Rashida Tlaib Accused Of Trying To Provoke And Embarrass Israel By Israeli Minister
Rashida Tlaib Accused Of Trying To Provoke And Embarrass Israel By Israeli Minister. The controversy surrounding the far left democrats trip to Israel continues this time with Rashida Tlaib requesting a humanitarian trip to visit her family in the West Bank.Israel approved the trip under the condition that she not preach BDS, the Boycott Divest, Sanction Movement against Israel.In her request Tlaib agreed not to promote boycotts and said she would respect any restrictions. Many praised her for the seemingly diplomatic approach to visit family. However after being approved she rejected the approval saying that her family would not want her to agree to restrictions in order to see her family.In an itinerary reportedly from their offices they refer to Israel as Palestine. One has to wonder if Rashida was being genuine in her request or if the whole purpose of the trip was to generate press.Israel interior minister said that it was a "provocation to embarrass Israel"While I can respect Tlaib for refusing speech restrictions the current state of the Israel Palestine conflict does not make it easy to navigate and travel. Many have criticized Tlaib for putting ideology over family.The trip was initially meant to be Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib but the offer was revoked due to their support of the BDS movement. Trump was blamed for pressuring Israel and Benjamin Netanyahu into refusing their entry. Ocasio-Cortez has also refused to travel to Israel until the other far left Democrats are granted entry
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I was warned that by going to Israel, I would not be allowed to enter many other countries.
In fact, there are many countries, I don't know the exact number, I think more than a dozen, that will refuse you entry if they find out you have ever been to Israel.
And now we have today's story, which is seemingly drawing a lot of controversy.
Rashida Tlaib, initially denied entry along with Ilhan Omar, Was then approved to enter after she sent a heartfelt letter saying she wanted to see her grandmother who was 90 years old so they could pick figs, I believe.
Upon the approval, she then said, no, I refuse.
And there's a lot of back and forth.
I think there are some good points in defense of Rashida Tlaib's position, although I do think it's kind of absurd to make a humanitarian request and then when they approve it, kind of deny it.
Which leads me to feel, to believe, that I think Rashida Tlaib may have been expecting to get rejected and wanted to make a point.
That's just my opinion, okay?
I know this is a very complicated issue.
The reason I bring up the issue about going to Israel is that Look, there's a conflict happening.
It's been happening for a long time.
Between Israel, Palestine, the Arab world, whatever side you fall on, there are people who are very heated in terms of their political position on this.
I am not one who knows nearly enough to get involved in what any of this means.
But I can say that even if you are in a position where you want to see your grandmother, uh, like Rashida Tlaib, I think the way she went about it is not making anything better.
It's actually making everything worse.
If her goal was to bring peace, then everything she's done has actually hurt that process.
And so that's what we'll talk about today.
And I want to start by going, uh, just going straight to the statement from the Israeli interior minister.
Now I can't read Hebrew and the translation is pretty bad, but we have Jake Sherman, who's Politico playbook, NBC News, MSNBC, who tweeted out,
from the Israeli interior minister, quote, I authorized this humanitarian trip,
but it turns out that it was a provocation to embarrass Israel.
Her hatred for Israel overcomes her love for her grandmother.
And there is a lot of criticism from the right saying that she would much rather take an
ideological stance and reject something she just asked for to make a point instead of
going and visiting her family.
But I do think it's fair to point out, while I do think it's kind of weird that she would ask to go and then deny it, They wanted stipulations.
You can't, you know, advocate for the boycott against Israel, and she said she wouldn't, but then later changed her mind.
And I think it's always fair to point out, you know, whatever her initial position was, she's refusing to bend the knee.
It's complicated, but I think it's fair to point out that perspective.
That she says she doesn't want to remain silent, and that's kind of a stipulation, so she rejected that outright.
It does say, however, that her political or ideological stance on the conflict Is more important than her going to visit her grandmother.
You can think that's a good or a bad thing.
I'm not saying you should have an opinion.
I'm just letting you know, like, that is fairly apparent.
So let's do this.
I have the Daily Wire pulled up, but I do have a bunch of other sources I want to go through and kind of break down how I... I do sort of come down on the side that I think they were trying to prove a point with everything they did.
And one of the things that leads me to believe this is, in an itinerary that was published, Uh, for their trip, they didn't say they were going to Israel, they said they were going to Palestine, even though their trip included going to parts of Israel.
In which case, it seems like they were making a direct political jab at Israel with this trip, so it's no surprise then they're getting, you know, they're not being, they weren't allowed in.
The whole thing is complicated, okay?
So I wanted to make sure I hit that point with the Israeli minister.
Let's read the story.
But as you know, we're talking about Israel-Palestine.
We're going to be deranked, demonetized here.
So if you want to support my work, go to TimCast.com slash donate.
There's a PayPal option, a crypto option, a physical address.
But of course, the best thing you can do is just share this video because Of all the things you can't talk about, Israel-Palestine is probably one of them.
And I know I'm probably going to get heat from people on the left and the right of this issue, very pro-Israel people, very pro-Palestine people.
Every time I talk about this, I get inundated with messages about how I'm right, about how I'm wrong, about how I'm wrong no matter what I talk about.
And I have very pro-Palestine people on the left who come at me saying I have no idea what I'm talking about.
And I'm just like, listen, I know.
I'm not trying to weigh in on which side is better or worse or anything like that.
But I will stress, don't be surprised if you get the boot, your fused entry into Israel because you called it Palestine, on multiple occasions, and you promote a movement which wants to boycott, divest, and sanction Israel, which is not, look, There is one Jewish state in this world, and it is within conflict.
So it's a complicated issue.
Let's go through the news, because I don't want to get too far without actually providing you the context.
From the Daily Wire, Israel grants Rashida Tlaib's request to visit the country.
She declines.
They report Rashida Tlaib announced on Friday that she would not be traveling to the State of Israel only hours after the Israeli government approved her special request to visit her family in the West Bank.
She said, My city wants to pick figs with me.
I broke down reading this and worry every single day after I won for my family's safety.
My cousin was texting me which photo of Omar and I they should put on a welcoming poster when I heard the news.
I couldn't tell her.
But she was approved.
She says, when I won, I gave the Palestinian people hope that someone will finally speak
the truth about the inhumane conditions, she continued. I can't allow the state of Israel
to take away that light by humiliating me and use my love for my city to bow down to their
oppressive and racist policies. Now, here's the thing. She actually sent a letter. And so this
is what I find very confusing. And I'm trying to be as delicate as possible. So please understand.
She sent a letter saying, please let me visit my family.
Israel said yes.
Now, I do think it's- we're in a difficult position where she has to go to Israel in the first place to then try and go to the West Bank, but you've got to understand the reality of a conflict that's been longstanding for decades, and I'm not saying one side's right or wrong, but this is the situation.
Alright?
I don't know what to tell you, and I'm not a scholar on these issues, so if you want to make a political point and reject them saying, by all means, go visit your family, you're free to do so.
Here's what we have from Noah Landau of, uh, they say they're covering Netanyahu for, uh, Harrots.
Breaking!
Israel's interior minister just approved Rashida Tlaib's petition to enter Israel on humanitarian grounds to visit her Palestinian grandmother at the West Bank.
She had to promise not to promote BDS during the visit.
And we have this image.
It's actually quite hard to see.
So I'll zoom in a little bit.
It says, Rashida Tlaib wrote this letter to the Honorable Aryeh Derry, Minister of the Interior.
I would like to request admittance to Israel in order to visit my relatives, and specifically my grandmother, who is in her 90s and lives in Beit Ur al-Foquah.
I'm sorry, I can't pronounce it right.
This could be my last opportunity to see her.
I will respect any restrictions and will not promote boycotts against Israel during my visit.
Whether or not you think she should or shouldn't be allowed to do that, I actually lean towards I think she should be allowed to speak.
I absolutely do.
I understand Israel is in a conflict, and I understand... You know, this is why I brought up initially that there are many countries that ban you from entering if you've ever been to Israel.
It's not black or white.
It's nuanced, and Israel is trying to do its best to protect itself.
There's a lot to criticize Israel for.
I believe in free speech, absolutely.
I don't mean like an absolute free speech.
You know, I believe there are certain restrictions for sure.
But I think she should have been let in and let her come and let her speak and challenge it and prove it.
But I'm not Israel, okay?
And I'm not Israeli, so I don't know what's best for them.
I just lean more towards let people express themselves.
But however, Rashida Tlaib said she was going to, you know, not talk about BDS.
She just wanted to see her family.
And Israel said, no problem.
Well then we get this story.
Tlaib cancels trip after Israel says she can come visit grandmother.
Congresswoman, I can't allow the state of Israel to take away that light by humiliating me and use my love for my city to bow down to their oppressive and racist policies.
You know, look, I respect that some people can change their mind, and that she initially agreed to it and then changed her mind, but I gotta say, I kind of feel like she assumed they were gonna say no.
Like, they were gonna reject her outright, and then she'd be able to be like, look, they won't let me see my city, you know?
I think I'm pronouncing that right.
Because then as soon as they agree, she goes, no, I will not bow.
It's like, well, you sent the letter already.
Like, you agreed, we're gonna go visit your family.
And I also think, Whether or not you think it's good or bad, she's erring on the side of ideology and the political fight versus going and seeing her family.
I really do think you can see your family and maintain your integrity and honor, and I actually think she could have made a point about this after the fact.
So I kind of don't understand her mentality, and that's why I think in the end everything that Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib have done has been to the detriment of what's happening in Israel and Palestine.
If she had gone, visited her family, and then came back and said that the only way she was able to see her grandmother was to agree to speech restrictions, and that in order to get to the West Bank, she had to go through Israel, that would have been a powerful point.
Instead, this is why I feel like she had no intention of actually going in the first place.
It really does feel like it was, some people have called it a publicity stunt.
I think I'm trying to be delicate again.
Publicity stunt, whatever you want to call it, I think it was about highlighting some political situation.
I don't think her intention was to go there and legitimately visit Israel and then visit Palestine, and there's a lot of reasons why that may be the case.
James J. Zogby said this is both heartbreaking and infuriating.
Rashida Tlaib will not be traveling to occupied Palestinian lands.
The humiliating treatment she received is dealt out by Israel to Arab Americans who travel attempt to enter and to Palestinians every single day.
Will Congress act?
Now, this is a statement from Rashida Tlaib where we have the gist of it.
She said, you know, she... To be fair, let's actually read it, okay?
So it's for immediate release from Congresswoman Tlaib's statement to Palestine-Israel.
She said, In my attempt to visit Palestine, I've experienced the same racist treatment that many Palestinian Americans endure when encountering the Israeli government.
In preparation for my visit, my grandmother was deciding which fig tree we would pick from together.
While Palestinians and Israelis who are against the illegal military occupation were looking forward to members of Congress finally listening to and seeing them for the first time, the Israeli government used my love and desire to see my grandmother to silence me and made my ability to do so contingent upon my signing a letter.
Reflecting just how undemocratic and afraid they are of the truth, my trip would reveal about what is happening in the state of Israel and to Palestinians living under occupation, with United States support.
I have therefore decided to not travel to Palestine and Israel at this time.
Visiting my grandmother under these oppressive conditions meant to humiliate me would break my grandmother's heart.
Silencing me with treatment to make me feel less than is not what she wants from me.
It would kill a piece of me that always stands up against racism and injustice.
She then goes on to make statements, which I have gone through in the past.
But here's the thing.
Let's talk about good faith versus bad faith.
In the culture war, we often hear that people are operating in bad faith.
That's all they ever say.
They accuse me of operating in bad faith, and I am milquetoast, fence-sitter, tepid, lukewarm, all of these things.
And I'm like, I don't, I'm not even here, like, I've actually provided defense to Tlaib's position.
She doesn't want to bow to Israel in order to visit her grandmother.
I kind of disagree with how she's going about it, don't necessarily trust her.
I think it may be an instance of bad faith.
And now I'll show you exactly why.
In this post from Harry Kachatrian, he says, according to their own itinerary, Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib chose to refer to Israel as Palestine.
Their trip there was little more than a self-indulgent ploy to delegitimize and malign the Jewish state from within its borders.
Well, I'm not gonna make any, you know, I'm not gonna justify his opinion following the statement.
I will point out, according to this, assuming it's true, I mean, he's a verified DailyWire contributor, US congressional delegation to Palestine, August 18th to the 22nd, tentative agenda.
Assuming this is their actual agenda, yeah, they said they were planning to visit Palestine with their arrival being to Tel Aviv.
I understand that you have to go through Israel for this to happen.
But I think it's not... Look, man, there is a conflict happening.
No one is happy about what's happening.
You've got people on both sides who are very much at odds.
You've got organizations that are digging tunnels into Israel.
They're being captured with weapons.
You've got Israel retaliating and doing airstrikes in Palestine.
It is not a simple circumstance.
Certainly, putting out an itinerary that calls Israel Palestine is the opposite of building peace and trying to solve this problem.
So, that's why I err on the side of, I really do not see this as genuine.
It seems like they wanted Israel to put up roadblocks, they wanted this to happen, they got what they wanted, and now they can point the finger and blame Israel.
And look.
There's a couple other things I'll go through.
But come on, man.
You know, I understand there's a conflict, but doing things like this does not solve the problem.
This story from January.
Israel relabeled as Palestine on map in Rashida Tlaib's office.
And this was, this is from forward.com, this was considered controversial.
A change was made to the map.
Let me zoom in a little bit.
A change was made to the map in Rashida Tlaib's office the day she was sworn into Congress.
A post-it note smacked next to Israel pointing to Palestine.
Tlaib of Michigan, a Palestinian-American, was one of the first two Muslim women to take her seat in the house, and she shared her heritage proudly.
She took her oath on a special Quran, a 1734 English translation that belonged to Thomas Jefferson.
That's incredible, by the way.
That is absolutely incredible.
Thomas Jefferson, for all the faults of the past, Was a very, very great individual.
And the fact that he had a Qur'an just shows that he was open-minded and intelligent.
I gotta say, I'm really inspired by the fact that she was able to swear an oath on a special Qur'an that belonged to Thomas Jefferson.
That's awesome stuff, right?
America is amazing.
I'm just gonna leave it there.
Not a day goes by that's not something about America that I find truly inspirational.
Granted, there's things that Chris has America for, but that's awesome, man.
And wore a red embroidered thobe, a traditional Palestinian gown.
She has been vocal about her support of the BDS movement against Israel.
Despite her views, she didn't stick the note on her map.
Among her entourage, a Palestinian-American comedian, Mo Amr, saw the map and added the post-it note.
I'm trying to make sure—you know, forward, my understanding is quite progressive.
This has been very controversial.
I want to make—I'm trying to be delicate.
I'll say it for the third time.
She didn't do this, but—right?
It's an issue of is—you know, how she goes about these things, and in the photos where, you know, they have this Is everything being done to try and solve the problem?
And I think the answer is no.
I think what's happening is things are actually being made worse.
You know, if you're gonna put out an itinerary, again, assuming this is real, that refers to Israel as Palestine, well, you're literally, like, taking a hard ideological stance in a situation that is absurdly delicate and is, like, every couple of years there's a massive military conflict between, you know, Gaza, the West Bank, and Israel.
And there's a lot to criticize Israel for.
Conservatives know this, and it's amazing to me that I've seen videos from conservatives where they point out the bad things that Israel does.
The West Bank settlements is the most notable.
But what they're going about doing, the statements she's putting out, look, I can absolutely respect refusing to bend the knee.
100% I respect that.
So Rashida Tlaib, you have my respect.
I believe you have a right to speak.
I don't believe you should have been barred.
If somebody wants to talk about BDS, fine.
At the same time, Israel is going to do what Israel thinks is right, and especially when you recognize there are a ton of countries that will ban you for simply going there.
There is no simple solution to this, and I just see this whole thing as bad for the entirety of it.
I have no idea what to say to anybody to be like, how can we solve this problem and get people to live peacefully?
Because there are absolutely dozens of countries that want Israel to be eradicated.
And that's not a solution.
Genocide is not a solution.
The obliteration of the Israeli state is not a solution.
So I don't know what to tell you.
I will say, all of this just comes off as, in my opinion, bad faith and making things worse.
Ocasio-Cortez chimed in the other day, saying, Netanyahu's discriminatory decision to ban members of Congress from Israel harms international diplomacy.
Visiting Israel and Palestine are key experiences towards a path to peace.
Sadly, I cannot move forward with scheduling any visits to Israel until all members of Congress are allowed to.
Well, it would make sense if you want to go to Israel if you referred to it as such.
Look, man, I have worked on stories where we are trying to plan a trip into Gaza, and it is incredibly difficult because of the Israeli government.
I understand.
Like, I get it.
It is a conflict.
There are people who are, you know, there's a video the other day I think of somebody trying to stab a cop or something.
We see these stories.
It is not an easy situation.
Oftentimes, You know, I feel like the only reason the sentiment is so harshly anti-Israel is because Israel receives support from the U.S.
and is more powerful, right?
The conflict didn't start with Israel just dominating everything, but right now Israel has the defense, they have the Iron Dome, they have support, they have financing.
They have technological development.
They produce a lot of, I believe, like logistical weapons support kind of stuff, technologies.
And this gives them a major advantage in this conflict.
I don't know how to tell you who's right or wrong in any war.
You've got ideologies on both sides.
I really don't.
I can tell you that when you have certain groups hole up in schools or hospitals and then fire rockets into Israel, you know, going over Tel Aviv, you're not solving any problems.
I don't know what the goal there is other than to make things worse.
And then Israel retaliates.
And you see these memes.
And I got like, man, let this be like my Tim Pool centrist opinion time on what I see when trying to deal with what's happening with the Israel-Palestine conflict.
People on the left will show comics and memes of a little rocket fizzling out and crashing, and then the IDF just dropping a barrage of bombs, making it seem like it was so disproportionate and unfair that Israel retaliated in this way.
Maybe.
I'm not saying it's not.
You'll see on the right, they'll show cameras pointed at Israel when the rockets start flying in from Gaza, The cameras are like pointed down, and then the camera points up as soon as Israel fires back.
So it's like, look, I don't know what the solution is.
I can tell you this.
Referring to Israel as Palestine, asking to visit your family, and then immediately turning around and rejecting it, these are not things that are going to make anything better.
And so I'm not surprised that you've got harsh criticism from conservatives towards Rashida Tlaib over how she handled this.
I can respect her refusal to bend the knee.
You know, people who are Palestinian, she should have a right to visit her family in the West Bank, and she should be allowed to speak.
I believe freedom of speech is a universal right, so I disagree with Israel on this one.
100%.
Well, I shouldn't say 100% because I recognize, man, I don't know enough about what's going on, but I do believe she should—let her in, man.
You know, it's complicated.
I know a lot of conservatives disagree, you know, putting out pieces saying they were absolutely right to bar her, There, the BDS would be the destruction of the Israeli state and all that stuff.
I'll admit...
My position is fairly left-liberal, left-libertarian spectrum.
And that means I recognize that this is hard mode in life, the hardest political position.
Because I recognize if I'm going to respect free speech, it's going to be for someone who's going to be preaching about things that would be harmful to Israel.
And I know that Israel is dealing with all of these countries that want to blow it off the face of the planet.
So Israel has to put a limit, you know?
I disagree.
And it's one of the biggest ethical, moral, and philosophical conundrums I've experienced.
Because you see these memes put out, these comics, where they're like, you can't tolerate intolerance.
And they say, when you tolerate intolerance—there's that comic, I don't know if you've seen it, talking about Nazis, where it says if you tolerate the intolerant, Eventually they take over and then you lose tolerance and I'm like man that just it's just not it doesn't make sense look I do understand that Israel is trying to not give a space to anyone who would advocate for its destruction I saw a story the other day that Europe parts of Europe or like certain jurisdictions are gonna start labeling Israeli products And I'm like that is a horrible idea Wow don't put like the Israeli flag on a product Wow that's just no I don't have that pulled up so take it with a grain of salt fact check me on that one
But I will stress, I understand if they allow her to go in and preach BDS and go to Palestine, it could make things worse.
But I believe in free speech and I believe Israel has to uphold freedom and liberty to be that symbol in the Middle East and prove that they are worth, you know, having their rights, their freedom, their existence by saying, we'll let you speak.
But you know what?
I'll end with this final thought, because I'm surprised I was able to talk about this as long as I did.
I really, really just don't know enough, man.
I'm not an expert.
I understand things are complicated.
It's hard to know for sure what the right thing to do is.
I understand that Rashida Tlaib has her family, basically, in a place that's very difficult for her to get to.
And if I wanted to go visit my family, and I was told I could visit them so long as I don't say X, Y, or Z, I'll tell you what I'd do.
I would say, OK, recognizing the power structure in place, I would go visit my family, I'd give them hugs, I'd leave, and then I would blast the policy and say, it is absurd that I had to do that, that I had to do – but family comes first, you know, for the most part.
Like, there's certain circumstances.
So I'll leave it there.
There's gonna be a lot of criticism for her.
I'm seeing it from a lot of people on the right that she puts her ideology above her family.
I think that's actually what the statement was from the Israeli interior minister.
Her hatred for Israel overcomes her love for her grandmother.
But you could frame it that way, or we can just say it plain and simple.
She does believe in the ideology and her political fight more than she cares about seeing her family.
I'll tell you this now.
People on the left probably are saying that's amazing that she's willing to take that sacrifice and not see her grandmother to stand up for what she believes in.
And there are going to be people on the right who are going to be saying, how could you turn your back on your family over political squabbling?
You could have gone and seen them and come out later.
I don't know what to tell you, man.
I'll leave it there.
Stick around.
Next segment will be coming up at youtube.com slash timcastnews at 6 p.m.
Thanks for hanging out, and I will see you all there.
Facebook basically admits they're spying on you.
Sort of.
A lot of people seem to think that whenever they talk near their phone, the audio is being captured and then sent to Facebook, who uses that for ads.
That's not true.
But, there are circumstances in which, without prompting your phone or your Amazon device or Google device or whatever, they will capture what you say, they will save it, you can't do anything about it, you don't even know who has it.
So I'll stress this.
First, the story we have from Forbes.
Facebook just gave 1.3 billion Messenger users a reason to delete their accounts.
Well, it's a very nicely editorialized headline, but I can't disagree, which is why I decided to use it.
Ultimately, what they find is that Facebook hired contractors to listen to what people were saying and transcribe it for their messenger service.
It's actually kind of complicated, but I've covered this story years ago in, I believe it was winter of 2014.
So let me just make it really simple before we get into the bulk of the story.
When you call out your device, so let's say you've got the Amazon, Google, or whatever, right?
Or your phone.
Apple has the Hey Siri, Google has, like, OK Google or whatever.
How does it know you're saying what needs to be said?
How does your device translate your speech into words?
It's actually kind of simple.
What you say is recorded, sent to a third-party company that runs the data through its server, which transcribes it and sends the information back to your phone.
In the circumstances now, we've come to understand Facebook had human beings doing it, which means there are people listening to what you say.
So you could be saying, you know, private jokes, you could be saying things, but here's the crazy thing is, it's recording you all the time.
Listen, here's the thing.
There was a period where if you wanted to activate your Android phone, you had to go into settings and you had to say, OK, Google, three times.
That was because it was trying to copy the unlock sound.
It didn't know what you were saying.
So you could have pressed it.
And my understanding is, in some circumstances, you could have said whatever the hell you wanted.
It tells you to say, OK, Google.
You could have said anything.
Because it's just listening to a wave pattern and looking to find a similar pattern.
And that activates the actual speech which gets sent, the actual recording device.
Now when it comes to like Amazon for instance, everything you say is going into that device.
At least this is my understanding, okay?
Everything you say is going into the device and then once their AI over the internet determines you've said the right phrase, It kicks back on, which is why it actually records just before you actually say its name.
It's interesting, isn't it?
Let's read this story and figure out what Facebook is doing, but Mark Zuckerberg is being called out by a senator saying, at best, his testimony is incomplete after this news breaks.
So, surprise, surprise.
Look, man, these companies are spying on you.
Not the way you think.
Let's get into the news.
Before we get started, Head over to TimCast.com slash Donate if you'd like to support my work.
There is a PayPal option, a crypto option, a physical address, but of course, just share this video if you like it.
YouTube is deranking independent political commentary.
It's probably going to get worse.
I don't know what the long-term viability of YouTube is going to be, but if you decide to share the video, it breaks that hurdle.
I gotta say, like, The view metrics for my channels are very different, and it shows that there is a deranking going on.
So if people don't share, then that's just like a downward trend.
And maybe it won't last forever, but for now, here we are.
So let's read the news.
Facebook has just become the latest big tech firm to confirm that external contractors are listening to audio of users' private conversations, according to a Bloomberg report.
Facebook has hired the contractors to listen in to users taking advantage of the audio
to text functionality in its messenger service.
The affected users had opted in to having their messenger chats transcribed, the firm
said.
However, Facebook messenger users might not have known this was going to be done by humans
who were tasked with transcribing conversations to assess the accuracy of the tool.
Now, that makes sense.
Why wouldn't you realize they're going to do this?
You know, even if, I guess the issue is people assume it's happening on your phone.
They assume, like, put your phone in airplane mode, try.
It won't work.
People assume their phone does.
It doesn't.
Your recording of your voice is sent to a computer that stores it.
They say, Facebook policies are not explicit.
Simply stating, we collect the content, communications, and other information you provide when you use our products, including when you sign up for an account, create or share content, and message or communicate with others.
They say, Thankfully, Facebook said it had paused the practice over a week ago after finding out Google and Apple had stopped their use of human reviewers.
Lo and behold, everyone's doing it.
A Facebook spokesperson says, much like Apple and Google, we paused human review of audio more than a week ago.
Oh, more than a week ago!
So this story is from Ars Technica.
Apple and Google temporarily stop listening to Siri and OK Google queries.
Now this is interesting.
This is from just about two weeks ago.
Apple will eventually resume human reviews, but only if customers opt in.
So let's read a little bit about this so we can understand why it's happening.
They say, Apple workers have stopped listening to Siri queries worldwide, the company said this week.
Apple plans to bring back human reviews of Siri voice recordings at some unspecified date, but the company said it will only review them when customers specifically opt into the practice.
How many times have they said they don't listen?
And now it's just coming out like, oh, by the way, you know how they weren't spying on you?
They were, but now they're stopping.
So, let's read.
Apple's decision to stop having humans listen to Siri queries follows a report last week that contractors who review the recordings for accuracy heard private discussions and even sexual encounters.
Congratulations!
Someone's listening to you have special time with your special person.
Apple calls the human reviews of Siri recordings grating.
We are committed to delivering a great Siri experience while protecting user privacy, Apple told ours and other news organizations.
While we conduct a thorough review, we are suspending Siri grading globally.
Additionally, as part of a future software update, users will have the ability to choose to participate in grading.
Of which, who would?
Like, who's, like, I've got, I've got the Amazon thing sitting right over there.
It's recording everything I'm saying.
It's not necessarily recording it, it's at least listening and sending that data off.
Because it doesn't know when I give it the command phrase.
Think about that.
If it needs the internet to decipher the words you say, how would it know you told it to wake up in the first place?
Now, it's possible they've stored a little bit of data, but I don't think that's the case.
I've looked into this.
This practice has been going on since at least 2014.
I made a video going through the Terms of Service and showing how they say, we will record what you say and store it.
And they say, like, oh, no, no, no, we're not spying on you.
Yes, semantics.
You're not spying.
We're grading.
It's different.
Google Paused Reviews Globally.
A German investigation into Google began after a Google contractor leaked a thousand voice recordings to VRT, NWS, a news organization run by a public broadcaster in the Flemish region of Belgium.
They say that they reviewed the recordings and was able to identify some of the people who were recorded.
They also said that 153 of the 1,000 recordings I listened to were conversations that should never have been recorded and during which the command OK Google was clearly not given.
That's the point I'm making.
How do... like...
Because it's listening, waiting for you to say, okay, Google, turn on.
So if you don't say it, it still records everything you're saying.
Welcome to the future.
Shortly after we learned about this leak, the leaking of confidential Dutch audio data, we paused language reviews of the assistant to investigate.
This paused reviews globally.
Google previously told ours that you must opt in to have your audio recordings stored to your account, and voice and audio activity is not required to use- We're living in a nightmare dystopia!
Can I- You know, like, come on, man.
How many times have they said they're not spying, they're not listening?
They are!
And now when they get caught, they're like, oh, uh, ooh, yeah, we're gonna pause that.
It's like, why were you doing it in the first place, man?
Look, I got my phone right here, I've got my Amazon device, I've got a webcam, camera, I'm sure all of it's going somewhere.
At least the two connected devices.
So, Senator Gary Peters asked Facebook's CEO to respond to questions about the company's audio collection practices following a report that revealed Facebook used outside contractors to transcribe user audio.
And let me just stress, look man, if you don't care that Facebook's listening to what you say, I don't care either.
It's your choice.
But they're giving it to third parties.
I gotta stress, man, you might be on a call with your mom, you might be talking about something really embarrassing, and then all of a sudden it gets leaked to the news, because that's what happened with Google.
And then what do you think's gonna happen when you get some politically ideological journalist, or reporter, or tech person, and they're thinking like, ooh, we're gonna get this person.
We're gonna ruin this person.
Think about all of the ideologues who would love to get a private conversation that proves something.
Peters claimed in a letter that, if true, the report proves Zuckerberg's 2018 congressional testimony was, at best, incomplete.
Oh, can we call it a lie?
At that hearing, I asked you specifically if Facebook uses audio obtained from mobile devices to enrich personal information about its users.
Your emphatic answer was no.
Peters wrote in a letter dated August 15.
Your exact words to me were, you're talking about this conspiracy theory that gets passed around that we're listening to what's going on on your microphone and use that for ads.
We don't do that.
semantics for ads.
That is the qualifier.
Imagine if someone said something to you like, did you steal the cookie from the cookie jar?
And your response was, you know, you're asking me that if I stole a cookie from the cookie
jar so that I could hide it under my bed, the answer is a resounding no.
I didn't answer whether or not I stole the cookies.
I answered whether or not I was hiding cookies under my bed.
You see what he did here?
He wasn't asked about this.
Sleazy, sleazy alien boy Zuckerberg.
And this is why we cannot trust major tech corporations to control our speech.
You see this game he played?
He was asked specifically, are you collecting audio from mobile devices to enrich personal information?
He injects four ads and is able to lie to, I believe it was the Senate.
Yeah, Senator.
Gary Peters.
That's how you do it.
Very, very clever.
Did you steal the cookie from the cookie jar?
I did not steal the cookie from the cookie jar for ads.
Just for ads.
Just add that word, and all of a sudden it changes the meaning of everything you said.
You didn't lie.
Because then either you're saying you did steal it, but it wasn't for ads, or maybe you didn't steal it, I don't know, maybe you're admitting it.
The point is, you see what he did?
He called it a conspiracy theory, and then said for ads, and walks around the question.
Look at that.
Gary Peters even tweeted out the exchange.
During the testimony, Zuckerberg appeared to be referencing a longstanding theory that Facebook records audio to target users with ads.
Facebook said that the audio transcriptions referenced in the Bloomberg story were anonymized and used to check that its artificial intelligence accurately understood the messages.
Which makes sense.
But you should tell people explicitly that you are taking what they say and keeping it stored for this purpose.
Instead, what we often get is, Facebook will be collecting data to improve its service.
When he was asked, are you collecting data to enrich personal information about users, he changes the subject.
And that's on you, Senator, I gotta admit.
You should have immediately said, I didn't ask you about ads.
Are you collecting audio from your users, period?
Answer the question.
Yes or no?
And then let Mark Zuckerberg answer.
Instead, we got weasel words.
In response to a request for comments on Peter's letter, a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement to CNBC,
the meme that Facebook is eavesdropping on your phone in the background is absolutely false.
Mark's statements on this were true when he said them.
They're doing it again. They're doing it. These people are slime.
What he said was true.
You're right, four ads.
It's true.
This meme.
That wasn't what you were asked about, you slimy sleazebags.
You never see me call people names, but this is the epitome of corrupt corporate slimeballs who are recording your conversations, sending them to third parties without telling you explicitly, and then when asked about it, they dance around with weasel words.
It has always been the case that Facebook only accesses your microphone if you have given our app permission, and if you are actively using a specific feature that requires audio.
It has also always been true that Facebook does not use your phone's microphone to inform ads.
Nobody asked you about that, you slime bags.
You know what, man?
I don't know how often I have to say it, but these companies are trash.
They are dirt.
They are evil.
This is evil.
They are being asked specifically about a problem facing Americans by American politicians and by a news outlet to better understand if these companies are recording what you say and storing that and instead they say, no one is recording what you say and storing it for ads.
It is a conspiracy to believe that at any point YouTube will spy on what you say for ads.
You see how they play the game?
These people need to be broken up or something.
I don't know.
If the government can't do anything about it because our politicians aren't apt, then I don't know what to say.
But we're living in the nightmare.
Facebook is doing this, and they are slimy weasels who will not give you a straight answer.
For ads.
You see that?
You see how the game is played?
I wonder how much you could actually take this beyond the realm of defamation.
Mark Zuckerberg is an alien in video games.
Mark Zuckerberg is a violent predator in my video game that I made.
You see how the game is played?
There's actually a pundit who will make calls for violence, and then after he does, say, in a video game.
That's the game. That is the game. Semantics.
That's what they're doing.
Mark Zuckerberg is an evil, awful, disgusting man in a video game I made.
In a story that I wrote.
You see how the game is played?
This is why I hate everything.
It's all fake.
Everything's fake.
I talk about this a lot.
It's probably my biggest pet peeve.
You know when a spokesperson speaks, it's fake.
You know when a politician steps up and speaks, it's fake.
It's all fake.
It's all lies.
And that's what really bothers me about the whole Trump thing.
They're like, Trump is a liar!
And I'm like, I don't care!
So are you!
So are they!
The whole game is played by people who lie all day and all night, and we put on this facade, pretending like we're better than we really are, instead of admitting when we screw up and being honest about the problems we are facing.
The President comes out and lies.
Of course he does.
Obama did.
Bush did.
You know, Trump just talks too much.
So, like, you know, I was talking to my friends and I said, if Trump never tweeted and shut his mouth, they wouldn't call him a liar because he wouldn't be talking.
You know what I mean?
Basically, the point I'm making is, Obama lied.
But Obama didn't talk that much.
You know, I think Trump is much less honest than Obama, to be fair.
Not that I'm a fan of Obama.
But I just get really annoyed when the media is like, Trump has lied 3,968 times!
And it's like, yeah, and how many statements did Obama make relative to Trump?
Trump tweets non-stop.
Not only that, why is that surprising to anyone that somebody giving a public statement about an issue would be at least misleading about it?
That's what they're doing.
You know what, I can say it though.
This is a lie in essence.
Facebook was specifically asked about a basic practice of recording audio and they changed the subject for ads.
That's what they've done.
For ads.
That's the game and that's how it's played.
I'm sick and tired of all of this.
Wouldn't it be great if you just had a politician step up and say, Oh, um, you know, first of all, obviously, there's some things we can't talk about publicly.
There's confidentiality, there's top secret.
But wouldn't it be great if, like, there was a scandal, somebody got fired, and they said, uh, we fired, you know, the, uh, my chief, like, let's imagine if Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez came out and said, Sycat Chakrabarty got fired because, you know, things were getting a bit tumultuous.
The conflict between him and other politicians was just bad for our mission and our strategy.
We don't think he's a bad guy.
We just think that it was ultimately bad for everybody that these fights were happening.
If the Democrats are going to win, we have to be unified.
And so while we wish him the best, that's just how things panned out.
Instead, what do we get?
He was great.
He just had to move on to go work for climate change.
Yeah, no, we know what happened, dude.
Why are we playing this game?
Why can't someone just be honest?
You know, and that's why it's really funny.
The Intercept wrote a story about Trump being simultaneously the most honest and dishonest president.
Because they said Trump just blurts out really honest things.
Like, uh, he said something like, We're gonna do this weapons deal with Saudi Arabia because it's gonna be great for our military contractors.
And all the anti-war left went, He just said it!
He just, he's blurted it out!
And that's why, you know, I tweeted, Bernie Sanders said on the Joe Rogan podcast, if there are aliens, he'll tell us about it.
Dude, if there were aliens, Trump would be tweeting like crazy.
You'd think that guy, he wouldn't hold back, he'd be like, there are aliens, that's, oh man, I didn't know.
You know, so, there is something refreshing in that Trump will just say things, like, without this facade and decorum.
And it's also true that Trump will say things that are incorrect, misleading, or often lie.
Not that I'm going to be the moral arbiter here, because I think the media plays that game too much, and I try to avoid that.
Look, man, I have my criticisms of Trump as the president, but I don't think you need to hear me rant about what the media does non-stop, 24-7.
So I'll get my criticisms in for sure, like most people will, but I think if we're being honest, we have to recognize that the intercept, the left-wing intercept, recognizes Trump that he lies a lot, but he also just blurts out the truth more than anyone we've ever seen.
And so it creates this weird circumstance where a lot of people really do feel that Trump is the most honest, and a lot of people feel like he is the least honest.
But I gotta say, it's not one or the other.
You know, the fact that—I gotta call out that moment where Trump just straight up was like, we gotta do this weapons deal with Saudi Arabia to benefit our military contractors.
You know, so taking care of threats like ISIS and Al Qaeda.
It's like, yeah, okay, dude, we get it.
You want to sell, you want to make money, it's good for the economy.
Trump just said it.
It's like, wow!
So I gotta admit, while I don't think everything Trump says is honest, for sure, it is refreshing to hear that blatant, just straight up, and I think people recognize that, too.
I gotta admit.
Well, I'll say it again.
I think Trump lies, I think he's wrong, but I also think he just says, he blurts out the truth, you know, in equal parts.
And I gotta imagine that for some people, just hearing Trump say, man, that person's a scumbag, you know, piece of crap, aren't they?
And it's like, wow, finally someone just saying it.
And I gotta admit, like, I do like it, you know, because this is the stuff that really grinds my gears, man.
I'll end now.
Next segment will be coming up at 1pm on this channel.
Thanks for hanging out, and I will see you all next time.
Donald Trump wants to buy the island of Greenland from Denmark.
Denmark says we are good.
Quote, the thought of Denmark selling 50,000 citizens to the United States is completely ridiculous.
And now everybody jumps on this train mocking Trump about his idea that he wanted to buy Greenland.
And I'm just imagining a bunch of really stupid people, no matter what Trump does, pointing and laughing, going, he's so dumb, oh my god.
And it's like, listen, buying Greenland makes a ton of sense.
They're acting like Trump's insane for proposing the purchase of Greenland.
While it may be extremely complicated and extremely unlikely, if the U.S.
owned the territory of Greenland, that would be tremendous.
Now, global warming is a problem, but Iceland is rich in tons of resources, and it's being subsidized by Denmark.
In which case, exploring the possibility of the U.S.
acquisition of Greenland isn't insane.
It might be a long shot, but it's actually a really good idea.
And I feel like this is something we see all the time with the left.
Why?
Trump says something, and they all start jumping up and down, hooting and hollering like Trump said the craziest thing in the world.
No, I mean, like, literally, if Trump proposed buying any kind of territory, that's not unheard of.
The U.S.
bought Alaska!
Like, this makes—it can make sense.
Will it happen?
I don't know.
Is it a long shot?
Probably.
But Trump wanted to explore this.
Think about this story.
The story is that Trump asked some aides to explore a purchase of Greenland.
That's it!
That makes a ton of sense.
I'm sure Trump has explored a bunch of possibilities.
See, this is the problem I have with the current state of politics.
Stop making me defend him.
It is not out of the question for the U.S.
to try and explore the possibility.
Greenland is—it's got 50,000 people.
There's a complication there, sure, but tremendous resources.
It would also allow the U.S.
to establish a base in the Arctic Circle, or I don't know if we don't already have one, we might, but it would allow us direct and permanent access to the Northwest, presumably, the Northwest Passage.
I don't wanna act like I know everything about what's going on up there, but Arctic oil for sure.
So it sounds like it makes sense.
Yet here we go on Twitter, they're all laughing and like, Ha, Trump's so dumb, and it's like, dude, calm down, man.
It's just like, let's read the story.
And I chose Vice on purpose to have a good time.
Now, before we get started, make sure you head over to TimCast.com.
If you'd like to support my work, there's a PayPal option, a crypto option, a physical address.
But of course, the best thing you can do, just share this video.
YouTube de-ranks independent political commentary, and I really can see it.
Usually, it's the 6 p.m.
segments I do are just like, They get beat down.
And it's probably because they're all next to each other, so I get it.
But still, I can see the de-ranking happening.
But let's read the news from Vice.
Danish politicians responded to reports that Donald Trump was interested in buying the island of Greenland with a clear message.
Are you nuts?
The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that Trump has repeatedly expressed interest in the United States buying the world's largest island, a resource-rich, self-ruling territory of the Kingdom of Denmark.
The Journal reported that while Trump has made the inquiries with varying degrees of seriousness, he had asked White House counsel to look into the idea, and some of his advisors had said it made economic sense.
Yeah, notably the oil and the iron ore and I think there's like zinc and a bunch of other materials in a widely… Just sparse and open land.
It's not being utilized extensively.
My understanding is that Denmark is heavily subsidizing it.
There are a lot of people who live there.
I don't know what makes sense.
But it's like, why is it that these people in Europe are just, oh man, you know what?
It's just the snooty elitist arrogance I can't stand.
The people who think they're smarter than you and know better, instead of saying something like, I absolutely understand why anyone would want to acquire this land, but we have 50,000 citizens there, and even though we subsidize it, we're not going to give up our access to these resources.
It's just too bad.
Is that the reasonable response?
The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that Trump has repeatedly expressed interest, oh, I'm sorry, I read that already, but in Denmark, which has never signaled any intention of selling the Arctic Island, population 56,000, the notion was met with scorn and ridicule.
Why?
Greenland's Foreign Minister Anne Lone Bagger said Friday that the sale of the island wasn't up for discussion.
We are open for business, but we are not for sale.
Adja Chemnitz-Larsen, an MP from Greenland's Inuit Attack at Igit party.
I apologize.
Also thought the idea was a non-starter.
My immediate thought is no, thank you.
I mean, these are common rational responses, you know.
Søren Espersen, foreign affairs spokesman for the populist Danish People's Party, was scathing of the suggestion.
If he is truly contemplating this, then this is final proof that he has gone mad, he told public service broadcaster DR.
The thought of Denmark selling 50,000 citizens to the U.S.
is completely ridiculous, but let's be real here.
What would happen in the event of the sale of Greenland to the U.S.?
The citizens of Denmark who live in Greenland would retain their Danish citizenship and probably gain green card access or dual citizenship with the U.S.
I imagine that would be something considered any possible transfer of ownership of the island.
It's that simple.
And again, stressing, they say right here, Greenland relies on nearly $600 million of Danish economic support annually.
But we'll get to that.
They say, the thought of Denmark selling 50,000 citizens to the U.S.
is completely ridiculous.
The ice-covered, 811,000 square mile island is a self-ruling part of the Kingdom of Denmark, with its government legislating on domestic affairs, while foreign policy and security matters are handled by Copenhagen.
Okay, so that's why I wasn't sure in the beginning.
million, they say, the island is rich in natural resources like iron ore, zinc, and oil, which
are becoming more accessible as climate change melts Arctic ice.
It also occupies a geopolitically strategic location between the North Atlantic and Arctic
oceans.
Under the terms of a defense treaty with Denmark, Washington operates a major air base in northern
Greenland.
Okay, so that's why I wasn't sure in the beginning.
We do have a base there.
Which forms a critical part of the U.S.
Ballistic Missile Early Warning System.
As far-fetched as Trump's alleged ambitions toward Greenland might sound, they're not without precedent.
Good job, Vice!
Vice doing a good job essentially calling out the absurdity of these people who are making fun of Trump for entertaining this idea.
Check this out.
Back in 1946, President Harry Truman made an offer to Denmark of $100 million for Greenland, but it was knocked back.
1917, the U.S.
bought the Danish West Indies, now known as the U.S.
Virgin Islands, for 25 million, to counter the threat of them being seized and used as a submarine base by Germany.
The Danish government is yet to officially respond to the reports of Trump's interest, but if they want to talk Turkey with the self-described great dealmaker, Denmark's leaders will have ample opportunity next month when the U.S.
president makes his first official visit to the kingdom.
The sale of Greenland is not on the agenda for the visit.
And then, uh, I don't know, there's a video that's not loading.
But this, uh, the reason I wanted to talk about the story about Greenland is for one, I'm seeing a lot of people talk about it on Twitter, and I'm seeing, there's like, it's always this left-right divide.
Like, one of the biggest problems I have with the left has always been their snooty elitism.
They're ivory tower opinions about how they're smarter than you and they know it.
Reminds me of the movie Dodgeball.
You guys ever see this?
Where Ben Stiller's character has the commercial where he goes like, here at Globo Gym, we're better than you!
And that's the attitude I always feel like it's coming from people on the left.
You know, I looked at—if you go to, like, on Reddit, to the politics subreddit, it's supposed to be general politics, but it's basically just anti-Trump.
It's like the inversion of the Donald.
And I question why is this not being moderated more properly?
Why can't there be real discussion about politics?
Now, the Donald is quarantined, but politics isn't, and there's a lot of reasons.
I'm not going to get into that.
The point is, you go to the politics subreddit, They had a story there today about Anthony Scaramucci ragging on Trump.
And I know what I'm gonna see.
I click it, and it's a big... Okay, I'm gonna avoid... It's a big circle of people patting each other on the back.
We'll put it that way, for the kids.
And we'll avoid using the adult language.
They're praising Scaramucci, saying, you know, thank God he's calling out Trump.
It's like, dude, this is a guy who got fired in 10 days for launching a profanity-laced tirade against his fellow staff members.
Why would you think he'd praise the president?
He gets a job, he starts spitting and yelling, and then they fire him, so now he's talking smack about the president.
Yet they're gonna act like this guy is speaking truth?
No, he's a disgruntled employee.
Look, you don't have to like the president.
You don't have to like what he says.
But it's these ridiculous stories where I just imagine they're all like laughing to themselves about how smart they are that Trump entertained the idea of buying Greenland.
But yeah, Vice News reporting, we do have an air base there.
We've got a race for Arctic oil, and we've got a giant island full of tons of resources.
It's got 56,000 people.
That's making it a long shot.
I'd imagine it's a lot of people, but it's also not 100,000.
It's also not a million.
So if Trump comes out and says, what are the prospects of us buying Greenland?
Just entertaining the idea.
And then all of a sudden the media grabs onto this, they start hooting and hollering, putting out opinion pieces to capture the Trump bump where they can talk about how stupid Trump is for entertaining the idea of purchasing Greenland when it's been done in the past.
And that's what you see.
That's what I see, at least.
Where's the calm and rational discussion where we can say, like, oh, okay, I think it's a long shot.
I wonder what his thought process is.
That's it.
Is there really anything to talk about?
Instead, what do we get?
We get every little thing he does.
Actually, there's a video you should check out, and it's called something like Stop Making Me Defend Donald Trump.
And it sums up how I feel so often, that you'll hear people talking about something Trump's done, laughing about how stupid he is, about how the orange man is bad, and it's like, what are you talking about, man?
It's like, it's not that big a deal.
He said to some aides, can we buy Greenland?
Does that make sense?
For all we know, it was a couple comments in passing.
Maybe we heard, you know, I'll give you a sane and logical, rational scenario.
Someone comes to Trump and says, so we've got Russian ships moving through the Arctic
trying to claim this territory.
Canada has pushed back on Russia.
And then Trump says, how can we get ships in there to compete or push back on any threats
from Russia?
And then someone says, well, you know, we'll need some operating territory, Canada or Greenland.
And then Trump goes, Greenland.
How active is that?
Well, you know, it's being subsidized by Denmark, and then Trump says something like, is there a possibility we can purchase the island off Denmark?
And then somebody says, I'm not sure, you know, it makes economic sense, let's reach out.
And then all of a sudden it blows up on Twitter, and everyone's just like laughing about how smart they are up in their ivory tower.
They know better than all of you, and it may have just been a general inquiry.
I'm willing to bet Trump has asked about other things like this we don't know about, but doesn't it make sense?
Think about the proposition Hillary comes out with when they're talking about Julian Assange, and she goes, can't we just drone the guy?
Are you nuts?
Here's what's really funny.
The right dragged her over this, but the idea that she thought we could drone strike the Ecuadorian embassy in the UK, and then apparently it was like, oh, it was a joke.
Oh, was it?
Talking about buying Greenland makes sense, but everyone on Twitter is going to go, and they're going to laugh and point the finger.
Hillary Clinton talking about droning Assange and Ecuadorian embassy, the media doesn't care.
You know what?
You get the point.
Alright, I don't even know why I made a video about this.
It's just, it's like... There's some big stories happening right now.
The Rashida Tlaib thing is going viral on Twitter.
Meanwhile, there's some new breaking news about the Clinton email scandal.
And here I am, just confused as to why this is what people care about.
For the most part, I don't even know why they care about the Tlaib thing.
You know, it's like, I get it.
She's not gonna go to Israel.
It's a complicated thing.
I might do a video about it.
I might do that as the main segment because the Clinton email scandal, admittedly, is really complicated and I'm going to have to dig through this.
But, you know, I see this story and I question why anyone cares.
Like, you know, it reminds me of Fight Club, when the guy walks into Jack's office with a paper of the rules of Fight Club.
And then Jack, the main character, says, don't bring me every little piece of trash you happen to come across.
And that's how I feel about stories like this.
But here I am not making a video about it, so whatever.
Stick around.
Next segment will be at 4 p.m.
YouTube.com slash Timcast.
It is a different channel and I will see you there.
Katy Perry is having a bad Me Too moment.
Just a couple days ago, she was accused of pulling down a dude's pants, exposing him to her friends, in which many people refer to as sexual misconduct.
Now she's being accused again, this time from a woman, I believe.
Katy Perry has a history of this behavior.
There's a video where she grabs Shawn Mendes's butt.
There's a video where, actually it's not a video, it was American Idol, I think, where this dude says he's saving his first kiss, and she tells him to give him a kiss on the cheek, and then she kisses him on the lips, and that was absolutely in violation of his consent.
So yeah, Katy Perry has a history of this.
Now, interestingly, we'll read through this news, feminists are getting behind the pushback.
I mean, how do I say this?
Feminists are calling her out.
Writing, if you're a feminist, you have to take the allegations against Katy Perry seriously.
I think everybody should.
I don't think it's about if you're a feminist or not.
I think if she's gonna do this, she needs to be called out.
But unfortunately, in the media, often these stories are ignored.
So that's why it's actually interesting to see this is finally gaining traction.
So this is good social justice, to an extent, right?
Me, too, has done some good things calling out these sickos.
But there have also been innocent people falsely accused, or, you know, people have made mountains out of molehills, like with Aziz Ansari.
But there was that one guy, I can't remember his name, he's on the Talking Dead, I think it's called, something like that.
He was falsely accused, they did an investigation, he came back.
Neil deGrasse Tyson was accused by multiple women.
Turns out, nothing happened, they brought him back, so the investigations cleared him.
So there's been bad.
There's been a lot of good.
There's been a lot of bad.
But the media... I shouldn't say the media, but people need to get behind calling out people like Katy Perry, too.
You know, we had Terry Crews.
Terry Crews is awesome.
And he came out.
He had his Me Too moment saying that he was abused.
Well, now we've got the female abuser, Katy Perry.
We've seen her do it on camera, right?
So let's read this news and dig into the celebrity gossip and social justice.
Before we get started, head over to TimCast.com slash donate if you'd like to support my work.
There's a PayPal option, a crypto option, a physical address, but of course the best thing you can do is share this video because I've already said sexual misconduct and dead.
So that means this video's out.
Actually, someone commented on a past video that it was a really good idea to put a red X in the front of the title of every video that's demonetized.
I don't know how that would impact the algorithm, but I like the idea of, like, letting people know this is demonetized.
And I used to do something like that.
I'll put it in the description.
But anyway, because of that, that's why I always do the promo, like, support, share, otherwise I don't exist on this platform.
But let's read.
Just three days after her Teenage Dream co-star Josh Kloss came forward with accusations of sexual assault, another person has surfaced with her own story of misconduct at the hands of Katy Perry.
This time, a TV presenter and producer in the country of Georgia is claiming that the pop star harassed her at an industry party.
Tina Kandelaki alleges that Perry was heavily intoxicated when she touched her inappropriately and attempted to kiss her.
After openly rejecting her advances, Kandelaki claims that Perry was persistent and continued to behave inappropriately before eventually moving on.
There are no further details as to when this encounter could have taken place.
Kandelaki says that she was inspired to come forward after seeing Kloss speak out.
Kloss claimed that Perry pulled his pants under the party in 2010, exposing him to fellow partygoers.
Perry has not publicly addressed either accusation.
So this is from AV Club, which is, like, News Guard certified.
I don't know the veracity of these claims.
It's an accusation, and I'm very much so innocent until proven guilty.
Katy Perry has some catchy old pop songs, and, you know, so, you know, everybody knows who she is.
She's very famous.
And so I do recognize there are people who absolutely would like to point the finger and try and claw their way to the top by targeting high-profile individuals.
I also recognize MeToo has called out some really sick individuals who are very high profile and got away with it for a long time.
So the point is, I'm not here to make a determination, but I do believe in, right, I think the left goes way too far with the believe the victim, believe women, all that stuff, but I do, like, my standard is if someone makes an accusation, we take it seriously, we investigate, but if there's no evidence, what can we do?
So if these people are claiming she's done this, and we've seen her on video doing things like this, when she kissed that guy on the lips, when she grabbed Shawn Mendes' butt, well then, there is precedent, There are accusations, and I think we should take them seriously.
It's taking the accusations seriously that got us to target those awful people that were actually called out during Me Too.
So, Katy Perry may be one of them.
But I want to make sure I stress, even if feminists are getting behind calling her out, man, I really don't like the idea of destroying someone's reputation unless we can prove it, right?
And so I'm always very worried about this stuff because you do have false accusations.
We don't know where the second accusation is coming from.
The country of Georgia, hard to prove.
But now we have this story just from like an hour before I started recording.
If you're a feminist, you have to take the allegations against Katy Perry seriously.
And this is not even talking about the latest one, I don't think.
This is just talking about the three that I highlighted.
So, Victoria Gagliardo-Silver.
Sorry.
I pronounce everybody's names wrong.
I'm really bad.
But I will make this one point.
If you ever hear someone pronounce a word wrong, It means they learned it from reading.
So it's actually a good thing.
You should be complimented for it.
But let's read.
What happens when a famous woman is accused of the sexual misconduct that we've been taught to expect from powerful men?
In the aftermath of the Me Too and Time's Up movements, Katy Perry looks set to find out.
Yeah, I agree.
The singer faces allegations of sexual misconduct.
Tina Kondalovsky.
Oh, so she does.
A Russian journalist.
Interesting.
This is not the first time Perry has been accused of questionable sexual behavior.
intoxicated at an industry party. Model Josh Kloss, who worked with Perry on her Teenage
Dream video, came out with allegations that she exposed his genitals. This is not the
first time Perry has been accused of questionable sexual behavior. An American Idol contestant
claimed Perry kissed him without his consent a few years back, but he declined to press
charges.
I mean, like, what is he supposed to do?
If what happened on TV, you're gonna have a bunch of guys, they're gonna be ragging on this dude, they're gonna be calling him cock, they're gonna be insulting him across the board.
He was trying to save his kiss.
Like, here's an interesting thing.
In my opinion, the people who would drag this kid over her kissing him are more likely to be, like, center to left.
Because I believe conservatives are absolutely likely to respect him when he said, I'm saving my first kiss for my first relationship.
It's a very traditional position, much more likely to align with faith-based ideologies and conservative ideologies, and she basically broke that.
And to me, like, man, you have one life.
You have one first kiss.
You have one first love.
You have one first relationship.
And you get one first impression.
This kid wanted something to be special.
Imagine being 50 and looking back and thinking about that first person and what it means to you.
But of course he can't press charges or anything like that.
Not that I necessarily think he should.
I don't know.
It was a peck on the lips.
He was trying to be sassy and silly, but she did violate his autonomy.
The issue is, even if he did want to say, don't do that, you can't do that to me, what would have happened to this guy if he came out?
If he said, I want, you know, a penalty, a repercussion, retribution, whatever, he'd have been destroyed.
Tens of millions of people, death threats, he would have gotten the worst of the worst.
The only thing he can do is pretend like everything's okay.
Granted, it was a peck on the lips.
But it was his first.
And so now he's, like, trying to deny it and say, oh, it doesn't count because we're not in a relationship.
It's like, nah, dude, that counts, it does.
Like, you know?
Whatever, whatever.
Say what you gotta say.
Uh, she says, Perry was also caught on camera grabbing Shawn Mendes's bum.
Bum?
When he was still a teenager in 2017.
But this time the allegations are more serious.
In an Instagram post, Kloss wrote, As I turned to introduce my friend, she pulled my Adidas sweats and underwear out as far as she could to show a couple of her guy friends and the crowd around us my penis.
Can you imagine how pathetic and embarrassed I felt?
And what can you do against somebody like Katy Perry?
Especially not even Katy Perry.
Imagine if you're a- like dudes get this.
And I know most people who watch are dudes.
But if a woman pulls your pants down, you can't do anything!
A woman can smack a guy in public and you can't do anything.
The moment you go to defend yourself, you're gonna have a bunch of people like, hey, don't hit a lady, what are you doing?
Because that's the nature of our society.
In fact, I would- here's the interesting thing.
And this is why I stress, social justice is not a left issue.
I'm pretty sure most guys and women who are for social... would be in favor of this... Actually, let me rephrase this.
When a woman hits a guy, a guy can't hit her back.
When a woman pulls on a dude's pants, he can't do anything.
He can only just laugh it off and pretend like it's okay.
Feminists disagree with that.
And so do men's rights activists.
It's not a left-right issue.
It's like, anybody who believes in equality will challenge this idea that women are immune to repercussions.
However, Typically when men call this out, they still get shamed and attacked, and even by feminists.
They'll get made fun of, they'll get mocked and belittled.
So therein lies the problem.
I believe at its core, those who truly believe in equality would call this out, and it could be left or right.
Let's read.
They say, I just say this now because our culture is set on proving men of power are perverse, but females of power are just as disgusting.
Kloss is right.
Despite three claims of inappropriate behavior, Perry has yet to be cancelled or face much public condemnation.
If these accusations, which the singer has yet to publicly acknowledge, are proven true, then Perry should be exiled from the industry and considered a pariah.
Well, hold on, hold on.
Like, so far, she's being a dick, okay?
Kissing, pecking a guy in the lips, crossing the line, pulling a dude's pants down, crossing the line, touching a woman, really crossing the line.
And I don't mean the woman part, I mean, with kissing the guy in the lips, it was crossing the line bad.
Pulling the guy's pants down is crossing the line bad, but actually going in to touch someone, you know, privately, whether a man or a woman, is like a full step into full-on assault, like, really crossing the line.
Grabbing Menendez's butt, it's like, you know, a lot of grains of sand in the heap, but...
In my opinion, I think she should publicly apologize.
I think never do it again.
But at the same time, I don't know, man.
I mean, I'm wary of cancel culture.
You know what?
I gotta keep these segments short.
I'll just read her closing statement.
She says, Perry may identify as a feminist, but accusations like these prove that abusing power and fame for sexual gratification is not reserved for men.
Feminists must recognize that sexual violence against men is as real and valid as sexual violence against women.
Hear, hear!
Here, here.
I completely agree.
That is equality right there.
Full stop.
As a feminist, I believe Josh Kloss.
I will support him in his quest for justice against his alleged assaulter.
If you stood by Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, Rose McGowan, and R. Kelly's countless accusers, you should be standing with Josh Kloss today.
I applaud And respect the principle, Victoria.
Completely respect your way.
I will fall more on the, let's prove it.
But take his accusation seriously.
But I absolutely respect the call out for Blasey Ford.
If you believed her, you've got to believe this guy too.
And I really do.
I respect integrity in principle, man.
Just prove to me that you really do mean what you say.
And I think Victoria here proves this.
So, yeah.
The accusations against Perry should be taken seriously.
Much respect to this article.
And I don't think anything will happen.
You know, there it is, now a second accuser coming out, but stick around, a couple more segments coming up for you in a few minutes, and I will see you shortly.
Oh man, talk about backfiring.
The algorithms that detect hate speech online are biased against black people, from Recode, which is Vox.
A new study shows that leading AI models are 1.5 times more likely to flag tweets written by African Americans as offensive compared to other tweets.
An AI can't look at your picture, what don't these people understand?
Okay, I haven't read the study, let's go through this, but my initial interpretation is, perhaps it's the way people speak, the content of their character, and not the color of their skin.
I really don't think that's the case.
But let's read to figure out for sure, because maybe that's the case?
That sounds weird.
Like on Twitter, it'll look at your picture and be like, ah, that's hate speech because that photo is a black person.
I really don't think that's the case.
But let's read to figure out for sure because maybe that's the case?
That sounds weird.
I think it might be a cultural issue.
Before we get started, head over to TimCast.com slash done it
if you'd like to support my work.
There's a PayPal option, a crypto option, a physical address.
But of course, as always, just share the video.
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So, I really do rely on your support in that capacity, but let's read the news.
Recode writes, Platforms like Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter are banking on developing artificial intelligence technology to help stop the spread of hateful speech on their networks.
The idea is that complex algorithms that use natural language processing will flag racist or violent speech faster and better than human beings possibly can.
Doing this effectively is more urgent than ever in light of recent mass shootings and violence linked to hate speech online, except, let me stop and say, Banning people makes the problem worse.
We've seen it.
Banning people makes it worse.
We have testimony from Twitter where they said people, that woman, the Westboro Baptist Church woman was de-radicalized by being exposed to these ideas.
When you start banning people for hate speech, they go and find hate speech havens.
Let them be exposed to ideas to stop them from getting radicalized.
They don't seem to understand this.
Sunlight is the best disinfectant.
Two new studies show that AI trained to identify hate speech may actually end up amplifying racial bias, so congratulations.
In one study, researchers found that leading AI models for processing hate speech were 1.5 times more likely to flag tweets as offensive or hateful when they were written by African Americans, and 2.2 times more likely to flag tweets written in African American English, which is commonly spoken by black people in the US.
So that's the point I'm making.
There could be white people who speak in what they refer to as African American English.
Actually, I'm going to put Britannica on that one so they can explain to me what that means.
What is this?
They say it's a language variety that has also been identified at different times in dialectology and literary studies as Black English, Black dialect, and Negro non-standard English since the late 1980s.
The term has been used ambiguously sometimes with references to only Ebonics, or as it is known to linguists, African American Vernacular English.
There we go.
I just wanted to make sure that was clear because I assume that's what they were saying.
They say it's commonly spoken by black people in the U.S.
Another study found similar widespread evidence of racial bias against black speech in five widely used academic data sets for studying hate speech that totaled around 155,800 Twitter posts.
This is in large part because what is considered offensive depends on social context.
Terms that are slurs when used in some settings, like the n-word or queer, may not be in others.
Exactly.
But algorithms and content moderators who grade the test data that teaches these algorithms how to do their jobs don't usually know the context of the comments they're reviewing.
That's why your hate speech algorithms don't work and you can't police this stuff.
Not only do you encourage radicalization, you make it all worse.
Algorithms don't know context.
Both papers, presented at a recent prestigious annual conference for computational linguistics, show how natural language processing AI, which is often proposed as a tool to objectively identify offensive language, can amplify the same biases that human beings have.
They also prove how the test data that feeds these algorithms have baked in bias from the start.
No one knows for sure if the content moderation systems that Facebook, Twitter, and Google use show exactly the same biases in these studies.
The technology these companies use to moderate content is proprietary, but the tech giants often turn to academics for guidance on how to better enforce standards around hate speech.
So if top researchers are finding flaws in widely used academic datasets, that presents a significant problem for the tech industry at large.
Anecdotally, activists have for some time accused platforms like Facebook of policing the speech of black Americans more strictly than that of white Americans.
In one notable case, reported by Reveal, a black woman was banned from Facebook for posting the same Dear White People note that many of her white friends posted without suffering any consequences.
Perhaps it was because they viewed it as a white person saying it, meaning it was punching at themselves, which is not bad, I don't know, versus a person of a different race targeting a different race.
But these experiments provide quantitative data to suggest that these actions are not isolated incidents, but are instead emblematic of a wider issue in how offensive content is policed on social media.
And perhaps you need to stop.
Perhaps that's the problem.
Perhaps it is a Chinese finger trap.
And we have been saying over and over again, you are going to police yourselves.
Take a look at all the people who track white supremacy on the internet being banned for showing symbols proving somebody was a white supremacist.
One guy wrote a book called, it was something like Alt-America, where he had a Klan hood on the cover of his book, so Twitter suspended him for this and said, you've got to delete it.
And he was like, but I'm criticizing them.
They said, we don't care.
And here you go.
Now you have proof, these studies showing, that not only do they not care, but the AI actually is going to be targeting black vernacular English.
I think African-American vernacular English.
Flawed human decisions get reflected in algorithms.
Martin Sapp, a PhD student in computer science and engineering and his colleagues at the University of Washington, set out to study what's flagged as offensive on Twitter because of the important political conversations that happen on the platform.
They first gathered more than 100,000 tweets used in two widely cited academic datasets.
These tweets had been hand-flagged by human beings with labels such as being hate speech, offensive, or abusive.
The results were astounding.
Tweets written by self-identified African American users were on average found to be 1.5 times more likely to be flagged as offensive.
Researchers then applied this test data into a larger algorithmic model run using natural language processing on 56 million tweets and saw that these biases were only further reinforced.
Taking their research a step further, Sap and his colleagues decided to do something interesting.
They primed workers labeling the same data to think about the user's dialect and race when deciding whether the tweet was offensive or not.
Their results showed that when moderators knew more about the person tweeting, they were significantly less likely to label that tweet as potentially offensive.
At the aggregate level, racial bias against tweets associated with black speech decreased by 11%.
The academic and tech sector are pushing ahead with saying, let's create automated tools of hate detection, but we need to be more mindful of minority group language that could be considered bad by outside members.
But this is true for everything.
Look at Learn to Code.
Look at Demand Voter ID.
These are things that conservatives use that were offensive to the left, so they got banned for it, presumably.
But as Jack Dorsey said, they were aggressive in how they policed this.
You have to understand, there's a lot of things that aren't offensive that get policed.
In one instance, I don't want to name anybody, but somebody jokingly called their roommate gay, and they got banned for it, but they were friends and they were making an inside joke.
This is the problem with policing speech in this way.
You need to hire full-time speech police, like China does.
It doesn't make sense, which is one of the benefits of having free speech in this country.
You know, these companies are going to try and try and they're not going to get it right because it can't be gotten right.
There are certain words I can't... Okay, there is a word I can't say that is not a slur.
I kid you not.
It's not a slur but I can't say it because it sounds too much like a slur.
And there was a story where a guy was on TV and he used a word that to some sounded too much like a slur and he got in trouble for it.
And it was like a regular word.
There was actually a really good example is guerrilla tactics.
Remember this?
A sportscaster was talking about Serena Williams' street style as a guerrilla tactic.
And you know what that means?
Like covert, subversive tactics?
And everyone thought he said guerrilla.
Like gorrilla.
He said G-U-R-I-L-A.
G-U-E-R.
He was using a legitimate word to explain something.
He got in trouble for it.
You can't police this stuff.
Nobody has any idea.
People need to stop being so outraged.
Because here you go.
Vox publishing a story saying straight up, the hate speech algorithm you made, guess what?
It was racist.
Congratulations.
You have only increased racism by trying to... It's a Chinese finger trap problem, man.
The more you pull, the worse things get.
I can't say I'm surprised by the story.
It's quite ironic.
It's the fire truck on fire.
I love that analogy, by the way.
It's like the perfect analogy of irony.
The fire truck is meant to put the fire out, and it bursts into flames.
And here you go.
Now we have... I'm not going to read through the whole thing.
I got to keep these segments short, as I usually say.
But they say, these studies crack open the fantasy that AI will be able to rescue tech companies from making the complex decisions needed to police hateful speech on their platforms.
These algorithms may seem like an easy solution to a complex problem, but they can have unintended consequences.
Well, there you go!
Your plan backfired.
It didn't work, and it's only gonna be worse unless you stop.
We gotta figure something else out, and it requires strategy.
But anyway, stick around, I got one more segment coming up in a few minutes, and I will see you all then.
Jimmy Kimmel is being fined nearly $400,000 because of one of his jokes.
I believe it was mocking President Trump.
We'll go through it.
But the story was—I have them both pulled up.
Donald Trump sent a presidential alert to everyone's phones, and apparently it made that noise or whatever that everyone's used to.
Well, I guess Jimmy Kimmel wanted to make fun of President Trump, so he ran a skit, and now he's being fined nearly half a million dollars because you're not allowed to do that.
And there's a lot of reasons for it.
I mean, when they do the tests on TV, like blaring the sound, People have to be alert, like, when they hear that they know something is happening.
You go to your TV, you look at the TV, and it says, this is a test, and you go, okay.
When you do it in a skit, and people don't see that, you're gonna trick people.
Like, the problem is, we want to avoid a boy who cried wolf problem.
So not only is Jimmy Kimmel being fined, the walking dead is being fined for doing the same thing.
But we're going to focus on the Jimmy Kimmel thing because we're going to be critical of Jimmy Kimmel.
See, Jimmy loves going after Trump.
And it's fine if you want to do it, but I don't think he's genuine and serious.
But now he's kind of paying the price for this segment.
But anyway, let's read the news.
And before we get started, head over to TimCast.com slash donate if you'd like to support my work.
There's a PayPal option, a crypto option, a physical address.
But of course, Share the video, YouTube is deranking my content.
With your support, your recommendation, by sharing it is way better than YouTube's ever would be, but let's read.
They say, Broadcasting emergency alert tones during non-emergencies and outside of proper testing is a serious public safety concern, according to the FCC.
BuzzFeed reports, The Federal Communications Commission has fined ABC and AMC a whopping six-figure sum.
Over episodes of Jimmy Kimmel Live and The Walking Dead that used emergency tones.
The FCC issued a press release on Thursday announcing settlements with ABC and AMC, along with other broadcasters for airing actual or simulated emergency alert tones, which violates the commission's rules on proper use of the emergency alert system.
Broadcasting EAS tones during non-emergencies and outside of proper testing is a serious public safety concern, according to the FCC.
The combined total the companies have agreed to pay will amount to over $600,000 in civil penalties, with each network promising that it won't happen again.
On October 3rd, 2018, Jimmy Kimmel Live broadcasted a comedic sketch that used the wireless emergency alert tones three times.
It was just hours before millions of Americans received Trump's first presidential alert, which the Federal Emergency Management Agency used to test the new system.
ABC admitted to the violation and agreed to pay $395,000 in civil penalties.
So my understanding was, So I guess the Jimmy Kimmel sketch was before Trump actually did it, but there was talk that Trump was going to be sending presidential alerts to our phones.
There's a bunch of alerts.
I don't know if you've ever gotten them, but whenever it rains here, and I'm in the Philly area, my phone is like, you are going to be wiped out by a giant flood, and I get this brrrr thing.
There's also been a ton I've received on my phone of Amber Alerts when I'm on the highway.
So your phone will start making crazy noises.
Actually, this was crazy.
It was like a month ago or a couple months ago.
I was like sleeping.
The lights are like kind of dimmed when all of a sudden I hear my phone starts blaring
as loud as possible and I'm half asleep.
So I just like confusingly just like smother the phone like I'm half awake and then I kind
of started to wake up like, whoa, wait, wait, what's happening?
And I looked and it said, tornado warning spotted in your area.
And so that's amazing, right?
I was sleeping and my phone, which is next to me, went nuts.
And I grabbed it and just, and then I looked and I woke up and it was like two or three in the morning.
I wake everybody up, I'm like, we got to get in the basement.
There's like, they're saying they're seeing a tornado forming.
So what would happen if I woke up and it was Jimmy Kimmel doing that?
And then the next time I heard it, I'm like, oh, not Jimmy Kimmel again.
Therein lies the serious problem.
I get it.
You want to make fun of Trump for doing presidential alerts.
But listen.
Warning systems, period.
I don't care if it's coming for Trump.
I understand there's a joke to be made, and I respect Jimmy Kimmel's right to make the joke, but they paid the fine.
They've put it past them.
I think we're good, but it's important to point out, man, you can't be reckless in this stuff.
You know, in their quest to just mock the president, they literally simulated an emergency alert system.
Look, I get it.
You want to make fun of Trump because he's going to send out emergency alerts, and the joke, I guess, is that it's going to be like tweets, like Trump gets banned from Twitter, and then you get an emergency alert where he's like so-and-so
is a fat pig or whatever yeah it's funny man but listen I think there's a lot of people
on the left that they just it's like no matter what Trump does it's a joke and they
laugh at him and it's like dude come on man like there's there's there's there's a time and place the
presidential alert system isn't a joke Like, you can make fun of the president.
I get it, man.
But there's a reason we need alerts.
There was a period, this big thing happened in Hawaii where people got an alert, like a missile was inbound, and that made people go nuts.
That's terrifying.
So, you have to understand, while it's funny that Trump tweets, We're not gonna play a game that Trump's gonna send a tweet out to everybody saying so-and-so's a fat pig.
So when you make that joke, congratulations, $400,000 fine, because you need to take this stuff seriously.
So, here's what I wanna do.
I gotta drag Jimmy Kimmel over this.
I do.
I absolutely do.
I am not a fan of cancel culture.
But Jimmy doesn't get, you know, a special pass.
You know, when these people want to play this game, dragging Trump, playing into the leftist outrage culture and all this stuff, you're gonna get yours, okay?
So first, this is just the...
The press release by the FCC.
They talk about Animal Planet did this, Morello Radio Holdings, AMC's The Walking Dead.
They say ABC's Jimmy Kimmel Live on October 3rd, 2018, they broadcast an episode of the late night show Jimmy Kimmel Live, which used a simulated WEA tone three times during a comedic sketch.
ABC transmitted the episode nationwide to 250 TV stations, including eight of its owned and operated stations.
Which in turn broadcasts the episode in their markets.
ABC admitted to the violation, agreed to pay a $395,000 civil penalty, and committed to a compliance plan.
So good on them, good on them, right?
You know, they pay their fine, you reap what you sow.
I'm not here to drag them over the coals, but I gotta do this.
Here it comes.
I have to drag Jimmy Kimmel.
You know, there's so many people that think they are special, that think they have a right to call people out, mock and belittle.
Now, Jimmy Kimmel, for the most part, I'm not trying to drag him.
I'll respect what the show did in terms of paying the fine and accepting responsibility.
That's always a good thing.
But in our cancel culture outrage, you want to make fun of Trump all day and night.
You know, look.
What is it, Glass Houses and Stones?
Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon have done blackface in the past, right?
Now, I'm not trying to point the finger at Jimmy Kimmel necessarily to claim he is a key component in outrage culture, but he has a very prominent show constantly dragging the president, Orange Man Bad, we get it.
You are not in a special position, dude.
You are in a precarious position based on the culture you are inflaming.
When you constantly do this.
By all means, you can make jokes, and by all means, people can change.
Bill Maher had an amazing segment where he said Kamala Harris in 2010 came out against legalizing marijuana, and today she's for it, and that's all that matters.
And I'm like, great!
Here's the thing.
Jimmy Kimmel, it was appropriate for him to make this joke back in the day.
And I get it, I'm not gonna blast him for making a joke about Trump.
But I want to point out, back in the day, he's like, it's appropriate for me to do this.
Did he learn anything?
No, of course not.
There's no learning, there's no change.
Today, it's appropriate for him to make fun of whoever he wants.
And so what I end up seeing is, does he actually care about Trump?
I really doubt it.
I don't think he cares.
I think he's just like, it's marketable.
So was him wearing blackface.
So the point I'm trying to make is, You can't claim to be on a high horse, pointing the finger at the president, making fun of the fact that he's putting out an alert system.
You'll pay a fine for it.
And you're also not in, like, I don't understand how we come to a position where Jimmy Kimmel is supposed to be a moral arbiter for us.
Going on TV and being like, how dare Trump?
Yeah, how dare Trump?
Come on, man.
Let's not play these games.
So this is a story back from February 7th.
And I bring this up, for one, because Jimmy Kimmel is now in the news reaping what he has sown with his joke mocking the president.
So I'll say this.
People can change, people can grow.
Not a fan of cancel culture.
I think people need to tone everything down.
And that's why I wanted to bring this story up for the most part.
But I also want to reference, you know, the Sarah Silverman thing that just happened.
I think it's fair to criticize them for doing blackface.
Within reason, because I do understand comedy, like, they were mocking the idea of blackface.
Actually, now take that back, Jimmy Kimmel wasn't.
He was just literally dressing up as a basketball player, like, was it Carl Malone or something?
So it wasn't even him making fun of blackface, he was literally just doing blackface.
That is leaps and bounds worse of anything you could accuse the president of having done.
So, I view people like Jimmy Kimmel as just, like, without principle, without integrity.
It's just, if it's marketable, they'll do it.
You know, I think, wasn't Jimmy Kimmel on The Man Show?
Like, a very offensive show.
So, how do we get to a point where he is the one dictating what is or isn't moral, where he's getting up and preaching about gun control and things like this, when he clearly doesn't know what he's talking about?
And here we go, you know, you pay the fine.
So, look, I don't know.
I'll just end by saying people shouldn't be canceled over making jokes in the past.
You know, blaring a presidential alert because you want to mock the president is a step over the line.
But he's gonna get his.
Sarah Silverman just got hers.
It's gonna come back to Fallon and Kimmel.
The thing about Sarah Silverman when she did blackface was that she was actually making a point about blackface.
She was wearing blackface to make a point about it.
Jimmy Kimmel literally just did blackface.
He just literally bodypainted himself and then made fun of the way a black guy was talking.
That's dramatically different.
You're the last person I'm going to come to for moral advice.
I'm not going to watch his show, but anyway.
I'll keep these segments short, as I usually say, so stick around.
