Trillbilly Worker's Party - Episode 444: Bulletin Board Material (w/ Special Guest Jayson Buford)

Episode Date: May 15, 2026

Aaron and Tom welcome friend of the show Jayson Buford on to talk about his two new pieces, the fetishization of white rural culture, and what happens when the biggest stars on the planet align themselves with the "manosphere." subscribe today: patreon.com/trillbillyworkersparty

I was picking up a friend of mine from the airport. They're into a mutual friend of ours birthday, lives in town here. They're a doctor, and they were telling me, made this little quip about, you know, when they were coughing and stuff. Oh, no. Well, now I've got haunted virus. Can't be doing it with me. Ha, ha, ha, ha.

And I didn't really have the heart to just be like, look, you can't mess with me like that. Because I suffer from, from. from a paralyzing hypochondria. And I just, I can't be receptive to, you know, little, little japes like that and so forth. But, Jay, B, where do you land on the haunted virus thing? That's why I've been asking every guest we've had on the last week, trying to get a, if I get guests from all over the country. And so you're the first, you know, East Coaster.

What's the level of, you know, paranoia and thread up in, you know? From what I've seen, it's only been on airplanes. Okay. Right. Okay, that's good. I'm not taking a plane. Yeah, I'm not flying. You know what I'm saying?

They don't say nothing about buses and being too close to the Greyhound bus bathroom, right? Like, I'm good at that. For what I've seen, it's just people been, you know, they've been airborne and then, you know, it's only been like seven people from what I last saw. But, you know, I'm not really on top of these things. We'll think about so many other stuff. Yeah, yeah. And we're going to get into all those, too, today.

But I just, before we started. So, Aaron, you should be good. just crack a window in the event. Yeah, as long as my seat, unfortunately, is right in front of the bathroom on the bus because I'm taking a bus down in Florida for listeners, getting a little trip out this weekend. And as long as I'm not huffing, as long as the haunted virus is not incubating in human shit, then I'll be huffing like next to that bathroom. I should be good.

You know, I'm not getting on a plane, you know, wear my mask. Yeah, we, yeah, we don't know about the human shit incubation. part of this shit. But I'm just, right now, my attitude, none of my business. Yeah, until, until, you know, for me, when I first started realizing COVID was when they canceled the NBA season, like, when it was, like, when they canceled the NBA, I was like, oh, shit. Oh, this got implications for me now.

Yeah. Now I care. Now I care. Now I care about public health. Although the Knicks were really bad that year, they were really bad that year. They were really bad. year, right? But so I mean, but I generally speaking, I'm an NBA fan generally speaking, but the Knicks were really bad that year too. So I was like, okay, well, end of the next season,

all right, fine, I'm cool. Yeah, it's like, put me out of my misery. Yeah, yeah. Well, Jason, was at least the fact that Netflix had released the last dance during COVID? Oh, that was the best. Was that at least a consolation for us? Yeah, yeah. Okay. Yeah, it was the best. You know I love Jordan. Yes. Yeah. Yes, indeed, brother. And one of the, one of the heartbreakers for me is them canceling winning time because I was looking forward to,

they could have riffed forever on that show. Like they could have went to the bad boy pistons. Yeah, they could have went to the Bulls teams. Like they could have just kept that show on the air forever. You know, the first scene of that show in season one, episode one,

the first scene, the very first scene is magic and at the doctor getting his HIV notification. Excuse me, sorry. Sorry, that's my girlfriend calling. Sorry,

baby. I'm talking about it. The very first scene of winning time is magic getting his diagnosis at the doctor. They could have done it up until his diagnosis. Now, let me go ahead. Now this ties back into the root of my hypochondria. I just hit it with the Hey, Baby, I'm doing a podcast text. The scourge of girlfriends worldwide these days.

So the root of my hypochondri, and really, I mean, you get at it. while the haunted virus thing freaked me out when the little quip was made, is my first exposure to like, oh, my God, was being a kid and seeing Magic's announcement. And when the announcement came out, I was like, you know, well, obviously I'm going to get that from a water fountain. You know what I mean? Yeah.

Like, you know, you didn't think anything about, you know, any other lifestyle factors or anything. He's like, if Magic could get it at any of us. Anybody could get it. Yeah. years later, I'm in therapy for this. And there's this old head named Terrell was my therapist for a little bit. And I was sitting there talking to him.

I was like trying to explore the roots of mine. And I was like, you know, the furthest I can trace it back is Magic's announcement. And he looks at me and he goes, you know Magic was on the download, don't you? And I was like, let's keep it between the lines here. It's like, you know. Well, so we're going real script here, but this is actually pretty interesting. There's a great Bill Simmons column where he talks about Magic and Bird, and he kind of talks about Magic post the announcement.

And one of the things Magic did is he would do these interviews where he talked about his, you know, sex life and talked about it in a way where it's like, I'm heterosexual. I'm so, so, so heterosexual. Because at the time, at the time, everybody's like, this is a, this is a gay disease, obviously. You know what I mean? And nobody thought that, like, just because, like, heterosexual odds of contraction are lower than, you know, the opposite. It's like, you know, just by.

Well, it was also just, you know, I mean, listeners and all this, obviously, just treading over a well-worn territory, I guess. We all believe magic straight, by the law. But, I mean, it was a deal. Tom doesn't want to get sued. well it was just a demonization right you know yeah yeah well so you want to be like I'm not I'm not morally you know so I'm tracing this long further magic is just my lifelong struggle with hypochondri is tied up at magic's struggle because he had a book out when I was in middle school and it I started to say it was called something like how I caught it but it wasn't it wasn't mad it was just it was just like a HIV

education thing the OJ version and in it it it And he tells the story about having sex with seven women in a Las Vegas elevator one time. So I don't know if that was part of the whole, no, no, no, I'm straight, I'm straight, I'm straight campaign at the time. And he was kind of overselling it. Or if like, you know, if winning times to be believed, he was out there like that, you know. So anyway, I'm glad Magic's, you know, one of the. Alive and well.

Alive and well still wins today. Anyway, our guest today is Mr. Jason Buford, a rider for Rolling Stone GQ. He's got his own substack, which I just subscribed to this morning because he wrote something this week, Jason, that I want to dig into a little bit more. And you also got something in The Guardian that's of interest to me as, you know, part-time rapper and former UK basketball booster Drake is, It's ice man season, I guess, tonight, you know. So we're going to tease out a couple of things you've noticed in this rollout, Jason.

That also tie back into, you know, Drake's embrace of the Manosphere and so forth, which is germane to our listenership. But, yeah, man, thanks for being with us again. Thank you for having me. Really appreciate it. Let's jump in right there. Okay, so you got this thing out for The Guardian. again. And I like other guys. It's like, it's just got Drake's got his own header, like all the Drake

just click his name, and this is the first thing that pops up. Drake lost the beef and embraced the manosphere. Is it too late for him to win back his audience? After his Kendrick Lamar feud, Drake alienated female fans with new album Ice Man, he's aiming for the top of the charts again. And I'll just kind of read through here a little bit, and we'll just jump out here where we need to. Despite his A-list pop star status, there's been a noticeable scrappiness to Drake's rollout for his ninth album, Ice Man. Last month, the rapper iced out his favorite courtside seats at the Toronto Raptors Arena with faux icicles dangling from the chairs, which, you know, something about this is, I was listening to this Jay-Z interview with the New York Times this week. And he seems to kind of take a little bit of a shot at Drake, not really a shot, but more of some, here's some elder statesman wisdom for you.

Let me learn you something. God and mature as you get older. Otherwise, you know, you're going to feel washed and, you know, like in hip-hop, which is notoriously a young man's game and so forth. I would just push back on Jay, just for a little bit of this. I think Drake is the one man on earth where his, like, sort of Peter Pan syndrome might actually, it's like an animating feature of his personality. Right, right, right.

In such a way that, like, it's weirdly, it can be off-putting for sure, but it's weirdly charming, like his refusal to grow up it for it. I mean, also, what would he rap about now? I mean, I guess Jay-Z getting older, it's not rapping about selling drugs or whatever. He's rapping about being on the beach with Bay, you know? Baskie, collect and baskiats. Exactly, exactly.

Yeah, you know, rich guy shit. He was able to, I guess on 444, which is pretty much like the album in which he's talking about. Like, Jay-Z was accused of doing the same things he's accused, quote-unquote accusing Drake of doing back in, you know, the blueprint three days back in the Magna Carta days, right? Like, he was accused of being that. 444 is the vibe switch where he was like,

okay, I'm going to talk about black excellence and family legacy, you know, this is uncle music now. Exactly, being the landlord and all the stuff he's going on. In the landlord. All things to come with age, wisdom, and acquiring wealth, so forth. Nobody wins with the family fuse. That's what you have to tell the tenants. But the like, like,

I understand he's too smart but I don't think he's thinking about Drake all the time obviously but he's too smart for his words not to be interpreted a specific type of way like I think you would be

I think you would be a little bit inconsiderate to think that he's not at least a little bit talking about Drake right right right right well because I also think too as you said Tom you know hip hop is a young man

game, but, you know, the guys that, you know, are classics, you know, and have always reigns supreme. I feel like there's always still a competition in their heads, you know what I mean, where they have to stay on top and no one can come for their crown. And I feel like Jay-Z is kind of in this position, you know, where he's just like, okay, you know, I'm sitting on the throne right now and, you know, I got to teach the young ones, you know what I'm saying. Yeah, Jay, yeah, I still be part of the culture, you know what I mean. Yeah, I think, Jay, you know, you talk about 444 was this kind of grown-up album where he's like, you know, lecture and it's about credit and everything. But, but, like, I feel like, I feel like, I feel

like he tried to do that on Blueprint 3 and kind of flirted with that, but it kind of went in EuroJ direction because he was kind of chasing hits still on that, like whatever that, like the sound of the time was, I want to have a Swiss beats record on that, which he's had a lot of Swiss beats records. So it's not like a novel thing for him. You know, he's got his Neptune's record. He's got his Drake feature. He's got his, you know, like he's like chasing relevance there. But like if he would have stayed with like, you know, what's this song? Thank you, thank you, thank you. Like that kind of stuff.

Like I felt like that could have been like a earlier foray into that 444 sound. But yeah, he's got like a string of records. They're a little disjointed. Magna Carta's a little disjointed for similar reasons. But, you know, yeah, I don't know. And then now it feels like Jay just kind of pops up once a year and does like some sort of like lyrical, spiritual, miracle, M&M style. Not in the style that he's rapping, but like in the, hey, look how good of a rapper that I

am like look how great I am at this thing you know right I'm still relevant he does one of those features about a year and then he's just kind of a dad there else in the time so anyway uh he followed that up with a more brazen stun a huge block of ice in downtown Toronto for the public to chip at until it filed revealing the album date now as far as roll else go this is like obviously like you know like crazy over the top and whatnot but But like the way that people were flocking to this and hitting it with the flame throwers and chipping away at it is like this big communal thing. It's like it's almost like Drake and his Mr. Beast era or something like that.

You know? Let's see. A huge blog about that Toronto. Chipped out to the thought real on the album date. In early May, he debuted a quirky episodic series on YouTube featuring skits in an ice manufacturing plant and the rapper driving an ice man branded truck around Toronto. Did he really? I'd never even heard of this. Yeah.

Dude, I, it's so funny. It's like, you know, the, like, the footage going around with him, like, on the back of a trailer, and he's, like, rapping, like, you know, he's got the bubble coat on with the, everything like that. There's, like, tweets of people, like, seeing him in the streets, and he's just having to keep this, like, cool guy posture. And it's just, like, stars, they're just like us sometimes. Even they can be wildly corns.

You know. Yeah. You know, in some way, it feels like, I don't know if I would call it. I think it's what kids gravitate toward. I was talking to a friend of the show Josh Olson one time, and he was talking about like, you know, he's a screenwriter and all this stuff. And he was talking about like, there would be like places around where he lives doing these like press junkets with like the matinee idols of our time,

the Brad Pitt's, Leonardo DiCaprio's, Denzette, Washington's, whoever. And like, the attendance for these things would be like kind of paltry can, comparable to like, you know, how big those guys are, stars or whatever. But then, like, you could do a screening of Grimlins too with Chapo. It'd be sold out like three months, like three months in advance, you know? And it's like, it's the same thing like that. Like, I feel like kids aren't enamored of the same things that we are. You know what I mean?

Like, they gravitate toward like whoever's the biggest star and they're like, you know, like the Doom Scroll or whatever, you know? And it's like, it feels like by virtue of that, like, you can see like a guy like Drake who has been like the biggest shit in the world for 15 years now. Well, yeah, something like that. And like now it's like it feels like there's this like equalizer because it's a different era. And like a different medium too, man. It's like the TikTokification, you know what I'm saying, that I feel like some of these people have to go through, you know what I mean? Where it's like you've already had your 15 minutes of fame, but now you have to, you have to excel in different like I mean,

like this YouTube video, these little skits, you know what I'm saying? What would be comparable back in the day, like, if a rapper wanted to remain relevant? I guess you would just release an album, you know? Well, when I was a kid, you had street teams. You know, you had people actually going around, like, slapping, like, you know, Def Jam most famously had a lot of those, like, for their imprints. And you'd have people going out and actually putting it on telephone poles and all that kind of stuff, you know. And then I grew up in shit fuck Eastern Kentucky.

So I was trying to get, like, the Locke Street Team, like, post your own, like, eBay and shit. I want to have that in my room, you know, that kind of stuff. But it's just a different thing now. And it's like, it's kind of funny to see, like, huge stars like this have to kind of capitulate to the sort of modes and platforms of the day to, like, yeah, stay out there the same way. In early May, debuted a quirky episode series on YouTube featuring skits in the ice manufacturing plant and the rapper driving an ice man-branded truck around Toronto. The mood seemed cheeky and defiant.

Good news for anyone who missed the semester of his 2016 viral hit, line bling. It's been an eventful and complicated time for Drake since his most recent solo studio album, 2023s for all the dogs, speaking of later career disjointed efforts. He is still the most stream rapper in the world. He has been attacked by hip-hop. Two years ago, Compton rapper, Kendrick Lamar, and Drake engaged in a battle that no one came out of unscathed. And, you know, we were talking about this last time, Jason. Many of the, of the opinion that Family Matters was the best record of the whole thing. And no, but by that, by the time that record came out, everybody had public opinion

had already decided that Kendrick had washed. Yeah, yeah. Also, it hurts your, your diss when 15 minutes later, Meet the Grams comes out, and he's literally rapping about you having, like, a third child or whatever, you know what he means, writes a letter about your parents, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know what I mean? So, so, we, our, you know, family matters.

didn't really have a 15 minutes of fame. No, no, no. If he would have came out with that first, then it might have been like a whole different thing. Yeah, right, right. Let it stay that way. However, I think it could have like, you know, we were talking about the parallels

with the J. Z. Nas battle. And it's like, takeover is obviously the superior record of those two. But like, like, at the time, it felt like Nause had, like, the most, like, barbs, like the most, like, cutting, you know, lines and everything. So everybody, public opinion was like,

I don't know, maybe it was a recency-biased thing that, like, you know, like, that he had won the battle by virtue of that fact. In fairness to Hove, Hot 97 did Ether versus Super Ugly. They didn't do Ether versus Takeover, which might have been more slided towards Jay. I think Takeover is like a great rap song. Takeover is incredible. Yeah, it's an all time. But also, like, you know, not to recursive a lot of those stuff, but like Jay, like, mathematics. like in his head like he's like he's like a mathematician almost you know like a very cold

calculated mathematician and what naus put on ether was that's like an emotional record yeah yeah yeah you know like naz is saving his career on that record you know yeah he's like yeah he's going for broke on this one yeah yeah yeah but if you look at it now like it's got that timeless conier production and like the maz's like production feels like a little thin by comparison you know it's like very of that time you know uh anyway accusations of intimate partner violence towards Lamar, a song about a possible daughter that Drake is hidden, and Lamar's Grammy winning death blow not like us about Drake being a hip-hop colonizer who chases after young women.

Something that always bothered me in that calculus is like, and again, this is like stupid, like, you know, outside looking in, like fan shit, right? But like, it was kind of weird to take it on face value that Drake was a pito, but like nobody engaged with like what he was saying about Kendrick's accusation. You know what I mean? Like, you got to call it both ways, you know, if you're taking it there. I mean, it almost seemed like people were ready to believe that Drake was a pedophile. You know what I mean?

Like, I mean, there were no real serious, like, no one that was like, oh, we should like really investigate this man. It was just like, oh, no, he's a pedophile, you know. Let's laugh about it. Let's laugh about it, which is like the worst situation that you can be in, you know. It's also just kind of like, just how the internet works now. It's like, it doesn't worry what's born out in reality. It's just whatever catches fire. Exactly.

And there's no legal mechanisms to like, no, this is a bop. yeah yeah yeah and then like we talked about last night it's like now Drake's gonna have to hear that fucking song played at every arena for the next 20 years you know i mean Amazon had a whole concert you know say they bought out a city yeah yeah let's say here consensus has said that he lost the bait between him and Lamar and that the consensus is right but the backlash against Drake was already starting to formulate before Lamar issued the first warning shot in a 2024 disc track in 20204 district in 20204 distract like that. Fans that once loved Drake for his undeniable hooks and sensual R&B sensibilities jumped to Lamar's side as Drake's music began to feel more lonely and bitter. While Lamar showed himself to be surprisingly nimble during the beef, Drake has previously charmed audiences with the lightheartedness as recently as 2021.

He dressed up as a B-movie action star and a Harlequin Romance hero in his way too sexy video. But this time, he was the butt of the joke that he wasn't in on. That's an interesting thing too. In that same Jay-Z interview, Jay-Z had like a, he pointed out something about Brooklyn's finest, you know, his song from Reasonable That with Biggie,

where Biggie has the line, which I never put, I don't know why I didn't put this two-and-two together because it's just right there, but he's got in line of, Faith had twins, she'd probably have two Pock's, which is like,

oh, shit, yeah. He was just kind of like leaning into the fact that Tupac was fucking his wife, you know what I mean? And Jay said like, even if it made him look bad, big he didn't like run from that kind of stuff you know and of course he was having a affair of little kim at the same time too so it's like maybe it all comes out in the wash i don't know how

they they they they judge all that but like drake kind of leaning into that corniness like i feel like drake is like a like a surprisingly like nimble battle rapper i feel like you know everybody forgets like he kind of beat meek mill when people were thinking meek mill was like one of those type of guys you know right right right took him to the cleaners and part of that is is like it's like it's It's the same thing that like somebody like why like M&M was like feared back in the day or whatever. It's because like if you have like an excoriating sort of self analysis and you don't take yourself too seriously and you kind of make yourself the butt, it kind of like works for like inertia in your favor. Like I think that's something Drake now. I saw like some of the merch he's rolled out for this record.

It said like 2024 is my year. Then he scratches out 2024 and that's 2026. That's like clever. It's self-referential. I think people appreciate that right. It's like charm, man. You know, it's like, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. You got me.

You know. Let's see. A carnival of distrust in innuendo made the battle with Lamar both potent and excessive. Drake wasn't being evaluated in the context of the beef or the music of the beef. And opinions flooded in based on the once muted suspicions of him being a culture vulture. It was a 180-degree turn for an artist who had previously been widely embraced. He essentially came out of the gate appealing to women, said music critic and the mother-load author, Clover Hope.

quote, he leaned into the sing-songy mixtape Drake that got him notoriety with songs like Jungle or others that had Leah samples, end quote. Hope remembers that women were some of Drake's first supporters around the release of his 2009 mixtape so far gone. What we first appreciated about Drake was he made it clear that rap was for women, explains hope. I think about L.L. Cool J and how he made space for that, targeting women's ears. For me and my friend group, he was magnetic. And also why his name was Ladies, Love Cool Jain. when Drake debuted, some self-appointed gatekeepers thought he wasn't hip-hop enough or wasn't good enough at technical lyricism to warrant his fame.

It never stopped Drake from combining his passion for southern rap maximalism with his R&B sensibilities. But in recent years, it has seemed like he may have internalized the critiques from hyper-masculine rap fans about the lack of agitation in his music and persona. Let's just stop by that. Do you feel like, do you feel like that shift has been sort of precipitated, by the beef between him and Kendrick, you know? Like he has to like, like almost as if he felt maybe emasculated perhaps. And now he has to kind of overcorrect and lean into like not just that audience,

but also his, I don't know, I guess his, is his, you know, feeling or how he feels as a man. You know what I mean? I guess he was doing that before, though, right? And I kind of get to it in that piece where her loss between him Savage comes out in 2022. too. And that album has a lot of really good songs on it that I do love. Like, I love Rich Flex a lot. But it also has Circle Local where he like literally says, you know, this bitch lied about getting shots, but she's still a stallion, you know.

Oh, God damn. Which is, which is, I think, a direct provocation towards Megan the Sound and about, you know, not very believe women of him. Right, right, right, right, right. Right. Exactly. Yeah, not, you know, seriously, yeah, not very believe. women of them. And I think that the beef exasperated it, but the stuff came before, a lot of that stuff came before the beef. And I think it made them vulnerable to what I kind of claim in the feature, which is that I think there are a subset of women that were once fans of Drake. And I think this is more of like a media class type of thing.

It's more of like a, I guess, you know, an intellectual worker type of thing. Like this is less of, you know, parasycial fans online or less of his kind of like really hardcore fan base. But I think some people went to Kendrick during that beef. Because Kendrick showed himself to be kind of a more of a fun guy. Malikos is a pretty fun song,

despite my kind of, you know, complicated feelings around it. And I think instead, Drake chose to be very much, like, not fun, very serious during the beef. And also his music on her loss, for all the dogs, it feels a little bit more lonely and, you know, bitter, like I said in the peace. But also, like, in a weird way, it's almost as if he has decided to connect with a certain young boy culture that's happening in American society right now. that always felt antithetical to what made Drake successful. Right. Yeah, no, totally.

It's, it's, you know, like, for the longest time, Drake was one of those guys that I feel like he kind of, like, really scanned, like, regional scenes and, like, put the guys, I remember, like, particularly, like, J.B. Blockboy in Memphis, like, some of those people that were, like, lesser-known sort of more regional acts, and he would, like, hop on their song. Look alive is incredible. Look alive, yeah, like, that kind of stuff.

But he did that for like a lot of other artists that like I could probably tell you in about 20 minutes when I knew my brain's working around. But like it's weird because like I'm such an old head. I'm like, you know, like of the two dope boys like blog era kind of like way I discover like things. And I'm not really, I'm not really my brain doesn't really work with the Spotify algorithm. So I'm not as connected. Like I come at things like way later. You know what I mean? The most people get them.

Like is he still kind of like that in a way? Or is it like, you know, is it all? sort of just whoever is OVO sound artists are or whatever. I think that we're in a weird time when it comes to American hip hop right now currently, and there are a lot of micro scenes, a lot of new gen soundcloth scenes that I love, with Drake's not involved in any of that. And so it would look weird if Drake made music with Xavier's So Bass, which is someone who I really like, but like, how can Drake make music with a guy like that?

And I think a lot of the guys that he put on Black Boy J.B., Even a, even Savage, who's pretty much a mainstream star, even without Drake, but someone like that. You know, any of the guys he, like, did music with around that time that he kind of like, you know, lent out a feature to, those guys are pretty much, like, really popular and successful now, right? Like, or you don't really hear that much out of them, but they're kind of like in the ether of fame, like the baby or someone like that, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like he can't, you know, so he's actually turned his attention to British rap right now. He's turned his attention to fake mink, you know, Jim Leggis. see like stuff like guys like that central c for example central c is also someone that he's got a feature

on yeah yeah exactly um allegedly he's got a feature on ice man too we'll see yeah i guess yeat i guess he had yeed on the last yeah that is true but but he's at a point now where he is the like rich guy at the club and he's like helping out all these like other like young like rich kids who are also kind of like self possessed for superstardom, but it doesn't feel as connected to the idea of like music in the way that like having Kendrick on Take Care

was, you know what I mean? That was like connected to the idea of like blog error rap community. There's no community in it. It seems more superficial perhaps, right? Exactly, exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally, totally. The misogyny on 2022's collaboration album with 21 Savage, her loss,

takes up so much space that it could have been focused on, excuse me, I should have wore my glasses. It could have been focused group by, you are no latehs. I have old shit. As well as Perry and Tate, admire Aidan Ross's podcast and recording lonely ads for crypto casino steak. He was compared to an in-sell after giving $50,000 to a fan who was dumped by his girlfriend.

His lyrics began to feel even more bitter and calculating. This is what you're talking about with Megan the Stallion thing, you know. The bitch lied about getting shots, but she's still a stallion line. for many female fans it was the last straw quote if you were on the fence about still being a fan of his as a woman that line was something where it was like i really can't get behind this from marked hope who says she wants to hear an apology for that line or his friendship with uh megan's attacker tory lanes who also i think is like a canadian guy right and like i know germane to like one of our research interest i think tory lane's dad is part of like this evangelical cult and he was kind of raised in like a

kind of a similar situation, not necessarily that I was raised in, but like on a bigger scale where they believe in like, you know, healing by the laying on of hands and maybe issuing, like, medical attention because like God's going to heal you, that kind of stuff, you know, like very name it and claimant theology stuff. I think his dad might be Jamaican. Yeah, yeah, I was, I'm getting very Bob Marley vibes, you know what I'm saying. I love Bob, but you know what I mean? That, yeah. I'm just saying, I hear you're right. You're taking the test, the roster community.

I'm just saying, you're going to walk that back here? Seek medical attention. It's all I'm saying. So, yeah, so anyway, let's just, I just want to, like, touch on that a little bit. Like, his kind of weird flirtation with the manosphere and, like, you know, the more. Is this part of, like, kind of, like, not to cut you up, Tom, but kind of, like, pointed question for you, Jason. Is this sort of like, we were just talking about Drake being very clued in, right, to vibes, right? Whether it's actually being sort of highlighting other artists or even if,

it's superficial now. Do you feel like he's like kind of like, you know, licking his finger and like, you know, seeing where the winds are, you know what I mean? Or is this like also just, I mean, it could be both, I guess, also just sort of a continuation of his lonely, sort of depressed guy, whatever he's been on lately, you know?

Yeah, I mean, I think it's probably both. Like, um, today, Bumani quote tweeted my, I wrote this substack kind of like a response to the Guardian article and like kind of like, you know, in my, own words because like you have to kind of fit into the guardian way of doing pros in that piece. Yeah, it's a good piece, but it's definitely like not quite my

like, you know, not quite my face. They won't let you say it, bro. I get it, bro. Yeah, you know. Literally. Literally. Literally. Literally. Literally. Literally.

And for me, for me, for me, like, I put that the Drake that I once loved felt like somebody who didn't join the hypermasculent club of bullies. You know, I think about

Lord knows where he was like, I know that's showing emotion don't mean that I'm a pussy. No, that I don't make music for niggas who don't get pussy, right? That's all, I always felt that way about Drake where I was like, oh, jeez, man, how could you listen that? I was like, bro, I'm sorry that I'm, uh,

I like women, I'm sorry. I'm sorry, O.G. Sorry, man. Like, so I, so, and to me, but I guess now to me and I guess what Bumani was saying

was that there was always a veneer of faux nice guy behavior from him which is obviously true right he's a rapper no one would ever confuse him for a feminist he's a rapper right I saw a show at Rupp Arena I guess that was like the last tour he did with like

he had Jay Cole with him I forget what tour what was that tour it was big as the what tour or whatever is him and Jay Cole and his last time probably coming to Lexington, by the way. We talked about that on Jason's podcast a couple months ago. I was like, this was a hard thing for me to come to grips with.

Because Drake was kind of ubiquitous in Lexington for a while because of his association with Coach Cal and whatnot. But like on the little ticker, like the whole like stage setup was like ESPN themed. And on the ticker, it had like that like the accusations against Drake, like kind of thing. Not the ones Kendrick highlights. But ones like was it like toxic, nice guy, I forget, something like that. But like the whole nice guy thing is like really just rude and trying to get pussy or whatever.

You know, like that kind of sense of it. But yeah, that's a good point. I'm sorry, Jason. I didn't mean cut you off. No, no, no, no. You're good. You're good. Yeah.

I think there's always definitely been a kind of that type of like faux nice guy veneer around him. And thus, obviously that trickles down to what he's doing now. Like, obviously there's a connection to it. But he used to have much more humanity. I remember there's an MTV. I forgot what it's, I forgot what it was called, but there was an MTV series where they would follow artist. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It was an hour special. Yeah, because they didn't want for Nikki. And then they didn't want for Drake. It was called Better Than Good Enough. Yeah. And he was just starting out. I don't even think, think me later I'll come out yet. Think really I hadn't come out yet.

And he had, like, one of his, like, women friends with him who was like so sweet and was just like, oh, I remember when Arby first started making music and he'd be like, he'd be like, hey, like, check it out. My friend made some music, you know, like, what do you think? And it was like, obviously, Drake's music. And she was like, oh, like, tell your friend that like,

the singing is really good, but the rapping needs to get like a little, oh, the rapping's not bad, but the singing needs to get a little bit better. And then Drake's mom was like, oh, my God, Arby, did you play Courtney your song? And I thought it was just, it was just like that type of stuff is missing now. And obviously, look, you get famous, right? It might just be like age and capitalism, right?

You get super famous, you can get super big. These things don't happen anymore. Like, you don't do that stuff anymore after you get really big and famous. But there's also just like a, and I guess this ties into what Jay's saying is that there's just like a humanity that's missing a little bit. Like a groundedness that's missing, you know? And that is, I think, all connected to what he's trying to do with the young streamer kids in the men's sphere, which is like, What the Manistphere is about to me is making masculinity seem really, really boring and making women seem like all... It's like Nazi behavior.

It's like making women seem like so ridiculously powerful that they have to be stopped as if women aren't three-dimensional human beings just like men are. Like it's... Which is the same thing, you know, I don't mean to be like historical, but it's the same thing that like Hitler tried to do with Nazi Germany, right? Like making Jewish people seem like ridiculously powerful and they're fucking... Simultaneously powerful, but also very weak, right? Yes, exactly, which is what the man is here is trying to do with women. And so it's really confusing for me, or not confusing, it's really disheartening for me for Drake to join in on that

because I thought I always thought what made Drake's music really interesting is he was like obviously all rappers have done breakup song before, Drake, right? Ghostface Killer has an album full of breakup songs on Iron Man, you know? Like the idea that Drake was the first rapper to sing about his feelings, that's a bunch of bullshit. It's actually kind of racist in a way. As if, you know, rap hasn't always been vulnerable, but it's always been a vulnerable genre.

Scarface, you know, you name it, you name it. But when I felt about Drake is that he was able to make the psyche, like really a part of his, the psyche and the fragility, like really a part of the music, you know, like really, really, like this kind of like emotional openness, like, it was very, very, like, out in the open to see as if it was like a Degrocy episode. And I, yeah, and I just think now, and he was able to make the situations he had with women feel really complicated and complex.

Like, I love this woman. She doesn't quite love me as hard enough, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Me and my mom were struggling with money. We're arguing about money. You know, I'm a middle class child who thought that he was going to be, you know, my dad was a musician. I thought that my parents are going to be super famous. But, like, it didn't work out that way.

They got divorced. Yeah, like I'm trying to figure out my shit. Like, what's my life? What's my arc? And that kind of, it kind of felt like an episode to a teen drama almost. And I just think that now it's gotten darker. And his joining in on a Manosphere is like dark, like not. It's like simpleton bullshit.

Right. Yeah, yeah. So it's like when I see that, I'm just like, and I don't say this often these days, but I'm just like, well, that's, that's beneath you. Yeah. You know what I mean? It should be, right? Well, beneath, it was beneath all of us, but it's especially beneath you.

And I guess, like, but money's right in that, like, yeah, obviously, like, there is a link between that style of person, you know, him giving $50,000 out to a guy that got broken up with is so crazy. But that is kind of, but that, that's so. But, but like Marva's room is a very bitter song about, like, breakups and, you know, fuck that guy that you love so bad, et cetera, et cetera. like there is a linkage to that but one every rapper is like that as we just said and also two like that was an interesting part of the music now this is like way less interesting and maybe it's just capitalism like maybe he just knows what the tide is turning and so okay like this is what the culture is in american society now you know trump is now president trump made inroads with every single identity group like every single one in 2024 every single one so

While the Democrats were all saying he was dead in the water. They all said he was dead in the water and then he got shot at and then he made inroads with every single identity group. So it's like maybe this is just the culture now. And Drake's just capitalizing off of that and it's just fun and games and it's just capitalism. But again, that used to be antithetical to who he was. Like he wasn't just capitalism. He was easily marketable, but he was also Drake. He was also doing stuff because he had genuinely passion for it.

So I guess that's what I was trying to get out with the piece. yeah yeah it's yeah it's kind of interesting because like you know kind of a story that didn't really get a whole lot of air like in the in the ice man rollout is like drake is kind of in a legal battle because stake the company that he all the time posts about that like you know let you gamble with like crypto and all that kind of stuff uh has there's like almost like i don't know if the finer details i'm sure i'm going to botch a lot of this but filling the gaps where you see that i'm missing it jason but basically it sounded like

Like there was like a false advertising thing where he was like not winning as much as it like let on. And like steak was like sending him more money to make it appear like he was winning at a much higher clip than he actually was. Isn't he also infamous for like famous like losing bets? You know what I mean? Well, yeah. But like that's kind of part of the whole vulnerability piece too. It's like when he eats shit on like a big soccer pun or something. It's like, yeah, it's just Drake just taking his usual diet of veils.

But. Yeah, there was like a Drake curse, right? That whole Drake curse state. Yeah. Yeah. But like he was, I mean, like he was winning like far more than the average weight. Nike sports better does, whatever. And so now there's like a, I guess sort of an antitrust or maybe like a false

advertising sort of like lawsuit going on that he's kind of named in. And again, things that are beneath you is and also directly dovetos with this Manistphere thing because all these guys, you know, got sponsorships with like the polymarkets and the caulsies and the gambling apps and every fucking thing. else, you know. Right. It's like to see the biggest, or one of the biggest stars in the world, kind of like doing the same shit, Aidan Ross is cashing in on.

It's just like, it's undignified, is what it is, you know? It's undignified. Yeah, I mean, I think, I don't want to romanticize the past, though, which I, which I'm always concerned about it in terms of my work as if I'm a romanticized in the past. And, you know, because you weren't, I wasn't around then. And so, like, but I'm always been somebody who, like, I'm a very cross-generational person. I think that's like a very like Probably a lot of people have this

But I think it's a very black feature too Like being like a car You know learning things from your fucking grandparents and shit And like there's like something about that in a way And so I'm a very like cross-generational person But I don't want to romanticize the past Like obviously like you know Tupac was arrested for sexual assault

Right so like I don't want to be as like Oh like this is undignify old rappers would have never done this But like Aiden Ross being involved in, you know, being a major player in hip-hop is so dark. Like, it's a dark thing. That guy being like

a major, you know, interviewer of, like, I want, like, Drake, sit down with like an actual interviewer. Don't sit down with Budden or any of, like, streaming guy. Like, sit down with, like, an actual, sit down with the New York Times

like Jay-Z did, or Taylor Swift did, and, like, talk about like how you feel about all the stuff about the beef do you think that you know actually agree with him i think lebron kind of turned his back on him because i don't know he needed to like appease his wife for some shit like it's like she's mad about the circle loco line too savannah was definitely mad about the circle local lavella savannah i think is also just mad about uh i don't want to get sued by the james family but like there's always been that rumor about lebron and toronto you know i don't know

I didn't know in Toronto. Yeah, like, what does LeBron actually do in Toronto? Oh, okay, okay, okay. We won't go no further than that, but. You won't go no further. But, yes, yeah.

I think, I think, like, I want him to show some actual real adult vulnerability. But, hey, these things, I love hip-hop so much. It's the music that, you know, has changed my life. It's the music that's in my blood. You know, I grew up having, you know, UGK posters on my wall.

you know, D6 Mafia posts on my wall, Jay Z porches on my wall, even clips posters on my wall. Like, it affects me that this genre that I love has turned us back on me

because I'm like, light skin or because I, like, you know, wanted to, yeah, or because I wanted to kind of, like, be a little bit more street,

you know? Like, like, that would be, that would be, like, really, I think, vulnerable and smart

and, like, human in a way. And I think that's what people generally want to see. But he's like, I guess it's like we're not living in human times anymore. We're living in very unhuman, alien,

dystopian times. And I guess, yeah, you know, I guess that's what he feels like he has to do to make money or it still be a star. But it's, it's disheartening, you know? Yeah, it's something we've talked about a little bit. It's like, you know, anybody raised in the South has had this sort of, you know, all,

not all, I shouldn't say all, but like not a few people I know that I grew up with There's this weird experience of like, you see a guy in a late model Ford truck and he's got a Confederate flag sticker on this truck, but he's like bumping 3-6 or, you know, whatever. You know, and it's just like this like dissonance of like, you know, the guys that I knew that were like the real hip-hop heads in high school were also like kind of racist. You know what I mean? Or at least the most charitable reading you could give them was, you know, like they're just products of where they're brought up at. out of not being exposed to, you know, as many black people as if you were, like, raised, like, in the metropole, like, in Atlanta or, you know, Nashville or wherever, you know.

But, like, it's like, and then when I think about Aidan Ross, who, like, you know, like, are these guys that Drake is sort of, like, made himself adjacent to in recent years. It's like, like, those guys are just kind of like the guys in the Confederate flag, trucks, bumping around, like, just done good. You know what I mean? their views are just as abhorrent. But because hip hop is pop music, you know, like there's like sort of a, it feels like to me that there's like sort of a compartmentalization of those things. You know, it's like somebody that can indulge in black culture, enjoy black culture,

and it's artistic output and all that kind of stuff. And then over here it be like, well, you know, we, you know, there are too many immigrants coming down the country, you know, whatever, like, you know, their thing is. Like those two things, like from where I grew up at, kind of sit neatly near each other, you know. So I'm not like surprised when I see that, but it is like weird for directing me. Like, you know. Well, I think, too, just the capitalizing on music and sort of hip hop and it being sort of subsumed into this monoculture, you know, that is kind of really, I guess, how do I'm going to say it? Like, it's de, it's not even just deconstructed, but I guess it dematerialized, you know.

And now it is just something that like, well, like, sure. you could have abhorrent views, but everyone's listening to Drake. Everyone's listening to Taylor Swift. Everyone's listening to this big superstar artist, you know, and not really considering any social, economic implications of it because the artists aren't making that kind of music for those kinds of people. Yeah, yeah. Well, I went up to Sneedville and my whip,

had myself a psychedelic trip. Ain't no place like Sneedville, Tennessee. I did say, Yetty Powder Pots, I called. bubble of pills, Sneedville's full of them old and thrills. Spiritual River, won't you help me ease my mind? Oh, Austin River Flow. Sneedville Blues can't take my soul. Way, wee.

Well, this dove tells it perfectly into the next thing I want to talk about because Jason's been real busy this week, and you got this thing up on your substack talking about Caitlin Clark walking out with Morgan Wallen, who also has a Drake tie him because like he was in a Drake video. I forget which one it was. Like what was it? You know the one I'm talking about?

It's like him and Drake are in Toronto and they pull up in the phantom or whatever. And it's like when Morgan Wallin sitting beside each other, it's like, huh. Yeah. It's similar in a similar vein to the thing that I was talking about. Like, you know, Morgan Wallens from Sneedville, Tennessee, which is not far from where I grew up, just, you know, like an hour down the row from where I grew up. and like famously back in 20, I think 2020, there was a video going around of him

very clearly drunk out of his mind and blackout, but saying the N-word and kind of saying it in a fashion, if I remember, it was like a little more little too comfortable rather than like virulent, not that that disemiguations matter. Yeah, it wasn't Riley Cooper so much as it was, you know, Justin Timberlake on a drunk night. Right. You know the white boys that say it when they're behind closed doors.

Yeah, exactly. So, but like Morgan Wallen is also, while that same time, like he's been embraced by little dirk, he's been like had made songs of Little Durk, like a lot of people in hip-hop. At the same time, he is sort of a figurehead of a certain type of white country music consumer who probably thinks he didn't do anything terribly wrong on that faithful night or like

kind of just like it's a strange thing his popularity increased after that like scandal you know what I mean and I think it's part and parcel of the whole MAGA area we live in and sort of like we're just sort of in the eternal

shadow of like you know of like Trumpism and all this stuff but there is something I feel like about you know and this is a very like like surface level critique and I've heard a lot of people say this and it's usually said kind of have jokingly but these guys just want to say like the R word and the N word and then like all this 100%. But there is something about like like I don't know it's like it accounts for like you know

when Jason we were talking about we talked about jelly roll we talked about post malone we talked about all these white artists that kind of cut their teeth in a black genre and then like either like when it wasn't necessarily like the hottest thing going made this sort of pivot to country music or I don't want to say traditionally wide art forms because like there's plenty of black folks who made country music and we can even go back to Ray Charles and like the whole history of leading up to country music and stuff like that is very much rooted in black music too but like

the mainstream interpretation of it is you know mostly thought of as a white genre or whatever and like what like like I guess we could kind of tease that out a little bit more in light of this. So, like, maybe you could just tell us, Jason, like, and I'll read from the substander here, too. But, like, what kind of, like, what got you thinking in these terms about, like, Caitlin Clark and... Yeah. I have a complicated relationship. Like, the piece went viral.

I wrote this on Monday morning. The piece went goes viral. Or was it Tuesday morning? It's what I forgot. But the piece goes viral. I have a complicated relationship with the piece. has been a few days from it now. So you're now, you're sitting on and like,

well, uh, now that it's got outside your, your bubble. Yeah, I mean, I guess I don't want people to think that I'm trying to get like peak woke 2015 Obama era BS.

Like I'm not, that's not what I'm trying to do. Like, I guess, I guess I was hoping that Caitlin would join the W. Yeah. And understand that. there is a world where people will lump her into a certain white

white supremacist adjacent style culture and I understand that Morgan Wall is really big and famous and he is he's got songs like he's got songs I would like if I ever heard them out I don't hear Morgan Wallen songs outside thank God but if I did hear them out if I was you know wherever I was where they play that Morgan Wallen,

I would hear him and I'd probably like some of it. Like I've heard some of it on Spotify. I have a friend who's really into him actually. Like a really good friend who's really into him. And I'm like, oh, like, I get it. Yeah, it's like country stuff with some swagger. You know what I mean?

I kind of get it. He's like, he's definitely a, you can kind of tell he's like a fan of hip hop. Like I actually wrote this in a piece that there's a, a kind of like lawless swagger that he has and obviously like a little dirt also would have as well, does have. And so I get,

the whole thing, right? We talked about it with Trump, right? Like, I get the whole, I understand it. I also think that the things that are adjacent to it are like not good. Not, no, like, look, we all have problematic entertainers, right? Like, people have been responding with, um, because Paige and the Dallas wings, when the Dallas wings went to see Chris Brown. Sure.

But she didn't walk out with Breezy, one, because she wouldn't, because she wouldn't. And two. Was it Paige Bukers? Yes, yes, yes. Okay, okay. Yeah, Paige and the Dallas wings went out with, uh, or went to a

show. Went to the show. Okay, yeah, yeah. Went to a show. But she didn't walk out with Breezy. Um, and the whole team is in a suite. So it's a little bit different than Caitlin Carr and Sophie Cunningham,

who was with her that night. Yeah. Caitlin and Sophie, who is like, we know is like a little bit adjacent to that type of stuff, to the mag of stuff. Right. you know, going to a Morgan Wallen show, right?

Yeah. I just think that with great power comes great responsibility, and I really like Caitlin Clark a lot. Like, I think she's a one. I think she's a terrific basketball player. I really enjoyed watching her in college. She's a terrific player. Like, I think she, genuinely speaking, like,

she feels like Larry Bird to me where, like, I refuse to have people say that she's, like, overrated. Like, no, she, I never saw Lymebert, particularly. But, like, old heads always tell me. She kind of Steph Curryed the game a little bit. She really did. Like, like, she's very, like, like Trey Young meets Tiley's Halliburton

Meets Curry, like that type of like deep three shots. No one was doing that from anywhere. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Pull up from anywhere. Nobody was doing that before her. She has a really unique style of play. Yeah. She's very self-assured. She reminds me of like a Tracy Flick or a Chris and Dunst's character and bring it on. Like, she's

a very like self-assured woman. I like that. Like, yeah. But I just think also with great power comes great responsibility. And I was hoping that when she made it to the W, she would kind of get that more and kind of like not be woke. I even said that in the piece

I don't want her to be like woke. I just wanted like not do. Well, realize that you're a role model, I guess, right? Yeah. Or like, yeah, I don't even want to say that. I guess I just want to, I guess I just want her to not make it as easy for a conservative person

to be like, that's our girl. You know what I mean? Like, you know, like, I just want her to be like a little bit more slippery. A little more, a little more media literacy, a little more cultural literacy in the sense that like, like, the way they even positioned

her against Angel Reese when they were in college like the weird race politics about that in the way that MAGA I don't even like Angel that much I thought that you can't see me thing up 20 that was fun it's too much it's too much up 20 with like one minute to go in the game

because that's not the spirit of competition that's I'm trying to get mine I'm trying to show people and I thought it was a little bit too much right obviously the racist attacks are what they are and it's fucked up and massage of your and all these things that are really messed up happened to Angel, which is like totally fair for her to like, you know, talk about afterwards. But I thought that the action itself was kind of corny. I was like,

okay, this is like a little bit. Yeah. Like we had our fun. I get it. But all right, guys. Like, you know, we're up 20 here. Like, yeah. Yeah. When I, you know, when I read this, well, and, you know, like, to me, it's like, I call it the Taylor Sheridanization of like, culture. I feel like a lot of the stuff, like to me, the sort of cultural touchstone that all this brings from is like the popularity of like a show like Yellowstone, which is very obviously sort of, not not obviously. I shouldn't say obviously because like when I say this, I want to be careful about my critique because I, like, I'm not saying

that like Caitlin Clark's a racist or like anybody that's in the Yellowstone show is racist or anything like that. What I'm saying is there are some cultural and media, I hate to say products too, because I don't want to reduce art to just calling it products, like something that you purchase. But we'll just, for the sake of argument here, we'll just say products. That come on a pre-approved MAGA list of things that they use to sort of subjugate people that aren't on that list and that sort of create that distance between people in this country at this time when, you know, obviously everybody is at each other all the time and so forth. you know it's just it's not Tom it seems like a reification right of all these american

myths you know what I'm saying yeah yeah yeah yeah and frontier and the frontier you know what I mean yeah yeah like yeah like Terrence is in is in South Dakota right now and he was texting me yesterday and he was like it's like you know he was talking to you know it's like his his in-laws there and saying they were saying stuff like 15 years ago nobody wanted to live here and now like you have all these rich people like kind of on their yellow stone tip trying to get out here and buy these big granges or like, you know, whatever. And part of that I think is rooted in like white flight and like, you know, like affluent people wanting to create distance between them and the hoary masses that they fucked over for a long time. But part of it is they see a cultural thing like Yellowstone, which is so absurd.

Like people don't understand how popular Yellowstone is. Yellowstone has about 53 million viewers. to put that in comparison, a show like White Lotus, which is a huge show in its own right, has a little over a million. So that's the threshold. Like if you had a million viewers of your show,

you have a huge show. But like 53 million, that's like, you know, like, I don't know. We were talking last time, Jason. Maybe Seinfeld was in that kind of ballpark. Maybe I don't know. I don't even know, though.

I don't have any figures in front of it, but I would surmise that something of that magnitude would be like comparable in terms of like viewership and stuff. And it's just so sort of hard to talk. about because like you say that people like you know I say that to family members back home they think I'm crazy or I'm woke or whatever you know they want to pilar me with but it feels like like how to sort of push back against that without like indicting individual people you know like I like I got like I'm not

of the opinion of course it's not for me to arbitrate anyway but like it's like I'm not interested in browbeating people like Morgan Wallen or whoever that's done like bad things that they that a recompense can can be made for. I mean, there's different levels of that shit. I mean, we just talked about Drake. Like, I don't want people to, I don't believe in the, I guess, I don't want to say cancel culture, but I don't want to believe in the culture that suggests that people need to be

100% intellectual and 100%, you know, the people like that word, intersectional. Like, I think that we need to have space for, I guess, complicated life. And we need to have space for, like, okay. this person might not understand a lot of stuff about race, but they are a good person in their heart. I do think there's a space for that in the world. A little bit of forgiveness and redemption, you know what I mean? Yeah, forgiveness and redemption and meeting people where they're at,

I think that's huge. I think meeting people where they're at is huge. And if there's a regret, I think, in the pieces, maybe I need to meet Caitlin Moore where she is as a person. Like, she's from Des Moines, Iowa. Like, I think I wrote that a few times where it's, like, I know she's from, like, Des Moines, These things are like it is what it is.

Like she's from where she's from. She can help that, you know? But again, like, don't make it so easy for these people, you know? And I think going out and walking up and Wallin, look, Drake has walked out with him, but you don't want to be compared to what's happening with Drake right now. We just covered why you don't might not. Yeah, you might not want to be involved with the shit he's involved in right now. Roger Clemens, you might not want to be involved with Roger Clemens,

Caitlin, you know? Like, yeah, that might not be the guy. Look, I think I have a Roger Clemens' biography on the wall there. I, you know, I'm a Yankee fan, you know, but like, yeah, and I want to, uh, Brett Farf, definitely don't want to be involved with Brett Farf, Caitlin. No fucking way, no. No way. No way.

Patrick Mahomes, not really, right? Like, Travis Kelso, these people aren't wavy. Like, you know, yeah. Like, they're not that wavy. So it's like, so it's, so it's just like, Look, look, you can be a fan of the music. Look, she likes the music. You know, I get it.

But, and he was in Indianapolis, right? She didn't fly out to fucking Tennessee. He was in Indianapolis that night. I get it. I get it. And he's monoculture. I get it. But I just felt like there was a opportunity to not do that.

And instead, she did that. Like, don't be like a Sydney Sweeney where the Reich can claim you as their darling. Exactly. And I don't think she's Sidney Sweeney because she hoops. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Like, Maya Moore is one of her favorite athletes of all the time.

Like, she's a hooper, you know? Right, yeah, right. You know? So, yeah, she feels, but she feels more adjacent to, like, a Taylor Swift and Sydney Sweeney where she's just like, she is who she is, and, you know, she's a woman. Like, one of my favorite quotes is she did the Time Magazine profile where she was, like, I would like to think that I earned everything that I earned,

but obviously, like, you know, women of color have been involved with the W and if we can help women of color, the media, obviously can help the W. And that's a little bit of a like, it feels like a mediated answer, like a little bit. But also like that I think is fine compared to I'm walking out with Morgan Wallen tonight. Right. You know? Right. Yeah.

That's preferable. Yeah. You know, whether right or wrong, is kind of held up as an avatar of, you know, pitting the rural whites, you know, against, you know, urban people of color or whatever the case. Yeah. And who wins out? Who's got the cultural hegemony right now and like that tug of war, which is all like horseshit, you know. And I feel bad in a way because I'm the cosmopolitan urban New Yorker talking about like Kailin and talking about.

Like I think I also think the problem with it was it going viral was like the clip that I, the clip of the piece that I had posted. Like I said, you think you gave him bulletin board material? I think I did a little bit. I think I said, she's so white, thus someone like Morgan Wallen can attach themselves to her. She's so white, thus someone like Dave Portnoy can think of her as a, I said daughter white supremacy, which I shouldn't have, I didn't mean that she is that. Right, right, right.

Like, these people probably think that way. Right, right, right. Like, Portnoy probably thinks that way. Like, I, again, I think porn is pretty funny at times. Like, I'm not like an anti-Brostal guy. like I've enjoyed some of the like I like a part of my take you know what I mean like but I think that in a way porn night definitely probably like thinks like that he probably thinks like this is this is a girl I can like make money off of yes she's one of us hell yeah you know what I mean and it's like that's like that's like I think not really a net positive for a lot of people it's not a net positive for her and it's not that and you need to be more media savvy about the capacity for people to use you like that you know what I mean and it's not enough to just say that well I don't want to talk about that I don't want to talk about that. these things. I'm disconnected from these things because other people are thinking about you and your capital, your cultural capital, you know what I mean? Part of that too is like this flatness that we've

been kind of talking about, how everything's culturally flat. Like you don't really have any, I mean, you do have characters. I don't want to say that, but you don't have like non-media trained characters that are just speaking like, you know, off the cuff and like sometimes stepping in shit, sometimes like whatever. Like in a weird way where now that everything's become more sanitized, it's become like, it's like simultaneously easier for like rat wingers to co-opt things said because now they've just made it like if you make some sort of generic what they would call woke statement or whatever they can just yeah like you say give them bulletin board material and you know and that's not what you've done here days but i understand what you're saying like where you're afraid to happen yeah yeah i mean

i i definitely think that clip it could be misconstrued as that and i i even though like people don't read so whatever but even though in the piece i say like hey i'm not i'm not i i asking her to be mega rapino. I actually don't want that because that would make, I don't know, it would make it weird and like not that cool. And it would feel like she's been co-opted by like, you know, milk toast liberals.

Exactly. I want her to hoop. I want, I don't mind the rivalry between her and Angel. Like, again, I even replied to somebody who was like, I've been, someone said I have defended Kaelin, but I actually agree with you this time.

And I was like, yes, I've also defended Caitlin. I thought that Angel, I said before, I thought that Angel did entirely too much during that title game. Like entirely too much. I thought it was like, you know, I didn't love it. Like, I support Angels' right to celebrate with

whatever Braggadocia. Yeah, what I enjoy, I believe in her right to celebrate, you know, even like, annoyingly celebrate. Like, I get it. But I also my personal taste felt that it was like a little bit kind of, okay, you're up 20. Like, what are we doing?

And she did it like, and she did it like twice for everyone to see, you know? It was like, also, she wasn't even involved. in the play. Like, it was like, it was like, it was like, okay, you're making a point here, which is fine, whatever, you're making a point. But like, all right, let's, let's calm down. And so I don't want it to seem as if I'm being like overly tough on her or, you know,

I'm, again, this, this cosmopolitan urban New Yorker being like, oh, oh, my God, you racist white people. I'm actually not like that. Like, I actually genuinely, I've actively seeked out things that aren't like that, because I want to increase my perspective on the world. Right, right, right. You know, like, I love New York. It's, in my opinion, the greatest city in the world.

But it's also, like, weirdly, like, the biggest city and also the small city. It's, like, a fucking bubble in a way. Like, the stuff that I view as important to me, somebody from New Hampshire or somebody from Ohio or somebody from Indian, it might not give a shit. And so I have actively tried to seek out other people because I don't want my bubble to just be this, like, New York liberal bubble. Right. especially because, especially because, like, I'm not, like, like, I, I do believe in socialism, but I wouldn't, you know, actively be a card carrying communist. You know what I mean? So I guess, I guess for me, I need to always, like, increase my perspective on the world by seeking people out because I, my concrete politics aren't, like, as strong as yours, Aaron.

Like, I love, I love how stronger politics are, right? Like, I've always, like, I don't know, I've always had, like, a complicated relationship with a lot of it. So for me, I guess I'm wondering if she's going to push back towards, I guess, the emanation of her and of her, I think, you know, vibe, if you will, or is she going to continue to allow these people to, like, use her for, you know, their kind of personal gain? I'm curious. Yeah. Yeah, I'm also curious when the cultural wins are going to shift kind of away from this

sort of fetishization of like white rural aesthetics and white rural um you know i'm not saying there's not value in it like obviously i love country music i love a lot of this stuff that i was raising and i love like a lot of the good things about my culture too but like there's also there's also things you don't want to celebrate i mean i think it's important you know what i mean to like kind of like push that stuff up too and not in like a sort of performative woke way but just like a matter of fact no idea. I'm just wondering if it's when the when the liberals win again, you know what I'm saying? If we'll see that cultural shift, I mean, I can't imagine them trotting out

in these sort of like pseudo-nativist. I mean, I mean, I guess they already always fucking do that anyway. But not the Sheridan, I wonder where they're going to go with this shermanization you've been talking about, Tom, you know. If they'll continue to carry that torch into the frontier or if they'll dial it back or if it'll not even dial it back because I don't think it's a conscious effort, but if the culture will kind of conform itself, you know I mean. Well, and the crazy thing about it is, it's like it's ground they're trying to make up because

the most reliable voting block for generations. We're poor whites in Appalachia and the rural South and so forth, you know what I mean? And then when you had a consensus around the civil rights movement with like, you know, a lot of, like usually rooted in like labor movements too, right? Like you watch something like Harlan County USA and any sort of like sort of, you know, cross-racial sort of organizing efforts are also rooted in like, like, like, you know, you know, cross-racial sort of organizing efforts are also rooted in, like material concerns around like your your work and so forth. But like they just totally punted on that. You know what I mean?

Like like totally. I mean they actually started blaming poor white people. Woke was like a scramble. I don't want to say woke too. It was like a Southern black term that like has just totally been bastardized. Like I like I even like hate saying it kind of like. I hate saying it too. It's too much.

We're talking. We're talking. Our audience is we're talking liberal identity politics. Right. Yes, yes, yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes, right. And usually when I say woke, I kind of sort of mean liberal identity, like corny liberal

identity politics. Yeah. But I hate the fact that it's a part of my vernacular. Like I- Yeah, me too. I said the other day that someone was too woke and I'm like, why would I say that? That doesn't sound like something that I would say. It's how they've corrupted it so much that it's now part of like regular basic human language.

And it sucks like I hate it. It does suck. But I guess, yeah. But when I, mean that someone's being too woke. Same with you, Aaron. Like, when I, when someone's being too like, liberal identity, neoliberal identity. You're being pandering

and performative for your own personal gain to look good to someone else. It's very fucking obvious to me. You know what I mean? Yes, exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. Well, fellas, I think it's a good note to kind of, we've been, you know, kept you over the hour, I promised. And, you know, we don't have the money to pay over time this monkey mouse outfit.

Thank you guys for having me on. This was, this was great. And it was so great to meet you, Aaron, too. Of course, you too, bro. Yeah, yeah. For a long time I've just admired you on Twitter and. Appreciate it, dog. Yo, and also, too, man, next time I'm in New York, man, we got to link up, bro.

Please, please link me. Yeah, please link me. I'd love to take you, take you out of Harlem, wherever you want to go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is the mayor right here, Aaron. You're going to get to throw up. I'll tell everybody where they can find you if they're not familiar. You can find me at GQ

Rolling Stone, ESPN, you know, all the places I write for, I have a substack, you know, Google Jason Beaver's substack, um, Jasonbeaver.com. I have a podcast to Jason Beaver's show. Uh, we took a little bit month off, because I've been like kind of really involved with this writing stuff.

I also did the job interview. I'm doing this job interview thing. Um, so hopefully I get that. But, um, June, we will be potting more. especially Nick stuff too because the Knicks are in the Eastern Commerce Finals. Well, hey, man, looking like a well-old machine too. They did not trust the process nor really seem to care much about it at all. We'll see, like I don't want to get too ahead of myself.

Last year was a very humbling series. The Pacers were hot, though. Abnormally hot, so I think we have a better chance. I don't think any of those teams are better than the Pacers team last year. any of the teams that we would face now that the Pists nor the Cavalier. So I think we got a good chance of being in the finals. That would be fun, but we'll see what happens. Watch this space and tune in to the Easter conference finals.

Jason, thanks again, man. If y'all are listening to this out there, go to patreon.com slash trillbilly workers party for the low, low price of what is now a gallon of gas. You can get an extra episode every week. your greater reward lies in heaven on the other side and salvation we will uh see you on monday thanks family peace