, this is a really terrible addition to a story that's already tragic,

but it is really consistent in terms of what Baker said yesterday at that press conference and the fact that it was quite easy for social media to dig up the fact that he himself is a racist. Yeah, so Ben had to explain me before the show started, why spelled China C-H-Y-N-A. And that's apparently a reference to Trump saying, China, okay, if you act now, there's an extra bit of racism thrown in for free in this t-shirt, right? And so, and by the way, his message almost read exactly like that. So, look, guys, the thing about folks who have discriminatory points of view, points of view. You know, racist, bigot, this, you name it. I'm, sometimes I try to hold off on saying that because I know that it's such a trigger for right wingers that they immediately

shut off their minds. No, racism can't exist. I can't possibly have it. So the minute you use that word, I will go to a corner and cry until you're done. But I will not open my ears or my mind, right? But why would you wear a shirt like that? So what are you trying to, what is a message you're trying to deliver with that shirt, right? So like on TYT we have a shirt that says Mount Squad more. The message being delivered is obvious. We like the squad, right? That's in Congress.

This shirt is, oh, COVID-19 is bad, but we all know COVID-19 is bad. Like you're gonna wear a shirt that says, I don't like AIDS? Okay, like, but what's your point? What, what are you saying? And of course, especially with the way that China is spelled there, right, to make, to evoke Trump's racist way of referring to China. And the whole point in the shirt is, this isn't about COVID, this is about me hating that this came from China. Look, you can turn that around and say the people that are most responsible of coronavirus is us here in America. And we had the most cases,

we had the most deaths, we also spread it to the most places. So in China, they, it appears to have started in Wuhan, right? And so that's bad. I don't know what, well, first of all, We don't know why it started. The most likely reason is for transmission from animals to humans, and it might have been in a roundabout way. So that's kind of random. That's not anybody's fault, right? And then the question is how do you deal with it?

The Chinese government is at fault for not immediately being honest and transparent about it. But again, we don't have a great like to stand on here. Our government was not very honest or transparent about it, let alone knowledgeable, you know, hydroxy and inject the bleach and all that stuff, right? So no, you're trying to make a political point about Asians, right? Like if you put on a t-shirt about the Spanish flu and you're like the goddamn Spanish did it to us, the point is the Spanish part, not the Spanish flu part, right? So, and by the way, that also did not start in Spain, okay, that also started in America,

not also, but that one started in America. So, but now back to the really important part here of, okay, why does, what are we concerned about. We're concerned about whether the sheriff can deliver equal justice. So when he has a shirt like that and proudly puts that out into the world, you get a sense of his mindset. But Ben is right. You get more of a sense of his mindset from the press conference. Now, everybody's focusing on he had a bad day. It makes it seem like sympathetic to him. Like the people who died had a much worse day. That's not how he framed it. He thought about it from the perspective of the shooter. Now, that's not something that cops too often.

Now, I've never heard a police officer of any kind saying about a Muslim terrorist attack. Well, to be fair, Ahmed had a bad day. Never, not once, nor will you ever see that. And you know that, everybody knows that even if you're a right-winger, you know that, right? It's about perspective, right? So then I want to talk about the things that are not, that have not been talked about in the press as much. He also said, you know, and this is, this is some, the people have talked about this to some degree. What he says is that it was not racist.

Well, look, I get some of the logic. If he said it was about race, then it makes it easy and apparent, right? And he's relaying information to you. It's not all bad. But I'm also not overly concerned about what the homicidal lunatic said. And a lot of people have made these comments online. You know, serial rapists don't go around and say, no, no, no, it's because I hated women. But their actions are fairly clear, right?

So, and then, but finally, the part I don't think a lot of people have talked about, he said he takes responsibility for it. Now, again, I've never heard that framing from a police officer. When a black person takes responsibility, it's called a confession. Now, when a white guy who hates Asians, kind of like you, does a confession, it's not a confession, he's taking responsibility. Like, he's a stand-up guy. That goes to frame of mind. And that's what we're concerned about in equal application of justice by police officers. Wow. Jake, that's such an important point, how just the turn of phrase, right? And the fact that he had the frame of mind, this sheriff's officer, whoever, he had the frame of mind, thought, presence of mind, to turn that phrase really points to the fact that this is a comrade of his. This is somebody who, who he has more identification with than the victims.

And as it pertains to those t-shirts, one of the things that jumps out the most to me in this country is the need and how effective, quite honestly, Donald Trump and conservatives were with deflecting from our culpability, our responsibility, their responsibility for this virus spreading as fast and as viciously as it did. And they know clearly the technique

to get away with that is to other somebody, like to vilify someone. Someone had to be the villain in order for them to get away with quite frankly the stupidity that we've seen not only since last year, but all the way to today with Rand Paul still suggesting that we shouldn't wear a mask anymore. So this China t-shirt is part and parcel of the strategy of conservatives to make sure that the Republican Party, Donald Trump specifically Fox News and everyone else who played this pandemic down bore no responsibility. And how do you get away with that? You make another villain. And that's what they did here. That's 100% right. And look, by the way, there could be a range of options as to why he did what he did.

And it's not binary. People are now trying to say, well, is it random? Usually when it's why folks, people say random, lone wolf, nothing we could do. No, no political angle, no religious angle, no nothing, right? And then is it religious or is it racial? The answer could be some combination thereof, right? So is he mentally unbalanced? Well, obviously, he killed eight people, right? Is a Muslim terrorist unbalanced? Yeah, obviously, they killed eight people, right? Even angry people of a certain ideology don't kill eight people. They do when they're mentally unbalanced, right? And so then secondarily, our racial and religious components present here, they certainly appear to be, I'm not foreclosing any options, but I'm saying you don't have to put it in just one bucket.

But one thing to me is absolutely clear. The guy says over and over again, he thought he had a sexual addiction, his particular church. And that doesn't mean it applies to everyone at that church. It's just that interpretation taught him that having sex was terrible and you should hate yourself for it. But they, on top of that layered in, women have tempted you. And hence, the implication is you should hate them as well. So if you want to protect that interpretation of religion, you are wrong. It does lead to misogyny.

And oftentimes it does lead to crimes like this. It doesn't matter what religion it comes from. If you're teaching people men that it is women's fault for X, Y, or Z, not based in any fact, but based on old, you know, misogyny and sexism, et cetera, yeah, you're, you're culpable. You put that poison in his head. So let's be real about that. Yeah. Okay. I think we've got a poll here. Let's go to t-y-t.com slash polls. You're going to have to remind me what the poll is.

Okay. Will the Georgia sheriff spokesperson lose his job over racist social media posts? Yes or no? Okay. It's a good question. Another good question for another day is should he? And so, look, Ben, on that front, one more thing. Sometimes I even catch myself feeling guilty about pointing out other people's racism. Like, I want to cushion the blow for white folks in the audience, because they really, really do get very sensitive about that. And sometimes, rightfully so, not often, right? But sometimes. And sometimes wrongfully so. And I catch myself being like, look, guys, can you see why this is? Partly as a way of better communicating with folks and reaching out to them and trying to evoke empathy to have a human conversation. But partly because if you're going to say, hey, maybe that guy might be discriminatory towards Asians and he has a gun and a badge, etc. Maybe we shouldn't do that.

I know that a lot of white folks are going to react with, oh, now you're being totally unfair to him just for being racist. I mean, yeah, I mean, I can see what you're saying, Jane, but I've got so many gray hairs from trying to deal in good faith with people who intentionally have no intention of dealing in good faith in these conversations. And I've got at the point now where it's like, you know, I'll use myself as an example. I used to get really sensitive when I would see post about misogyny or all men do this and all men do that. And eventually, I just had to come to terms with the fact that, you know what, even if it's not me, it exists. And if I'm so sensitive about them saying something that hurts me and my feelings just because I'm a man, then I'm probably complicit with this entire problem in the first place. And it wasn't until I was getting it off a train in Boston one year. And this guy just acting normal, asked me for a pen, pre-pandemic, obviously.

I gave him a pen and this young woman got off the train and he went from professional to complete barbarian in 0.001 seconds. And I was like, oh, you know what? I'm going to shut my mouth anytime someone says something about men because it may not be all men, but having just one who can act on that level of vitriol towards women is extremely dangerous. So that's my world. Yeah, well, last piece of irony here, you know, Ben Shapiro has that line about facts, don't care about your feelings. Man, the right wing's got a lot of feelings. And we all have to be so sensitive, like couch or critique and like, are you guys okay? Like that's a cop that might, you know, not care about Asians that are suffering crime and he's a cop.

Or he might even do things against Asians with his badge and his gun. Are you guys okay? Are you guys okay? Are your feelings okay? Oh, your feelings are okay. All right. Now can we get to the facts about anti-Asian crime, et cetera? We spend so much of our collective energy worrying about the feelings of right wingers.

Yeah, yeah. Speaking of the feelings of right wingers, I want to shift gears to Charles Eugene Roy, better known as Chip Roy. He is a U.S. representative for Texas 21st Congressional District. And today in testimony, he said something that is extremely problematic. He said, There's an old saying in Texas about find all the rope in Texas and get a tall oak tree. You know, we take justice very seriously. I want us to take a listen to that clip. The victims of race-based violence and their families deserve justice. And it's the case what we're talking about here with the tragedy, what we just saw occur in Atlanta, Georgia. I would also suggest that the victims of cartels moving illegal aliens deserve justice,

the American citizens in South Texas that are getting absolutely decimated by what's happening our southern border deserve justice. The victims of rioting and looting in the streets last week, businesses closed, burned last summer, deserve justice. We believe in justice, right? There's old sayings in Texas about, you know, find all the rope in Texas and get a tall oak tree. You know, we take justice very seriously. And we ought to do that. Round up the bad guys. That's what we believe. My concern about this hearing is that it seems to want to venture into the policing of rhetoric in a free society, free speech, and away from the rule of law and taking out bad guys. So clearly the problem here is the allusion to lynching, which goes without saying is a blithe on American history.

that in some forms still occurs to this day. And it troubled a lot of people. And before I get too tied up into what this man said, I wanna share a tweet from Catherine Lee, Dr. Catherine Lee, because she called, once she heard it, she immediately called the congressman's office to find out why he would say such a thing. And his staffers made an excuse,

and this is the excuse that they made. And this is what she said on Twitter. that quote, did rep Chip Roy begin his remarks at the House Judiciary Committee hearing on violence against Asian Americans by joking about Texas's justice tradition of trees and ropes? Surely I misheard. And the justification that they gave for that was the fact that he was quoting, quoting a song, quoting a song by Toby Keith. The song is beer for my horses. And this is the excuse that a significant comment. Congressmen staffers gave for him making an illusion to lynching when this country has such a history filled with lynching. And just for good measure, I want to read the quote from the song because a quote from the song isn't even better. The line, the lyrics from the song isn't even better. And this is what the song says. Grandpappy told my pappy back in my day, son, a man had to answer for the wicked that he's done. Take all the rope in Texas, find a tall oak tree,

Round up all them bad boys, hang them high in the street for all the people to see. And my only question before we go any further is who do you think his grandpappy actually identified as the bad guy? Jake. Yeah. So there's obviously a history of lynchings in this country and in Texas, and that's what he's referring to. Now, not all lynchings were done against African Americans. There were times that they would grab folks and hang them that were white, okay? But were the majority of the lynchings, the overwhelming majority of lynchings done to black folks in this country?

Yes. Was the point of the lynching justice? No, almost never. And the point was to terrorize black people in this country, you better not stand up to us. If you do, we'll hang you from the tallest oak tree. And like I've told you in the past, it's disturbing, but you should know it. They oftentimes would do a picnic around the body. And that was a message.

It wasn't a message to the bad guys. That what bad thing they did, like Emmett Till and the others, was not a crime. It was the audacity to think that they might be anywhere near as equal to white people, okay? So that's the history of Lynch. By the way, they would burn the body afterwards, they would cut off the genitals. So understand the reference he's made, because he's making a reference, it's a very clear reference. So I want you to understand the power of that reference. I don't want him to pretend that the history of lynchings in this country is different than what

it is. Oh, we did, could have happened to anybody. It happened randomly. No, no, no, no. The overwhelming majority of lynchings in this country had a very political purpose. If you stand up to us, we murder you in the most grotesque ways, and we do it as a political statement, which is by the way the definition of terrorism to kill for a political message. So that is Chip Roy, sitting Republican congressman of Texas, glorifying terrorism. Maybe the worst terrorism we have ever had in America. You say, oh my God, 9-11, okay, 9-11 is awful, absolutely awful. Now, that was one day. Take hundreds of years of you. If you dare raise your head, we will murder you in the streets from the tallest oak tree. You are talking about terrorism. Why do you think they burn crosses on people's yards? That was to terrorize them. If you ever rise up and demand equality or anything coming to equality, we will lynch you from the tallest oak tree in Texas. So now Chip Roy, in the middle of a hearing about, Discrimination says, oh yeah, these days the Republican Party rewards monsters. So they're in a

competition for who could be most monstrous. So now Ron Johnson went out there the other day, said, oh, the people who were rioting, they were white, so I didn't have any problem with them. But if it was Black Lives Matter, I would have hated them. I would have been really scared. And now Chip Roy says, hold my beer. Okay, I'm going to go pro-lynching. I'm going to go pro-lynching, because the Republican voters are here for it. I will not be punished. I will be rewarded. That's why today he doubled down when challenged. He said, yeah, yeah, I meant it. And that's who the Republican Party is today. That's who they are. That's who they've been. That's who they desire to continue to be. And they try to get away with it under the guise of

free speech. But when your speech becomes a threat to my life, right? That's the intersection that we're playing with right here. It's because he's doing this in context in the backdrop of eight people being murdered, six of them being targeted because they were Asian. And he's using just this off-the-cuff illusion. And what he gets to is lynching. That shows the depth of the political derangement that rest in the hearts of conservatism. This is how they think.

From the depths of his heart, he really, thought that that was making a salient point. And the thing that gets me the most about this, Jank, is that there's one other clip, and it's from 2019. And I want to show why, where in this instance, he's telling people to hold the line, don't be so angry. We really care about Texas and justice, justice in Texas, but don't get so furious. I want you to see how angry he got over the Oversight Committee, the House Oversight Committee, requesting emails from Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner. Like, he got 38 hot over this. Take a look in. This is the face of the Democratic Party. This is the face of your Congress today, America.

Good job, Chip. Good job. Mr. Connolly. I thank the chair. I thank the chair. I have a motion. I do want to just say, shame on my colleague from Texas. No. To question the motivation of Democrats. Shame on this body. Yeah, I know. We've heard from you. It's my time. It's my time. And you'll continue to hear from me. Wait a minute. In defense of this country. Mr. Chairman. Hold up. He has the time. I have the time. America deserves the time. Yeah. America deserves better than what I just heard from, Mr. Mr. Chairman, I have a motion.

Taking his ball and going home. Bye. So he gets so enraged over trying to have accountability for Republicans that he gets up and storms out. Rest in power to the chairman at the time, Elijah Cummings. But he wants us to not get so hasty with our anger over a white supremacist killing Asian Americans. That to me is the epitome of what Republicans and conservatives are in this country right now. And I love that you showed that clip because it's really important context. So context matters.

So when it's eight people murdered and we're having a hearing about anti-Asian crime, which is up 150% in the last year, he's not bothered by it. He's bothered by, wait, are you gonna stop me from saying racist things? I'm really, you know, that vexes me, right? But when it's his privileges and the privileges of his Republican colleagues that are in question, Oh, I'm so mad, right? Oh, a bunch of people were slaughtered. That's okay, I'm, you know, I'm going to nitpick here, right?

Ivanka, we're talking about Ivanka. Now, but the other part of the context that matters is later in that speech from today, Chip Roy, started talking about the Chinese communist government and sort of blaming them for the virus. But wait a minute, that's the kind of talk that started this in the first place. So now, why are you making those comments? in the context of this here. If we're having a hearing about Chinese trade relations with China or something along those lines, and you want to use your demagoguery there in that context, okay, I still don't like it, but at least there's a logical connection. The only reason

to bring up the demagoguery around the Chinese Communist Party at a hearing about anti-Asian hatred is to say, I kind of like the anti-Asian hatred. This is what sparked it in the first place. That's why I'm gratuitously bringing it in here to tell you, I'm going to rub your face in it. The reason is my voters love it. They love it when I'm racist. So I'll throw an anti-Asian rhetoric in a committee hearing about anti-Asian rhetoric, and I'll throw in a gratuitous lynching reference for you to really just wave that white hood all over the Congress. I want you guys to be clear if there was a clan, I'd be the leader of that clan is what Chip Roy is saying. I got it, Okay, now that message is super clear. But one more thing, Ben, he said in Texas, we take justice

very seriously. Do you? Because the lynchings, by definition, and I'm not just talking about the black lynchings, every lynching, by definition was an affront to justice. We do not want to go through the justice system. We want to hang that guy right or wrong. We don't want to to take it through the courts. We don't want to go to law enforcement. What we want to do is take it into our own hands because we're not interested in justice. We're interested in vengeance, right or wrong. That was literally the point of the lynchings, otherwise they would have gone through the justice system. So he is making a passionate defense of injustice as he spews his racist rhetoric for the Republican crowds to consume. Yeah, yeah.

All right, we have to take a break here. But when we come back, we're not done with this because some that at some point, I guess, claimed to be on the left like Glenn Greenwald has decided that they're going to fly their flag too. And white people must be defended. So Glenn is here to help. We will talk about that when we come back. We need to talk about a relatively new show called Un-F-F-The Republic or UNFTR. As a Young Turks fan, you already know that the government, the media, and corporations are constantly peddling lies that serve the interests of the rich and powerful.

But now there's a podcast dedicated to unraveling those lies, debunking the conventional wisdom. In each episode of Un-F-The Republic, or UNFTR, the host delves into a different historical episode or topic that's generally misunderstood or purposely obfuscated by the so-called powers that be, featuring in-depth research, razor-sharp commentary, and just the right amount of vulgarity, the UNFTR podcast takes a sledgehammer to what you thought you knew about some of the nation's most sacred historical cows. But don't just take my word for it. The New York Times described UNFTR as consistently compelling and educational, aiming to challenge conventional wisdom and upend the historical narratives that were taught in school.

For as the great philosopher Yoda once put it, You must unlearn what you have learned. And that's true whether you're in Jedi training or you're uprooting and exposing all the propaganda and disinformation you've been fed over the course of your lifetime. So search for UNFDR in your podcast app today and get ready to get informed, angered, and entertained all at the same time. Oh, I'm going to be able to be. All right. super chat first. Peter Hamby writes in kicking the victims while they're down, rubbing salt

in the wounds. It makes me wonder which virus is worse. The virus Trump ignored or the virus that's been around for over 200 years being racism. So Peter, by the way, I noticed that you became a young tourist member the other day. Appreciate it brother. Thank you for doing that. The join buttons right below for anybody interested in doing that. It helps get out our strong progressive message and it allows us to fight for change together. So it makes a big difference. In fact, the folks who just did that are Zay Ivory 7, News Palau 1, and Kylie Walker. So thank you. We're really appreciate it, and it makes a giant difference.

Republicans eat in YouTube super chat says about the sheriff explains why he talked like his defense lawyer, a defense lawyer for the shooter. It really did seem that way. By the way, that has happened on many occasions that we've shown you here documented. When it's white, right wingers, all of a sudden, the cops are the most sympathetic people you've ever seen in your life. And here, I wanted to do this comment, but then I'm going to explain something. So Tony Montana wrote in in our member section, t.com slash join to become a member there. Mr. Jenk, I do not mind you ragging on white people.

I'm a white person who's a descendant of Andrew Jackson via my maternal grandmother's part of my family. But Tony, I want you to understand something. We're not ragging on white people. That would be equally insane. Okay, no, we're talking about white right wingers with a certain ideology. And the fact that they're white is only relevant because of the power dynamics in this particular country. There are countries where white folks are minorities, etc. Now overall in the globe, whites have had more power, certainly in the last couple hundred years, right? It's not always been the case. So it is situational context does matter, but it's never against white people. Because, that would be irrational. So Puff to Magic Dragon says, notice old Chip doesn't dare mention the insurrectionists. I think the American people deserve justice. Or how about all the people of color gunned down by authorities? Their families deserve justice. Could you imagine? That's such a great point. Because imagine if a Democratic congressman gave a speech about, you know, there's an old saying in texts about roping people. And that's why that cop who murdered

the unarmed black man, we'll find a rope in a tree for him. Imagine. All right, back on TYT, Jank and Ben with you guys. I'm going to read one more comment here from our member section before we go on with the news. It's actually related to the story we're going to cover. Mickey C. the Silver Dragon Road in, not racially motivated about the Atlanta shootings. He first shot up in Asian business, then drove 27 miles to find two more. Were there no other businesses on the long drive there? So, you know, on the surface, this is not complicated.

Okay, now we'll dive into non-service, so you'll see probably not complicated. Okay, so Ben, take it away. So Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Greenwald cannot see the link between the Atlanta spa shootings where a white man killed eight Asian women and white supremacy. I want us to take a look at what he had to say on Twitter before we set the record straight. The first thing he said on Twitter was the following. And quote, has anyone provided an iota of evidence that what is driving this horrific surge of anti-Asian violence is, quote, white supremacist domestic terror? That would require data showing who is primarily perpetrating the violence and with what motive.

Where is that? Now, he went ahead and dunked on liberals for speaking out against his ridiculous tweets, and this is what he shared. He said, quote, please look at how stupid and lowly so many liberals are now. If you ask for evidence to support sweeping but dubious claims about the cause of anti-Asian violence, they won't answer. Their brains won't allow that. Instead, they'll call your races.

It's all they know how to do. So at that point, the journalist Michael Harriet from the root.com, he jumped in to set the record straight for Glenn Greenwald, and this is what he said on Twitter. Quote, the research revealed nearly 3,800 incidents were reported over the course of roughly a year during the pandemic. It's a significantly higher number than last year's count of about 2,800 hate crimes nationwide over the span of five months. He went on to say, also, every day. journalists will tell you that the reason evidence is so scant is because the pandemic is barely a year old and most law enforcement agencies haven't compiled and released their annual crime statistics yet. This knows that. Now, before we go on any further, Jake, I want to jump in, I want to get you in here on this conversation because this is a market shift from someone I I used to consider friendly as well as a colleague in this space representing the left and progressivism, but it looks as though Glenn is finding colleagues somewhere else

at these days. Yeah. So Professor Lessig at Harvard, when talking about corruption and politics, used a great phrase, lean to the green. That's what the politicians do, right? And unfortunately, in the new media, some folks are. are finding it irresistible to lean towards a certain direction. It doesn't mean that in that case it has to be financial.

It could be that it's just leaning towards attention. So look, I know how Foxen's works and I've been approached by shows there. And the number one thing they ask you to do is not disagree with the host. So if they bring you on, they only bring you on to agree, unless it's a structured debate. Those are different, okay? But a guy like Tucker Carlson brings you on, and they kind of groom you. And are you okay with only agreeing with them? So that is the implicit deal that Glenn has made. Look, he can say, no, I didn't, I never said that, etc. Really? You're constantly debating, Tucker? No,

when I see you on Tucker, you're only agreeing with him. So you're being used for a specific purpose. And yes, you're getting more attention. But it ain't worth it, brother. And so Glenn Greenwald is He was a guy I deeply respected and has done great work and that's still the case. And so the fact that he's gone in this direction does not erase that past work. Now having said that, he is, in my opinion at this point, partly seeking that attention and partly so obsessed with being contrarian that it is to the detriment of seeking truth. Because if you're constantly trying to be contrarian, well, by definition, your priority is to stand out by being different rather than stand out by serving truth.

Yeah. And so it will lead you to, if we're being super generous making mistakes like this, if we're not being generous, it's not a mistake, and it's intentional. Now, Michael Harry has a really compelling point here on whether it's intentional or not. You couldn't do a simple Google search to see that anti-Asian crime has gone up by 150, has gone up 150% last year. And as other hate crime have decreased, that one has gone up. And you think it might have, and you're sure that it has nothing to do with anti-Asian bigotry that is being pushed politically nonstop, including on channels that you're on 24-7. Okay. So the second layer of that observation by Michael, which so great is, wait, why make that assumption? Not only are you not Googling it

and you're not looking it up and you're coming in fact-free while accusing others of not having facts, ironic to begin with, but the second part of it is, why assume that the forces of bigotry and racism are innocent if you have no facts, right? And so at a minimum, you can say, look, we don't know, but I can see that the guy drove 27 miles to go attack more Asian places, and I can see why that would be a question that was being asked as to his motive. Maybe I haven't concluded it yet, but that seems like pretty overwhelming evidence. Instead, it appears that you were concluding the opposite. It is a curious place to start a debate we didn't even need to have. But you needed the attention, so you forced a debate by protecting the people

that you know are now craving your content. And you know, the thing that really bothers me about this is the casual disregard for the the lives that were taken in exchange for defending people from even the accusation of white supremacy, as if murder is far less egregious than the accusation of white supremacy. And there's one thing that I said on my show this morning, when Glenn wants to see the evidence of racism and white supremacy, the data from this, the data is in the morgue. Like, the bodies are there. The bodies of Asian and Asian American women are there. And he expressly targeted them. And for him to come out on this side of the issue, whether it be for attention, whether

it be for just the sake of contrarianism, I also think it's because he has slowly but surely made his number one issue to be against cancel culture. Again, as if cancel culture is far more egregious than murder. But now back to Michael Harriet's point, it's true. It's true that law enforcement agencies did not release stats for 2020 yet, but here's some data that we're going to put on your screen that came from the pre-pandemic era. And it shows that the rate of violence attacked by white people are almost seven times higher in comparison to the number of violent crimes by other ethnicities. And we've seen, Jank, we've seen that it has been reported that white supremacist right wing terrorism is one of the most significant threats

to life in this country. I mean, the evidence and the trend is there. And most of all, you said it, Fox News, they are part and parcel of spreading this anti-Asian bigotry that we've seen across this country. And I think perhaps maybe he is doing this on behalf of Tucker Carlson, his friend who show he likes to go on as often as he can. Yeah, and look, at this point, Tucker Carlson are constantly talking about how immigrants are dirty and were the country's overcrowded and they bring disease and crime. This is textbook racism, textbook. Glenn, you can't tell that? Look, I had an exchange that I've talked about in the post game with Tucker Carlson backstage before we debated a Politicon. It was perfectly cordial.

Our debate was perfectly cordial. Can you agree with Tucker Carlson that we shouldn't have more wars? Yes, we can agree on that. And so I gave him every benefit for the doubt. But how many times is you going to go on air and talk about how dirty and unacceptable immigrants are and brown people are before you begin to realize maybe he's a white supremacist and I shouldn't be helping white supremacist. Okay, look, apparently Glenn can't see that. Jimmy can't see that.

They're blinded by whatever they're blinded by. Attention, I got to have it. I got to be contrary and I got to agree with the right wing they'll put me on there. Okay, they're going to get super hurt by that. They're going to have feelings. At TYT, we frequently talk about all the ways that big tech companies are taking control of our online lives, constantly monitoring us and storing and selling our data. But that doesn't mean we have to let them.

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ecstatic ecstatic can you believe what they said about me but the good news with me as everybody knows is i don't believe in cancel culture so Glenn can say whatever he wants chip roy can say whatever he talk or can say whatever they want i get to say something back and i'm saying it right now and if it hurts your feelings i don't give a damn at all It's called speech and I know you're in favor of it. And so don't go on Tucker Carlson and pretend you don't know Tucker Carlson's racist. Please don't do that. Don't write this message when everybody's hurting and saying like, well, I don't know that

it's white supremacist domestic terror. That's what Glenn said. Oh, golly gee. I mean, I don't like all of this was sprouting around me and the crime is up and the guy said it's China, China, China, I don't know where it came from. I'm gonna assume it isn't, okay? And so that is a weird assumption to have. And second of all, Glenn, are you so unsophisticated that you think, hey, you know, I see

that chart that Ben put up and black people attack Asians too. And I'm going to point that out. You're unsophisticated enough to not know the context. Okay, number one, you got to layer in socioeconomic conditions. If you say you don't have to, that is a position that is anti-intellectual and buttresses racism for no reason, okay? So, but secondly, you think black people can't hear Trump either? You think you can't hear the constant message of it's the Chinese, it's the Chinese, it's their fault, it's their fault. And by the way, what do the rich do? In this country, it happens to be

rich white right wingers. They set us against one another. Hey, black folks, be mad at the Jews. The Jews are the ones that have the power. All of a sudden they're mad, right? Hey, you don't have enough white guy in West Virginia or black guy in Oakland, maybe it's the Chinese, it's the Chinese, it's the Jews. And then next, you know, there's attacks on synagogues, there's attacks on Chinese, it's called stochastic terrorism. You don't know that concept, Gwen, you know that concept. But hey, congratulations, by saying outrageous things in the middle of people's pain, you got a lot of attention, mission accomplished. In the middle of everyone's pain, right? I got to let that one go, because that drives a

rage and a fury in me because he wants to put the emphasis on protecting white supremacists or people from the accusation of white supremacy before he even gave a moment's consideration for the families who are now trying to figure out how they're going to bury their family members during a pandemic. Good job, Glenn. But as Michael Harriet points out, Greenwald's rhetoric appeases his newfound fans. I'm going to read this quote, this tweet from Michael Harriet. He said, also notice how Glenn didn't say, I haven't seen any data, therefore I believe all the journalists, cops, and actual Asian Americans say, no, he's like, f all that, I need white people to verify this for me. And I want to bring up the tweet that Michael Harriet is referring to.

It's a tweet that was cited by Glenn Greenwald, but it was liked by a very proud white supremacist. He has no shame about his white supremacy, Nicholas J. Fuentes. And the tweet said, has anyone provided an Iota evidence? The same one that we read. disliked by an aspiring and upcoming, rising through the ranks conservative that is a very loud and proud white supremacist. And perhaps that is the audience he's more concerned about appealing to than the humanity of the eight people who lost their lives this week. My last thing I'll say is, you know what's part of cancel culture? Murder. Facts. And so he canceled the lives of those eight people. But you couldn't find it in your

heart to find sympathy for the people who had been canceled, had their lives canceled. Instead, you found sympathy for the white supremacists as people wondered if they had some culpability in this murder. Glenn, I'm just asking you to look at your priorities one more time and see if you could find it in your heart and your mind to actually open up to the possibility that maybe not everyone is wrong at all times and that you are not a champion simply for disagreeing with everyone, that maybe the pursuit of truth is more important than the pursuit of attention through disagreement. Okay, we gotta take a break. When we come back, more ass kicking all around. I'm going to be able to be.

I don't know. You know, I'm going to be able to be a bit of a bit of a bit of a bit. All right, back on a young Turks during the break here. I gotta reach some of your comments. Effectos writes in, people need to remember that Asia is made up of more countries than just China, Japan, and the Koreas. I worry for Thai Indian and Filipino Americans who could be targeted. In fact, they have been.

And so that's a great point. No more trigonometry says Glenn Greenwald has been going in this direction for a while. He's done great work in the past, but he's so bent on hating liberals and mainstream media that he just comes off as a contrarian. And by the way, he doesn't just come off that way. He is a contrary. The same thing with Michael Tracy. They're so obsessed with being contrarian that they've lost sight of reality.

So all right, that's in our member section, t.com slash join and become a member there. Get your comments read more often. That's one of the privileges. We're going to do post game today you're going to love. New members on YouTube, Krista Card, Kobe Green, Signier, Cordray. You guys are amazing. amazing, thank you for hitting that join button down below. Now some amazing comments for super chat. First, Republicans Eat wrote, the fact of it being targeted to Asians from a white person,

by definition, is a white person trying to be superior to those Asians. It is obvious. So that's one comment. Yesi Garcia says just as nice. And the last part is great. Yes, he says, Jenk, I love your passionate intelligence. Right wingers want proof of racism, but not for voting fraud. Oh, that's such a great point. God, I love our audience. Okay, so the only place you don't need proof is when it comes to voter fraud. That's amazing, amazing. And Republicans, with another good point, why is it not being regularly pointed out that GOP is responsible For the entire outbreak, we saw the result of the outbreaks with CDC and place China. And when they removed it, this was the result. I mean, yeah, if we're going to get at people

for spreading the virus, it should be Republicans. They spread it the most. It's as a fact. We can get into it on another show. Trisha Briggs says, Jenkin, Ben, is always thrilled to see you. That being said, I miss Anna. There's references to queens and bosses, et cetera. Thank you, Trisha. We appreciate it. We'll be right back. You know, I'm going to be able to be. All right, back on the Young Turks. Jake had been with you guys. Ben, take it away.

So, Jake, despite the mass shooter in Atlanta, in the Atlanta Spa Massacre, specifically targeting Asian women, Tucker Carlson did last night what he has paid extremely well to do. He dismissed the possibility that this was a race-based white supremacist attack. And he did so without any remorse whatsoever. And he did so without any consideration for the fact that his own network over the last year has been promoting the bigoted notion of the Chinese China virus. So the guy's accused of murdering eight people and all the questions

were about race. Okay. But notice, it's the politicians who jump in immediately to divide the country along racial lines. Now you have to understand Tucker Carlson does this specifically because his job at Fox News, which he's paid extremely well to do, is to sever and to separate the cause from the effect. The effect is what we saw this week, which is a white Christian man went and targeted Asian spas and killed and massacred eight people. The cause, at least one of the causes, is Fox News and Tucker Carson, Carson, continuously and regularly promoting the xenophobic idea that it came from China and that the reason we're suffering so much in this country rather is because of China. And you have to understand, the reason

he does these type of things is because he has extremely big shoes, big racist shoes to field because he is replacing or has replaced Bill O'Reilly, who made it very clear that this country was built and is supported and sustained on behalf of white Christian men. Do you understand, and I'm not saying this in a condescending way, you're smarter than I am. But do you understand what the New York Times wants and the far left want? They want to break down the white Christian male power structure of which you're a part, and so am I. And they want to bring in millions of foreign nationals to basically break down the structure that we have. So that's the hour that Tucker Carson has replaced.

And this is what he does so well. And this is what he makes about $6 to $10 million a year to do. He is there to make sure that he protects that white male Christian power structure. But he gets paid so well because he's able to so plausible deniability into the minds of all the people who are watching. So despite constantly and consistently forwarding white supremacy on his network, he's always there to make sure that no one ever feels any responsibility for the actions that inevitably come from this white supremacist rhetoric that they push on a regular basis. Now, I want to watch, I want you to watch some of these contradictions. Take a look at this next clip as he uses fear of overpopulation

to attack and vilify immigrants. What's happening on the border site will change this country forever. A lot of things won't this will, and you should know that. Unlike other disasters, mass illegal immigration is permanent. No one ever really gets sent home. Over the past 30 years, the population of the United States has exploded by nearly a hundred million people, mostly due to immigration. Were you even aware that that happened? You're not supposed to say a word about it, as every year the United States gets steadily

more jammed with people, and at the same time, more chaotic and less cohesive. As the open spaces shrink, as nature itself recedes in the face of yet another strip mall or apartment complex or fast food outlet to serve the new people. This is becoming a crowded country, and crowded countries are ugly, unhappy countries. Why are we letting that happen? Now wait, so just a few days before that, though, Tucker Carlson made it clear that our country isn't particularly overcrowded. Take a listen in.

Well, even with 320 million people living here, this country still is not particularly crowded. Right. So which is it, Tucker? The fact is the country is not particularly overcrowded. There is a population density map from 2020 that shows that there are entire states that nearly have fewer than five people per square mile. That means that there are people who literally have to drive into town over the bridge and through the woods in order to see another human being. But that's besides the point. The point is that he would rather use immigrants and use the fear of overpopulation as a way to attack immigrants than to actually be consistent in his

argument. And this is what he does so well. But the question is, is he worried about overpopulation because in this next clip, he seems to be worrying about us not having a big enough population and blaming it on low sperm counts. So we spent last year hearing about a health crisis, a pandemic, but there are a lot of health crises. This may be the biggest one. Falling testosterone levels which have completely reshaped our society, and falling sperm counts, which may make it impossible to continue the human race. Why is this happening? Probably because of chemicals in our environment. According to one scientist, sperm counts in the Western world have dropped 59% between 1973 and 2011. At this pace, sperm counts will reach zero by 2045. No one talks

about this. Everybody should be. So which is it, Tucker? Is it the fact that you're a concerned about overpopulation? Are you concerned about us not populating enough? Or is it rather that you're concerned that we're populating this country with the wrong color of children? And this is why Tucker makes the big bucks. He makes the big bucks because he's simultaneously capable of forwarding white supremacist rhetoric. He's simultaneously capable of sewing the idea of white genocide constantly every night. He packages up in his nice Brooks brother suits, or quite frankly, He probably, those suits are probably too cheap for him now because of how much money he makes. Because his particular skill set is to constantly sever the effect from the cause.

Because if people ever slowed down long enough to realize the type of white supremacy that is being forwarded over Fox News every single day, they would pause and reflect that they may have some culpability in what happened in Atlanta this week. But not to Tucker Carlson. No, his job, his one job, is. to use thousands of words every single night that his compatriots actually summarized in just 14 words by saying Tucker Carlson really believes that he must secure the existence of his people and a future for white children. And he's paid millions of dollars to do that every single year. So of course, he cannot see the racism in the attack that happened this week in Atlanta. Because to paraphrase Upton Sinclair, how could Tucker Carlson possibly see the racism when

Fox News pays him millions of dollars to ignore it? Ben, that is 100% right. And let me give even further context to that. So these are, first of all, Tucker Carlson is not a dumb guy. So does he know history and context he does, right? So it's not an accident that they're choosing the words that they're choosing, okay? So, and in fact, and the white supremacists have said that he does the most sophisticated job of pushing out their message.

I think there's a lot of truth to that. That's why I'm more concerned about a guy like Tucker Crosso than I am of Donald Trump. Donald Trump is a ham-handed fool, and everybody knows that, right? And whereas Tucker Crosso knows how to be clear enough to his white, right-wing, racist audience that he's on their side and making the same kind of points that they love to hear against black and brown people. while having plausible deniability. But Tucker, you can play that game with the mainstream media, and a lot of times they'll fall for it.

And they go, I mean, context history, I've never heard of it. But we're not going to fall for it in our audience, and we're going to tell everybody. You like speech? We got speech for you. Okay. So let's explain. First of all, you have said on occasions, and Lauren Grimm has said the same exact phrase. The immigrants will not replace us.

That was written into your script. It was in your prompter. you read it ahead of time, and then you read it on air. You know that the Nazi phrase is the Jews will not replace us. And that's not a phrase that's so common that you go, well, you know, I went to go get a burger, I don't know, I went to go get a pizza. Everybody says I wanted to go get something, right? No, they will not replace us. It's kind of a weird comment. Why were Jews trying to replace you? It's distinctive. So when you take that out and you put the immigrants will not replace us,

Your intent is a thousand percent clear. Okay, but if you say it's one comment, okay, then he goes on and is on multiple occasions talking about how dirty immigrants are. Now that is the most classic trope against the others. The people that you want to isolate and say are a problem and that we should do something drastic about. Was that using the Holocaust? Definitely, do you know that? Of course you know that. Are you using it despite that? Well, that would be an interesting decision that you're making, right? Why are you choosing to say, I'm going to ignore a historical context of these words? So if you said, for example, if I, like, I hate the corporate donors.

So I might be tempted to say that some of them are puppeteers. But I would check myself because I know the history. If you say a Jewish person is a puppeteer, well, that's propaganda that the Nazis used. So you shouldn't use that in the context of a Jewish person if you're being thoughtful because of the history of that phrase. But here, instead of being thoughtful, you're purposely driving at home. They're dirty, they're dirty, they will not replace us. Look at these people that are coming in to replace us, and now you go to overcrowding. Well, does overcrowding have a history?

Simple Google search, okay? So you go to perspectives, this is about this context about Holocaust. Let me read you just a simple sentence from there. The law against overcrowding in schools and universities passed on April 25th, 1933. It set strict limitations on the number of Jewish students permitted to attend both public and private schools and universities. The justification was overcrowding. We just don't have room for the Jews.

So now you have to tell me, Tucker, are you that ignorant that you don't know what right-wing fascists have done for time immemoration? to categorize the others as intruders that are here to replace you and that are dirty and leading to overcrowding, which is causing problems for you. And the very next part of that ideology is we should do something about it. So are you ignorant? Are you the most ignorant person on television or are you purposely racist? Looking forward to your answer.

Yeah, looking forward to hearing. But I doubt he'll say anything because it wouldn't pay well for him to actually tell the truth about the situation, Jane. Okay, absolutely. All right. Well, unfortunately, we've got to take a break here. Look, first of all, everybody checking out the Benjamin Dixon show. As you can tell here, fire. Okay?

Ben, thank you. I appreciate her, brother. Thanks, James. It's a pleasure. Absolutely. When we come back, we've got a lot more stories for you guys. Brenner looks going to join us. And we got some serious stories left.

But we have one you cannot miss. There's a new phenomenon of the right wing claiming to be super straight. I have never been more amused by a story. I mean, it'll be a crime if you miss that story. So stay right here. We'll be right back. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks.

Support our work, listen to ad-free, access members, only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.