It Could Happen Here Weekly 152
02:51:13 Share

Football fans, picture this. You bet on your favorite player to score the first touchdown, and he throws an awesome block so his teammate can score instead. If this happens, BetMGM wants to give you another chance at the end zone. With BetMGM's second chance promotion, you'll get your stake back if your first touchdown scorer scores second instead.

That's right, bet on any pro football player to score the first touchdown of the game. If you're right, you win. If your players score second, you get your stake back in cash. Everyone knows the most exciting part of football is the score. With BetMGM's Second Chance promotion,

you have a chance to keep the fun going after the first player crosses the goal line. Place a first touchdown score wager today. BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly. See BetMGM.com for terms. 21 plus only, DC only. Existing customer offer. Subject to eligibility requirements. Rewards vary. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.

We're partners in life and in business. With Freedom Unlimited, adding antiques to our collection is

Toyota has been building a legacy of excellence for years. From developing hybrid technology to upping the standards of safety and efficiency, Toyota is the one

Toyota. Let's go places.

Imagine relying on a dozen different software programs to run your business, none of which are connected, and each one more expensive and more complicated than the last. It can be pretty stressful.

Now, imagine Odoo. Odoo has all the programs you'll ever need, and they're all connected on one platform. Doesn't Odoo sound amazing? Let Odoo harmonize your business with simple, efficient software that can handle everything for a fraction of the price. Sign up today at Odoo.com. That's O-D-O-O dot com.

One in three women and one in four men experience domestic abuse in their lifetime, and nearly half of survivors delay leaving because they can't bring their pets with them. Purina started the Purple Leash Project to help eliminate one of the many barriers domestic abuse survivors face, a lack of pet-friendly domestic violence shelters.

Through the Purple Leash Project, Purina is helping to create more pet-friendly domestic violence shelters across the country so abuse survivors and their pets can escape and heal together. Visit Purina.com slash purple to get involved.

Hey, everybody. Robert Evans here. And I wanted to let you know this is a compilation episode. So every episode of the week that just happened is here in one convenient and with somewhat less ads package for you to listen to in a long stretch if you want. If you've been listening to the episodes every day this week, there's going to be nothing new here for you, but you can make your own decisions.

Welcome to It Could Happen Here. It is a beautiful sunny day in Atlanta, Georgia, which means I think they're all lying about the weather. They said this hurricane was going to come and I'm fine. I don't believe them. It's all fake. Joined with me today is Mia Wong. I'm Garrison Davis. Welcome to It Could Happen Here.

Welcome. And it's, hey, look, it's cloudy in Portland, so clearly they were telling the truth. I don't know what's going on in your reality, but... I can't believe that the Republicans have hijacked the weather control matrix and are aiming it at Portland, Oregon to wipe it off the map to give Oregon...

To give Oregon's vote to Donald Trump in the next election. You know, one of my foundational early political memories was discovering that like the mid-2010s era mayor of Ankara thought that NATO had an earthquake machine that they were setting off off the coast of Turkey in order to cause tsunamis during hurricane season so that because of deep NATO could destroy the Turkish economy. God, I hope so. And I always thought that was very funny. And now every single like...

Major politician in America believes some shit like that now. And I was like, oh. Everyone has something. Not everyone has the same thing, but everyone has something crazy that they believe. And that's what we're talking about here today. So...

Oh boy, it has gotten bad, folks. Yeah. As Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton brought widespread devastation to the southeastern United States, politicians, TV anchors, and influencers have been trying to weaponize the tragedy and the disaster relief effort for their own partisan electoral gain, particularly via the use of disinformation.

While the government's response to Hurricane Helene can certainly be criticized, bad faith attacks originating from the far right have spread wildly online and have been boosted by Trump and Fox News. Many of these focus on the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA.

with some of them connecting to like decades old conspiracy theories about the agency. Yeah. So this episode, we're going to go over some of the conspiracy theories and misinformation circulating about these hurricanes, but not necessarily to like debunk them because like

I know who's listening to this, but I think it's actually more helpful to place them into the larger tapestry of conspiracy thinking leading into the election and discuss how modern misinformation has presented a whole new problem that simple fact checks aren't equipped to handle. Hey, Garrison, you are very confident about that, but I personally know leftists who I have been friends with who believe the weather weapon shit, so you never

Well, I mean, I do believe that fact checks aren't going to be the main solution here. Oh, no, they're not going to help that. I'm just saying, look, there are believers everywhere for the eyes to see.

It's great. That's kind of what I'm saying here. Yeah. Now let's start by talking about Donald Trump and FEMA. Oh, God. So some of the misinformation spreading about FEMA right now includes the claim that the agency is only providing $750 in aid to individuals affected by Hurricane Helene, when actually the $750 payments are just the initial relief funds to help with immediate needs.

There's also been claims that FEMA only issues loans and any relief money received has to be paid back. This isn't true. Only in rare cases when someone receives duplicate funds from FEMA and insurance does money have to be returned to FEMA. There's also been claims that if victims fail to pay back FEMA, they will then seize your property. This is also false. More on this later.

Now, a TikTok video with over a million views claimed that FEMA is raiding people's homes to seize supplies.

This isn't true. FEMA doesn't raid people's homes. On a more racist note, it's claimed that FEMA has run out of money for hurricane victims because Kamala spent billions of FEMA dollars on housing for illegal immigrants. At a campaign rally, Donald Trump said, and I'm not going to do the voice, the Harris Biden administration says they don't have money because they spent it all on illegal immigrants. This is a

They stole the FEMA money, just like they stole it from a bank, so that they could give it to their illegal immigrants, unquote. This lie was also shared by Sean Hannity on Fox News, and even when confronted with facts that discredit this claim, commentators on Fox still insist that even though it's not technically true, it still feels true. It may not be actually true that FEMA...

resources that could have been available in North Carolina have been given to migrants. But there's no question about the broader orientation of FEMA under the Biden-Harris administration, which has been to channel huge amounts of money to communities and to non-governmental organizations to help with the massive influx of migrants that they themselves have created. And this is a fun one, too, because, like, there is FEMA underfunding, but the reason there's FEMA underfunding is that Republicans keep voting not to give it more money. Yes. Which, like...

Oh boy. I mean, again, this is a big part of the Republican strategy, just making life worse for everybody so that everyone's more angry so that people will vote Republican. And that is the strategy they want because as long as their base is doing badly and upset and angry, they will find some way to blame it on the opposition and then vote in Republican. This has been the conservative governmental strategy for decades.

Yeah. Do all the terrible stuff and then blame the stuff that you did on immigrants, which good times. Love this country. Great stuff happening. A famously reliable strategy. Trump's also lied about the governor of Georgia not being able to get in contact with President Biden to coordinate disaster relief efforts when in fact they had spoken the day prior.

Trump also claimed that the federal government and the North Carolina Democratic governor have been, quote, going out of their way to not help people in Republican areas, unquote.

This is also completely false. There were more isolated areas in North Carolina that were harder to reach, but people are trying to get there. And in fact, some of the hardest to reach areas were actually immigrant communities who were too scared to actually ask for federal help out of fear they would be deported. So yes, there actually is people really struggling to get relief, but it's not by and large your Trump voters. Again, certainly the relief efforts managed by the government have

have had their fair share of problems. People are not getting all the help they need. But this is not a conspiracy by the Democratic governor to deprive Republicans of hurricane relief. Like, that's not true. Now, Trump's falsehoods about the hurricane and the disaster response in service of his reelection campaign have signaled that it's a-okay for Republicans to spread all manner of hurricane conspiracy theories targeting the federal government.

Oh boy, and this is where we're gonna get into the newest conspiracy theory sweeping the nation, that the government controls the weather.

All of the weather, especially hurricanes. Now, this is not a new conspiracy theory, certainly. I'm so sick of the weather weapon shit. But the fact that we have sitting congressmen, including Marjorie Taylor Greene from Georgia, who is riding this thing like a fucking horse, is a little bit wild. She has been posting nonstop the past week about how, quote unquote, they control the weather. I wonder what they means, right?

She has been attributing the weather modification to a few different agencies, including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Yeah, sure. Sure. Noah's doing this. Like, come on. She has posted memes that prove that they're controlling the weather because they list a whole bunch of weather modification patents.

Now, the funny thing is, is that most of these patents are like over a hundred years old. If any of them are expired. Yeah. These patents contain plans to drop water from balloons to produce rain. That's the weather modification she's talking about. She included a patent that includes like a way to use like airplane exhaust to blow away poison gas from like trenches. That's chemtrails, Garrison. It's chemtrails.

It's absurd. All of these things are like ancient patents. And like weather modification is a real thing technically. Like we have been trying to alter the weather. One of the pointed to like real technologies is cloud seeding. Cloud seeding is a small scale technology to alter a cloud's precipitation, usually to increase a cloud's ability to produce localized rain by adding ice or condensation nuclei into the forming clouds. This helps areas suffering from drought and low rainfall. Now,

cloud seeding has been has been jumped upon by republican conspiracy theorists as proof that the government is actually engaging in a massive weather control operation including to produce hurricanes now hurricanes are famously uh quite large and it is impossible to determine the path or cause one to happen this just simply isn't true yeah and i mean the largest scale like

Attempt to manipulate whether the humanity has ever done like on purpose that wasn't global warming was for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, and it took it took the entire industrial, technological and scientific capacity of a nation of one billion people.

And putting, like, an unfathomable amount of resources and planning and, like, logistical capability at specifically not making it rain in Beijing for, like, a fairly small amount of time and lowering the air pollution levels, they barely managed to pull that off. So they sort of kind of made the weather better in one city for, like, two weeks. And that took a level of resource coordination, like, fucking unfathomable. Like...

Most of human history. It's very challenging to alter the weather. It requires a lot of resources. No, it doesn't work very well. They had to shut down factories across half the country. It was a fiasco. These people aren't

actually talking about that. They're talking about conspiratorial efforts from the federal government's Illuminati to target hurricanes on certain red states to alter the election. That's really what they're talking about. Conspiracy theorists on the right have pointed it to HARP, a University of Alaska Fairbanks program that uses high-frequency equipment to study the upper atmosphere, according to Reuters.

no atmospheric monitoring equipment do not alter the weather conspiracy theorists have also targeted doppler radios and next rad basically like radar control systems and radio control systems as being used to change weather patterns and cause hurricanes this this isn't true you can't change the weather with a radio or with radar yeah again like i we're not we're not debunking this because this is so no this is so ludicrous but

these are the conspiracy theories that they're invoking and like and like harp conspiracy theories do go back quite a while i've i've seen a few other things talking about like direct energy weapons and lasers from space or lasers from the ground pointed at the atmosphere which caused hurricanes to form this also isn't real we cannot cause a hurricane to form it's it's too big no

And the thing about this stuff is like, these are all old conspiracies, right? But it's like, these are things that used to be like, like you would, you would walk into a room full of guys who believe that nine 11 was staged with holograms and that MK ultra successfully produced mind control that was originally developed by North Korea. And those people would laugh the like harp idiots out of the room. Yeah. It was, it was a conspiracy seen by other conspiracy theorists as like two obviously bullshit. Um,

Do you know what isn't bullshit, Mia? Is it the products and services that support this podcast? It sure is. The MyPillow guy, you're trying to sell gold now? Here we go. Get your gold!

Alright, we are back. But yes, these conspiracy theories have existed for a long time, talking about some degree of the government's ability to influence natural disasters and big weather events. People have tried to blame forest fires on lasers, specifically the Maui fires from a few years ago. They said were actually caused by direct energy weapons to get people to flee their land so that it could be seized by the federal government.

All this kind of stuff. Now, like, some of them also point to, like, geoengineering, right? They say that although geoengineering is said to combat climate change, it actually causes climate change. Geoengineering, there's technically a few forms, but the one that we're talking about basically, like, injects aerosolized chemicals into the atmosphere to reflect sunlight. Obviously, reflecting sunlight's not going to make a hurricane worse, but whatever. Yeah.

So this has gotten really bad. This has taken over a significant portion of the online right. Yeah. To the point that even people like DeSantis are having to come out and say, hey, guys, no, this isn't real. In a press conference, DeSantis claimed that there are, in fact, weather conspiracies, quote, on both sides. Uh-huh. Yeah, my one friend. You kind of have some people who think the government can do this, and others think it's because of fossil fuels, unquote. Yeah.

Oh, my fucking God. DeSantis' communication director later reiterated the claim, saying, quote, the government controls the weather crowd and the global warming and climate change alarmists are two sides of the same coin. Unscientific, agenda motivated and unhelpful following a storm. Weather is weather, unquote. Jesus Christ. So even in their refutation.

of the weather controlling conspiracies. They cannot help but dip into some climate denial conspiracies. We love to see it. Oh my God. Now, I think like hurricanes and natural disasters are uniquely susceptible to misinformation. During times of crisis, people try to search for information to relieve stress. And they often don't take the extra time to verify said information.

Whenever a new natural disaster strikes, old footage and videos circulate being passed off as current events. Conversations and arguments about climate change and climate denial also spark during natural disasters, leading to a surge of climate change conspiracy theories.

While this is nothing new, the way people are getting information is changing with the increased use of AI, chatbots, personal assistants, and image generation. There was this TikTok trend ahead of Hurricane Milton where you ask in Amazon Alexa what the result of the hurricane was going to be before it hit landfall. I'm going to play this video that has over 2 million views on Twitter. Alexa, how...

How many lives were lost during Hurricane Milton? Overall, extreme Hurricane Milton caused 21.3 billion dollars in damages and caused 262 fatalities. October 8th, 2024, 12:15 p.m. Central Time. Very scary. Now, this other video has over 750,000 views on TikTok. Alexa, what kind of hurricane is Hurricane Milton?

From Fandom.com, Hurricane Milton was a extremely powerful category 5 hurricane that caused widespread damage across its path in October 2024.

They've already predicted the outcome. I wonder why. So, that one may have given you a hint about what's going on here. Obviously, Alexa doesn't know the future, nor has the government pre-programmed data about its secret weather control program into your Echo device.

Alexa just pulls from information it finds online. In this case, fandom.com hypothetical hurricanes wiki. Are you fucking kidding me? Which is a wiki-based comprehensive database of hypothetical tropical cyclone articles that anyone can edit. Unquote.

You know, I said as a joke a couple years ago that we were about two years out from the QAnon people discovering the plot of Metal Gear Solid and believing it was real. But, like, we're so close to that now. We are two months out from an AI telling them the plot of Metal Gear Solid and them believing the Patriots secretly control the government.

They're quoting from a fandom wiki on fake hurricanes that people make for fun and can be manipulated in the lead up to a hurricane specifically to cause this type of reaction. Again, like, as a bit, right? It's absurd. Now, to go even further into this AI singularity hellhole, a Twitter user tried to debunk that first video I played predicting the death toll. In the replies, this other user wrote, quote,

There was a Hurricane Milton in the year 2000. Please, before you post, at least try to fact check with Grok, unquote. They include a Grok AI screenshot that reads, quote, The name Milton has been used for one hurricane in the Atlantic Basin. Hurricane Milton occurred in 2000. However, for the 2024 hurricane season, there was another Hurricane Milton, making it the second time this name has been used for an Atlantic hurricane.

Unquote. So an argument then ensued about which AI is correct.

Quote, Grok and ChatGPT disagree on the existence of a prior Hurricane Milton. Grok says, prior to the 2024 hurricane season, there were no hurricanes named Milton in the Atlantic. Next, I asked ChatGPT, Hurricane Milton, which occurred in the year 1990, caused significant damage, particularly in Mexico, where it made landfall. I asked ChatGPT a second time,

Was there a Milton hurricane in 2000? ChatGPT said, Yes, there was a hurricane Milton in 2000. It formed in the eastern Pacific in late December. You know, I... Another person replied, saying, Grok states a 2000 hurricane named Milton struck Nicaragua in 2000, but it doesn't show up on the National Weather Service's hurricane tracking charts for 2000. Very curious.

It's insane. It's insane. These people are using ChatGPT and Grok AI as search engines, and when they hallucinate fake data, they're alleging some kind of conspiracy theory to suppress data on a previous Hurricane Milton. I mean, and it's also just worse, like, having, like, this person condescend being like, please, before you post, try to fact check with Grok. You're like, what the fuck are you talking about? Grok is a condescender.

A comedy AI chatbot that's going to generate you a nonsense response. It's not a fact-checking tool. It's not even a search engine. They're just hallucinating data that people are then passing off as real information. I think I kind of feel for these people in the sense that if you live through the 2010s, the thing that you were able to do and that you were trained to do was if you had a question, you would type it into Google, and sometimes it would give you the right answer. Yeah. Right? Yeah.

Now, it's like a machine has been created that answers the question, what if Google never gave you the correct answer? And all of these people have been trained that they can put this into the internet and it will give them the correct answer. Except now, we have a machine that destroys the entire Amazon every single second in order to generate the wrong answer. Well, and specifically because of how these AI systems have been politicized with Elon Musk and stuff, Republicans view it as like...

a political imperative to use them over the Democrat-leaning search engines. And people aren't just turning to AI in lieu of search engine. They're also using TikTok. They're also now using X as their own search engine to get reliable information from users instead of actually verified information online, which you can find with a little bit of searching.

So all this is creating a quite volatile scenario where misinformation is spreading at a faster pace than it really ever has before. Now, just like in the Springfield pet eating hoax, people on the right are also spreading AI images as evidence of how the Biden-Harris government failed their disaster relief response after Hurricane Helene.

The most circulated image is of a crying little girl wearing a life vest holding a wet puppy. Oh, no. She is sitting in a boat surrounded by floodwater. This is pure boomer bait, right? Yeah. You will never regret liking this post. Rolling Stone traced this AI image to a Trump web forum called Patriots.win. Oh, God. And users there quickly saw that it was AI, but that didn't stop its spread online.

The image got on Twitter and was spread around after being posted by Utah Senator Mike Lee, who has a dark mega profile picture. I'm going to quote from Rolling Stone, quote,

Laura Loomer called the image sad, quote, tweeting from a post by Buzz Patterson, columnist for the conservative blog Red State, who wrote of the picture, Our government has failed us again. Amy Kamir, RNC National Committee woman for the Georgia GOP and the co-founder of Women for Trump, tweeted on Thursday that the image has been, quote, seared into my mind, unquote. Informed that she was not looking at an authentic photo, Kramer doubled down.

"Y'all, I don't know where this photo came from, and honestly, it doesn't matter. There are people going through much worse than what is shown in this pic, so I'm leaving it up because it's emblematic of the trauma and the pain people are living through right now."

Oh my god. So, again, like, at this point, people know they're spreading fake information, but they're doing it anyway because it helps them. Like, they are willing participants in the complete removal of reality from their constituents' brains. A mega Twitter account posted this AI photo with the girl and the puppy and wrote, quote, Kamala doesn't have enough money for this child. I can't hate this administration enough, unquote. Oh my god. Ugh.

So, do you know what I can't hate enough? Nope, nope. Do you know what I love dearly with my full life force? Is it products and services? Yeah, it's the products and services that support this podcast. Listen to them. We will be right back afterwards. Okay, we return to conclude our Hurricane Misinfo rundown.

So why is this stuff catching on? Like, what's happening that's causing this to be so much worse than usual? What's going on? Why is this spreading right now? To answer that question, I'm first going to read a tweet from Candace Taylor, a Georgia candidate for governor back in 2022. Quote,

The weather can and is being manipulated. Wake up. Stop being ignorant or plain stupid. There's no such thing as coincidence. The most important election in the history of America is 30 days away. Pray. Georgia voting has been compromised, and I don't know if we will be able to get all of our early voting days in. Now a hurricane is coming straight for Florida. These two states are necessary for a Trump victory. No coincidence. Sigh.

So, of course, this is all a conspiracy to send hurricanes specifically at red states to compromise Trump's ability to win the election.

A woman at a Trump rally explained that the government is using cloud seeding to make the hurricanes worse, and that this was pre-planned because Amazon Alexas already knew the information about the hurricanes ahead of time. Her reasoning was that the hurricane-damaged land could be seized for lithium mining by Kamala Harris's husband, and that the weather was controlled to rig the election against Trump. Now, this little tidbit about Kamala's husband, it's a nice little anti-Semitic jab in there.

Of course, the Jews are controlling the weather to do lithium mining. Why not? I'm not going to play a short clip from this interview. Not the whole thing, because it's way too long and she rambles about cloud seeding for longer than I want to include. But I will include this one short clip. You're implying that the government made a hurricane stronger to hurt its own country, the United States of America? Correct. And what would be the gain of that?

When if you if like there's been people out there if they have an Alexa I don't know if you've heard that and they've asked what caused Milton You can go on there now. It's already predicted the number of deaths in the amount of time It's already predicted it you on a Google It won't do that if you ask it about Helene. It'll tell you the government actively used seed

This is before Chalene even happened. Why would a country want to have a hurricane be strong and hit its own country?

Because they want to control certain places. And if you're looking at where the hurricane's going, it's a lot of red states. If you're looking at the counties in North Carolina that were hit, there were all of them, 26 out of 28 of those counties were for Trump. They're doing whatever they can because they can't rig the election. Even control the weather? Yes.

Very compelling stuff coming out of the Trump rallies. Jesus Christ. I'm going to quote from a Media Matters article on hurricane misinformation and conspiracy theories. Quote, a video with over 64,000 views has on-screen text that reads, we're at the point of revolution.

It features a user speculating for over six minutes that Hurricane Helene was somehow part of a plan to suppress white Republican votes. Quote,

Because guess which way these towns leaned? They leaned red. These were largely Republican-leading towns. As far as they're concerned, they could all die, and they don't care because that's just one less vote for Trump. Unquote. Yes, Asheville, North Carolina, famously a Republican town.

Famously, the conservative paradise of Asheville. Yeah. Now, a lot of these conspiracies also link up to very old FEMA conspiracies, right? There's been conspiracies about FEMA since the 1980s. They've been heavily tied in with the militia movement. The formation of the Oath Keepers was in response to FEMA concentration camp conspiracy theories. Basically, that

They'll use natural disasters in FEMA to like round up patriots to do some kind of new world order or that they're going to use FEMA to seize your land. So then you're going to be put in a FEMA concentration camp. Very old conspiracies. Now, these have kind of fed into the current conspiracy matrix regarding the hurricanes. I'm going to quote from this one guy on Twitter called the Health Ranger. No, not the Health Ranger. Yeah.

No. Do you know who the Health Ranger is? Yeah, the Health Ranger is a frequent Alex Jones guest. Yes, he is. He's like an anti-vax guy. He's a whole thing in this whole conspiracy universe. I hate him so much. He does. And this is what he says about the current hurricanes. Quote, No. Incoming intel. All caps.

FEMA is waving ungodly amounts of money at private security firms right now, begging for security contractors to station at Florida to prevent Floridians from returning to their homes and businesses after the storm hits.

The evacuation orders are to push people out of Florida and keep them out. Reportedly, Delta Force personnel advising FEMA at the top, devising denial of area enforcement plans, which will be enforced at gunpoint if required.

I'm told FEMA is practically panicked to get enough armed personnel on site, anticipating a tremendous amount of resistance from displaced people who want to return home to salvage whatever they can. This is the next step up the escalation ladder as the federal government wages war against the American people, as we saw FEMA carrying out in North Carolina, actively hindering rescue efforts to maximize starvation and death.

To the people, do not escalate. Hold your ground peacefully and firmly. This looks a lot like a J6-style trap to provoke an insurrection and declare martial law to cancel the election. Don't play into their hands, unquote. This unhinged diatribe got over 10,000 likes and was spread wildly around Twitter.

A few days ago, the Institute for Strategic Dialogue posted an article documenting this current conspiracy ecosystem, and they included one TikTok video that stated, quote,

to my North Carolina families, please, I know it's hard, but please do not take that $750. It's a loan, and if you don't pay it back, they will seize your property. In response to this, FEMA clearly stated that FEMA cannot seize your property or land applying for disaster assistance does not grant FEMA or the federal government authority or ownership over your property or land.

So now we have these conspiracy theorists, which are being boosted by Republican officials,

basically encouraging people to resist help from FEMA to not evacuate and like all of this puts themselves and others in great danger right you might say well if conspiracy theorists don't want help from FEMA like what's the harm right well these people have like kids like these people have families it's not just them that are going to be affected if they're refusing to evacuate their family from the path of a hurricane and like they're

their kids die, that's super fucked up. If they're refusing help from FEMA to feed themselves and their family, that's not a good sign of the current state of this country. Yeah, yeah. It's bad. Ron DeSantis' press secretary had to come out against the

The unhinged ramble from Health Ranger on Twitter, she quote tweeted his post saying, Wow, the...

Wow. Well, the fucking Ron DeSantis is press person. The, the, the leopards are finally eating your face. Have you joined the leopard eating face party? Wow. Who could possibly have predicted this? The Ron DeSantis team has been replaced by the lizard people. I swear. Yeah.

No, like, things got so bad that in DeSantis' emergency declaration, he had to specifically put in language that stated that law enforcement will help ensure that people can return to their property after the evacuation has ended. Like, goofy. Goofy shit. And just like in general, all these FEMA conspiracies are preventing people in need from requesting badly needed help from the agency.

I'm going to include this one clip from this guy who was interviewed on MSNBC talking about how his family has been refusing help in North Carolina.

My father-in-law lives just outside of Asheville, North Carolina, and he was badly damaged by Hurricane Helene. And he has refused all FEMA help because he's a hardcore Trumper. And he believes, he literally believes that if he accepts anything from FEMA, they're going to take his house. I don't understand how so many people are under the spell of this freaking con man. I don't understand it.

It's absolutely heartbreaking about your father-in-law. I'm so sorry to hear it. It's hard to even imagine it. I mean, he lost almost everything, and he's refusing all help from the federal government and complaining to us that he doesn't have food, that he doesn't have the stuff he needs, and yet he won't accept the help. What the hell are we supposed to do? We're not in a position to be able to fly across the country and help him.

There's people begging us to get him to accept help, and he won't do it. And I guarantee you, I'm not the only one. I guarantee you, I'm not the only one. I wish there was something I could say as to...

You know, I don't know. Is there does he have access to any electronics where you could send him some information debunking this and that he might. We've done all of that. We've done all of that. We've sent him we've sent him all the FEMA bulletins. We've sent him all the stuff from the fact checkers. He doesn't believe it. He thinks it's all he just believes Trump literally. And he just it's a cult. He's a cult member. I'm sorry to say it. He's a he's a cult member.

And he's my father-in-law, and it sucks. That's pretty bad. That's devastating. And I think that is very resonant to a lot of people right now, and how this whole conspiracy, misinfo ecosystem that's been getting worse slowly over the course of the eight years has just ruined families and puts people in constant active danger. Now...

These conspiracies have also led to threats against FEMA workers and meteorologists for both being a part of the conspiracy and for controlling the weather. Yeah. I'm going to read a quote from the Institute for Strategic Dialogue. Quote,

Falsehoods around hurricane response have spawned credible threats and incitement to violence directed at the federal government. This includes calls to send militias to face down FEMA for the perceived denial of aid, and that individuals should, quote-unquote, shoot FEMA officials and the agency's emergency responders. Unverified claims about attacks on FEMA representatives have been used to glorify and encourage violence, unquote.

Media Matters archived a TikTok video threatening FEMA employees, which received over 200,000 views, saying, quote, Dear Feds and FEMA,

If you're trying to deny people access to help in the affected area, be advised. We're still under the War on Terror emergency declaration. If you violate your constitutional oath to protect and assist, the charge will be treason. Punishment can mean being unalived immediately by the citizens you are withholding aid from. Unquote. On TikTok, they're threatening to unalive government agents.

Another video states, quote, Public notice. We, the United States of America, have declared FEMA personnel engaged in obstructing local rescue efforts in the area impacted by Hurricane Helene to be enemies of the state. If FEMA personnel offer any further obstruction or fail to immediately assist to their best ability, they can be arrested or shot or hung on site. Unquote. Jesus Christ.

Now, a lot of these conspiracy theories are also heavily anti-Semitic, talking about the religion of local officials, like I think the mayor of Asheville, and just in general, combining these weather control conspiracy theories with FEMA conspiracy theories, etc.

saying that the Jews are somehow controlling all of this. And that's just a recurring aspect of these conspiracies that I feel like it is worth mentioning, especially because the right is trying to weaponize claims of anti-Semitism to attack the Democrats on Israel right now, which is absurd because the Democrats are

extremely pro-Israel, but still their constituents are going to be spreading all these like very unhinged anti-Semitic conspiracy theories about Jews controlling weather and using FEMA to hurt Christians in the Appalachians, all that kind of stuff. Now it's not just threats against FEMA officials. Death threats have also been targeted against meteorologists as Rolling Stone documented in a article last week.

Quote, I've been doing this for 46 years and it's never been like this, says Alabama meteorologist James Spann. He says he's been inundated with misinformation and threatening messages like, stop lying about the government controlling the weather or else, unquote.

A Washington, D.C.-based meteorologist named Matthew Capusi said, quote, for me to post a hurricane forecast and for people to accuse me of creating the hurricane by working for some secret Illuminati entity is disappointing and distressing, and it's resulting in a decrease in public trust, unquote.

So like, again, like, why is this all happening? A part of it is because the election is upcoming and people are trying to find reasons to think why Trump might lose. And they're saying that the hurricanes are actually a plot by the Illuminati to make Trump lose the election via having these storms controlled by Jews and Democrats to target Republican areas. But like, what has changed in the actual ecosystem to allow this to feel like it's so much worse than what it usually has been?

And I've kind of decided that everyone is now Alex Jones. Like everyone has become their own little mini Alex Jones. Platforms have changed in the past eight years to create massive social and financial incentives to go viral. So now everyone is just doing what Alex Jones did, right? Like Alex Jones learned that he could make a profit saying all kinds of crazy shit on air. And now other people have also learned this lesson.

This is a part of, I think, what's going on now. How does everyone has the capacity to go viral by saying whatever crazy shit they can during a moment of crisis. A few days ago, there was a really good article in The Atlantic by Charles Warzel titled, I'm running out of ways to explain how bad this is. This is going to be linked in the sources below. I recommend you give it a read, but I'm going to read a paragraph from it here. Quote, this is more than just a misinformation crisis.

To watch as real information is overwhelmed by crank theories and public servants battle death threats is to confront two alarming facts. First, that a durable ecosystem exists to ensconce citizens in an alternate reality. And second, that the people consuming and amplifying those lies are not helpless dupes, but willing participants.

This reality fracturing is the result of an information ecosystem that is dominated by platforms that offer financial and attentional incentives to lie and enrage, and to turn every tragedy and every large event into a shameless content creation opportunity. This collides with a swath of people who would rather live in an alternate reality built on distrust and grievance than change their fundamental beliefs about the world."

I know, Mia, we've been talking about this misinformation problem in the chat, and I know you had some comments you wanted to share. Yeah, there was a—oh, God, where did I first hear this? Might have been a Philosophy Tube episode, but there's a bunch of philosophical stuff about how ignorance works.

And about how it's not just like, ignorance isn't just the state of not knowing something. You have to actively create it, right? You have to, you have to go out of your way not to seek the information that would, that would sort of like, you know, cause you to have to know or cause you to change your worldview or cause you to like have to confront what your beliefs are. And so people actively sort of,

construct this this reality around themselves so they don't have to do anything that ever sort of challenges their own views and this is something that you can see i mean you just you see it happening all over the place

This is one of the things that we're still gets like gets right. That is important. Is that like people are active participants in the construction of their own universes. And now there's, there's a financial incentive is a social incentive. And there's also a cognitive incentive, which is that like having to deal with the fact that you might be wrong, but something fucking sucks and is hard.

And sometimes you just don't want to know. Totally. Yeah. I mean, and this is something that like myself, Robert, and you have been talking about increasingly the past few years. It feels like misinformation is an outdated model to understand our current predicament, right? Like misinformation is no longer meant to like actually change minds or persuade people. It's just a mechanism to construct and reinforce false realities. Yeah.

In the recent meme politics episode, I talked about how AI images of trans athletes or of immigrants stealing pets, these aren't meant to convince anyone of their authenticity, but they exist in lieu of evidence to help people maintain their reality tunnel. An information researcher at the University of Washington named Michael Caulfield wrote an article earlier this year about how a whole bunch of mega people

started to deny the authenticity of those videos of Kamala Harris's rally in that Detroit hangar, showing a massive, huge crowd with Air Force One or Air Force Two landing and her getting off. With these mega people saying that this was AI, this was fake, there was no way the crowd would be this big. And they invented a whole bunch of reasons for why this photo must be fake. And this wasn't fake, this was a real photo, this was easily verified. There's video evidence from multiple sources showing that this is a real thing that happened. But Caulfield wrote, quote,

Unquote.

And yeah, I don't believe in giving these people a degree of passivity, right? Like this is an active choice that they are doubling down and reinforcing and creating their own reality tunnels to live in. And I think the other aspect of this, this is something that Robert was talking with me last night is like,

The people also propagating this, the people creating the environments to make this happen are also willing participants, right? Like this is a big reason why Musk bought Twitter is so that it purposely could turn into the current conspiracy like shit show that it currently is.

Facebook used to be where conspiracy theorists gathered to post their weird boomer opinions. And now it's Twitter alongside just actual, like useful, verifiable information. And now because these two platforms have kind of combined how we have so much conspiracy content on Twitter, it also just damages the use of Twitter as a platform to look for real information.

And I think you can see the same thing with TikTok, with its very loose content moderation policy regarding factual information. And the fact that people use TikTok as its own search engine, creating its own ecosystem of misinformation, fully isolated away from the rest of the internet.

And this project to like wear down collective reality is a long-term project by the right. You could look at the John Birch Society and other anti-communist groups from the 50s who used to deliberately put out fake articles about communists infiltrating. Fox News and a whole bunch of conservative mass media like talk radio was created at least in part as a reaction to Nixon being forced out of office.

And a lot of the same people funding right-wing media are also pushing for charter schools and attempts to destroy public education. It's all an intentional effort to make people's media literacy go completely down the toilet and propagate entire false versions of reality in service of a few rich people. And that's what our current situation is right now. And I don't know if there's a way to stop it. As you heard in that clip from MSNBC, like,

fact checks don't work anymore because that's not like the point of any of this it's not meant to actually persuade people it's only meant to reinforce what they already want to believe so what do you do in a world post fact checking i don't know uh and we're gonna have to find out i don't know me did you do you have do you have any closing thoughts you know i will say one of the few things i've ever seen that's gotten someone out of something like this is just

Sometimes it doesn't always work like this, but every once in a while you could have an experience that is so cognitively shattering to everything that you'd believed that you

It just implodes. So, Mia, you're advocating to dose your Republican family members with LSD? Is that what I'm hearing? Well, no. What I'm advocating is that the people who think that China is a socialist state be sent to China and have to interact with members of the Chinese Communist Party? Because I have seen this work. It does work. It can. I've seen it happen. You can't talk to these people for more than five minutes without your... But, I mean, you know, on a sort of more serious note, I mean, this is something that...

you know you're trying to fight emotions on on a sort of intellectual level and so like if you want to deal with this you i i don't i think you have to kind of be working on on a sort of like emotional act factor register and that sucks because it's you know it's effectively the abandonment of politics as politics it's it's arguably just a complete retreat into fascism

But, you know, if you take this sort of understanding of one of the elements of it as fascism is reducing all politics to aesthetics, right? But we've hit this point where,

There's no centralizing viewpoint, like central reality tunnel that most people are in. And that's largely partially because of these people trying to destroy it and partially because the people who were running the mainstream media blew themselves up by lying about Iraq and then by spending 30 years insisting that neoliberalism was the greatest economic system ever and then 2008 happening.

And so, like, you know, we're in this position where the people who had built the guardrails blew it up in order to make money and push a political agenda. So now a bunch of other people who want to just destroy everything inside of those rails are just like detonating bombs inside of all of our like psychological conscious.

I mean, I think the guy who was talking about his stepdad in Asheville is correct. It is a cult. And you have to treat it like you would treat a cult. You can't fact check them out of this. You have to treat them like your friend just joined Scientology. Some people might just choose to completely cut the person off because they find it too dangerous. And that's fine.

But I think there should be others that remain as a lifeline to the person, right? If they ever one day realize, oh no, I'm in a cult and I need help, there needs to be a way for them to get out. There needs to be a lifeline for them to escape.

And this is the only way that like, quote unquote, cult deprogramming has worked. You can point to like people who've like gotten out of the QAnon conspiracy theory. Like this is the only tactic that actually works. And it's reliant on the courtesy of others, right? It's reliant that you have to put yourself in a degree of danger by maintaining contact with this person that is kind of dangerous because they are in this like very volatile cult. There needs to be some lifeline for them.

And I think that's really the only way that I know of right now that shows a degree of success in getting people out of this, like,

fucked up conspiracy matrix. And it sucks, and it's not easy. And most people promoting cult deprogramming are hacks with pseudoscience. And it turns out this is just a very emotional problem. And it requires, unfortunately, emotional solutions that a simple Reuters fact check will not suffice. So anyway, that is my rundown on what's currently going on with the hurricane misinformation. It's really bad. Yep, it could happen here. ...

Football fans, picture this. You bet on your favorite player to score the first touchdown, and he throws an awesome block so his teammate can score instead. If this happens, BetMGM wants to give you another chance at the end zone. With BetMGM's second chance promotion, you'll get your stake back if your first touchdown scorer scores second instead.

That's right. Bet on any pro football player to score the first touchdown of the game. If you're right, you win. If your players score second, you get your stake back in cash. Everyone knows the most exciting part of football is the score. With BetMGM's Second Chance promotion,

you have a chance to keep the fun going after the first player crosses the goal line. Place a first touchdown score wager today. BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly. See BetMGM.com for terms. 21 plus only, DC only. Existing customer offer. Subject to eligibility requirements. Rewards vary. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.

This week, Charlemagne Tha God sits down with Vice President Kamala Harris for a conversation you don't want to miss. The things that we want and are prepared to fight for won't happen if we're not active and if we don't participate. They tackle the big questions, politics, policy, and what's next for the country. Doesn't the Biden administration have to take some blame for the border, though? Charlemagne, first thing we dropped was a bill to fix the broken immigration system.

Which, by the way, Trump did not fix when he was president. Don't miss this in-depth interview with Charlemagne Tha God and Vice President Kamala Harris, only on The Breakfast Club. Catch the full interview now on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Make sure you check it out.

Hey, y'all. Are you ready for an explosive new podcast that brings together hip-hop and history? My name is Nimany, and I'm the host of Historical Records, a brand-new podcast for kids and families that proves better to make history, you have to make some noise. ♪ Flash, slam, another one gone ♪ ♪ Bash, bam, another one gone ♪ ♪ The crack of the bat and another one gone ♪ ♪ The tip of the cap, there's another one gone ♪

I make this show entirely by myself. Impressive, right? Okay, okay. Maybe I get a little bit of help from my sidekick, Tina the Raccoon. Every week on Historical Records, join me, Nimity, and Tina the Raccoon as we learn about the unsung heroes of the past and turn their history into hip-hop.

Listen to Historical Records on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, I'm Jack Peace Thomas, the host of a brand new Black Effect original series, Black Lit, the podcast for diving deep into the rich world of Black literature. I'm Jack Peace Thomas, and I'm inviting you to join me and a vibrant community of literary enthusiasts dedicated to protecting and celebrating our stories. Black Lit is for the page turners, for those who listen to audiobooks while commuting or running errands.

for those who find themselves seeking solace, wisdom, and refuge between the chapters. From thought-provoking novels to powerful poetry, we'll explore the stories that shape our culture. Together, we'll dissect classics and contemporary works while

uncovering the stories of the brilliant writers behind them. Blacklit is here to amplify the voices of Black writers and to bring their words to life. Listen to Blacklit on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, it's Mike and Ian. We're the hosts of How to Do Everything from NPR's Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Each week, we take your questions and find someone much smarter than us to answer them. Questions like, how do you survive the Bermuda Triangle? How do you find a date inside the Bermuda Triangle? We can't help you, but we will find someone who can. Listen to the How to Do Everything podcast on iHeartRadio.

It could happen here in the podcast about things falling apart. I had to put them back together again. I'm your host, Mio Wong. So for people who listened to yesterday's episode, which I'm hoping is like most of you. Yeah, so yesterday was a very kind of downer episode on hurricane misinformation and the way that these sort of people construct these reality tunnels. And, you know, they have become active participants in their own sort of propagandizement.

And I think we kind of... We left on a kind of note of what you can do for sort of individual people, right? Which is the same mechanisms you use to get someone out of a cult, which is you stay with them, you maintain enough personal connection that you can pull them out if they ever want to come out. But that's also not a large-scale solution to this problem. And...

In order to talk about a large-scale solution to both our present social crisis and the ecological crisis that this social crisis is being aimed to sort of cover up right now, I'm talking to Rosewater, who's the hub coordinator for the Sunrise Movement's DC Hub and delegate to Sunrise's delegate body, and also a solar pump organizer. Rosewater, welcome to the show.

Thank you so much for having me on. Yeah. Hi, everybody. My name is Rosewater. And yeah, longtime fan of Cool Zone Media. Y'all were my introduction to my current like Democratic-Confederalist politics. Oh, that's awesome. So it feels like a really fun, like full circle moment to have a chance to be on the pod.

Yeah, and I'm excited to talk to you. So the specific thing we're talking about is in terms of there being an actual plan for what people are doing, like past the next three weeks, like after the election, the biggest thing that has been happening is...

Something we've talked about a little bit on this show is the proposed 2028 general strike. So do you want to talk a little bit about what that is before we get into Sunrise's involvement and the sort of broader story? Yeah, yeah. So I feel like most people who follow leftist politics were following the UAW strike against China.

the big three automakers last fall. And people found their strike really inspiring. And they had really strong gains that were the sort of straightforward, increased pay, better benefits type stuff. And people were celebrating that. But I would say the two actual most important changes were not reported on nearly as much. One was they eroded their labor peace clause.

And they made it possible to go on strike if any of their facilities were closed, which labor peace has, in my opinion, been sort of strangling the U.S. left for 80 years. Yeah. Can you explain what that is for people? I think we've usually more broadly talked about is no strike clauses. But yeah, can you explain what that is? Yeah.

Yeah, so labor peace is essentially a truce that was established between the labor movement, capitalists, and the U.S. government, where the labor movement gets generalized rights and the...

U.S. government is like a, quote, fair mediator between capitalists and the labor movement. And capitalists get a consistent workforce and peace, like peace from disruptions. And this essentially was established between the beginning of World War II and the end of the Red Scare, when all of the socialists and anarchists and communists were expelled from the labor movement.

And it felt like a good deal to a lot of liberals at the time and a lot of normal rank and file workers at the time. But on reflection, it has really strangled the U.S. labor movement. And so the fact that the UAW eroded their no strike clause at all is a huge precedent. Right.

Yeah, and this is something, I mean, I don't remember if this actually got into the Labor Notes episode that I did, but I remember at Labor Notes, I was listening to people talk about this, and this is stuff that

I think the global impact of it has also been really underplayed. Like, I mean, obviously there was a lot of attention paid to this in Mexico, right? Because there's a lot of like, you know, the structure of the auto industry is such that. Not so obvious to me. I didn't even think about that until just now. Yeah. So one of the things that NAFTA did is that sort of right across the border. Right, right. A whole sort of range of factories that are right across the border that operate off Mexican labor that do some of the auto industry stuff. And so there's always been sort of connections between that.

The more independent unions there and sort of American unions. But this is also struck as being watched really, really heavily in China. Yeah. Which is interesting because Chinese state unions are a fucking joke. Yeah. They're basically not real unions at all. And the extent to which... China's version of the labor peace was also...

The deal was less like you get rights and we get like labor peace and more like we're going to just stamp out our working class organization completely in a way that like was even more thorough than what happened here where most of it got wiped out. I think like the breaking of the labor peace and the demonstration that there is another way.

It's something that has reverberated massively across a lot of different places. I don't think both the people organizing the strike or the sort of like press coverage of it has really gotten into sort of how wide the reverberations of this have been. Right. I think if it were just eroding that clause alone, it wouldn't be such a signal. But the real thing that caught my attention at first was...

Immediately afterwards, they changed the end of their contract date to International Workers Day 2028. And they called on every union in the country and later every union in the world to align with that contract and go on strike with them on May 1st, 2028. And that was the first time that

Correct me if I'm wrong. That was the first time that a major labor union in America has called for a planned general strike since 19...

1948. Yeah, I think that's true. And I think there being an actual plan and there being a way to do it that's legal is a big deal because part of the problem with this is that there's, you know, unlike a country like France, American labor law is specifically designed so that you don't have this happen. Mm-hmm.

There's a bunch of legal mechanisms for this, but it's very, very specifically designed to make sure that people are not allowed to do solidarity strikes, people are not allowed to coordinate the entire power of their action. And this is a pretty promising way around that. Yeah, this may...

be better for later in the episode. But one of the things that we're doing is we're in collaboration with the Institute for Social Ecology doing a teach-in on labor peace and the history of general strikes in the U.S. about a week after the election in order to orient ourselves in whatever new political context exists there. But yeah, so... Yeah. Yeah.

I think that's a jumping off point to get into. I think Sunrise is kind of an unlikely organization that people would think to be getting excited and trying to get involved in a labor struggle. But yeah, let's talk about how Sunrise got involved. And I guess first also, I don't know how many people listening to this know what Sunrise is. And if you do know what Sunrise is, that might also make you more surprised through getting involved in labor. But yeah, let's talk about that.

Yeah. So Sunrise is a youth climate movement that has been one of the main advocates for the idea of a Green New Deal when AOC first came into office. And she did that sit-in at Nancy Pelosi's office. That was a Sunrise action. Yeah.

And we historically have been an org that sort of like tries to bridge the divide between people who are sort of apolitically liberal and more radical politics, which is a hard place to be. Yeah. Someone's got to do it. But we've really focused on trying to.

like connect environmentalism with labor, actually. Our main slogans, the main intervention that we've succeeded at has been associating the idea of environmental action with jobs, like green jobs and stuff like that. The problem with that has been, one, it has been primarily rhetorical, especially after Bernie's loss.

In 2020. Yeah. And stories matter, but material conditions matter more. Yeah. And the reason that we didn't, we weren't more materially involved in connecting labor and environmentalism. And by that, I mean like connecting with unions is that unions leadership was often very far to our right. Yeah. You know, especially in the United States. So it, it didn't feel like it made sense, but yeah,

As a result, the sort of Biden years have been a time where there's been a lot of internal discussion about like who we are. Are we a radical movement that sort of positions itself rhetorically as more normie in order to bring in like young people who whose parents won't let them, you know,

join a fight to end all unjust hierarchies or like seize the means of production, et cetera. Like, are we, are we a radical movement that poses normie or are we a like liberal progressive movement that sometimes asks for radical things? And that's been a really big conflict within the org these last few years because the path that

to any climate action. The only path that a lot of people have seen has been electoral stuff, pushing politicians and things like that. In a lot of ways, the Inflation Reduction Act was a direct result of Sunrise's organizing and our work to try and force through the Build Back Better program. But it aligned us with Biden and

And from the point of view of a lot of our organizers, like even if it was a victory, it didn't feel like one. And it's certainly not nearly large enough to actually handle the scale of the crisis. And so essentially, yeah.

the more radical wing of the, of the movement has been winning that fight over the last year to fight. So strong word has been winning that like debate over the last year or two. And specifically this last summer, when the American Federation of teachers joined the general strike, which almost no one has heard about, but, um,

AFT and their 1.7 million members have already decided that they're going to try and join the 2028 general strike. So it's not just the UAW anymore. Yeah, but unfortunately we need to take an ad break. When we come back, we are going to get to that because that I think will be looked back as one of the pivotal moments of this whole thing that everyone kind of just missed when it happened. I completely agree. It's going to be amazing. Yeah. Okay. Ads, unfortunately. Ads. Ads. Buy gold. Buy gold.

We're back. Don't buy gold. At some point, I'm going to write a don't buy gold episode. You think this is a joke? There is a don't buy gold episode. It's being worked on in the Mia laboratory. The gold scammer ad thing.

Okay, back to the present, or I guess back to the future. I don't know. Time is falling apart here. But let's talk about the AFT, the American Federation of Teachers. Right. And I don't know what they've announced in terms of this.

Right. So the American Federation of Teachers, sort of led by the Chicago Teachers Union, the Baltimore Teachers Union, and to a smaller extent, the D.C. Teachers Union, managed to get through a resolution at their convention that said,

When you read the title, it's very boring. It's like on aligning with the UAW. But when you actually click on the document and you read it, it is like class struggle fire. Like reading it from beginning to end, I felt exhilaration. I felt like a fire exploded in my heart. It was so amazing. And...

I heard about this the same weekend that we were actually having a climate disaster training in D.C., right? We had about 100 leaders from across our movement, about half of our staff there. And at the beginning, people were really excited for climate disaster actions responding to moments like this, actually. But when we talked about victory, when we talked about, and we're going to have like

uh mass mobilization against the climate crisis where the whole of our society like pitches in to do this the federal government like does a world war ii style mobilization against this destruction and stuff like that you could tell that people didn't see a path you could tell yeah and so like this news dropping that the teachers were joining a general strike we're joining mass disruption

in some meaningful way, it hit us like a bomb. It was the perfect moment for it to hit us because it was like, yeah, if the auto workers are going on strike and the academic workers are going on strike and the teachers are going on strike, then why can't the students go on strike? And not only why can't they, but the students must go on strike. And that was sort of the moment that really...

got our movement from, yes, we would like to figure out some sort of different way to get to the mass disruption needed in order to like win serious action on the climate crisis to like, oh, there's a path. Yeah. Like we see, we see a path. It's, it's core memory. Like if you know, like inside out, like core memory formed that weekend. It was, it was beautiful. Yeah.

Yeah, and I think what's, you know, I mean, there's a couple things that are important here, right? But I think it's being underplayed exactly how important it is to have teachers' unions being into this because the thing about teachers' unions is that they're an extremely important lever on the labor movement because the way the capitalist society is structured, right, is such that most child care is just sort of

like all of that labor is basically it's been pushed on the teachers right and the moment that child care collapses right a bunch of people suddenly also who are not normally on strike suddenly are not able to do their jobs because they have they have to find some way to take care of their kids and so this is this is sort of a massive like leverage point and in the in the same way that like sort of dock worker strikes or i mean not in the same way but like in a sense that

A strike by these people can shut down way, way more labor than just theirs directly. Right. This is something that's very important. Yeah. Yeah. I never really thought about that. I've thought about them in the context of like their sort of community pillars. So like when teachers go on strike, they often bring way more community support with them than other types of workers. But yeah, you're totally right. Like,

outside of the community going with them, also, that is the primary form of childcare that exists in this country. Yeah, and it's something that teachers' organizers, teachers' union organizers are very big on emphasizing because they have an enormous amount of social power. And it's kind of, to a large extent, hasn't been tapped yet.

for for the kinds of sort of mass political action that we're seeing here like it's one of those things it's one of those sort of leverage points that's always existed but there hasn't really been the kind of like political will or momentum or sort of organizing capacity to fully mobilize it and yeah and so i guess i want to move from here to talking about

Sunrise's involvement in the strike because I think this part's really interesting both in terms of there being like both in terms of strike support and student strikes. So can you talk, I guess, about the sort of politics of student strikes and how you see this fitting into the broader thing that's happening? Yeah, yeah.

So the climate movement sort of had the height of its power in 2019, I would say, when you had Fridays for Future and like Greta Thunberg, climate strikes all across Europe and America. But I would use the word strike in quotes, right?

Because sometimes you had full walkouts. Sometimes you had like those sorts of huge things. But most of the time, it was students asking permission from authority figures to participate in a rally and things like that. Whereas in a class struggle context, like a strike is people going to the authority figure and saying, this is not occurring because we're not going to be here.

You know, like this has been a critique that's existed inside of Sunrise, like from that period for years now, which was one of the reasons why we haven't focused on those sort of tactics as much. But with this sort of moment, especially if...

we can bring the teachers along, right? Being able to have students see their authority figures doing this sort of thing, especially in more conservative areas, while also teaching them how to do it. Because in really meaningful ways, schools are practice work. Like they were directly modeled after factories in the 1800s.

So schools are modeled after work. So if schools are practice work, then student strikes can be practice labor organizing. Yeah, I mean, and turning schools from sort of laboratories for the reproduction of the class system into laboratories for...

Learning class struggle is something that's very, very important, both in the immediate term and in the longer term. Yeah. We've talked a bit about this on other episodes, but like there hasn't been the kind of like generational pass down of organizing skills that we've seen in previous generations. Right.

And the way, honestly, we were talking about this in our sort of UAW staff union episode, right? The way that a lot of these unions are running their staff systems also aren't designed to build up like continuous momentum for people who learn how to organize and keep doing it. And this is a way we can sort of restart that treadmill to create a

a generation of, of organizers, both in this moment and for the future. Yes, exactly. And I have had many critiques of my organization, many critiques of my movement, but the thing that has always made me want to like stick around has been seeing the young organizers who like find themselves here. Like the primary person who does our press stuff in the movement is the

turning 18 in like three days. Wow. They're one of the best organizers I know. Wow. It's inspiring, but it's something that we... I want our movement to do at scale, as opposed to having something like that every once in a while. Like you said, the idea of creating an entire generation. And I'd love to talk about...

sort of thought process and plan around that after the ad break. Woo! Here's some ads. When we come back, we'll do things that aren't ads, question mark. Woo!

And we are back. They want better ad transitions. They should raise my salary. Damn it. All right, we're back. Awesome. So one of the things that I think is really, in terms of like for us, a stable niche in the movement ecology is to be sort of a feeder for radical labor in a sort of way. Like,

Because one of the things is, even if you are radical and you go into the labor movement, oftentimes you are going to be taught practices that rely on labor peace in meaningful ways. Practices that are going to be really disrupted if labor law weren't a thing and stuff like that. And it's something that holds back our ability to create a strongly organized working class. But in the context of schools...

right? There is no labor law. There is no labor peace in a high school, right? So as a place to practice the sort of radical class struggle organizing that we're talking about, it

It's sort of the perfect place because it's a simplified version of the workplace of like adult reality. There are obviously many other like blockages like students and like young people, minors have far, far less power and far fewer rights than

than you do once you become an adult. And their family has far more power over them. There are huge barriers. But in terms of grounding people in class struggle, labor organizing tactics, I'm thinking of things that you can learn about in Jane McAlevey's book, No Shortcuts, and stuff like that. They can learn how to

you use structure tests and like use hard organizing conversations in order to build their power in a specific like context and things like that. And whether or not they actually managed the strike, right. At the end of it, you have an 18 year old entering the workforce is a skilled, trained class struggle organizer who has gained their politics completely outside of the context of labor peace.

Yeah, and I think that that's one of the important aspects of this. And I think that the second one is something you were talking about earlier, which is sort of bridging the sort of labor ecological divide. And I think that's been happening more, which is encouraging because there's been an enormous effort to make sure this doesn't happen. I mean, I think we've talked about this on this show at some point. I know Margaret's talked about it on Cool People Does Cool Stuff.

But, I mean, one of the most famous science people tried to do this. So, IWW organized it. Jodi Berry and she... So, legally speaking, we don't know who killed her. What I will say is that she was killed by a car bomb that was virtually identical to a car bomb that was built by the FBI. That was edited by the FBI in their bomb training things a couple of weeks before. So...

Right. We genuinely don't know who killed her. However, comma, someone, someone built a car bomb and blew her up in order to stop this from happening. So it's something that is right. Very, very obviously seen by the powers that be is extremely dangerous. Yeah. In the same way that we know exactly the singular one person who on his own completely killed Martin Luther King with no support from the U S government. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. And like, you know, I think this is an important moment to sort of do this because one of the things that the right is trying to do

to like capture this sort of like moments of radical labor has been like, Oh yeah, all the problems with the UAW are because the government wants to force them to make electric cars. It's like, you know, there's very much like an anti-ecological angle to definitely to the way that sort of like Republican like co-option is happening. It's another thing that we can use a simultaneously tactic for our side and helps defeat a co-option attempt. In addition to this being a way to like take,

take on the climate crisis in meaningful ways.

The climate crisis is also a way where we can make more radical demands. This is one of the reasons that I really love Sunrise and ecological, like eco-socialist movements in general, because if you ask someone to seriously consider how do we address the climate crisis and you're not paying them to have a specific answer, which is nonprofit industrial complex things,

Like if you ask someone to seriously consider what do we need to do in order to address the climate crisis in six months, you have a radical, no matter what, in my experience, no one who I've ever like talked to who has thought about that question seriously for six months and not avoided it has not come out the other end being like, Oh, we need a general strike. We need a revolution, you know? Yeah. And so like being able to bring that exact idea,

That exact analysis into the labor movement, I think, is one of the things that can bring back radical labor. You talk to labor leaders who might feel comfortable with labor peace and they're like, we can do this. We have time. And you're like, how much time exactly do we have? Like, really think about it.

Yeah, and this is something that we've seen, and I think this is sort of a good place to wrap up. This is something that we've also seen in the way that immediate short-term disaster response is happening, where all of these sort of, you have millions of people who would not show up to a mutual aid thing, are suddenly out there doing mutual aid and have at least temporarily completely restructured the way their society works because they're confronted with this sort of immediacy of...

Of crisis and also the immediacy of the fact that the way that we have been doing things simply is not actually a functional way to, for example, respond to a hurricane. Yeah. I think there's a bridge there between the sort of immediacy of this like mutual aid disaster response politics and sort of long term goal of of trying to actually like have sustained substantive action against the sort of climate devastation.

Yeah, I completely agree. And this is quite a tangent from the specific topic that we're thinking about. But when I think about democratic confederalist politics, like Rojava was able to take power and have its revolution because the state retreated. And ideally, we don't have a civil war that causes the state to retreat, ideally. Yeah. One thing we do know is

will happen and is happening right now is that the state retreats during disasters. The state retreats during climate disasters. And so if we're prepared to take that temporary mutual aid structures and jump on them,

in order to create systems like what they have in Rojava and create, like, build our labor movements, build our neighborhood power, build our direct democracy capabilities, and be able to be like, no, we want to keep these. Whenever the police come back, whenever da-da-da-da-da,

Yeah, like there's going to be devastation, but there's also a lot of opportunities for creating really, really beautiful things. Yeah, and I want to close on... There's now a whole argument as to whether or not...

Whether or not Buenaventura de Rudy, who was one of this very prominent organizers in the Spanish Revolution, ever actually said this, but there was a quote attributed to him that goes roughly, we are not in the least afraid of ruins. Like we are the people who built this world and we'll fucking do it again. Wow. That's beautiful. Yeah. And I think that's inspiring.

in some sense, the attitude that we have to be going into this here, right? Of, you know, like the path that we are on now, and this is true, even if a movement takes power that is dedicated to actually sort of dealing with the climate crisis, right? The stuff that we have now is normal, right? This is just what the future is going to be. There's going to be disaster. There's going to be storms. It's going to be destruction. But again, fundamentally, like we are the people who built this world and we can build it again. We're going to have to build it again and we're going to build it better. Yeah.

Actually, that makes me think of this one song that we sing a lot in Sunrise. Like we have a really big cultural focus on movement song. I would really love it if that could be the outro. Yeah. There are more waters rising, this I know, this I know. There are more waters rising, this I know.

It is a song called More Waters Rising by Sarah Lynch, who is a movement musician actually from Asheville, North Carolina. It's not fully clear to me right now if they are safe, but we've been singing this song for many years. There are more fires burning this I know.

It is a song that I think really resonates with the thing that Mia Mia just finished talking about, knowing what's on the horizon, knowing the ruin that we may face, but also knowing that we're not afraid of that and that we can get through it.

Yeah, so I hope that you all find the strength with this song and with these plans to rebuild the mountains. Thank you. I will wade through the waters when they far away to me. I will wade through the waters, this I know, this I know. I will wade through the waters, this I know.

Football fans, picture this. You bet on your favorite player to score the first touchdown, and he throws an awesome block so his teammate can score instead. If this happens, BetMGM wants to give you another chance at the end zone. With BetMGM's second chance promotion, you'll get your stake back if your first touchdown scorer scores second instead.

That's right. Bet on any pro football player to score the first touchdown of the game. If you're right, you win. If your players score second, you get your stake back in cash. Everyone knows the most exciting part of football is the score. With BetMGM's Second Chance promotion,

you have a chance to keep the fun going after the first player crosses the goal line. Place a first touchdown score wager today. BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly. See BetMGM.com for terms. 21 plus only, DC only. Existing customer offer. Subject to eligibility requirements. Rewards vary. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.

This week, Charlemagne Tha God sits down with Vice President Kamala Harris for a conversation you don't want to miss. Listen, I feel very strongly I need to earn every vote, which is why I'm here having this candid conversation with you and your listeners. They tackle the big questions, politics, policy, and what's next for the country.

I am running to be president for everybody, but I'm clear-eyed about the history and the disparities that exist for specific communities, and I'm not going to shy away from that. Don't miss this in-depth interview with Charlemagne Tha God and Vice President Kamala Harris, only on The Breakfast Club. Catch the full interview now on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Sup, y'all? This is Questlove, and I'm here to tell you about a new podcast I've been working on with the Story Pirates and John Glickman called Historical Records. It's a family-friendly podcast. Yeah, you heard that right. A podcast for all ages. One you can listen to and enjoy with your kids starting on September 27th. I'm going to toss it over to the host of Historical Records, Nemany, to tell you all about it. Make sure you check it out.

Hey, y'all. Are you ready for an explosive new podcast that brings together hip-hop and history? My name is Nimany, and I'm the host of Historical Records, a brand-new podcast for kids and families that proves in order to make history, you have to make some noise. ♪ Flash, slam, another one gone ♪ ♪ Bash, bam, another one gone ♪ ♪ The crack of the bat and another one gone ♪ ♪ The tip of the cap, there's another one gone ♪

I make this show entirely by myself. Impressive, right? Okay, okay. Maybe I get a little bit of help from my sidekick, Tina the Raccoon. Every week on Historical Records, join me, Niminy, and Tina the Raccoon as we learn about the unsung heroes of the past and turn their history into hip-hop.

Listen to Historical Records on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, I'm Jack Peace Thomas, the host of a brand new Black Effect original series, Black Lit, the podcast for diving deep into the rich world of Black literature. I'm Jack Peace Thomas, and I'm inviting you to join me and a vibrant community of literary enthusiasts dedicated to protecting and celebrating our stories. Black Lit is for the page turners, for those who listen to audiobooks while commuting or running errands.

for those who find themselves seeking solace, wisdom, and refuge between the chapters. From thought-provoking novels to powerful poetry, we'll explore the stories that shape our culture. Together, we'll dissect classics and contemporary works while

uncovering the stories of the brilliant writers behind them. Blacklit is here to amplify the voices of Black writers and to bring their words to life. Listen to Blacklit on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, it's Mike and Ian. We're the hosts of How to Do Everything from NPR's Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me. Each week, we take your questions and find someone much smarter than us to answer them. Questions like, how do you survive the Bermuda Triangle? How do you find a date inside the Bermuda Triangle? We can't help you, but we will find someone who can. Listen to the How to Do Everything podcast on iHeartRadio.

Hello, and welcome to the podcast. It's a calm introduction today. Just a chill one. It's me, James, and I'm joined by Mia. How are you doing, Mia? Not the best, but you know, we're hanging in there. We're defeating the illness and the frailness of the human body. Okay.

overcoming the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God or something. That's what Elon Musk does every day, of course. Yeah, we're doing this with the power of cough medicine. It's going to be great. Yeah, yeah. Not the kind of cough medicine that you can only buy so much of. Okay, so we're here today, powered by cough medicine, to discuss the United Nations interim force in Lebanon. Of course, a thing that we haven't talked about before, but that lots of people are talking about on the internet. And I wanted to like...

Just clear up what I think are some misunderstandings or just a lack of background. Sort of explain what they do, explain who it's composed of, a little bit of history and sort of its role here as...

Israel begins attacking Lebanon as it did Gaza, right? And as it has continued to attack the West Bank as well. Yeah, and as we're going to get to the end of this episode, they've started making a small push into Syria. So great things happening here. We'll get to that at the end of the episode. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Israel once again employing an entirely proprietary understanding of borders and where they are and how they work. Maybe they're actually the no borders state. You know, like Benedict Anderson. My opposite.

My opposition to the Sykes-Picot borders is well known, but not like this, man. This is not what I meant when I said destroy the Sykes-Picot borders. In the Venn diagram, the overlap of people who disagree with Sykes-Picot, it's Miao Wang, the Kurdistan Workers' Party, and Israel. But it's very small, and they disagree with it for very different reasons.

ISIS too. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. Yeah. You're really in good company. Yeah. I remember back in like, back in like 2014. So this one's for, there's, there are a bunch of kids who listened to this show and by kids, I mean, people who weren't like 27, um, who don't remember the fact that you could just argue with ISIS people on Twitter. Yeah.

Oh, yeah. In, like, 2014, 2015. And, like, they had a really good PR operation. Oh, incredible, yeah. And one of the arguments they would make was, like, well, yeah, we're trying to destroy the imperialist, like, civil borders. And we're like, well, okay. Like, you're doing this by establishing ISIS. And it's like...

Really? Yeah. No, that was a wild time when you could argue that like you can still argue with like an Assadist occasionally on Twitter or like. Oh, sure. But this wasn't even just like people who support them. This was like actual ISIS PR guys. Yeah. That was their whole job was to argue with you. Yeah. There are some pretty good articles from back in that time period about that. If you're too young to remember that.

But yeah, so we're talking about UNIFIL today, right? The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon. Why are we talking about them? Because the IDF has spent the last week or so edging on just openly attacking them. And it has more or less openly attacked them, but it hasn't done so in like a

complete way, I guess. We'll talk a little bit now about some of the things which have happened, because I think we should probably start there. And then we'll explain who UNIFIL are, what they do, why they're there, etc. A little bit of history. So UNIFIL has caused a situation with the IDF extremely serious and a flagrant violation of international law. A phrase which is used every time Israel does anything, because it's true. And then nothing happens. And then nothing happens, yeah. And that, I think, where we're going to end up today is that, like,

It's good that they are there, right? Like just to big picture this, what Israel has done in Lebanon, in Gaza and in the West Bank is it has attacked anyone who is any form of outside observer, right? It has killed aid workers. It has killed journalists and it has shot artillery rounds at peacekeepers, injured peacekeepers in Lebanon, right? Anyone who can provide any form of independent oversight,

who can provide any form of accountability for what they're doing is in danger. And this like, it's more or less, I mean, Russia does this a little bit too, right? But like among, like, I don't know what,

We're supposed to understand Israel as a democracy, but this war seems to be pretty unpopular even there. And then Yahoo really isn't. He's taken the Trump approach to democracy, let's say. Israel seemingly murdering journalists as part of its policy, as a goal of its invasion of Gaza, is pretty unique even by the standards of other Western militaries who have done some pretty terrible things in the Middle East in the last 20 years.

So some of the things it's done in recent days, it's fired smoke rounds about 100 meters from their compounds, causing unifil peacekeepers to have to don their gas masks. 15 of them were injured. They had like skin irritation from whatever the munition was. I don't quite know what it was. I guess I think expired smokes can do that and tear gases, old teargas.

tear gas can do that. You're not supposed to use tear gas. Yeah, that's a war crime. Yeah, that's a war crime. It's a war crime that lots of people do, to be fair. They wouldn't be the first one I'd see. But then, again, right? Like, these are people... Are they signatures to a Geneva Convention, actually? I don't know. That's a good... They are. They don't give a fuck. Does it really matter? But, yeah, have a look. I'm interested to know. Yeah, they actually have ratified the Geneva Convention, which I guess makes them mildly more... There you go.

international law bound to the US, which is the ultimate rogue state. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean, Israel is pretty much a rogue state at this point, right? Like that, I think, is the sort of the frame of analysis through which they should be understood. A rogue state doing violent settler colonialism, wherever the fuck it wants with your taxpayer money, because...

Apparently, there's nothing it can do which will cause it to have one centimeter of accountability from the US. Other things they've been getting up to, they've knocked down compound walls of the UNIFIL compounds. Can we explain what UNIFIL is, by the way? Yeah, sure. So the UNIFIL is the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon. It's tasked with peacekeeping, monitoring the withdrawal of the IDF. So in theory...

The IDF, as we'll get into, has invaded Lebanon many times. In theory, since 2006, which was the last time it sort of

invaded Lebanon on like it's invaded Lebanon on a very small scale like hundreds of times right like for instance stepping across the border which the border is not entirely agreed upon by Israel and Lebanon but the United Nations has imposed something called a blue line which is what it considers to be the border Israeli troops will go across that to trim trees a lot so they can like spy more effectively right they literally have towers and cameras and stuff and

But in 2006, people who are old like myself will remember Israel. Last time it did a sort of full-scale evasion of Lebanon and on its withdrawal. I'll just go through the history of uniform now and we can talk about the attacks later, I guess. So they're supposed to keep

the IDF and Hezbollah, in theory, out of an area between the Litani River and the Blue Line. The Blue Line is where the UN drew the border in 2000. And the idea is that the border was drawn there by the UN to determine if Israel had withdrawn from Lebanon. That doesn't necessarily mean that all parties accepted it as the border. They don't, but it is the Blue Line for now. The UNIFIL have been in Lebanon since 1978. That

That was one of the times when Israel invaded Lebanon. At that point, they were looking for the PLO. Yeah. I think the PLO had crossed over from Lebanon to attack and massacre people in Israel, right? At which point Israel then decided to just go hog and fully invade Lebanon in 78. It invaded again in 82 while UNIFIL were there and it...

sort of bypassed UNIFIL positions at that point. And it doesn't mean that people didn't die in these invasions. UNIFIL troops are peacekeepers because they did, right? Like, it's a dangerous place to be. Also, like, 82 is like the Sabra Shatila massacre. Like, it's just like hideous Israeli massacres of refugee camps.

which is the kind of thing that like used to cause more anger in the U S that it did now. Like, yeah, now it's another day that ends in Y right. Like, you know, they, they bombed our hospital again. It's a year of bombing hospitals now. Uh, and it doesn't seem to register anymore. It doesn't, you know, make the, make the headlines. Yeah. In, in 82 Israel bombed compound and it took Israel until the

year 2000 to quote unquote withdraw from Lebanon. And at that point, that was when the blue lion was drawn, right? During that time before 2000, it wasn't just the IDF that was operating in the area. You also had the South Lebanese army. I don't like the division of groups in this part of the world exclusively along religious lines, because I think that doesn't entirely explain things always. And I think it's like a very analyst brain way of seeing things.

to be like, oh, these are the Shiites and they do this. These are the Sunnis and they do this. But the SLA is a majority Christian organization. And it began as its own independent thing in the civil war in Lebanon, but it became more or less an Israeli proxy, right? It's certainly in this area and the UN calls them Israeli de facto forces, which is kind of a bold move.

move from the UN actually like yeah to just say it of course saying it and doing it is another thing but like during the time from 82 to 2000 Israel invaded multiple times right including in 1996 when just in the year of 1996 Israel fired on UNIFIL peacekeepers 270 times so like I think that's like every weekday for the entire year to put things in perspective you know like if they took weekends off

They fired on them every weekday, including shelling a UNIFIL compound. After the withdrawal in 2000, UNIFIL's task was peacekeeping, monitoring the withdrawal, and assisting the Lebanese government in restoring its authority in the area under UN mandate 1701. In 2006, it's elevated again. And eventually, it's sort of ground to a standstill that time, ground to a standstill on top of a massive pile of civilian bodies, as it tends to do, right?

They bombed Beirut in 2006. I remember that. I was traveling in the Middle East in 2006. I remember just being like, oh, this is... It's one thing to watch war on TV when you're at home, but when you're that little bit closer and it's people who are like, my cousin is there. My brother is there. A good school friend of mine was in Beirut, I remember. It was one of my earlier experiences of just being like,

This is horrific and there's nothing we can do. Like no one seems to care. No one's going to stop them. And like here we are getting on for two decades later and in fact, no one has stopped them. They're still doing it. Talking of things that no one can stop, Mia, no one can stop the relentless march of capitalism. And that is where we now have to pivot to advertisements. We are back.

So in 2006, once again, Israel killed UN peacekeepers, right? Perhaps the most notable incident is when a precision-guided bomb struck a bunker in which four UN peacekeepers were sheltering. They'd been shelled 14 times that day. They had then gone to their bunker, right, to be protected from the shelling, at which point they received this precision-guided munition, which killed four of them.

The peacekeepers were from Austria, Canada, China, and Finland. Later, the UN sent a quick reaction force and a rescue team, which the IDF also shelled. Jesus Christ. Yeah.

I think this may be the time to point out that I think a lot of people are maybe hopeful, and maybe it's true, that if Israel crosses a line with attacking European people, that will matter more to the states and governments of the world than it has done with killing Palestinian civilians. And to a degree, they might be right. You've had statements from a dozen or so countries that Israel shouldn't be attacking Palestinians.

But they're still getting this fire hose of money and weapons, right? There's still been no actual accountability. I think that will actually stop them from doing what they're doing. That's not like the fault of the people on the ground in Unifil for the most part. Yeah. But nonetheless, it's the case. It was also in that incident in 2006 that I was talking about, Unifil called the IDF 10 times to ask them to stop shelling. And this bunker, by the way, I'm not talking about like

concealed position, right? Like I've been in bunkers and I'm away for work that you might not be able to see very easily. This bad boy is painted bright white with the letters UN on it. It's incredibly well marked. It's impossible to miss. It stands out like a sore thumb. That's where they dropped their precision guided munition. There was also an incident in 2010. This might be one people remember. This is one of the tree trimming incidents. So the IDF was trying to trim trees on the blue line.

The Lebanese military perceived them to have entered Lebanon. I'm sure the IDF perceived themselves to be inside Israel. The IDF's understanding of borders, as I said, is somewhat unique. And so Indonesian UNIFIL troops were there. This is a particularly interesting incident. The Indonesian troops seem to be pretty popular in Lebanon. From what I can tell, there are 41 nations that take part in UNIFIL. But there are a large contingence of Spanish, French, German troops.

Italian and Irish peacekeepers and Indonesian and Nepali peacekeepers as well. The Indonesians are interesting because their government doesn't recognize Israel. And so they have no diplomacy. I don't quite know how they manage that because as we'll get into, Yudhafala is controlled by this thing called a tripartite mechanism, whereby they have to agree on almost everything with the government of Lebanon or the military of the Lebanese army and the IDF, which is

It's kind of classic UN, right? You have these people there who are positioned to do something really important right now, which is to stop the IDF doing in Lebanon what it has done in Gaza.

But they've managed to engineer themselves into a situation where the IDF also has a veto on pretty much anything they can do. Yeah. Which, like, I was told... I spoke to someone who was very familiar with the operations of UNIFIL, and they were telling me, for instance, that the IDF had been able to control what munitions they were able to bring into the country. Jesus. Which matters because, as we'll get into...

One of the things that IDF likes to do is literally knock on their front door with main battle tanks. They actually knocked down the front gate of the Unifil compound with a Macava tank. Certainly, knocking the front gate down with a Macava is one way of going about asking. Yeah, which is insane. Yeah. These people just completely lost their minds. Yeah, that's the thing, right? I think that's what I want folks to take away from this, is that it

It's unlikely that the UN is going to go toe-to-toe with the IDF at this point. Yeah, no. That doesn't mean, as I've seen people saying, that either they're there to spy for the IDF, they're not. The IDF keeps killing them. Yeah. In quite large numbers. I think 42 Irish people have been killed in the history of uniform deployments.

from other countries too, right? Nor does this mean... Netanyahu has called them, quote, hostages of Hezbollah, which is kind of a ridiculous claim. Yeah. As many of the things that come out of his mouth are. Like, they're also categorically not. They're hostages of the United Nations and there's this system that it's backed itself into whereby two belligerent parties can stop them doing anything they do. So I'll give you an example of that 2010 case, right? These Indonesian UNIFIL troops are trying to prevent...

the IDF and the Lebanese army firing at each other. The IDF is entering into Lebanon to cut down some trees in the perspective of the Lebanese army. I guess they started throwing insults at one another and soon enough they start shooting at each other. So two Indonesian peacekeepers, there was a video of this that went around for a while, uh,

So the Indonesians decide that basically there's nothing we can do. They're going to shoot at each other. And so they decide to withdraw, which probably isn't the best. They're not keeping peace by force, I guess. But they basically decide there's nothing they can do. They decide to pull out. Local people...

a roadblock to try and make them stay and prevent the IDF from entering Lebanon. This happens a lot. You'll see this happening. And this happens in various... I'm going to get into some other UN situations where this has happened, right? But the two peacekeepers get separated from their unit.

This is a video that kind of went around at the time. I'm sure they're genuinely afraid at that point, right? In the video, they're being helped by local folks and they end up getting in a taxi to leave and come back to their base. And...

Which, like, I'm sure they were in a pretty shitty... They were having a bad day. Yeah, yeah. And to quote Major General Alain Pellegrini, who was a French officer who was UNIFIL commander from 2004 to 2007, quote, the problem is in such cases as this, if you intervene to protect the IDF, for instance, UNIFIL will be accused by Hezbollah or the people of protecting the Israelis and collaborating with the enemy. The other side, if we do the same with the Lebanese, Israel will accuse UNIFIL of collaborating with Hezbollah. So, like, yes, it will in the...

that we're seeing currently, like, I think obviously what Israel thinks and says doesn't really have much credibility anymore because they're ruled by this tripartite mechanism. There's really very little they can do. They can fire at people if they're fired upon, but the IDF isn't like engaging them in small arms combat, right? They're...

lobbing artillery shells into their compound. They're firing smoke. They're bashing down their walls with Caterpillar Armored Bulldozers. The IDF loves an armored bulldozer. Yeah. Because, I mean, you can probably join the dots on why the IDF loves an armored bulldozer. You know, they're in the business of knocking stuff down, I guess. Yep. Yeah. Going...

into urban areas and destroying people's homes. That's, I'm sure other folks have armor bulldozers too. Just IDF is kind of well known for using these things. They shot down an observation tower last week, which had two peacekeepers in it. And obviously those people were injured because their tower got shot down. But like, they're not fully attacking them enough that those peacekeepers would like defend themselves or their, uh,

their positions. And I think if people are, like, hoping that somehow, like, an engagement between peacekeepers and the IDF will be what causes accountability, I don't think that's going to happen. Yeah, and for, like, for the UN to actually, like...

really seriously intervene in a world like this, it takes one of the UN Security Council members being like, we will send our own troops. That's like how the UN got involved in Korea, right? Yeah. Like, the US was like, fuck it, we're going to send an army there. And like, Russia is not going to, like, send an army. No. They

They're significantly too busy invading Ukraine and selling natural gas to Israel to do anything. China's not going to do it because they're Israel's second largest trading partner and they don't give a shit. No one's actually going to send troops to back some kind of UN mandate to stop the Israelis from doing this. Even if the Israelis were to just start killing peacekeepers, it's not going to happen. It's never happened any other time the Israelis have killed peacekeepers. Yeah.

like peacekeepers have in other places for yeah that for instance Irish peacekeepers in Congo right or the Canadians and indeed like the the uniform have engaged in combat before but I think the chances of them like

stopping the IDF invasion are extremely slim. Yeah, like if you're fighting a state that is just directly an American proxy, there's no way. Yeah. I don't even think like the 70s NAM, like non-aligned movement, like dominated UN could have pulled something like that off. And like this UN will not.

No, like the UN will issue strongly worded statements. The UN will say it's deeply concerned. And I imagine that like if you're just like a troop and you're on your unifil. So most of the at least for the Irish, most of the people that have volunteered to be there. Ireland is probably among at least among European countries, a country that has stood strongest in its solidarity with Palestine for a long time.

I'm sure it fucking sucks. I'm sure it really blows. Oh yeah. And what the IDF has done now is advance past their like forward positions and the positions where people are being injured by shelling at a headquarters position. So like, if you imagine a triangle with a broad base of it at the front, they're shelling and sort of fighting around the headquarters positions. I'm sure if you've been spending that much of your life as a soldier, you know, like, and you're watching something terrible happen, you'd want to fight, but yeah, you're just sitting around. Like,

That doesn't mean that it's bad that they're there. No, yeah. Like, any form of accountability will make it more accountable than what happened in Gaza, right? Yeah. Or at least it will make whatever happens more visible than what happened in Gaza. And it probably legitimately has slowed the Israelis down. Yeah. Versus what would happen if there was nothing there and they could just run roughshod, which is, you know, again, like what we've seen in Gaza and what we've seen in the West Bank. Yeah, like, I mean, their strategy in Gaza has been...

First of all, like militarily inept, right? Like they've lost control of areas in their rear because aside from just killing lots of people and flattening cities, they don't seem to be

really doing much in an actual sort of targeted manner. And like, yeah, just the presence of peacekeepers means that you can't just carpet bomb in advance, you know, fire at anything that moves. This area between the Latani River and the Blue Line, civilians have largely left because there's intense combat going on there, right? Has Bala present there? And then obviously the IDF are now present there and they're fighting. So like,

If people can leave, they've left. So having, not that civilians have really slowed the Israelis down in Gaza or been a civilian casualties don't seem to be something they care about. But yeah, having these folks there has stopped them just carpet bombing the area, which is a good thing. Something that's not a good thing is our obligation to pivot to adverts again, which we will do. All right, we're back.

Yeah, I guess like I've seen it from a few people. I think it's either the people who discovered like international politics a year ago and previously like hadn't really thought about it or from the kind of nativist right, the idea that like they shouldn't be there.

I've seen it from some kind of nativist type folks about Ireland. Like, why are the Irish there risking their lives for the Lebanese? What the fuck did the Lebanese ever do for them? I have such good news for you about who was training the IRA in the 70s. There were a lot of guys with Irish accents in the Beca Valley training in the pillow camps in the 70s.

So, you know, they really have actually done things for you. It's one of the things people do this with like the US or there's like one of the Israeli lines. It's like, ah, what is what have Palestinians ever done for black people? It's like, well, like a lot of people who got a lot of training in the 70s. Like they genuinely are for better and for worse, because like there's also groups that they trained that like they probably shouldn't have. Like, yeah, without a doubt, a lot of the groups that became the fighting vanguard, which was OK, it's

I don't want to describe the fighting vanguard. The fighting vanguard were like a kind of militant wing of the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria and like a bunch of those fighting vanguard guys who survived. So they do an uprising and I think it's 84. They like all get killed. Those people who survive go on to be some of the founding members of Al Qaeda. So not not always. Yeah, no, great.

Yeah, but like, you know, their record, like, look, one out of like 20 of the people you trained go with haywire is not great. But like, you know, 19 other ones did pretty good. Yeah, I think Abdul-Azhar was in the Bekaa Valley for a while. Yeah, yeah. Lots of cadres of the PKK. Yeah, PKK was there. Yeah. Kurds died, actually. There's a good article called The Kurds Who Died for Palestine. I was reading recently.

Because often you'll see this idea that the Kurds are inherently Zionist, and I don't think that's true. No, they fought in the Leviticus Civil War on the side of the PLO. Because they were in Bekaa Valley in the PLO's training camps. Yeah, they didn't really have much choice, to be fair.

Israel was coming for them. Yeah, and like, Israel is one of the countries that helped kidnap Abdullah Ocalan. Like, they're really not pro-Zionist at all. No, this is one of those things that you'll see from like, I don't know if they're bot accounts, or they're just people with very unoriginal opinions who like, kind of Turkish state lines. When Israel builds settlements in the West Bank and Gaza, they do it with steel that comes from Turkey. Yep. So, yeah.

maybe treat those claims with some skepticism if there's a gray wolf in bio, particularly. Yeah, there is a broader, more serious point there, which is that like the actual physical resources that the Israelis use to physically build the occupation, right? Those all come from places and it's not all the US. And I think people have this image that like, well, like it is true. The US sends an unbelievable amount of money to Israel, but like,

There's a lot of places where the Israelis are getting their shit for, right? Like the Israeli tech sector. The Israeli tech sector is one of the cores of the Israeli economy and is one of the cores of the Israeli occupation. It's almost entirely fueled by semiconductors and stuff that they buy from China, right? That's where all the physical, technical infrastructure of this stuff comes from. I talked about it before about Russian natural gas, right?

All of these countries who will, you know, talk all of this shit, like, and the UN about Israel, like, people's geopolitical stances and what they're willing to send materially to the Israelis are not the same thing at all. And if you want to actually gauge how the occupation functions, it's because a lot of countries that nominally will be like, oh, we oppose Israeli occupation, we'll just send them all the fucking resources that they need to do the occupation. Yeah. Yeah.

And they don't get any heat unless it's like literal bombs and bullets, right? Yeah. And even then, like lots of people, like... Yeah. There's plenty of non-US. I mean, the UK does a lot of this too, right? Yeah. One of the things that IDF likes to do that I haven't mentioned yet is mock air assaults of uniform positions. Jesus Christ. Well, they'll fly in like a bombing formation, just

basically, I guess, haze them. I can't really think of a way to describe it. It's terror. It's a terror campaign. Yes. It's a very clear indication that any day we could wipe you off the map. And some of the Unifil assets seem to have anti-aircraft missiles. Some of them don't. But even still, a determined attack by the IDF, they'd be in big trouble, of course. So right now, I guess, the situation we're in, according to the person I spoke to,

is that these positions, Israel has advanced past, the peacekeepers there are still in their positions, right? They have, using their own funds, which I presume means funds from the states of which they are part, fortified their positions and improved their positions. With their own money? Jesus Christ. Yeah.

Well, the UN is supposed to provide positions for them. It's supposed to provide their rations and it's supposed to provide weapons and vehicles for some of the states that like kind of aren't up to, I guess, a modern standard. That's incidentally why you don't see it so much here. But in other parts of the world, you'll often see troops on peacekeeping missions who like perhaps you haven't heard of that country's military before, right? Like it's very common for like...

Also, I think it is better that there are African peacekeepers in Africa than white European peacekeepers, I think, for historical and very obvious reasons. I will mention, one of the places that sends a lot of peacekeepers to places is Nepal, and the record of Nepalese peacekeepers that are being sent by Maoist governments are not great. Not great.

Yeah, you can Google that. We've talked about this in Brazil at length. And in Haiti, like, sorry, Brazilian-Nepalese cooperation in Haiti is a shitshow. Yeah.

No, it has not been good for the Haitian people. I will say, like, one of the things that happens a lot is the UN pays them a certain rate for peacekeeping, I guess, or the UN compensates a certain rate, which is often a lot more than those militaries pay their soldiers. So it's like a source of income for the military. If you see what I mean, they can, like, skim off the percentage. But these guys have, at their own expense, fortified their positions. At their own expense, supplied themselves with rations. So, like, they bought a ton of food and water. It's what that means in, like, non-military.

nerdy terms. So they're pretty well stocked up, right? They're bunkered up. Yeah, but it's also like this UN operation is being equipped in the same way that American school teachers make sure their classrooms have pencils. That's a perfect... What the fuck is going on here? Yeah, yeah. Jesus Christ. It may be, Mia, maybe the state not the best way of organizing human society is what people are saying. Look, we need to fuse the two and finally bring about my lifelong dream of armed teachers union pickets. Yeah.

Yeah, bring it back to Blair Mountain, but for teachers. Yeah, it's like, don't arm teachers, arm teachers' unions. Yeah, we can finally get bipartisan agreement on... Yeah, they're pretty well holed up, like American preppers dream of themselves being, right? Surrounded by ammunition and MREs. But at some point, they're going to run out of food and water. And at some point, that means that they're going to have to resupply, right? Now,

I'm just going to check the date very quickly. UNIFIL is on Twitter, by the way, if you want to follow them there. They kind of give a daily update on what's going on. On the 13th of October, UNIFIL said that the IDF soldiers stopped a critical UNIFIL logistical movement, which could well be like an attempt at resupply of one of these places, right? At some point, they're going to have to resupply them either by air or by land. And I think that is when we will...

most likely see like exactly how hard the IDF wants to go against like in this case trucks full of MREs right like yeah and previously they've got in standoffs like a few years ago the French the French have done some interesting stuff as part of the Unifil mission like in 2010 they kind of went on a unilateral operation without approval to look for Hezbollah yeah not a great move but

Yeah, it's wild. French forces in Lebanon is such an interesting thing because it's like you have inside of the French soul is warring at all times two forces. It is racisme and antisemitisme. Because they hate Muslims so much, but they are also so antisemitic. This is at all times warring. The nature of the French soul, the two wolves that live inside the French person.

Yeah, well, in 2010, their Islamophobia was winning. Specifically, they used sniffer dogs in people's homes, which is very disrespectful in culture in that part of the world. I mean, also here, I would be really pissed off if fucking a bomb squad started running sniffer dogs around my apartment. Yeah, for sure. Get out. Going through private property, doing things that they weren't. They're supposed to operate with the Lebanese armed forces, right? So they patrol alongside them. But

in this case, the French decided they were just going to send it solo and obviously pissed a lot of people off. And like, it's really interesting to see people address their concerns. Well, it's not interesting, I guess, but people address their concerns specifically with the French element of Unifil rather than other elements of Unifil. Like,

for instance the indonesian seems to be pretty popular the indian element of unifil teaches weekly yoga classes which are apparently becoming more and more popular i've seen a bunch of videos uh there's like tiktoks of of lebanese people in that area who speak english and they all speak english with an irish accent oh yeah because they've been there for so long it's great yeah yeah um yeah well the irish have been there since 70s right like

I know of people who have two generations of their family who have been peacekeepers there. Yeah. I think for those people, like over time being there, I'm sure they do develop a personal connection to the people who, you know, they're around and the people whose communities they are protecting. And like,

I genuinely feel like it's probably really a shitty situation to be in. Yeah. Being locked in your base. That doesn't mean they should leave, right? I just want to end with like, and I know we want to talk about the Golan Heights too. In 2013, actually, Austria pulled out of the Golan Heights and Ireland had to deploy a bunch of people really quickly to kind of cover that area. But,

if we look at like Srebrenica, right, where the UN could have prevented a genocide and did not. Yeah. The UN forces there withdrew, they surrendered, and then places were captured by the Serbs and then used as collateral to stop the UN doing any more to prevent what... And like, some of the most horrific acts in human history happened at Srebrenica, right? Just disgusting, terrible stuff. And like,

Hopefully the UN has learned from that. Hopefully individual nations... I think in that case it wasn't so much the UN as a whole as the specific chain of command of those peacekeepers. I think they were Dutch. It's worth noting in that point too that part of what's going on there is that a lot of the European countries...

until well into the genocide were basically pro-Serb because they saw the Serbs as something that could, like, just cleanse the Muslims from Europe. It's like, this is the explicit language that they're using, right? Yeah. And this has always been a problem with UN missions. It's like, well, half the time you're trying to stop a genocide, there's, like, some faction of the UN that's like, no, this one fucking rips. Yeah, yeah, right. But they are the bad guys, though, aren't they? I think it's good that they have, like, Muslim countries within their group. And, like...

I think it's probably good that the Irish are there in large numbers because as a country, they have been better on Palestine than almost anyone else in Europe. Yeah, it turns out being a colony has an effect on you. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's on us as the British. But it's better that they're there, I guess. And like, no one talked about them for the past 10 fucking years, but like the most important time for them to be there is right now. Yeah. And like, even if they're not fighting, I think they serve a useful role in like,

It's the only accountability mechanism that Israel can't just destroy. There are definitely people who are alive right now who would not be if the Irish were not there. Yeah, and I know we have these number of Irish listeners. I know it sucks if it's your family member who's stuck there. It feels like they're not able to do anything because they're just stuck there as collateral, as a bargaining chip. I don't know. I think overseas military deployments by European countries go. It's one of the more defensible ones. It's one of the ones that has stopped

civilian lives being harmed yeah and uh yeah i think like the idea that they should leave which i've seen people trotting out like that no they shouldn't like when they leave it's just like gaza all over again it's just israel carpetballing civilians and talking of carpetballing civilians i guess me you wanted to talk about like israel has decided to invade another country so okay so one of the things that's happened this has gotten almost no attention i think because

because the Syrian government does not want to admit that this is happening and they're not doing anything about it because they don't give a shit. So Israel has been occupying the Syrian Golan Heights since 1967.

They've militarized it. They've just been holding the territory for... I shouldn't have tried to do math on the fly. Like over half a century. 60 years? Yeah. And one of the things that's been happening recently is there had been... There had been like... I was going to describe it as like a Russian monitoring force sort of on the border of the Syrian-Aqaba Golan Heights and the sort of like southern provinces of Syria. Yeah. And the Israelis...

seem to have just apparently they've done this before where they'll just like go in and bulldoze a bunch of farmland. Yeah. I think this is on the real species of demining, right? Yeah, sort of. Yeah. It's always been it's always been pretty clearly like a land grab kind of thing. Yeah. But normally what happens is they go in, they bulldoze a bunch of places and they pull out. Yeah.

Somehow they have surpassed Turkey as the number one bulldozer of olive fields, which is sort of staggering. They love that shit. But this time, they've set up what seems like a road project, although given everything that we've been seeing about

the sort of like rise of the concept of greater Israel where they just start invading everyone and radially outwards from Israel is truly alarming. They've bulldozed these places, but now, but they set up like barbed wire like around the new territory, which seems like they're just actually attempting to do annexation. Yeah. And that's really alarming because I mean, like the Syrian government isn't going to do shit about this, right? Like, you know,

you know, Israel has bombed Syria a few times already. Oh yeah, they bombed Syria last time I was there. The Syrian government doesn't give a shit, right? They're too busy. Like, they have courage to kill. Like, they don't have time to be dealing with fucking Israel here. Yeah, yeah. But,

There's been an explicit Israeli push like even further out from the Golan Heights. And I think we're just going to see this intensify as as the most sort of like deranged settler factions in Israeli politics gain more and more power in the sort of like, frankly, like very American. We must push our borders. We must like push into new frontiers and seize more land like cycle sort of perpetuates itself. Yeah. And a lot of the people doing the settling have literally come from America to do the settling. Yeah. Push.

Pushing out in the Golan Heights is bad. I know Israel claims it was attacked by Ketib HaZbullah in the Golan Heights last week, and Ketib HaZbullah has denied that. They claim Israel fabricated it. Neither of those people are people I particularly trust. Yeah, well, and this is also one of these funny ones where it's like, the Israelis are denying that they've done this, I think.

And the Syrian government is also denying that they've done this, but like everyone who's there is like, well, obviously they did this. Like, yeah. And like,

I don't know why Israel keeps wanting to open up near France. I mean, like you say, it's settler colonialist logic, I guess. But I do think that the continuation of this full-scale war generates consent for the government as it exists in the moment that it stops and the government's legitimacy will collapse there. Yeah. But yeah, pushing into Syria opens up a whole other world of shit. Just the worst stuff. Yeah.

Yeah, if there's a nation on Earth who really doesn't need anyone else trying to fucking... And it's not that Israel has not been killing Syrians for a long time. Israel has been lobbing munitions into Syria for a long time and it's increased in the last year. I was in Syria on October 7th last year and pretty much as soon as Israel began responding to that attack, it began responding in Syria as well. But a ground operation is a whole different thing. There ain't no UN peacekeepers in Syria. And yeah, that could

could be very bad. Yeah, so we'll keep you updated on that story as it presumably continues to get worse because everything seems to end. I mean, I will say, okay, so today Biden made a thing that said if Israel hasn't resolved the humanitarian situation in 30 days, he's going to cut off aid. But that's not going to happen. It's simply not. Everyone says that.

all the time. I mean, how many lines have they stepped over, right? Like, how many... An American red line is a line that when you step over, nothing happens. Yeah. That's just how it works. Right. Like, it was in Syria. It has been multiple times. Yeah. I mean, there's this old Russian joke about China's final warning.

Throughout the entire 70s when there's all these border disputes going on, even in the 60s and in the 50s and 60s, Chinese officials would be like, this is China's final warning. Russia must stop. Nothing would happen. This is where we're at with the Democrats being like, ah, Israel must stop doing whatever the fuck. No, they're not going to do anything. They don't give a shit. Yeah, no. We've cried wolf so many times. Yes.

it's clearly not an issue that Harris feels like it's going to lose her the election. Yeah. And then whoever wins, we got four more years of turning a fire hose of money and weapons on children in Palestine and apparently Syria and Lebanon as well. So yeah, it's great. It's all great. I'm afraid, yeah, this has not been a good news episode. I hope people who have family, I have friends who are in Lebanon, like I hope people who have family there are doing okay. I know it sucks. I know it sucks.

Football fans, picture this. You bet on your favorite player to score the first touchdown, and he throws an awesome block so his teammate can score instead. If this happens, BetMGM wants to give you another chance at the end zone. With BetMGM's second chance promotion, you'll get your stake back if your first touchdown scorer scores second instead.

That's right, bet on any pro football player to score the first touchdown of the game. If you're right, you win. If your players score second, you get your stake back in cash. Everyone knows the most exciting part of football is the score. With BetMGM's Second Chance promotion,

you have a chance to keep the fun going after the first player crosses the goal line. Place a first touchdown score wager today. BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly. See BetMGM.com for terms. 21 plus only, DC only. Existing customer offer. Subject to eligibility requirements. Rewards vary. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.

This week, Charlemagne Tha God sits down with Vice President Kamala Harris for a conversation you don't want to miss. The things that we want and are prepared to fight for won't happen if we're not active and if we don't participate. They tackle the big questions, politics, policy, and what's next for the country. Doesn't the Biden administration have to take some blame for the border, though? Charlemagne, first thing we dropped was a bill to fix the broken immigration system.

Which, by the way, Trump did not fix when he was president. Don't miss this in-depth interview with Charlemagne Tha God and Vice President Kamala Harris, only on The Breakfast Club. Catch the full interview now on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Make sure you check it out.

Hey, y'all. Are you ready for an explosive new podcast that brings together hip-hop and history? My name is Nimany, and I'm the host of Historical Records, a brand-new podcast for kids and families that proves in order to make history, you have to make some noise. ♪ Flash, slam, another one gone ♪ ♪ Bash, bam, another one gone ♪ ♪ The crack of the bat and another one gone ♪ ♪ The tip of the cap, there's another one gone ♪

I make this show entirely by myself. Impressive, right? Okay, okay. Maybe I get a little bit of help from my sidekick, Tina the Raccoon. Every week on Historical Records, join me, Nimity, and Tina the Raccoon as we learn about the unsung heroes of the past and turn their history into hip-hop.

Listen to Historical Records on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, I'm Jack Peace Thomas, the host of a brand new Black Effect original series, Black Lit, the podcast for diving deep into the rich world of Black literature. I'm Jack Peace Thomas, and I'm inviting you to join me and a vibrant community of literary enthusiasts dedicated to protecting and celebrating our stories. Black Lit is for the page turners, for those who listen to audiobooks while commuting or running errands.

for those who find themselves seeking solace, wisdom, and refuge between the chapters. From thought-provoking novels to powerful poetry, we'll explore the stories that shape our culture. Together, we'll dissect classics and contemporary works while

uncovering the stories of the brilliant writers behind them. Blacklit is here to amplify the voices of Black writers and to bring their words to life. Listen to Blacklit on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hello and welcome to It Could Happen Here.

I'm here with Mio. How are you doing? It's abominably early, which is not even podcast early. It's like 8 a.m. here, so it's going to be... We've done the caffeine. We're holding on for dear life. I feel you. I feel you.

I have to ask, have you noticed that the continents are dripping a little bit? Continents are dripping? Yeah, yeah. And I don't mean like blinged out. I mean, like if you take a look at a map and you assume that north is up and south is down, you'll find it kind of looks like our major landmasses are melting a little bit. Ah!

You know, okay, now that you say it, I can kind of see it. Yeah, this is a concept known as continental trip. And I'm not tripping on anything. I'm not the first person to notice. Incredible. You can look it up. There's a whole Wikipedia page about this and everything. And well, South America alongside India, they're kind of seen as the quintessential examples of this continental trip. And this is a very...

Odd way that I've decided to segue into the next nation in our exploration of Latin American anarchist history. It's right to the east of Chile and south of every other country in its hemisphere. That is, of course, the Argentine Republic, more commonly known as Argentina, which is derived, by the way, from the Latin word for silver. Oh, okay.

My name is Andrew Sage. You can find me on YouTube as Andrewism. And thanks to the scholarship of Chuck Morse, Jeffrey de la Focard, and Angel Capuleti, we're going to take a journey into the history of anarchism in Argentina. Also, got to do the shout out for Capuleti's Anarchism in Latin America. Great book. Also great cover. Got a big bird on it. Good stuff. Oh yeah, shout out, of course, of course. So I suppose the best place to start is in the beginning. Yeah.

So there was this thing called the Big Bang, right? The universe expanded extremely fast. In like picoseconds of time, there was a large movement. It's a large expansion of matter. Yeah, but seriously, Argentina has been peopled since the Paleolithic period.

In particular, we find evidence of ancient peoples butchering the meat of an armadillo relative as early as 21,000 years ago. Jeez. So, you know, we've been around. We've been around. From then on, as far as we can tell, for now at least, because, you know, the timelines are constantly getting updated.

With new information, as it should be, the area to be known as Argentina was pretty sparsely populated by a variety of diverse cultures with diverse social organizations, including foragers and farmers. To make a long and largely unknown history of indigenous coexistence and conflict short, people continued to live and the earth continued to spin for the next few millennia until a few ships on the horizon spelled doom for all to see.

These are, of course, the Europeans, who first arrived in the region with the 1502 voyage of Amerigo Vespucci, with the Spanish navigators Juan Díaz de Solís and Sebastián Cabo in particular visiting the territory in 1516 and 1526 respectively.

Then in 1536, Pedro de Mendoza founded this small settlement of Buenos Aires. Maybe you've heard of it. But it was abandoned in 1541 thanks to continuous indigenous resistance and had to be refounded in 1580.

As for the rest of what would be Argentina, the Spanish Empire that was running most of the continent was busy looting the silver and gold mines in Bolivia and Peru. So Argentina was kind of seen as a backwater. It wasn't as much of an interest by comparison. Argentina stayed under the Viceroyalty of Peru until the creation of the Viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata in 1776 with Buenos Aires as its capital.

After two failed British invasions in 1806 and 1807, and as you can see, the British and Argentina have had a bit of a scuffle for some time now. Yeah. The Buenos Aires capital would be the stage of revolution, as the 1810 May Revolution replaced the Viceroy Baltasar Hidalgo de Cisneros with the first Junta, a new government made by and for the locals.

And then there was a royalist counter-revolution, some anti-colonial alliance with the then Spanish Philippines, divisions between centralists and federalists over the newly formed Argentine state, proposals to crown a Sapa Inca as monarch of an independent Argentina, and the official declaration of independence for a republic on the 9th of July 1816. Just to go back a bit, to be clear,

There is an alternate history scenario in which Argentina was briefly or continuously under an Incan monarchy. That would have ripped. Literally, I believe it was a cousin of Tupac Amaru III was being considered for the position. Incredible. Incredible. Incredible indeed. See, people tend to see South America as just like...

You know, it's just the extra continent. I mean, I don't think people think about how much has gone on down there. Or rather, it's not really present in the English-speaking world's imagination. You know, we tend to focus on more of the Northern Hemisphere side of things or whichever specific region we find ourselves in, whether it be the Caribbean or Australia, New Zealand, UK, US, Canada. We tend to think about English-speaking colonial history more.

But Latin America had a lot going on in its time. I mean, come on, they had an alliance with the Spanish Philippines. Yeah, rips. Yeah, so, I mean, civil war go brrr, as they say, between the centralists and the federalists. And that would continue for a while after the declaration of the republic in 1816. And it was only resolved in 1831 with a federalist victory. Basically,

Basically, it was a division over how they should organize the state, whether it should be in a federal manner or more centralist unitary manner. And so the Federalists won, which would lead to the War of the Confederation between 1836-1839, the establishment of the Constitution in 1853, and a temporary secession of Buenos Aires, which was forced back into Argentina by 1861.

And as in much of Latin America, anarchism would establish itself fairly early on thanks to the waves of migration from Europe, and particularly from France, Italy, and Spain. There are so many Italians. So many Italians. Oh yeah, just an absurd amount of Italians. These folks fled political repression and poverty in their home countries.

Refugees from the Paris Commune and anarchist literature from the aforementioned lands would find themselves in the streets of Buenos Aires City and the countrysides of Buenos Aires Province. They circulated anarchist ideas through group meetings, such as the group El Miserable in the port city of Rosario, and publications like La Revolte, which was founded by Kropotkin all the way back in Switzerland.

Kropotkin's words of a rebel would also make frequent appearances throughout Argentina, and his conquest of bread received a translation by Catalan carpenter Juan Vila. As with the splits internationally, the First Internationale's local section in Buenos Aires, which was founded in 1872, would split between the supporters of Marx and the supporters of Bakunin.

The former were predominantly French, the latter predominantly Spaniard and Italian. Three decades of substantial migration started in the 1880s would spark significant growth in the anarchist movement, as the migrants found crushing economic deprivation and repressive governance where they'd hoped they'd find prosperity and liberty. Over three million people arrived.

leading to the country having a foreign-born population of 33% by 1914. Nowadays, as in much of the world, unfortunately, that once foreign-born population, some percentage of them, are now unfortunately anti-immigration. Yeah. And violently so. It's a cruel irony that we find ourselves with. Just mere decades ago, their own ancestors were migrants. Yeah.

Among the migration wave came the likes of Hector Mate, an Italian anarchist who helped publish Il Socialista, which is a weekly paper. And of course, believe it or not, the one and only Errico Malatesta, who keeps making guest appearances in these Latin American anarchists on the street. Yeah.

He's just like all over the place. Just traveling everywhere. If I recall correctly, he made an appearance in Cuba. He made an appearance in the Egypt episode as well. Yep. He just keeps showing up. He's really, truly a globetrotter in a mold that we haven't really seen. Hey, I mean, move aside Pitbull. You know, he's the real Mr. Worldwide.

So Errico Montesta, he actually fled Italy in 1885 after escaping imprisonment. And he helped to establish the Circulo de Estudio Socialis, where he and others gave public speeches promoting anarchism. And he worked to organize the Sociedad Cosmopolita de Obreros Panaderos, an anarchist baker's union.

I didn't know he could bake. Maybe he could bake, maybe he couldn't. Maybe he was just there, you know, helping them set up. But in my head, I'd like to imagine that he was pretty good at baking bread and making cookies.

You know, I'm pretty sure it was like an ice cream salesman to a wall point. I thought I might be getting that confused with like some other anarchist who was going around everywhere, who was also selling ice cream. You know, I wouldn't be surprised. I have vague memories of there being a story about like him having an ice cream cart and trying to make money and he couldn't do it because he kept giving ice cream to children. I think I remember that story. I think so. We'd be good if you want to.

You know that those ads used to show on TV a couple, like about a decade ago, most interesting man in the world. Yeah. He was, he was based on Errol Cromant. Yeah.

Yeah, so Manal Tessa later returned to Europe in 1889, yet he left a lasting legacy in helping to organize workers and sow the seeds for a powerful anarchist movement in Argentina. In the early 1890s, the anarchist paper El Perseguido became one of the most popular and prominent voices of anarchist communism in Argentina, despite ongoing repression and government censorship.

The anarchist press continued to expand during this period, with publications like La Voz de la Mujer and Anarchist Feminist People emerging in Rosario. The 1880s and early 1890s also involved significant internal debates, particularly around the role of workers' unions in revolutionary tactics. Some groups embraced anarchist cynicalism, while others believed smaller affinity groups as catalysts of social revolution were the way to go.

While in the midst of a massive, rapid industrial growth and dealing with the worsening economic situation for the working class, such a society was ripe for transformation of the anarchist variety. Initially, the anarchists have been focused on counter-cultural concerns, particularly in the field of education, but as their ranks swelled in number, the stage was set for the debut of a mass anarchist movement among Argentine workers.

In 1897, the anarchist workers were found La Protesta Humana, later shortened to La Protesta, which would become an enduring anarchist paper throughout Latin America. But the anarchists didn't just stick to papers, though. In 1901, anarchists were instrumental in the founding of the Argentine Workers' Federation, or the FOA, which was Argentina's first labor federation.

The Federation was founded in a Congress that assembled some 50 delegates representing 30 to 35 workers' organizations from both capital and interior. The aim of the Federation was an entity that included all workers without regard to their races or beliefs based on a solid foundation of direct action and economic struggle.

Though initially including Marxists, those would later depart to found the General Workers Union or the UGT, which was more amenable to party interests of course, which left the FOA in anarchist hands. The FOA stood at the forefront of the struggles, advocating for higher wages and better working conditions. At the time, the typical workday was 10 hours or more, with wages barely covering essential needs.

Strikes broke out across industries, with notable successes. Painters in Mar del Plata secured an 8-hour workday, and dockworkers in Buenos Aires won a 9-hour workday along with a wage increase. But despite the repression, the workers' movement continued to grow stronger. The FOA's membership surged, with 42 unions and over 15,000 members in 1903, rising to 66 unions and nearly 33,000 members a year later.

In 1904, at its fourth congress, the group was renamed the Regional Workers' Federation of Argentina, or the FORA. Their reasoning was ideological. By adding the adjective regional, it made plain that Argentina was not considered a state or political unit, but a region of the world in which workers struggled for their liberation.

This fourth Congress also approved a solidarity pact that proclaimed the establishment of a classless society with neither state nor private property as the ultimate aim of their struggle. The anarchist influence was clear, but it gets even more explicit in the following year. The UGT had been subordinate to the Marxist Socialist Party, but even their third Congress in 1905 had a syndicalist emergence that preferred workers' associations to political parties.

Basically, even the non-Anarchist workers' organizations were being influenced by the anarchist wave. So much so that the UGT wanted to form a solidarity pact with Fora. But the anarchists in Fora didn't quite trust the parliamentary socialism of the UGT. Still, they did work with them to call a general strike in 1907 in solidarity with cart drivers in Rosario, joined by some 150,000 workers from around the republic. That strike ended in victory for the workers.

In 1905, two years before and at its fifth Congress, Fora made its commitments to revolutionary anarchist communism explicitly known. Quote, We advise and recommend to all our followers the broadest possible study and propaganda with the aim of instilling in workers the economic and philosophical principles of anarchist communism. This education, not content with achieving the eight-hour workday, will bring total emancipation.

and consequently, the social evolution we pursue. End quote. FORA was among the largest federations of workers' organizations, and it was officially anarchist-communist. The 1906-1907 general and tenant strikes garnered greater fervor, and in response, Buenos Aires Police Head Colonel Falcón swore to finish off the anarchists. 1907 saw FORA and UGT attempt a merger,

But since the majority sought adherence to anarchist communism, the merger could not be achieved. Fora was militant and effective in achieving many of its goals, including wage increases, reductions in the length of the workday, and various rights of association.

Port workers, ground transport workers, seamen's unions, beakers, metal workers, construction workers, and ship workers were all prominent in the Federation and were well positioned to paralyze the Argentine economy and win their demands.

In the first decade of the 20th century, these unions led six general strikes and many more partial strikes. And women were more involved than in any other radical movement of the time, taking part in consumer boycotts and rent strikes as well. But the anarchists knew that ruptures in the capitalist economy wouldn't be enough. It could never be enough to merely confront the system and refuse to cooperate with the system as it is.

The social revolution also demands consciousness, solidarity, and the prefiguration of an enlightened, progressive society and social organizations. Thus, anarchists engaged in counter-culture: multiple papers in multiple languages, theater and poetry, mayday marches, social centers, popular education centers, popular libraries, and discussion circles.

All of these efforts were seeded throughout the cities and linked to various unions to create a veritable and dynamic network of revolutionary causes. And since the government understood the anarchist threat, they tried their best to raise the cost of revolutionary activism. The actions included petty police harassment, the humiliating and inconvenient searches and gratuitous demands for identification, which were a familiar experience for the anarchist militants.

There was also the outlawing of radical publications, the suppression of the right to public assembly, mass arrests, martial law declared for a total of 18 months between 1902 and 1910, and of course outright violence to the police, the army, and other formal forces, in addition to thugs acting on their behalf. The government also attempted to undermine the anarchist movement through legislative means.

The residence law in 1902 granted the government the right to deport foreigners that are deemed undesirable without trial. After the law had been in effect for a few years, FURA called a general strike against its oppressive conditions. FURA's leadership condemned the law as a violation of human rights, laboring it as a tool by the state to suppress free thought and working class movements. The government did not budge.

On May day 1909, police violently attacked a peaceful protest organized by transport workers and anarchists, killing eight people and wounding many others. Colonel Falcone, the recurring villain who ordered the attack, later became the target of a retaliatory bombing by young anarchist Simone Radowitzky in November 1909. This act of defiance shook the whole country. In the meantime, the anarchist cause also resonated internationally.

In response to the execution of Francisco Freire, a Spanish educator and anarchist, Fora led a series of strikes in Argentina, joining global protests against his death. 1910 marked Argentina's preparations for the centenary celebrations of its first national government, portraying itself as a beacon of prosperity.

But oh, here come the workers with their unrest and protests to sour the vibes and demand the release of political prisoners and the abolition of the law of residence. Naturally, the government responded by declaring a state of internal war, arresting hundreds of anarchists, including foreign leaders, and imposing extreme censorship and restrictions on civil liberties, shutdowns of publications, and the declaration of a state of emergency.

The government also introduced the social defense law, which levied a series of penalties against anarchist activities specifically. As the centennial celebrations unfolded, Argentina had transformed into a heavily militarized state, with more than 2,000 anarchists arrested or deported. So much for a grand celebration of their free democracy. Despite the repression, the workers' movement continued to grow.

Forrest's general strikes forced the government to make concessions and release jailed workers, but divisions began to appear within the movement. After dealing with so much repression for their radical ideas, a split occurred in 1909 with the formation of the syndicalist group CORA, which adopted much of Forrest's structure and retained some anarchist ideas, but leaned towards a less radical approach, hoping to be less of a target.

The anarchists took yet another hit when, in 1912, the science peña law made voting secret and obligatory, thus making anarchist abstentionism as a tactic illegal. Their range of possible actions was being intentionally closed. While dealing with these external pressures, anarchists also had to deal with pressures from within the workers' movement by even more folks who wanted to compromise the revolutionary goals. Another split between the syndicalists and anarchists occurred at the Forrest's 9th Congress in 1915.

Unions were increasingly led by reformists, social democrats, and uncommitted anarchists, which led to the thesis of a neutral syndicalism focused on winning workers' rights becoming the dominant position within fora. The syndicalists dropped their commitment to anarchist communism and claimed the name the fora of the 9th congress, while the minority of anarchists that maintained their commitment to anarchist communism took the name the fora of the 5th congress. The timing of this split was impeccable though.

You see, as has been a recurring theme in this series, the Russian Revolution of 1917 had a significant impact on Argentinian anarchism. In a sense, it reignited the revolutionary fervor within the movement and led to the reformist and cynicalist 409 losing influence, while revolutionary ideas once again gained momentum. For a brief moment, there was hope, but the Bolsheviks would waste little time in crushing that hope.

By 1920, Argentinian anarchists, like their European counterparts, began to distance themselves from Leninism. They began to recognize the authoritarian nature of the Bolsheviks, took note of Kropotkin and Lenin's correspondences, and soon came to reject the idea of the dictatorship of the proletariat. On his part, alongside his mass slaughter of the anarchists in Kronstadt, Lenin also ordered the confiscation of anarchist texts, which he saw as influencing the conflict within the Bolshevik ranks.

tale as old as time yeah anyway next time we'll see if and how the anarchists in argentina managed to navigate the tumultuous 20s 30s and beyond to leave a lasting mark on argentine history but uh things aren't looking too good for them right now until then all power to all the people this has been it could happen here

Football fans, picture this. You bet on your favorite player to score the first touchdown, and he throws an awesome block so his teammate can score instead. If this happens, BetMGM wants to give you another chance at the end zone. With BetMGM's second chance promotion, you'll get your stake back if your first touchdown scorer scores second instead.

That's right, bet on any pro football player to score the first touchdown of the game. If you're right, you win. If your players score second, you get your stake back in cash. Everyone knows the most exciting part of football is the score. With BetMGM's Second Chance promotion,

you have a chance to keep the fun going after the first player crosses the goal line. Place a first touchdown score wager today. BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly. See BetMGM.com for terms. 21 plus only, DC only. Existing customer offer. Subject to eligibility requirements. Rewards vary. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.

This week, Charlemagne Tha God sits down with Vice President Kamala Harris for a conversation you don't want to miss. The things that we want and are prepared to fight for won't happen if we're not active and if we don't participate. They tackle the big questions, politics, policy, and what's next for the country. Doesn't the Biden administration have to take some blame for the border, though? Charlemagne, first thing we dropped was a bill to fix the broken immigration system.

Which, by the way, Trump did not fix when he was president. Don't miss this in-depth interview with Charlemagne Tha God and Vice President Kamala Harris, only on The Breakfast Club. Catch the full interview now on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Make sure you check it out.

Hey, y'all. Are you ready for an explosive new podcast that brings together hip-hop and history? My name is Nimany, and I'm the host of Historical Records, a brand-new podcast for kids and families that proves in order to make history, you have to make some noise. ♪ Flash, slam, another one gone ♪ ♪ Bash, bam, another one gone ♪ ♪ The crack of the bat and another one gone ♪ ♪ The tip of the cap, there's another one gone ♪

I make this show entirely by myself. Impressive, right? Okay, okay. Maybe I get a little bit of help from my sidekick, Tina the Raccoon. Every week on Historical Records, join me, Nimity, and Tina the Raccoon as we learn about the unsung heroes of the past and turn their history into hip-hop.

Listen to Historical Records on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, I'm Jack Peace Thomas, the host of a brand new Black Effect original series, Black Lit, the podcast for diving deep into the rich world of Black literature. I'm Jack Peace Thomas, and I'm inviting you to join me and a vibrant community of literary enthusiasts dedicated to protecting and celebrating our stories. Black Lit is for the page turners, for those who listen to audiobooks while commuting or running errands.

for those who find themselves seeking solace, wisdom, and refuge between the chapters. From thought-provoking novels to powerful poetry, we'll explore the stories that shape our culture. Together, we'll dissect classics and contemporary works while

uncovering the stories of the brilliant writers behind them. Blacklit is here to amplify the voices of Black writers and to bring their words to life. Listen to Blacklit on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hello and welcome back to It Could Happen Here. I'm Andrew Siege.

Find me on YouTube at Andrews Home. I'm here once again with... Oh, Mia. Haha, that was my cue. Yeah. Indeed. Yeah, she's here. And today, we're continuing the Latin American Anarchism series with our exploration of anarchism in Argentina. Thanks to the scholarship of Chuck Moss, Jeffrey De La Focard, Angel Capiletti, and Jose Antonio Gutierrez and Ian McKay.

When we last left off, various laws and government actions were pressed hard on the anarchist cause in the country. Which one the anarchists executed, jailed, or exiled? What would become of the anarchist movement? Would things get better or worse? It's hard to say. I think you know the answer. 1919 marked the year of La Semana Tragica, or the Tragic Week, when several metalworkers were killed by strikebreakers.

This led to a general strike that shut down the entire country and pushed Buenos Aires into a state of chaos for several days. The anarchist paper La Protesta noted the complete shutdown and praised workers' solidarity. But despite the revolutionary atmosphere, the movement lacked a clear objective, which weakened its long-term impact. They had the power, but didn't do too much with it.

Eventually, the police and Argentina's first fascist organization, Liga Patriotica, were able to subdue the rebellion. The fascists, by the way, were backed by military figures like Rear Admirals Bermej Garcia and O'Connor. They attacked and killed with impunity. And in the end, 55,000 were detained, with anarchists sent to Martin Garcia, Ireland. And as many as 700 were killed and 4,000 were injured. The anarchists' movement persisted, as they always do.

La protesta continued publishing alongside the launch of new papers like Bandera Roja and Tribuna Proletaria. Even after the government banned Anarchist Press in March 1919, the movement continued to organize, culminating in an extraordinary congress of 200 unions in September 1920. Throughout the 1920s, 405 remained a powerful force in Argentina's labor movement, pushing for causes like the Six-Hour Weekday and resisting rising nationalist and militarist sentiments.

But throughout came more repression. In 1921, Argentinian workers de la Forestal in the Chaco region were brutally killed for demanding better wages and conditions. The anarchist fora proposed solidarity actions, but the more reformist fora, the 9th Congress, distanced itself, leaving the movement unsupported. This indifference unfortunately also extended to other violent incidents, such as the murder of workers by the fascist Liga Patriotica in Cualeguaychú.

and worse still were the largely unreported massacres of striking rural workers in Patagonia by the army, sending 1,500 to death by firing squad, an event ignored by most media except for anarchist outlets like La Protesta.

In this case, at least the anarchists got their get back somewhat later when German anarchist Kurt Wilkins assassinated Colonel Hector Valera, the military leader responsible for the killings. That whole story is so wild because the German assassin was also a pacifist. But it's just like, fuck it, we ball. Yeah, I mean, sometimes you had to do what you had to do. Yeah.

And, I mean, the government got it to get back as well because Wilkins was later murdered in retaliation for his murder of Colonel Hector Valero. But at least that led to a general strike across Argentina. It truly is a wild story. Anarchists in Argentina further agitated in opposition to the trial and execution of Italian-American anarchists Sacco and Vanzetti in the United States in 1927.

This was a notorious case, by the way, but we'll pull that string another time. There was a certain anarchist who took the protests in a different direction though. Known to be prolific in his acts of violence, Italian anarchist Severino de Giovanni carried out bombings against the American embassy to protest the trial, bombings against the Italian consulate to protest Italian fascism, and robberies throughout the country.

Di Giovanni's actions sparked debate among anarchists about the issue of quote-unquote anarcho-banditry. Some papers, like La Antorcha, defended Di Giovanni. Others, like La Protesta, attacked him. Di Giovanni's fight came to an end in 1931, when he was arrested and executed for carrying out the murder of one of his fiercest fellow anarchist critics, a certain La Protesta editor named Emilio López Arango.

As you could probably imagine, there weren't any general strikes to protest the Giovanni's execution. General José Félix Uriburu led a coup in 1930 that marked the rise of fascism in Argentina and the continuation of systematic persecution against workers and anarchists. Many were imprisoned, deported, or killed, including prominent figures like Juan Antonio Morán and Joaquín Peniña.

Anarchist groups and unions were repressed under Uriburu's martial law, while the more moderate Confederación General del Trabajo, or CGT, dominated by reformist socialists, survived and became the main representative of workers in the country thanks to Uriburu's corporatist stance.

Martial law was peeled back slightly by 1932, but with such heavy blows to the movement, anarchists had to pull back to the more counter-cultural efforts that defined their movement in the 1880s. Fora resumed publishing activities, with that protester returning as a daily, but government pressure, including actions against his editors and restrictions on postal services, made it difficult to maintain this daily schedule.

Eventually, La Protesta transitioned to a weekly, then bi-weekly, and finally monthly publication. Despite these challenges, a group of anarchist militants in Villa Devoto Prison conceived the idea of a National Anarchist Congress. This Congress first met in September 1932 in Rosario, with delegates from across the country.

And one key outcome of this Congress was the creation of the Comité Regional de Relaciones Anarquistas, or the CRRA. This laid the foundation for what became the Argentine Anarcho-Communist Federation, or FACA, in 1935, although the organization never really gained a mass following.

In 1935, Anarchists also established the Biblioteca Popular José Ingenieros, a library and social center. While initially founded with the support of socialists, the anarchists took full control after the socialists left.

Around this time, anarchist groups campaigned fiercely to free Vuoto, Maini, and Diago, comrades who had been tortured and imprisoned for over a decade. The newspaper Justicia was created solely to advocate for their release, which was finally granted in 1942.

Throughout this period, the anarchist press remained active. The number of publications diminished. Several publishing houses like Nervio, Iman, Tupac, and Reconstruir kept anarchist literature alive, publishing key works and essays. In 1933, Acción Libertaria emerged and eventually became the voice of FACA, later known as the Federación Libertaria Argentina, or FLA, until 1971.

But the most significant international event for Argentine anarchists during the 1930s was the Spanish Civil War. The rise of fascism and the resistance led by the CNT and Federación Anarquista Ibérica, or FAI, inspired Argentine anarchists to provide solidarity and support.

Many traveled to Spain to join the fight, with José Grunfeld becoming the secretary of the FAI. Campaigns to support antifascists in the Spanish Civil War were also launched, with FACA publishing books and pamphlets on the struggle. FACA launched Solidaridad Obrera in 1941, edited by Juan Corral and Loreano Riera, though it was later shut down by the first Justicialista government under Perón.

Fora also began publishing a series of booklets, including Todos Contra la Guerra in 1935 and Lucha Constructiva por la Libertad y Justicia in 1944. One notable libertarian cultural journal, Hombre de America, ran from January 1940 until the end of 1945, covering nearly the entire duration of the Second World War.

FACA was clear about its position on the global conflicts of the time. In a 1942 general plenary, the group denounced both Western democracies, which they saw as veiling capitalist exploitation, and the Soviet Union, which they deemed bureaucratic capitalism. However, they saw the greatest threat in National Socialism, the Nazis, and the rise of the Third Reich, warning that totalitarianism was the worst danger of their era.

Faca's statement to Solidarity with the oppressed under Nazi barbarity also recognized the threat posed by Soviet expansionism and the false promises of post-war democracies. Domestically, Faca and Fora faced a new challenge with the rise of Juan Domingo Perón. His populist approach, while beneficial somewhat to workers, was paradoxical for anarchists.

Perón's government promoted a state-centered, jingoistic project that co-opted labor movements through control networks, undermining genuine proletarian democracy. Anarchists rejected Peronism, seeing it as a threat to the revolutionary ethos of worker solidarity. Despite this, Fora retained some influence, especially among agricultural workers who were caught between the identities of peasants and workers.

In June 1946, Anarchist launched a new newspaper, Reconstruir, with Luis Danussi as editor. The first issue featured Jacobo Prince's critique of Peronism in an article titled El Totalitarismo Falsea El Principio de Justicia Social, calling out the regime's distortion of social justice.

By the late 1940s, early 1950s, Fora's influence had waned and anarcho-syndicalism was reduced to a smaller role in Argentina's labor movement. However, the Sociedad de Resistencia de Operarios del Puerto, aligned with Fora, demonstrated their commitment to anarcho-syndicalism in 1952 by rejecting a compulsory wage tax to fund a monument to Eva Perón. Jesus Christ. Yeah.

This act of defiance led to the imprisonment of several militants for six months. Imagine you decide you want to reject extra taxes because the dictator's wife demands a monument. Like that's... You get thrown in jail because you decide you don't want to pay that tax. God, it's terrible stuff. While Perón's regime weakened free unionism, he did so by means of corruption rather than violence.

Contrasting with the methods of his predecessor, Uripuru, FACA continued its work, holding several congresses, including the 4th in 1951 and the 5th in 1955, just before Perón's overthrow. In 1955, FACA rebranded as the Federación Libertaria Argentina, or the FLA.

And the FLA held its sixth Congress in 1961. And its journal, Reconstruir, published regularly from 1959 until 1976, coincided with the onset of Argentina's most brutal dictatorship. But before we fast forward to 1976, we need to explore what took place in the 60s. The 60s are known as the New Left Era in many parts of the world, thanks to the rise of student radicalism.

The New Left is marked by a notable libertarian and democratic impulse, an emphasis on cultural as well as political transformation, an extension of traditional left's focus and class struggle to acknowledge multiple forms and bases of oppression, including race and gender, an emphasis on anti-imperialism and anti-colonialism, and a rejection of bureaucracy and traditional forms of political organization in favor of direct action and participatory democracy.

Many youth were searching for a third way outside of Soviet and Western models. So during the 1960s and 70s, a new generation of Argentine youth turned to anarchism, though they struggled to collaborate with the older anarchist movements. Cultural and political differences were at the heart of this divide, with younger militants aligning themselves more with the global anti-imperialist movements of the time than with the anarchist legacy already within Argentina.

In some ways, this generational rift left a scar in the anarchist struggle. In other ways, it helped younger anarchists to develop a clearer ideological stance compared to their counterparts in countries where such internal conflicts were less prevalent. One of the most significant anarchist groups to emerge during this period was Resistencia Libertaria. Operating clandestinely and with a cellular structure, RL aimed to ignite mass resistance and ultimately spark a prolonged popular war.

The group was active in neighborhoods, labor movements, and student circles, and it had a small armed wing for defense and expropriation purposes. Although it was formerly a national organization, Arreol's main operations were in La Plata, Cordoba, and Buenos Aires. As Argentina grew increasingly polarized in the mid-1970s, Arreol activists became targets. Many were disappeared even before the military coup of 1976.

But then it hit. Henry Kissinger at the United States Machinations bore fruit. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we go in there. A military coup overthrew President Isabel Perón, the third wife of the original Perón, and installed a junta led by Lieutenant General Jorge Rafael Videla, Admiral Emilio Eduardo Macera, and Brigadier General Orlando Ramon Agusti.

This coup was part of Operation Condo, a coordinated effort between Latin American dictatorships backed by the United States under its Cold War national security doctrine. The aim was allegedly to maintain stability in the region that America considers its backyard.

and US officials, including Kissinger, were sure to meet with Argentine military leaders after the coup to encourage them to wipe out their opposition quickly and brutally before any whiny human rights concerns started to be raised internationally. The Junta remained in power until December 1983, during which time some 30,000 people were disappeared or executed. RL militants were particularly targeted by the regime.

One particularly horrible story I have to share. The military men responsible for the killings, often spared pregnant women, kept them in custody until they gave birth, then killed the mothers and gave their infants to childless military families. Jesus Christ. That's the kind of evil we're dealing with. Yeah. And despite the dangers, RL continued its activities until 1978, when a series of coordinated police raids dismantled much of the group.

Around 80% of RL members were detained in concentration camps, but they were tortured and most were eventually executed. And that is how you kill a social movement. In the final years of the dictatorship and following the re-establishment of civil government in 1983, new and relatively anti-authoritarian social movements emerged in Argentina. Among the most prominent were the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo, a group of mothers advocating for justice for those who had been disappeared under the military regime.

Alongside them, various ecologists, feminists, and other grassroots activists began to make their voices heard. This shift marked a significant departure from traditional state-centric leftist politics, with a growing inclination towards more decentralized approaches. While this climate sparked renewed interest in anarchism,

it didn't lead to a substantial increase in the membership of older anarchist organizations. Instead, it highlighted a transformation in how social movements approached activism and sought to address issues of justice and accountability. And then we come into the 21st century. In the early 2000s, Argentina, which was once a poster child for neoliberalism thanks to the actions of the dictatorship, found itself in the throes of a devastating economic crisis.

This meltdown didn't just affect the economy, it ignited a wave of social movements that were far more confrontational, radical, and anarchistic than before. We saw the rise of militant neighborhood assemblies, factory takeovers, and intense street protests. What was happening in Argentina was the direct result of more than two decades of so-called free market reforms and structural adjustment programs.

These policies had left the economy in ruins, with poverty and unemployment levels soaring. By the time the crisis hit, poverty had shot up from 31% to 53%, and unemployment had jumped to 21.4%, nearly a quarter of the country's population. Out of this chaos came the PICTEROS, a new movement of unemployed workers who turned their anger into direct action.

They didn't just march in protest. They blocked roads, demanding work and dignity. But what set the PICTAROs apart from traditional unions was their commitment to horizontal organizing and direct action. They knew that those unions didn't represent them, and they wanted something more than just jobs. They wanted dignity, and they wanted a say in how society was run.

One of the voices from this movement, a woman from the Solano neighborhood in Buenos Aires, captured this spirit when she said, I dream of my children finding a way of life here, away from the despair the system gives us. We're building something new. Politics without political parties. End quote. The PICTEROS didn't just demand employment. They wanted meaningful work that gave them control over their lives.

They weren't looking to be folded back into the capitalist system that had failed them. Instead, they called themselves autonomous workers, envisioning a society where people took charge of their communities and their futures. And then came December 2001. On the 19th, the crisis hit a boiling point. All across the country, people took to the streets. Unemployed workers, middle-class families, and whole neighborhoods. They were united in their demands.

an end to the government's economic policies and the resignation of the deeply unpopular President Fernando de la Rúa. After two days of street battles with police, the government collapsed. In the wake of this upheaval, neighborhood assemblies popped up everywhere and the piqueteros intensified their efforts. Millions of workers across Argentina joined a general strike. In Buenos Aires alone, over a million people defied a government-imposed state of emergency, flooding the streets in protest.

It wasn't just about venting frustration, it was about reclaiming their power. In a way, the ideas of anarchism, self-management, decentralization, and direct action were being put into practice on a truly massive scale, even though anarchist groups themselves didn't necessarily lead the charge. The fight wasn't just on the streets, though. It had to happen in the factories, the fields, across all the sectors of society.

They couldn't just remove politicians. They had to dismantle the entire system of exploitation and replace it with something radically different. A key piece of this puzzle was the rise of the fábricas recuperadas, or reclaimed factories. These takeovers didn't start with the 2001 uprising though. The first occupation happened back in 1996 when workers in a coal storage plant took control after the bosses abandoned it. More factories followed suit, with workers stepping in when owners fled it.

But they weren't even trying to launch an offensive against capitalism. They were simply trying to survive, to hold on to their livelihoods in an economy that had pushed them to the edge. By the time of the Argentine uprising in December 2001, over 170 factories had been reclaimed, with some 10,000 workers taking part in this new form of collective labor. The message was clear. When the bosses leave, the workers are more than capable of keeping things running.

In these reclaim factories, they got rid of the traditional management hierarchies and made collective decisions and shared income equally. It was a living example of one potential way society could function without the capitalist class. In the midst of the Argentine economic collapse, these workers didn't just resist, they were also producing. Hence their banner of Occupar, Resistar, Procir. Occupy, Resist, Produce.

They knew it was possible to not just fight, but to build something new from the ground up. Not just to survive, but to lay the foundations for a new society. The cries of "Que se vayan todos" echoed the widespread disillusionment with the entire political class. But the sentiment needed to be transformed into something more substantial. A proper political framework to drive the momentum forward.

But this alternative, this framework, this potentially anarchist framework, wasn't fully developed among the population at the time. There were some comrades who were working towards building such a framework, but much of the movement, particularly of the left, were focused on elections as a way forward. Their logic was simple. A left-leaning government could introduce policies to alleviate the situation and prevent the open repression of popular movements.

But what was this really achieve? It risked the transferring of the struggle from the streets, from the workplaces, from the hands of the people into the hands of a new set of politicians. Shifting the focus from the masses to a few leaders operating within clearly capitalist institutions. The elections were not important. The fight wasn't about winning seats in the government. And that needed to be understood. The fight was about building a true popular power.

Que se vayan todos, out with all of them. Rejecting not just individuals, but the entire political, social, and economic power structures. Even though the Argentine people were not identifying as anarchists, they were applying anarchist principles in many aspects of their struggles. Just like the Zapatistas and Chiapas who rose up in 1994 with the rallying cry, Ya basta, or enough already. The Argentine uprising was a clear rejection of state power and capitalism.

The volts can't last forever, but they could plant the seeds of a new society, one built from below. But the movement was torn between the two approaches, of whether factories should be managed by workers under state ownership, or if they should be completely worker-owned. Some argue the demand and expropriation by the state wasn't a real solution within the capitalist framework, because the state itself was responsible for the conditions they found themselves in.

But even though they argue that true workers' power came from the workers controlling their own production, on the flip side, cooperatives don't really address the deeper issues of capitalism. Cooperativism doesn't inherently challenge capitalist relations of production. It just tinkers with the surface issues like monopolies, internal structures, and competition. Building a network of cooperatives can be valuable.

But it's not going to create a subsystem capable of toppling capitalism. Anarchism, and specifically anarchist communist ideas, propose something far more transformative. Abolishing all forms of power exercised by a minority, whether the bourgeoisie or the state. Assuming control of not just factories and fields, but all of society. It's not a choice between cooperatives or state-managed workplaces. It's about creating conditions for all workers and all people to self-organize.

And such reforms, such as reforms for workers to have control of their workplaces, are merely steps toward a much larger goal, which should be kept in mind in that struggle.

These experiences and this history in Argentina shows us that anarchist ideas are not just lofty dreams. They're grounded in real struggles of working people, consciously or unconsciously, proving that a society without bosses, managers, and exploitation is possible. Every social struggle, every revolutionary action is another step towards building that world. Through these movements, through these actions, through these struggles, we can see the foundation of a new society.

And to the people of Argentina, who now face the rule of a new right-wing menace, I implore you to stand up and say once again, Que se vayan todos. Out with all of them. All power to all the people. Peace.

Hey, we'll be back Monday with more episodes every week from now until the heat death of the universe. It Could Happen Here is a production of Cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from Cool Zone Media, visit our website, coolzonemedia.com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can now find sources for It Could Happen Here listed directly in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening. I'm

I'm Julian Edelman. I'm Rob Gronkowski. And we are super excited to tell you about our new show, Dudes on Dudes. We're spilling all the behind-the-scenes stories, crazy details, and honestly, just having a blast talking football. Every week, we're discussing our favorite players of all times, from legends to our buddies to current stars. We're finally answering the age-old question, what kind of dudes are these dudes?

We're going to find out, Jules. New episodes drop every Thursday during the NFL season. Listen to Dudes on Dudes on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Muhammad Ali, George Foreman, 1974. George Foreman was champion of the world. Ali was smart and he was handsome. The story behind The Rumble in the Jungle is like a Hollywood movie.

But that is only half the story. There's also James Brown, Bill Withers, B.B. King, Miriam Akiba. All the biggest black artists on the planet. Together in Africa. It was a big deal. Listen to Rumble, Ali, Foreman, and The Soul of 74 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Do you ever wonder where your favorite foods come from? Like what's the history behind bacon-wrapped hot dogs? Hi, I'm Eva Longoria. Hi, I'm Maite Gomez-Rejon. Our podcast, Hungry for History, is back. And this season, we're taking an even bigger bite out of the most delicious food and its history. Saying that the most popular cocktail is the margarita, followed by the mojito from Cuba, and the piña colada from Puerto Rico. Listen to Hungry for History on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Welcome to Gracias Come Again, a podcast by Honey German, where we get real and dive straight into todo lo actual y viral. We're talking musica, los premios, el chisme, and all things trending in my cultura. I'm bringing you all the latest happening in our entertainment world and some fun and impactful interviews with your favorite Latin artists, comedians, actors, and influencers. Each week, we get deep and raw life stories, combos on the issues that matter to us, and it's all packed with gems, fun, straight up comedia, and that's a song that

Only Nuestra Gente can sprinkle. Listen to Gracias Come Again on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was assassinated. Crooks everywhere unearthed the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state.

Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.