| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
|
unidentified
|
Able to watch C-SPAN on a black and white television set in his prison cell. | |
| This is being carried live by C-SPAN. | ||
| It's being watched not only in this country, but it's being watched around the world right now. | ||
| Mike said before, I happened to listen to him, he was on C-SPAN 1. | ||
|
unidentified
|
That's a big upgrade, right? | |
| It was Sunday on Meet the Press that Utah Governor Spencer Cox talked about the cancer that social media is having on society. | ||
| This is Spencer Cox. | ||
| The damage that social media and the internet is doing to all of us, those dopamine hits, these companies, trillion-dollar market caps, the most powerful companies in the history of the world, have figured out how to hack our brains, get us addicted to outrage, which is the same type of dopamine, the same chemical that you get from taking fentanyl, get us addicted to outrage, and get us to hate each other. | ||
| I'm seeing it in real time since the tragic death of Charlie Kirk. | ||
| I'm seeing it in every corner of our society. | ||
| The conflict entrepreneurs are taking advantage of us, and we are losing our agency. | ||
| And we have to take that back. | ||
| We have to turn it off. | ||
| We have to get back to community, caring about our neighbors, the things that make American great, serving each other, bettering ourselves, exercising, sleeping, all of those things that this takes away from us. | ||
| Well, Governor, you referred to social media as a cancer on Friday. | ||
| That's an incredibly strong word. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Do you believe that social media played a direct role in this assassination? | |
| I believe that social media has played a direct role in every single assassination and assassination attempt that we have seen over the last five, six years. | ||
| There is no question in my mind that cancer probably isn't a strong enough word. | ||
| What we have done, especially to our kids, it took us a decade to realize how evil these algorithms are. | ||
| Spencer Cox on Meet the Press on Sunday, plenty of articles in today's papers about the impact of social media, and we'll get to those, but we mostly want to hear from you your reaction to those statements by Spencer Cox and also your views on social media. | ||
| Have they changed since what you've seen over the past week since the assassination of Charlie Kirk? | ||
| 202-748-8000 is the number for Democrats to call. | ||
| Republicans, 202-748-8001. | ||
| Independents, 202-748-8002. | ||
| We'll start in New York. | ||
| This is Rob, Line for Democrats. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, dude. | |
| Thank you so much for C-SPAN. | ||
| God bless. | ||
| You know, I'm probably addicted to C-SPAN at this point. | ||
| But, you know, the thing that scares me about what's happening on our internet is that there's apparently reports that Russia and China are doing things on our internet to influence our thinking and our behavior. | ||
| So, you know, if you think about that, causing us to have even more emotional responses to one side or the other side. | ||
| I got plenty of Republican friends. | ||
| I have plenty of Republican friends that, and sometimes I think I have more Republican friends than I do Democrat for some reason. | ||
| I don't know why that is. | ||
| And I'm actually, you know, on many issues, I do side with Republicans. | ||
| But one thing I never do is get into any heated sort of exchange with my friends that have, you know, the alternate view on the other side. | ||
| And I try to understand my friends when they have sometimes I have a few friends that are a little strict and stern in how they view some of what's going on. | ||
| But, you know, we always come together as friends and put it aside. | ||
| But I understand the positions and the arguments from the Republicans, some of which I agree with, some of which sometimes you find people are a little bit too have allegiance to a conspiracy theory. | ||
| So what do you do then? | ||
| Rob, can I ask you? | ||
| You mentioned the state-sponsored actions to fan the flames, and certainly a concern that has been brought up by political leaders, by national security officials, something that they've tracked over the years. | ||
| So if it's a state-sponsored threat to the United States to try to divide us, should there be a state-sponsored response to that? | ||
| Should the federal government do more to regulate what's said or the images that are seen on social media? | ||
| Is it up to the government? | ||
| Is it up to the social media companies? | ||
| Is it up to individuals who can help here? | ||
| Everybody, you know, but you'd be okay with a federal response to try to tamp down on some of this? | ||
|
unidentified
|
You know, when you hear a wild theory that you know is not based on anything, when you can see on the internet, you get that gut feeling that this is either AI or somehow it's generated in such a way that you know it's not based in fact or reality. | |
| Yeah, I mean, I wish that our president would have passion over this type of thing, you know, when it comes to dealing with, you know, Russia and China. | ||
| I think that he talks the talk, but he doesn't walk the walk. | ||
| So there you go. | ||
| That's Rob in New York Line for Democrats. | ||
| This is Bennett out of Severna Park, Maryland, line for Republicans. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi, good morning. | |
| Thank you so much for having me on. | ||
| I wanted to talk about the Democratic Party's strategy of having a big tent of supporters. | ||
| One thing that Democrats need to understand about conservatives is that there is an acceptance issue of a lot of the public behavior among Democrats. | ||
| I mean, in the last few years, Republicans have been forced to accept things like dragged storybook hours at public libraries, indecent displays and parades. | ||
| And now what we're learning about with this shooter is that he was engaging in like anamorph, sexualized, fetish stuff. | ||
| And, you know, this is a, just as political violence is a greater than 50% Democrat Party issue. | ||
| I mean, there's really no question about it. | ||
| It's between 50% and 100%, without a doubt. | ||
| So, Bennett, bring me to this. | ||
|
unidentified
|
This behavior is absolutely greater than 50% on the Democratic Party as well. | |
| Bring me to the social media question that we asked here. | ||
| Have your views on social media, what we're seeing online, and how people engage with each other. | ||
| Has it changed since Wednesday, one way or the other? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I think people use social media in order to score points against each other. | |
| They don't talk with each other. | ||
| I think people need to get off social media completely. | ||
| It's completely toxic. | ||
| And people can't control themselves. | ||
| I think that people are replacing normal human interactions in the presence of humans with an online dialogue. | ||
| And when you have such anonymity that you can hide behind screens, it gives you the perceived freedom to act in a way that you wouldn't normally do. | ||
| And it's creating a toxic environment. | ||
| And it really is a negative feedback loop that becomes exacerbated. | ||
| Bennett, would it surprise you that what you just said just then sounds a lot like what Hassan Piker, and he's a progressive liberal social media influencer. | ||
| He's on Twitch and other channels. | ||
| It sounds a lot like what he told Politico in his interview. | ||
| So he was supposed to have a debate with Charlie Kirk in two weeks. | ||
| He's debated Charlie Kirk in the past. | ||
| Again, he's an influencer on the left. | ||
| And Politico asked him a series of questions. | ||
| They asked, how do you maintain your humanity, twitching and then absorbing images like the one you saw today, and just being on an increasingly digital world? | ||
| This was his response. | ||
| And it sounds a lot like what you just said. | ||
| He said, my family, my friends, and going out in public, I think is the perfect antidote to the vicious nature of the internet. | ||
| People become a lot more cruel under the guise of anonymity. | ||
| There's a cliché like, oh, you wouldn't say that to my face, or you're a keyboard warrior. | ||
| And in some respects, that's true. | ||
| He goes on to say, I feel like a lot of people are far less vicious when they get to see the other person, when they get to be around the other person. | ||
| And recently, before the internet, before the technological availabilities, that was the overwhelming majority of our interpersonal relationships. | ||
| It was always in person. | ||
| It was always face-to-face. | ||
| And I think we've lost that. | ||
| And that's how I try to keep myself as grounded as possible, which is ironic, of course, since the political violence such as this one also makes it harder for me to go out in public. | ||
| But that's why I said I can't let fear dictate my life. | ||
| Again, Hassan Piker, popular left streamer. | ||
| What do you make of those comments and how similar it sounded to what you just said, Bennett? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I would agree totally with what Hassan says. | |
| And I don't agree with what a lot he says, but he sounds like a very intelligent individual when it comes to that issue specifically. | ||
| I think the question that America needs to be asking itself is what leads people to self-isolate behind a computer screen for significant periods of time and allowing themselves to become immersed in dangerous, | ||
| twisted content that, I mean, when the framers talk about it, when they talked about the First Amendment, they did not talk about some of the things that people engage in today. | ||
| There's been this evolution of thought, and I think the online community just creates an environment where these niche ideas can flourish and they become expanded upon in such extreme ways. | ||
| And it's just sad to see. | ||
| Bennett, thanks for the call from Severna Park. | ||
| This is Chris here in D.C., Independent Line. | ||
| Chris, good morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hey, good morning. | |
| I've never been a fan of social media. | ||
| I don't have any of the platforms. | ||
| And I think, you know, I like that we're having a pretty civil discussion right now, even though there's some, you know, a political ideology going on and conversation. | ||
| But, you know, I don't think the government should get involved. | ||
| I mean, there's always this preaching of, you know, smaller government, smaller government. | ||
| And we're seeing that that's actually going in the reverse direction right now as the government is getting involved in everything. | ||
| But, you know, this can of worms has been open, and I don't see it going back because too many people feel it's a way not only to express their voice, but make a profit and push agendas at the same time. | ||
| So I'm just not a fan. | ||
| And the people at the top who run these companies definitely don't care what's happening at the bottom because they're super rich and they're getting rich. | ||
| And, you know, although I don't agree with everything that the governor of Utah said, especially how, you know, he's releasing some of the facts and everything else, I think that his statement about social media is spot on and correct. | ||
| And, you know, it's exploded since COVID. | ||
| We're going on a very, very dark path because there's going to be, there's, what, probably millions of podcasters and influencers and everything out there who have very young, influential, able-to-be-influenced people, especially kids listening to them. | ||
| And as the gentleman said before, absorbing content where they can be in the privacy of their home, they can be anywhere at any time and just flip on the phone and get the content that they want that might not be correct content. | ||
| Chris, let me ask you this. | ||
| Chris, let me ask you this. | ||
| You said you don't think the government should be involved. | ||
| I imagine that that's a free speech argument, right? | ||
| That the government shouldn't define what can and can't be said. | ||
| Is that sort of where you stand on that? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes. | |
| So what about Congressman Randy Fine, Florida Republican, has proposed legislation to shed light on the flow of money behind some of the ideas that spread on social media? | ||
| This was his quote: I'm filing a bill requiring protesters and influencers online to disclose when they're being paid and by who. | ||
| These are political actors, no different than political candidates who have to disclose where their support comes from. | ||
| Would that be a good thing for influencers to have to disclose if they're being paid where that money has come from? | ||
| Would that help at least shed some light on where these ideas might be coming from? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'm open to considering that only if the politicians would do it as well. | |
| So when they're campaigning or when they're pushing an agenda, well, let me just say, go back to the campaigning thing. | ||
| Ever since Citizens United, you know, corporations have exploded their input into financial coffers. | ||
| And we, as the, where's the transparency? | ||
| So I'm for transparency on a level, especially if it's transparency across the board. | ||
| And if you're going to be pushing for internet companies or whatever to be disclosing We'll leave this here for live remarks now from Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro addressing the issue of political violence. | ||
| Live coverage here on C-SPAN. |