Sloganeering
Well, hello everybody and welcome to another episode of the 2 Parachutes Podcast. I'm one of your co hosts. I'm Scott Olson, retired FBI agent and private investigator out on the West Coast. With me is my partner in crime.
Shawn:Yeah, thanks Scott. Sean Baker Garcia here, and I am still the happy accidental CEO and global national security enthusiast. So welcome to another episode of 2 Parachutes Podcast. What's on your mind, Scott?
Scott:So in our preparation process, we usually grind through a lot of stuff and then when we launch into recording an episode, we have an idea of what we're going to talk about. We're going to do something a little different today in the grandest traditions of what is the 2 Parachutes Podcast. I'm just going to throw a pitch at Sean and you Sean.
Shawn:Well, good for you. I was a catcher in high school for softball, so I'm ready.
Scott:That's perfect, I was a swimmer so I'm not very good at throwing
Shawn:stuff. Great.
Scott:But here's kind of what I'm seeing as I read news in the last couple of days and it kind of made me laugh, and that is we are on the very last day of the visit to The United States of King Charles, the British king, and the news that I'm seeing as we get to the last day, it is Thursday the thirtieth as we speak, so King Charles and Queen Consort Camilla have done their official end of visit goodbye with the President and the First Lady. They are like out in Front Royal, which is Western Virginia, doing a couple of more events and then they will depart later this afternoon. But by all accounts, the visit of the king to The United States has been a great success, and in particular members of Congress are talking about how he has been a unifying force in the public dialogue, and it made me laugh because I think in the previous week or two we have had no kings protests.
Shawn:Yeah man.
Scott:So what I'm interested in is the irony, but also what it means. What sloganeering means because you have people, citizens crowding the margins, crowding those little fences that they put up to see the king. I gotta think that some of those people have been at No Kings protests. And so the irony makes me laugh, and I was just wondering if the irony makes you laugh or if it tumbles something sort of more important for you.
Shawn:Yeah. Well, so it would be funnier if it wasn't relieving in some sense, right? Because we have so much going on in this country, and there's so much of just anger and frustration and divide that I feel like, you know, definite irony that two hundred and fifty years after the birth of this nation from a total national emancipation from, you know, national parentage, right? Like, we as the child state, like, demanded our emancipation from our parents. You know, following that metaphor that almost never goes well for the child.
Shawn:And so two fifty years later, our emancipated parent is coming back and saying, how how's how's that going for you? You know? And and it's not going so well, Scott. It's not going so well. But it's also not going as poorly as I think media would make you believe.
Shawn:I I think that you know, it's funny. There's many things I could many different in traditional 2 Parachutes Podcast form, you know, many wind gusts that I can follow here. I'll just throw some grenades, thought grenades out, and then you can pick up whichever one you want to run with. But the first thing I'd say is that, you know, for a community of protesters who ostensibly are agitating against single anything rule, whether that's the single individual or a single, you know, political class, you know, it could be agitating against a monarchy, an oligarchy, a dictatorship, you know, take your pick of, you know, regime form. It's interesting to me that that is coming from the same group of people who are firmly dedicated to one party rule, because ultimately that's what they want, which is just fascinating.
Shawn:And then secondly, I think it's also not lost on me. And this actually was a good reminder, speaking of PrEP, you and I had discussed Ben's, you know, former senator of Nebraska, Ben Sasse, and his recent interview that he gave. I don't remember what outlet he he gave it to, but, you know, he he was he didn't specifically make this a partisan issue, but I'm gonna look at it through a partisan lens just because we're talking about the no kings protesters in light of the British monarchy's visit to America on her 200 birthday. Right? So so, you know, basically, what what I took from it is that, you know, yeah, like, the the people who who are, an active part of the no kings protests are also ostensibly, again, part of that one party Democrat platform because, you know, that's their position is they want one party rule, even though they say that's not what they want.
Shawn:I mean, that's you know, but prove it otherwise. Right? Like, you know? And and at the same time, it's like, you're also really committed to political dynasties. You're committed to the Obamas and to the Clintons and to, you know, the the Kennedys.
Shawn:And, well, I mean, of course, RFK is now on the outs. But, like, he he's a black sheep among pure, you know, driven white snow sheep. Right? You know? And and, you know, the Chuck Schumers and the Nancy Pelosi's and the Dianne Feinstein's who ran congress for, like, decades.
Shawn:And Ben Sasse's point was and, again, he did not partisanize this at all, but he was just like, you know, members of congress should get elected, and then they should go do really important good work, and then they should go home. Go home. Because the minute you stick around more than one or two terms, you become entrenched in the in the vehicle itself, the political vehicle itself, and that is dangerous for you and your ability to act independently and conscientiously because then the motivation becomes reelection and party politics over citizen, justice and citizen sort of service. And so I just think that's that's one path you can go down. And then secondly, I just think that, you know, it it it's The United States has so much, so much that we have done in our short little life as a country, as a national entity.
Shawn:And I think that, you know, when you are talking about, like, no kings or like, what are you I
Scott:mean,
Shawn:literally, like, you you have all the elections. You have all the freedoms. You have all of the things. Like, you know, I'm just curious. Like, what does that definition look like then for the people who are agitating?
Shawn:Because I'm having a hard time following, like, the logic behind what that I mean, really, what it comes down to is it's it's really just a a no Trump, you know, kind of protest, which is far more defensible probably and far more, you know, accurate. Like like, because it's not you're not really against kings and dynasty and inherited legacy. You know, you're not. You wanna you you think you are, but you're really not. So so let's let's get down to the nitty gritty of what the real and and if it comes down to a cult of personality and you just simply don't like Trump, then just say that.
Shawn:You know? But because to do anything else makes you look completely hypocritical and disingenuous. And and I I don't think that that is the look that they're going for. And maybe they would have a good counterargument to why they're not part of the kings movement. But, you know, but again, like, yeah, I just think the whole thing is is really it is funny on some level, and I do think that those protests are not getting very much traction because I don't think people feel very like, it doesn't make any sense.
Shawn:It's like they got this catchy little slogan and thought it was super clever and are running. But it's like, okay. Well, like, I still feel pretty free. Like, I, you know, I don't I'm not restricted from doing anything. Like, I can do pretty much what I want.
Shawn:And, you know, and so, yeah, I just and I I it's not lost on me that nobody protested the King Charles. I think that was my other point actually, is I was gonna say is, you know, US The US in general body politic, the our constituents have had this up and down relationship with the monarchy over the years, you know, because, I mean, I don't know, of course, anything in in the '19 mid nineteen seventies and four because that wasn't around. But, like, you know, everybody loved Princess Diana, and so then they were on this big swing uptick, you know. Well, people didn't like Queen Elizabeth, so they were mad at her, but then and they couldn't stand Charles. And then, you know, and they were in love with Diana, though.
Shawn:And but then she, you know, of course, the divorce and then her untimely tragic death, which, you know, then kinda put the monarchy in a slump again. Like so you know? And then different people, like, you know, support them at different times. And so or maybe they've always been divided, and maybe, like, Democrats have always been more inclined to just be like, yeah. We like the fun sort of black sheep, like, you know, Fergie and like Diana and, you know, but we don't like well, and they loved Andrew until Andrew became like, you know, a criminal, like, you know, and now we all hate Andrew, which, you know, great.
Shawn:Like, we should because that guy's probably gross, you know, and and probably actually is criminal. But then, you know, but then by the end of Elizabeth's reign, I think she had recaptured the fancy of most Americans even on the progressive side just because she's such an institution. And she's just such a pillar of strength and continuity and stability for the British people, I think. You know? And and, oh, by the way, they're still very beloved in a lot of their former common wealth nations, you know, or current continued commonwealth nations.
Shawn:So, you know, that's their business. That's not ours. We chose not to be part of that commonwealth, and that's just fine. But but yeah. So so I think that that's the other piece of this is Charles, like, good on the old boy.
Shawn:He lived long enough to rehabilitate himself, and I think he probably always was a decent decent enough human. I do. I think he was as an adult now, I can go back and look at that whole era of him and Diana and just see it for the tragedy that it was, which is just an arranged marriage that that neither of them knew what they were really getting themselves into. And then just, you know, having like actual feelings and emotions kind of get in the way of, you know, probably tradition that needed to be updated and refreshed a bit for the modern time. But then it just took you know?
Shawn:So in a way, was necessary to get the monarchy to where it is today, which is a much more I mean, they still have their rigidness and tradition, like any good traditional structure and institution will. But, but he I gotta give it to I was a I was a huge Charles hater. Like, I was all team Diana. I was when I was a young person. I was like, he's horrible.
Shawn:He's gross. That woman is a, you know, a homeworking, you know, psychopath. And, you know, now that I'm old, I'm like, Oh, I kind of see it from Camilla and Shambles's perspective now, you know, the show The Crown actually helped me a lot with that, because I was like, you know, just wasn't in love with her. I mean, that's just what it came down to. And he was forced to marry her and then it just went to hell, you know?
Shawn:I mean, it was literally as simple as that, you know?
Scott:Yeah, and it's the what I see in so much of what you're describing and in your inimitable way, you've touched on so many things. Which is awesome. You know, so much of it really quite quickly devolves into, you know, fourth grade schoolyard, who's popular and and who's not. And you know, there there is a lot of tragedy, you know, with Charles being in love with Camilla, not being allowed to marry her, having to marry somebody else because you know these are the rules and that's maybe that's a whole topic for another show, but it's to me what really sticks in my brain in this fourth grade school yard who's popular and what can you say without being shunned and what can you not say without being shunned. Who has the authority on the schoolyard and then you know sometimes that authority all of a sudden disappears because of some reason or all of a sudden it's gone.
Scott:But it's the sloganeering that's fascinating to me and maybe what I'm seeing is you know the current slogan at the moment is no kings and now we have a king come in and he's lionized regardless of you know the trajectory of his life and it kind of puts the lie to this slogan no kings and you know I sort of line up all the slogans and all the slogans are lies and maybe it's because slogans are lies, slogans are too simple and it makes me draw a string and just bear with me here, because it goes back to a book that I read years ago by a guy named David Grossman, who wrote a book called On Killing and Grossman was a military guy. Think he retired as a colonel, but the book details the process that militaries around the world go through to train their soldiers past the human instinct to not kill each other. And now I can hear people screaming in outrage, oh, that's not true. We've got blood in the streets and all those things. And read the book, read On Killing, because the human instinct, even if you're in your amygdala, even if you're doing your fight aspect of fight or flight, to in a not fight or flight type of environment, in a combat environment, whether that combat is what we might call a war by whatever definition we use or if it is, you know, organized crime, gangland war, big city crime where people are getting hurt and killed, in pretty much every single instance, part of that construct that allows a human being to get past the innate instinct to not hurt other people and to the point where a person can hurt another person, it's demonizing the person that they are intending to hurt or that they do hurt, the way that you demonize is you categorize, you separate, and then you lower your opponent and raise yourself.
Scott:And when you look at all of the political sloganeering and it is shot through our political system, it's shot through every political system. Take your pick, it's not just no kings, it's from the river to the sea, it's Black Lives Matter, it's everything, but it follows the same protocol and it's intentional that it follows the protocol, but when you look at the slogans, I mean, whoever said black lives don't matter?
Shawn:Right, yeah, it's super misleading, yeah.
Scott:It's super misleading I understand it and I understand I'm going to get criticized because in the fourth grade schoolyard the white male can't comment on the concept of Black Lives Matter because of the color of my skin obviously and I'm being sarcastic here and maybe misinterpreted but here we go sarcastically I say I will be seen as somebody who's not entitled because I don't understand and that's another slogan Based on the way I look, I can't understand. I'm an intelligent person, and I want the conversation. So, for me, the issue is the sloganeering, and now we come to the 2 Parachutes Podcast reason for being, right? When you see these slogans, it's a valid choice to jump on board, if that's the thing that any person wants to do, then that's the thing that that person can do. I I think a better way is to look at the slogan, and when you see a slogan, try and understand what the agenda behind the slogan is, and try and see the lie in it, because there's always a lie in a slogan, because it's too shallow, it's too neat, it's too sound bitey,
Shawn:but
Scott:again, it's hard, and I would say that about slogans I agree with as well as slogans I disagree with. I can't think of a slogan off the top of my head that I agree with at this point.
Shawn:Nike, just do it. Yeah, there you go,
Scott:there you go, but it's I think it's no accident that slogans correspond to reactive brain and not thinking brain, and I doubt very much whether political people and the community organizer people and the people that are out in the public discourse that are coming up with these slogans are sitting around and having discussions about how we get into people's amygdalas. But the discussions that they are having that are, you know, this is the kind of message we need to control the narrative, this is the kind of message we need to put out there, they're going to do that, and I am 100% opposed to any sort of regulation that would prohibit people from doing that. I think that's ridiculous, but at the same time, I think as everybody operates in the public discourse, looking at the facts matter, and driving through to look at the facts, to understand where the slogan comes from, and to understand the agenda informs the individual regarding what they think and how they will engage, and you see time and time again, over time, the truth will always come out. Saw an editorial in the Wall Street Journal the day before yesterday that went through chapter and verse how the research article upon which almost all of the legislation related to spending money to fight climate change, that paper has been withdrawn because it's faulty, the factual basis doesn't support the conclusion, there are no facts for the spend, and it's not making news because climate change isn't a thing now.
Scott:We're talking about AI instead of climate change, but everybody who for decades talked about how the planet is going to end, they were wrong. And so my question to the community is, hey, you have a great idea, Mr. Mandani in New York, you have these great ideas, comma, what if you're wrong?
Shawn:Yeah.
Scott:What if you're wrong? What happens if spending tens of millions of dollars on a grocery store turns out to be a bad idea? What happens if giving free everything to everybody turns out to be a bad idea. What happens if, you know, shaming a wealthy guy as having too many homes turns out to be a bad idea. Right.
Scott:What happens? My quarrel, I guess, with the fourth graders in the public discourse is they're not thoughtful. They think they're right. Not examining the facts and they don't consider what's gonna happen if they're wrong.
Shawn:Well, and I think part of how that happens is they don't take I think that use of slogans, which is essentially a a propaganda tool, right, to, you know, influence an opinion of some constituency in some place in the world. Right? If you look at it as as like a pool a tool of political propaganda, you know, it it's, you know, it's always been around. You know? I mean, like, it's just that you wasn't you know, there was a precursor phase where it wasn't digitized, and the speed and velocity at which those types of slogans, like, crop up and then sort of take root within the body politic of a given nation or community is it's much faster, is one of the differences today than than in previous, you know, times in in our lives.
Shawn:I think they're, you know, and maybe they were always poorly worded. You know, I mean, when you think back to some of the original slogans, you know, you can go back to even the founding of our country, you know. But, you know, even in places like France, Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite, like, you know, remember the Alamo. These are, you know, all the way to modern era. You know?
Shawn:So there's probably problematic use of terms in all these, but I would say we have a particularly good knack for getting things just generally wrong, you know, because there's no agreement on what things mean. Words don't seem to matter anymore. And so, you know, the no kings protest slogan is fascinating to me because, again, you know, if your goal is to equate a king or a queen, I e a monarchy, with something evil and bad, then you probably wanna take it up with your friends in, you know, Britain, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, The Netherlands, Belt. Like, they all have monarchies still. You know what I mean?
Shawn:And I don't think that those are even countries outside of Europe, you know, Japan, Thailand, you know, Jordan has a monarchical system. I don't know if they're a full constitutional monarchy. He may actually wield more power than other monarchs in Western Europe. So I guess my point is, you've got to be more precise. Because you're conflating things that actually you probably wouldn't say to people who you really because the people who are part of those movements, I'm pretty sure they don't have any quarrel with any of the Western European countries I just listed.
Shawn:And there's more, by the way. Those are just the big ones. There's also a ton of little monarchies that are in Europe still that are flourishing, you know, national communities. And okay. So if it's not all monarchies, okay, then maybe it's like something you know?
Shawn:So so and if you yourself are a proponent of one party rule, again, which no Republican or Democrat should say that they're not because both of their dream is to have full total one party rule. So okay. So you want one party rule, and so which means you want groupthink. Well, that's not a very, like, free speech, you know, free will type of concept. And then, you know, you're also very much wedded to this, you know, this dynastic political, you know, transition where it's like the kids and the grandkids, and they're all politicians.
Shawn:Like, you know, they grew up like any other family business. Right? Like, you know, my dad was a, you know, mechanic. I'm a mechanic. My kid's a mechanic.
Shawn:You know? I mean, so so we are very much still intellectually, at least superficially, kind of just it's in it's ingrained in our our sort of being and for a lot of people in The United States. So so, yeah, you like political dynasties. Don't say that you don't like, you know, because because, you know, if Sasha or Malia Obama or Michelle ran tomorrow, you'd all flood this, you know, the the gates. You know?
Shawn:You you would do it. You would vote for those those women, and, you know, maybe they would deserve it. I don't know. But, like, point being is, you know yeah. So so I guess just my quarrel with it is just be honest about your slogan.
Shawn:You know?
Scott:Yeah. And that's and and that's I guess I guess that's that's the rub, right?
Shawn:And it's
Scott:funny when you look at the actual monarchs you listed, there is family history that can go back a short amount of time, a couple of centuries, or a long amount of time. But the sort of the the American political dynasties mean, okay, you have JFK. He he he was well
Shawn:and what did they call it? Camelot, right?
Scott:-Yeah, they called it they called it Camelot.
Shawn:-We love it.
Scott:-But my point is there's there's no dynasty there. I
Shawn:mean -Yeah.
Scott:-His his brothers were involved, but his children were not political animals. Clinton's, same thing. I mean, yeah. Bill and Hillary had highest levels of government, but their children weren't. Yeah.
Scott:But I think what liberal people would say is no, the the real dangerous political dynasty was the Bushes, because there you have father and son who were both presidents, and so that's something we need to be concerned about. But it's a good debate. It really is a good debate, because are the Bushes really seen as a political dynasty? I doubt if you ask, you know, people on the street, in those street interviews, you know, name American political dynasties, not many people would come up with Bush, and a lot of people would come up with Kennedy. Yeah.
Scott:And it's, yeah, it's fascinating to me what that means, and then what you don't see is in this last presidential election cycle, as part of the the dynasty or the no kings movement, what you don't see is how did Kamala Harris run for president. She was not
Shawn:That's another good point. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. She
Scott:was there was no democratic process for her ascending to the top of the ticket. There flat out wasn't and we can have the debate and all the reasons why, and this, that, and the other thing, but the bottom line is that was not a democratic process, and as soon as you say that, fingers are going be pointed back, and it's going to be, well, you know, the Republicans did this, and now we're squabbling, and so the question becomes, how do we, in this public discourse, how do we try and stay away from the squabble? And I think part of it is to focus on what the facts actually are. And part of it interestingly is to do what King Charles apparently does very well, which is at some level to stay above the fray. To say, yeah, I mean, I get there's nobody has clean hands.
Scott:You know, we got issues here that a lot of people care about, but let's get above ridicule. And I think it is getting above ridicule because personally I think ridicule is low. I remember, I love doing this with you, because just as we're talking, I remember these old stories. I remember back in the beginning days of Scott Olsen, when I was a deputy prosecuting attorney, I a trial attorney, and I would be in trial sometimes. Yeah.
Scott:And the first couple of times that I was personally attacked at trial by defense counsel, it made me really angry because I was being personally attacked.
Shawn:Okay.
Scott:But after about the second time, I'm trying to figure out why is this guy launching at me? Right. And what it didn't take me too long to understand, and I talked to some of the senior prosecutors that were mentoring me and they confirmed this, is when you get personally attacked, that means that that's the best thing that defense counsel has.
Shawn:Sure.
Scott:There's they can't make an argument on the facts. They can't make an argument on the law, and it's that old saw, you know, if you got the facts pound on the facts. If you got the law pound on the law. If you haven't, yeah, pound on the table. It's that sort of thing, and I see that in the public discourse.
Scott:When there is a personal attack, and when there is a slogan, it means that the person that is launching that personal attack, whether they have facts to marshal or not, they either don't have facts or they're not marshaling facts. They're either wrong and they know it, or they're lazy. But that's what a personal attack means, and what I'm hoping, dear listeners, is that you will take that as an indication, not of honor or of good, but an indication that the attack really isn't personal. The attack comes from the frustration of somebody who either hasn't done the hard work of interacting or who doesn't have facts to marshal and they don't want to lose and they're frustrated and angry and so they're going to attack hoping that they can push their way through. And even though it doesn't feel good to be personally attacked, you can take it as a calming thing of, okay, I've actually won here, and over time what I was able to do was just to sort of sit back and fold my arms and smile, let the opposing counsel say whatever he or she was gonna say, and then stand up and not even address it.
Scott:Just say, here are the facts, here's the law, and here are the inferences that drive the decision that you wanna make, and it's hard when you see, you know, people on the street corner waving flags around and saying no kings, and you want to have that debate, but if you're saying no kings, you know, it doesn't really mean what the phrase says. What you're really saying is, like you said, I want to win. I want to win. That's a better place to start the discussion. Okay, Yeah, I think what's not happening that you think should happen?
Scott:That's a different conversation.
Shawn:Yeah, well, yeah, I think and again, it's a fascinating one because it forces you to look at things like, you know, the precision of words, right, and intention, you know, and how those two things get blended together. And then I also think it's a great time to be talking about, like, what what does that what is a democracy, a self described democracy? You know, how does it work with the very human tendencies to be drawn towards, you know, dynasty. You know? Because even though it was funny.
Shawn:So I went because I was I wanted to see if I could come up with some good stats while you were chatting. So I quickly did, like, who are like, you know, how many people have actually held office and by what families, you know, and came out really interesting stats. So, the Kennedy's win hands down. 14 to 17, family members across four generations have held public service office on some level.
Scott:Wow. I am surprised that they Yeah.
Shawn:Wrote about that. So, yeah, and then the Adams's that come in second. John Adams, John Quincy, and then so that with eight to 12 of their family members holding public office. Then it's the Bushes who come in at five to seven and the Roosevelt family also at five to seven. So which I think I I mean, I certainly knew FDR and was cousins of of Teddy Roosevelt, you know, but but yeah.
Shawn:So, you know, because, again, we think of public. We we probably, like, it's harder to keep up with who the heck's running for office when you got a random mayor of one city or like, you know what I mean? But, you know, it it's a political dynasty in the sense that I know, again, to me, I just look at that as like, well, you know, it was very common in society for you to just take on the tradecraft of your dad. Right? Like, if you were a man, a young man, for many decades up until recently, probably up until the fifties.
Shawn:You know what I mean? And so to me, that's not all that shocking. But when you then also think about the fact that it's not just like at the national level that this is happening, like when you think about like the the Daly family, I think is isn't it the Daly's who are, like, kind of Chicago? That's like Chicago politics. Yep.
Shawn:You know?
Scott:It's the premier dynasty. Yeah.
Shawn:Or or the Cuomos in New York. Right? Like, you know, like, the birds here in Virginia family. So we just, we gravitate towards this, you know, that's a natural inclination, I think, of the human condition. So again, this is not to say it's good or bad.
Shawn:It's just to say, be careful what you're labeling as a slur, you know, because you're intending it as a slur, but there's actually such a depth there behind what that actually means. And it's not always an indicator of something ugly, terrible, and bad. You know what I mean? And so they're kind of working against cross purposes with their own intention, I think, sometimes.
Scott:Yeah. It's a great illustration of how the facts matter, and, you know, in this case, I didn't have command of the facts.
Shawn:Well, neither did I. I just, you know, I just knew that the Kennedys were, you know, prolific, you know, as a family, but, you know.
Scott:But it's nice to have the reference tool in front of us. AI is a great tool, you know. Yeah. Fire can burn your house down and it can cook your dinner.
Shawn:It's in perfect. It's gonna
Scott:it's, it is a tool. It is neither good nor bad. It is a tool, even though it might appear to be human and we can have that debate.
Shawn:Yeah, yeah.
Scott:You know, I think the important point is, you know, command of the actual facts is important
Shawn:Yeah, perception versus actual.
Scott:Yeah, and me not having command of the facts. I mean, part of this is you got to have command of the facts.
Shawn:Well, that's us doing the hard work of interacting. That's it. We just did it.
Scott:And it's not all that hard to look at a situation and go, Oh, wow, I thought this because I thought these were the facts. The facts are actually this pile of stuff over here. Okay, let's go and do this. Yeah. So that's one thing, but you know, other is it's this terrible trade off between innovation and stability.
Scott:Know, we always vote for the Democrat. We
Shawn:always vote
Scott:for the Republican. That offends my sensibilities because it's not thoughtful.
Shawn:And
Scott:that's personal to Scott Olsen, but it's still not thoughtful. We always vote for the daily. We always vote for the Kennedy. We always vote for the Clinton. Again, not thoughtful, and I think our system of government, power comes from the people, not from the lord of the manor, not being thoughtful leads to problems.
Shawn:Yeah, yeah.
Scott:And that circles us back around to the sloganeering thing, and it's used because it works and it works because of how our brains operate, but again, defense against the slogans and against outcomes we don't like is, you know, how we vote and how we interact in the public realm. I was, I can't remember what I was looking up, but I was looking something up and I came across a social media post where there was somebody who was talking about people who are moving from blue states to red states, which is something that's been happening now for five years or so. Yeah. Her big point was, remember that you are leaving a place because it sucks there.
Shawn:Yeah. So
Scott:when you come here, vote differently. Because the reason it sucks where you came from is based on how you voted. And so if it's bad there, don't make it bad here. Change. And all I got from that was be thoughtful.
Scott:Understand that, okay, you think your one vote doesn't matter. Actions have consequences. Yeah. You know, the message to our listeners is be thoughtful, have opinions, be thoughtful. If you get bushwhacked by a slogan, okay, you don't have to stay bushwhacked,
Shawn:but
Scott:slogans work because they, it's not that they cater to our lowest nature, they cater to our fight or flight brain, and that's not a low nature, that saves us,
Shawn:that
Scott:actually saves us, but you know, with slogans, it's important to get on your limbic system train and move on over to your rational brain and do the work.
Shawn:Yeah. No, I think that all makes sense. You know, as I'm sitting here just thinking about it as well, like, delving into, you know, the fact that you pay we're saying no kings. The other part of that, you know, and I and I loved the point that that you made about the Kamala pathway to the presidency. I you know, that would have that had she had been successful, that would have been the closest thing to, you know what I mean, an undemocratically, like, you know, resulted presidential election in The United States, you know, at least in my lifetime.
Shawn:Maybe there have been other maybe other installations. I mean, George Washington was obviously installed as president. I don't know how that vote, if there even was one, occurred. I I need to refresh my history lessons. But but, you know, but the other piece of this is it also just fully ignores the fact that, you know, 77,000,000 people voted for Donald Trump.
Shawn:You know? Now where's and and only, you know, again, if statistics are correct that I'm referencing, 74,000,000 voted for Kamala. So okay. So so either way, let's just say she got 78 and she actually won it. You know, again, she would still be more at the receiving end of a no kings protest than than Trump because she skipped the primary.
Shawn:You know what I mean? Process kind of a thing. Right? And and and got just just as little votes as he did, you know, out of an electorate of, you know, 240,000,000 US citizens that are eligible to vote in this country. So so, you know, that means that we're leaving, you know, 85,000,000 voters, I think, who sat the last election out.
Shawn:Okay. Well, well, yeah, because if you count 154 between the two of them, 85 sat out. And then there was also a small percentage that voted for a third party candidate, right? So again, I don't know what you what more you want. Like, that that that's not a dictatorship.
Shawn:Right? Like, you know? And and I know that he talks a big talk about, like, oh, I'm not gonna recognize the result, but he hasn't done it yet. You know? He's he he obviously when Biden won, Biden won, and Biden assumed the presidency for four years.
Shawn:And, you know, and I don't see him trying real hard to come back for a third term. You know what I mean? Like, so so I'm just not sure. Like, I just think it's a it's a failed slogan that's way less clever than what the people, like, chanting it think it is. And and I actually think it hurts their movement because of the disingenuineness of the of the branding.
Shawn:And and also, by the way, have you seen who attends these? Like, it's not what I would call the rainbow coalition. You know what I mean? Like, it's, you know, it's not even the age demographic coalition, like rainbow coalition. Like, it's very little diversity in those protests and those rallies.
Shawn:So, you know, I don't know. It's but but it is a good exercise to like I said earlier, it's great to talk about these things. It's great to talk about these concepts, and these structures, and variables that kind of give texture and color to our young and evolving, potentially with some serious growing pains right now, you know, republic and democracy. But but yeah, there it is. I don't know.
Scott:Yeah, it's it's interesting. I mean, Washington was selected by vote. It wasn't a contested vote, but it was the early system that memory serves was that Congress voted. And so, I mean, there are less than 50 ballots cast. So that was one.
Scott:The only president that in The United States that became president without being elected is Gerald Ford, as far as I know, because he was nominated and then confirmed by Congress as vice president to replace Spiro Agnew when Agnew resigned, and then he ascended to the presidency when Nixon resigned. So I think he is the only president who served without having run for president.
Shawn:Run for him, yeah, been. Yeah.
Scott:Think I that he's the only one.
Shawn:Not including people who ascended due to assassinations, right? Assume. I
Scott:think, and somebody who understands, who knows that area of history better than me, can give us better facts. But I think all of the other vice presidents who ascended to the presidency were elected vice president. They ran in the election and they won on that president vice president ticket. Ford did not. He did not run and he was not elected.
Scott:And so it's an interesting thing, but it's still the system working but it's remarkable how many lies there are out there and lies that aren't particularly well hidden Yeah. And we can get ourselves spun up and spun up and spun up about lying because that's another inherently human thing. Maybe it's an amygdala thing. I don't know. Yeah.
Scott:Because if you, you know, if the leaf is trembling, you don't know if it's a lion or the wind, you need good facts. You need somebody who says, well, I didn't see a lion over there to be telling the truth and so we do have a very human revulsion to fabrication, to lying. Mean two hundred years ago duels, somebody ended up dying were, you know, because you insulted and honor and almost all of those insults to honor were usur or a liar and not a general.
Shawn:Yeah, right, right. Can you imagine? Yeah.
Scott:And so we have this today and the concern that I have is that people swallow these lies whole because it confirms what they want to believe and this goes back to the brilliant book by Daniel Kahneman, Thinking Fast and Slow, you know, we believe things that are false, even though we dislike falsehoods because it supports what we've already decided that we believe and what we've already decided is true.
Shawn:Right.
Scott:And I think that the pathway out of the fourth grade and into something better is to challenge factual statements, so that you understand what the actual truth is and I'm suggesting that we should not get wrapped around the axle with lying, because lying is intentional deception and that's not great,
Shawn:but
Scott:unintentional deception, I really believe the planet is going to die in twelve years, so we've got to do all this stuff, is equally damaging and in some ways more dangerous because if a person actually believes something that isn't true, they are going to pursue the inferences and the ends driven by that with much more vigor than somebody who knows that what they're advocating is based on a falsehood and so facts everybody, facts matter. Yeah what the truth is and and part of facts mattering is that sometimes we don't know sometimes we we can't know and if you can't know then you need to be very careful about taking action.
Shawn:Yeah. Well, or propagating and proliferating a thought, right? I mean, that's, you know, because part of the power of slogans, whether it was in the digital age now or before that was, you know, you are compressing a complicated issue into this very emotional, moral shorthand statement. That's a sound bite, right? And then, you know, that makes its way throughout the community one way or the other.
Shawn:And so it makes, you know, again, there's a certain amount of trust that gets ascribed to whoever generates those slogans automatically. And so, you know, when that when blind trust starts resulting in a complete abdication of accountability for what the actual facts are, then that that's where you get sort of into problematic territory here.
Scott:We need to say that again. When blind trust leads to abdication of responsibility.
Shawn:Yeah,
Scott:that's brilliant, Sean. That's great. When blind trust leads to abdication of responsibility. And that's when blind trust leads to abdication of responsibility and I'm saying it over and over again to say it in my mind and yours, because that's what leads to, you know, pick your I can't believe that society did that thing event from over the course of history, it's because blind trust led to the abdication of responsibility.
Shawn:Right.
Scott:It's going along with the crowd. It's being a lemming. Again, pick your slogan, right? We talk in metaphors a lot here. And maybe we need to debate whether metaphors are our slogan eerie or not.
Shawn:2: I know, right? Potentially, you know.
Scott:Yeah, but when blind faith leads to abdication responsibility, is a problem. The hard work of living in a participatory democracy is not engaging in blind faith and fact checking everything and I think that the days of your where it was colorable to say, well, you can't fact check everything, I mean I'm reading the newspaper, how can I check what happened? Well, now you have access to a lot more facts because we have our electronic systems and algorithms that can search huge amounts of data. You still have to consider the results that AI kicks out of the internet. You actually, the individual, the average person sitting on a park bench, can do a lot of due diligence.
Shawn:Yeah, Well, making the distinction between blind and informed trust. I mean, you know, I am because of, you know, years of reliability and continuity of ethical sort of, you know, objective reporting, like, I'm gonna read an article coming out of, you know, The Wall Street Journal and or, you know, Foreign Policy Magazine. And and those are reputable publications that I'm probably not gonna spend a lot of my time fact checking, you know what I mean, if I read something? Because I feel like I've had enough interaction with that kind of a public but if you see something that just pops up on some random site you know what I mean? Like, I can sift.
Shawn:Right? And and you know? Or maybe the Wall Street Journal pops off with some crazy statistic that I'm like, that sounds weird. I might actually go and Google it or chat GPT it and look for additional resources to kinda cross validate. And, you know, so so you're you're right.
Shawn:Like, you know, it there there's a difference between blind trust and informed trust. You can't fact check everything and everything you read every single minute of every day. You have to rely on certain things, you know, as just a human efficiency. But, like, you know, if it's a highly contentious issue matter or if it's personally impacting to you in some way, you know, you should be on the ready to say like, I need some other information. I need some different types of sources to kind of help me understand like, you know, what's the angle here?
Shawn:You know? Yeah. Yeah. I think that's important.
Scott:Yeah and I agree and the flag I throw on the play is what you're describing which is it's if I am scraping information that's one thing just trying to stay informed just one thing, but it's a different thing if somebody is asking me to do something, if they're asking me to believe something or asking me to take an action to vote, to donate money, agree to a tax, I want to know now what your agenda is, are your facts correct and it's not just big things like you know we should build wind farms because the planet is dying.
Shawn:Right.
Scott:Certainly show me your facts but vote for my guy and not this other guy.
Shawn:Right.
Scott:Show me your facts. Why do you want this guy and why do you want me to vote for him or for her?
Shawn:Right.
Scott:And I think that's a great start. Yeah. Fundamentally people really are too trusting, which is interesting for a species that hates being lied to.
Shawn:Yeah. Yeah. That's true.
Scott:They really are too trusting.
Shawn:Yeah. Well, think that's especially in today's day and age. I think it's also You have to exercise judgment when and I'll give you an example, because I don't know how to explain it. So I had one of my youngsters over yesterday. She is a undergraduate in her first year at American University, and she's doing great things.
Shawn:Another baby bird, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah. This one's a So smart she's gonna do big things. But, you know, she was telling me about one of the programs that she is participating in.
Shawn:And I don't remember if this was through Howard, because she's also doing a thing for Howard University. So, you know, but or if this was an AU program or if this was just a part time job. I couldn't tell. Anyway, but she's a public health biology double major. And, you know, she's, you know, kind of in that specialization.
Shawn:She's looking at, you know, women's health issues and, you know, things like that. So one of her sort of little jobs, and she was excited to be telling me about this, was to go to middle schools and, like, do like these short modules on mental health and, you know, like nutrition. And and she said sexual health. And I said, hold on now. Like, why are you going into a seven why is an 18 year old, you know, going into a seventh grade classroom talking about sexual health issues?
Shawn:You know what I mean? That bothered me. That bothered me a lot. And and when she fully described what she was talking about, I got even more bothered because it is wholly inappropriate. And so so then I was like, okay.
Shawn:So I know I can trust this because she has no reason to lie, and she's telling me that she's doing this so I know that this is a thing. But what I think is really important before I flipped out and went, like, nuclear on whatever school system you know what I mean? Like, I was like, I need to get my facts in order. Like, I need to understand. Is this a one off program?
Shawn:Is this contextualized to a certain condition or parameter or type of school? Like, I didn't know. So that's another example of I'm not questioning the claim or what that she's telling me that this is happening. But what I do need to do before I start writing letters to my congressman is figure out to what extent is this happening and what are the conditions that led to this and how is it managed and how many students and are the you know, because then I started grilling her. I was like, well, do parents have the right to opt out of this?
Shawn:Because I wouldn't want my no offense to you, my dear. I love you, but, like, I wouldn't want you teaching my child this stuff. Like, you know what I mean? And she said herself she and then as I probed her about this, she was like, yes. They can opt out of it.
Shawn:I said, well, that's a start, and that's good. And I hope a lot of parents are doing that because it's really, really bad form. This is not the kind of stuff you all need to be. Especially, again, like, you're not even a licensed professional. You're just a teenager who just graduated high school.
Shawn:Why are you talking to these 14 year olds and 13 year olds about this? That is not okay. So and she agreed actually with me on that point. And then she's Sorry, I think I lost.
Scott:Yeah, you lost audio. Yeah, so while Sean's speaking out her technical difficulties, I agree. The notion that an 18 year old would be talking to 13 year olds about their bodies and human sexuality seems to not be a great idea. And I think part of the focus there is, part of the roadmap, part of the thing to fact check, or part of your fact checking process should be what kind of pushback do you get when you're asking questions? Because there have been a number of instances during the DEI push in schools where these anti colonial theories and race theory was being taught.
Scott:When people started looking for facts, they were shut down. Get the facts because you wouldn't understand. That's a problem. Anytime anyone doesn't want to talk about facts is a huge flag on the play, I think. Let's see if Sean's back.
Scott:You're not back on audio. So we are getting to the end anyways, everybody. So maybe that'll have to be the last word as we're having our Oh, Sean's back.
Shawn:Oh, good. Sorry. I last word. I apologize. That's I I bought these fancy new headphones thinking they were gonna be amazing, and they're doing nothing but doing me dirty.
Shawn:So yeah. So I'll have to fix that quickly. But, no, you know, just to have that last word, I'm just saying that, you know, definitely check facts, definitely be precise with your use of terms and words, and and, you know, be particularly skeptical or at least discerning when, you know, some sort of new, catchy slogan starts being, like, you know, bandied about. You know, like, look at it. Analyze it.
Shawn:Think about it to say, does this actually make sense? Do I actually believe this? Like, what is this thing actually communicating? Or what are these words actually communicating? And then even when you know a fact is true, you know, before you pop off and go nuclear, look at the context that surrounds the fact, you know, because that matters as much as the fact itself.
Shawn:You know, because if you take an isolated statistic outside of context that is important, you know, it could change the entire narrative of what that fact represents. So just be smart consumers of knowledge and information is all.
Scott:That's fantastic. That's a great last word. And we'll see you all on the next episode of the 2 Parachutes Podcast. Have a great rest of your day, everybody.
Shawn:See you guys drop in with us next time.