Maintenance Phase - Pete Evans Part 2： COVID & Consequences

00:00:00.000 okay the only one that i could come up with which i came up with when i was like plugging

00:00:15.280 in my microphone a second ago was welcome to maintenance phase the podcast that is post

00:00:20.640 agriculture but pre tea good i can't i can't think of anything we're pre that's the worst

00:00:29.280 thing i've ever heard and i love it uh i am michael hobbs i'm aubrey gordon and if you

00:00:34.560 would like to support the show oh wait should we do it in unison like an 80s sitcom

00:00:41.260 okay wait can we do you want to try it no no okay for the love of god no just do it

00:00:49.240 if you would like to support the show you can do that at patreon.com slash maintenance phase or you

00:00:55.660 can buy t-shirts mugs tote bags masks all manner of things at t public both of those things are

00:01:01.920 linked for you in the show notes you are welcome to do either of them you don't have to do either

00:01:07.000 of them if you want to keep listening just keep listening hang out you don't have to do it we're

00:01:10.220 going to tell you a wild tale about an australian tv chef yes and today we are closing the account

00:01:17.020 of pete evans i have been bursting to record this episode have you really yeah because okay you know

00:01:23.560 that like my entire internet presence is characterized by like a total lack of impulse 0.96

00:01:27.500 control i have had to sit in my house for like four days and not google this fucking guy and 0.91

00:01:35.000 find out how the story ends i feel like your twitter presence is id and my twitter presence 0.97

00:01:40.200 is super ego. And by our powers combined, we're like one person. I like that yours is the best

00:01:47.000 parts of your personality and mine is my worst parts. It's a good balance. So Mike, last time

00:01:54.540 we started our story about paleo Pete Evans. Walk me through what you recall of that story.

00:02:02.260 I mean, it's basically a story of radicalization. This guy, Pete Evans, starts out as a fairly

00:02:07.480 normal restaurant owner and then he ends up being like a judge on a reality show and becomes a more

00:02:13.460 prominent influencer and then he gets into paleo he gets just like further and further down a rabbit

00:02:20.180 hole and starts getting into like weirder and weirder stuff and seems to like become more

00:02:26.140 disconnected from reality and just kind of like internet poisoned yes part of the ways that that

00:02:31.520 internet poisoning shows up is that he starts making these big bold wild and like almost

00:02:35.800 completely unsubstantiated claims. He starts talking about how there were quote unquote

00:02:40.760 mountains of evidence that fluoride is a neurotoxin. He made a claim to a Facebook

00:02:46.080 follower with osteoporosis that that person should stop eating dairy because he believed

00:02:51.380 that dairy would strip the calcium from your bones. We are going to check in with him in the

00:02:58.240 year 2020 okay at this point pete evans has been a judge on the uh reality cooking competition show

00:03:06.700 my kitchen rules for about eight years despite all of these totally wild public claims he's still a

00:03:13.940 big tv star he's still writing cookbooks he's not really paying any price significantly or one that's

00:03:20.660 visible to the public at this point but that is true until 2020 okay i told you last time i'm

00:03:27.520 trying to tell the story mostly in chronological order. This is going to be the one like dramatic

00:03:31.520 license moment. Needle scratch. So 2020, as you may recall, was the year that the pandemic sort 1.00

00:03:37.520 of started in earnest globally. Folks are locked down. They're freaked out for pretty much the

00:03:43.040 whole year. We don't have vaccines. We don't have treatments. We don't have anything. In November of

00:03:49.020 2020, he went on a podcast and decided to talk about his sort of philosophy and best thinking

00:03:56.660 around COVID. And we're going to watch a little clip.

00:04:01.880 You're healthy. So does that mean you can't live your life based off the choices that other people

00:04:06.800 have made? You know, you live your life, you look like a fit, healthy human being that's open to,

00:04:12.280 you know, growth and expansion. So should you be punished and not being able to live your life

00:04:20.500 because there's other people out there that are sick? So you can't go outside today because

00:04:26.060 somebody else might die. I mean, these are big, big, big questions. And I don't have the answers,

00:04:33.960 but I'm putting out the question out there. Let's just take this virus as an example. We know that

00:04:39.680 it affects 0.00 part of the population that already have these issues. So should we look

00:04:47.200 after these people? Should we improve their immune system? Should we look at feeding them

00:04:53.840 a wonderful diet? Should we look at doing meditation for these people? Should we look at

00:04:57.480 what self-love means for these people in the position that they're in, in the nursing homes?

00:05:03.600 How do we encourage self-growth, self-love, self-empowerment? How do we change their immune

00:05:10.060 system? Because we can. Imagine if the government came together with the leading health professionals

00:05:14.500 and said, okay, let's target this. Let's help these vulnerable people. Everybody else continue

00:05:19.120 on the way that you're living, but let's actually, let's put the funds and the resources

00:05:23.300 wonderful anti-inflammatory diet let's make sure that there's no wi-fi in the vicinity of these

00:05:28.980 people because we know ems can have a problematic effect on the immune system what about if we put

00:05:35.780 these people into the sun for a certain period of the time so we can increase their vitamin d

00:05:40.040 what about if we got the right uh put pumped ozone into the air or however it works as a

00:05:47.260 disinfectant what about if we use certain light therapy that might help with this

00:05:51.920 these coronaviruses that are affected by light therapy what about if we use heat therapy because

00:05:57.720 we know this works for certain coronaviruses what if we use this this this this this for our most 0.89

00:06:02.800 vulnerable do you hear anybody fucking talking about that there you go have you okay i i i know 0.82

00:06:09.700 nothing about the person who's interviewing pete evans i have no context for this at all but i was 0.97

00:06:16.100 reading in his face as he was listening to that a thing that i have gone through where as you're

00:06:23.560 listening to somebody it's like oh you are unhinged and like i have to think like i need

00:06:29.160 a strategy to deal with like what i'm hearing because in normal conversations you're not doing

00:06:35.800 like a bunch of chess moves like 17 ahead but then once you realize it's like oh you're this

00:06:40.500 you're like a wi-fi causes cancer person so now it's like in your brain the whole paradigm of the 0.98

00:06:46.800 conversation shifts and you're like yeah how can i how can i get to the heart of like what the fuck 0.72

00:06:51.640 is wrong with you you absolutely see the light go out of his eyes where he's like oh it's incredible 0.58

00:06:57.520 you can see the moment where he's just like oh it's gonna be this kind of interview what's

00:07:03.140 happening fundamentally in this clip is that pete evans seems to be really pissed off that he can't

00:07:07.800 go outside yeah they can't do stuff and that he has to wear a mask yeah pete evans really seems

00:07:12.420 to be reaching for a public policy justification for why he feels so frustrated right and his sort

00:07:20.360 of theory here is that there's like some kind of incentive for people in power to keep us locked

00:07:27.060 down blah blah blah blah he's not saying covid isn't real he is saying that the things that we

00:07:33.980 need to do for covid are continue operating as usual and like pay special attention sort of to

00:07:42.100 disabled people and to elders who are most susceptible to covid and his answer to that

00:07:47.560 is to put all of those people on paleo yeah teach them how to love themselves even though as he puts

00:07:54.620 it they've made like the wrong choices in their lives which is why they're not healthy that is

00:08:00.920 like a cornerstone of covid garbage it's also extremely funny in the context of covid specifically

00:08:07.060 because the number one risk factor for covid is age hey man you chose to get old yeah like what

00:08:13.760 my grandma's 97 like changing her diet is not gonna affect her vulnerability to covid totally

00:08:22.040 totally it's an interesting juxtaposition with the rest of his argument because he's saying

00:08:25.840 if you got COVID, it's basically your fault. But we should change government policy to make it more

00:08:32.380 likely that you get COVID. And then, Mike, when you do get COVID, we put you on paleo,

00:08:38.380 we teach you to love yourself, and you do some meditation and we pump in some ozone.

00:08:42.620 My favorite thing in that little medley was that he mentioned meditation.

00:08:45.980 My understanding is that like the health benefits of meditation are like pretty well

00:08:49.700 established. And like meditating is very good for you. But is it a treatment for COVID?

00:08:54.880 yes totally it's just this weird thing of like it's this whole world view where like things are

00:09:00.960 either good or bad yeah and if you're sick then you should just do more of the good things

00:09:05.920 regardless of like the actual circumstances right of like an air conditioner fell out of a window

00:09:12.440 and like crushed my arm and it was amputated he's like have you tried yoga totally it sounds like

00:09:17.100 you don't love yourself it's like no there's a specific thing with a specific cause yeah

00:09:24.580 I have another clip for us.

00:09:28.100 Ooh.

00:09:29.860 What would you say to somebody that might say that we might not have the technical training to understand certain things if we think for ourselves?

00:09:41.780 Like, I haven't studied anything to do with virology.

00:09:45.560 So when it comes to me understanding various different viruses and things, I don't think I might have that capacity.

00:09:50.640 What would you say to someone that says that?

00:09:52.920 I would say go with the basics, mate. Breathe, live, eat, sleep, love. I mean,

00:10:01.040 why do you need to be an expert on viruses? Well, I guess to determine whether COVID's

00:10:06.140 a thing or not. What does it matter? If nobody told you about it and you were living your life

00:10:10.680 without ever hearing of it, do you think you'd catch it? Well, I guess they would say that

00:10:16.800 perhaps I wouldn't be in the demographic that would catch it. They would say that I'd be

00:10:19.900 walking around, I'd visit my 90-year-old grandma and then she might die because I did that. Maybe

00:10:25.480 that's what they would say. I mean, there's a lot of people say they still haven't worked out

00:10:29.140 or isolated the virus itself and that's up for debate. But the people that seem to be getting

00:10:35.380 affected by this are the people that already have at least one or two or three different

00:10:40.840 comorbidities, which is other illnesses or diseases. Now, it's very controversial,

00:10:46.860 but how did these people live their lives what choices did they make through their life

00:10:51.940 to get type 2 or diabetes or heart disease or this or that or the other did they live

00:10:58.660 in a state of freedom or did they live in a state of fear what did they choose to put into their

00:11:03.760 bodies as they died for the last 60 70 80 years what were their what were their emotional beliefs

00:11:09.840 throughout their life you know did they believe that they were lovable did they have self-love

00:11:14.360 did they have self-worth did they live in a state of victimhood did they live in a state of 1.00

00:11:20.760 victimhood oh this is the fucking this is this like toxic like conservative bullshit but like 1.00

00:11:27.640 everyone's a victim now also i'm a victim because you're asking me to wear a mask 0.99

00:11:32.500 they're bad kinds of victims but i'm the good kind of victim my victimhood is real but theirs

00:11:39.880 is fake because they're only dying of an infectious disease that I will not admit exists.

00:11:45.140 The other thing that I will say is happening in this clip. He's like totally just saying

00:11:49.140 the quiet part loud. I know. I kind of respect it. It's like, it's like, what if they deserve

00:11:54.200 to die? I mean, the captain is going down with the ship. The other thing that he is just sort 0.68

00:12:00.960 of laying out pretty plainly is that when he talks about who's at high risk for COVID,

00:12:06.400 it, he's absolutely not talking about old people. He's absolutely not talking about he's talking

00:12:11.180 about fat people, right? Yeah, the things that he named were heart disease and diabetes. The things

00:12:15.980 that he talked about were the choices that people made and having self worth and like, yeah, you

00:12:20.540 don't invoke type two diabetes and heart disease to talk about thin people. I love that it's like

00:12:25.460 fat people are unhealthy, and maybe they deserve to die. And also, why do they have such low self 1.00

00:12:31.020 worth. Yeah, totally. Look at you grotesque fucking trolls living under a bridge. You're

00:12:35.880 all gonna die and it's gonna be your fault. If only you had loved yourselves more. I know. Get 0.99

00:12:40.340 fucked asshole. I mean, I think part of the reason I wanted to lift up this clip in particular is 1.00

00:12:48.140 that it feels like the clearest and most crystallized example we have gotten on this

00:12:54.040 show of something that we've talked about off and on, which is healthism, right? Right. Healthism

00:12:59.600 is sort of a term of art used to describe the ways in which we ascribe morality and value judgments

00:13:06.700 onto people that we perceive as being healthier, right? It is strictly a visual assessment of

00:13:13.880 another person, right? That's what healthism relies on. And that is genuinely the argument

00:13:19.300 that he is sincerely advancing here. You made good choices. Your life shouldn't change just

00:13:24.500 because other people made bad choices. If you're healthy, it's because you made good choices. If

00:13:28.800 you're unhealthy, it's because you made bad choices. Sorry to everyone who has cancer,

00:13:33.020 COPD, diabetes, depression, anxiety. That's all a result of your choices. And if you don't want

00:13:39.140 to have it, you should have made better choices and different choices. Sorry, whoops, I made good

00:13:42.540 choices. And also, I feel like COVID brought out a lot of that because it was asking people to make

00:13:47.840 a common sacrifice for more vulnerable groups like that broke a lot of people's brains.

00:13:52.900 Yeah, I mean, I think so in organizing world, there is a lot of discussion of like our fates are intertwined. But aside from like taxes and voting, we don't actually ask people to act like it. Right. And this was one of the biggest asks that we had of a collective population to act as if we were caring for one another and act as if other people's fates and their lives and their livelihoods mattered as much to us as our own.

00:14:21.920 Well, one thing that I'm so frustrated by is that like, if you look at the actual polling, most people were fine with this. Most people understood this. The first probably month of the pandemic, March, April, in the United States was like one of the greatest acts of solidarity in modern history.

00:14:40.380 Yeah. And then it was like people like Pete Evans that were like that just poisoned it all. Right. And that started like whispering in people's ears about like, well, you've been home for so long. And these other people, they're not grateful. Yeah. And it's all this bullshit. And all of a sudden, all this like whispering in people's ears started to become like a fucking grim social movement, which was never very big.

00:15:02.880 but they were very loud and they were very fucking online and all of a sudden it was like okay well 0.98

00:15:08.080 like eight percent of the population is being a real dick about this and so we all have to like 0.98

00:15:13.560 build our policies around like how these like really scary people are going to react uh do 0.85

00:15:18.480 you remember how last episode i was like the beat hasn't even dropped yet oh yeah the beat is

00:15:23.120 dropping mike so we started with this podcast appearance now we're going to rewind to the start

00:15:29.100 of 2020 and just walk through the year awesome in january and february and a little bit into march

00:15:37.020 pete evans is going hard he's doing his pete evans thing he posts a photo with a caption

00:15:45.080 that is very complimentary of him and rfk jr oh that's the q anon thing and anti-vax king

00:15:54.540 anti-vax rfk i feel like having a photo of you and rfk junior in january of 2020 is like being

00:16:02.260 able to say that you bought coldplay's first ep or like saw them at cbgb's or some shit you're like 0.84

00:16:08.220 i was into the anti-vax guy before there were even vaccines so rfk picture all of that happens

00:16:14.660 then the pandemic hits nations and cities start locking down pete evans gets on facebook live at

00:16:23.320 this time when folks have unreliable information at this time when folks are reaching for anything

00:16:28.200 that gives them a sense that they like they have some kind of talisman that makes them feel more

00:16:34.300 secure in what's happening in a really insecure and uncertain time right like people are just

00:16:39.220 kind of reaching for whatever pete evans gets on facebook live and he starts talking about a device

00:16:45.100 called a biocharger. We're going to watch a little video clip of an ad for the biocharger

00:16:53.420 made by the manufacturer of the biocharger.

00:16:58.420 Scientific and medical studies have proven nutrition and exercise are both key factors

00:17:03.440 towards optimal health and prevention or recovery from chronic illness. But there is another

00:17:08.200 important factor that's often overlooked, voltage. It's important to take care of our bodies.

00:17:15.100 Hello, I'm Jim Law, and I'd like to tell you about the Biocharger, an innovative and non-invasive technology that actually recharges our cells to the optimum level.

00:17:26.260 Think of our bodies like a cell phone. Just as daily use drains this battery, our everyday lives diminish the voltage in our cells.

00:17:35.120 The biocharger is the world's first subtle energy revitalization platform.

00:17:40.380 It's essentially the ultimate human recharging station, restoring your body's natural energies.

00:17:45.900 We believe that if we could mimic nature and find a way to produce these subtle energies in a biocompatible way,

00:17:54.160 that virtually anyone could benefit from having restored cellular voltage, regardless of age or health.

00:18:00.040 The three most important factors in cellular health are voltage, nutrition, and dealing with toxicity.

00:18:06.760 What you'll find, as a common characteristic of all disease, is inadequate cellular voltage.

00:18:14.500 Mike, what did you learn about the biocharger?

00:18:16.880 What?

00:18:17.900 I learned that cellular voltage and toxicity are the things I should be worried about.

00:18:24.100 hey man if you're not feeling good it's because your your cells don't have enough voltage in them

00:18:30.420 also okay i have seen lower production values in this kind of like grifty health stuff before

00:18:36.720 so this wasn't as bad as it gets but like it's just like here's a bunch of stock footage of

00:18:42.580 like conventionally attractive people like hiking and shit and then when it talks about the actual

00:18:46.920 machine it cuts to people with like i guess electrodes on them in some sort of doctor's 0.98

00:18:51.640 office and they're sitting in front of something that looks like fucking the dalek from doctor who 0.91

00:18:56.900 this like little weird robot from the future that's like 0.89

00:19:00.640 look it's the thing that they put in like a family movie about a science fair where like

00:19:08.700 a kid is like tinkering around with it and then there's a big puff of smoke and the kid's face

00:19:14.180 is covered in soot and they like it looks scientific so pete evans goes on facebook

00:19:20.900 live and he's like i've been using this thing it's incredible it's called the biocharger ng

00:19:25.920 it is on in the background behind him so he looks like an absolute super villain in the actual video

00:19:33.920 so he starts talking about the wuhan coronavirus and how this is like a great

00:19:40.800 device to use to combat it oh that was that's like a little easter egg for weirdos once again

00:19:48.840 the australian medical association immediately tweets about it and issues a statement and they

00:19:54.500 keep calling it a fancy light machine yeah this is a doctor calls it a glorified lava lamp has

00:20:01.240 anyone did anyone end up looking into like this actual company because like were they paid i mean

00:20:06.340 i i assume they were paying him to do this nope also almost immediately the manufacturer of the

00:20:12.140 biocharger ng releases a statement distancing themselves from pete evans and being like this

00:20:16.980 isn't for covid no even even the cellular voltage grifters were like that's too far man like let's

00:20:24.740 dial it back here i added on here because i was like we probably won't read it but your reaction

00:20:29.320 to this makes me think we should this is a quote from their statement i'm so desperate to see this

00:20:34.860 uh okay it says recent coverage points to the biocharger as a cure or treatment to the novel

00:20:41.440 coronavirus the biocharger is not a medical device and for that reason advanced biotechnology

00:20:47.540 suggests that anyone seek medical attention from their primary care provider if they are

00:20:51.760 experiencing symptoms of covid19 and all other diseases infections and ailments oh that's some

00:20:57.280 like lawyers the lawyers of the biocharger people were like oh the lawyers got in there i love how

00:21:03.680 whenever anybody takes one of these like scammy medical manufacturers to court or whatever they're

00:21:08.940 always like oh this is fake they're just like immediately just like oh it's it's not real oh

00:21:15.540 hey that all that stuff we said about cellular voltage and how everything boils down to this

00:21:20.740 actually we're not selling a medical device whoops just kidding it's okay this video has 11 000 views

00:21:27.440 that's not very many views it's really not so like the fact that pete was able to find this 0.94

00:21:34.220 speaks to like where the fuck he is on the internet this is like sub 3 a.m infomercial

00:21:41.680 stuff oh mike if you are distressed by this oh the levels we're gonna drop to here momentarily 0.97

00:21:48.580 oh my god so the other thing that happens after his promotion of the biocharger ng

00:21:54.060 is that the australian regulatory body called the therapeutic goods administration

00:22:00.480 immediately launches an investigation and within a couple of weeks issues a really significant fine

00:22:06.480 to him he's fined 25 000 dude i love this oh my god right oh just like basic accountability and 0.98

00:22:16.720 like non-impunity for people that tell fucking lies constantly he got charged almost the price 0.93

00:22:21.780 of two biochargers for talking about a biocharger on facebook that's that's how much a biocharger 0.99

00:22:27.020 costs fifteen thousand dollars no my guy and as soon as they're pressed they're like oh it doesn't

00:22:34.720 work oh by the way if you bought this because he talked about it sorry so not only does he get

00:22:42.140 fined for the biocharger stuff he gets fined 25 grand for that but also they launch more

00:22:47.680 investigations into how he had discussed other health issues and treatments and ultimately his

00:22:53.120 total fines are $80,000. Love it. And from there, so that happens in April. In May,

00:23:00.600 he is dismissed from My Kitchen Rules. Okay. So that was it. The network says that it's because

00:23:07.280 the ratings were down. Okay. And they needed to mix things up. Okay. That seems extremely

00:23:12.080 unlikely to me. The ratings might have been down. One month ago, he said a thing and then got fined

00:23:16.760 by like your large, you know what I mean? Like, I'm like, no, it's looking bad for him. He's

00:23:20.520 saying bad shit. Although, to be fair, I would not put it past a TV production company to just 0.99

00:23:24.900 not give a shit that someone's like a massive grifter. Totally. I will say there was a piece 1.00

00:23:31.420 about this in The Age that had my favorite lead. Celebrity chef Pete Evans has activated his last

00:23:38.900 almond with The Seven Network. Oh, that's good. Compliments to the chef. I love that lead. Pete

00:23:45.100 Evans has crammed his last trail mix into the shape of a slice of bread.

00:23:49.440 End of it.

00:23:51.900 So in May, he gets fired from My Kitchen Rules.

00:23:55.500 That same month, he shares a video on social media.

00:23:59.960 That video is a three-hour lecture.

00:24:02.820 The lecture is being given by David Icke.

00:24:06.840 Who's that?

00:24:07.540 What?

00:24:08.260 Is he bad?

00:24:09.500 I'm using context clues.

00:24:11.280 I really thought you were going to know who David Icke is.

00:24:14.180 okay david ike is an english sort of former footballer and current wild ass anti-semitic

00:24:22.880 conspiracy theorist oh you can catch him shouting about the new world order and how the world is 0.98

00:24:29.820 run by hapsburgs and lizard people he's a fucking new world order guy yeah one thousand percent and 0.99

00:24:37.220 genuinely he believes that the people running the world are not only jewish they are also like 0.99

00:24:43.620 a separate race of lizard people this is like he'll talk about how you can like look in their 0.51

00:24:49.760 eyes and you can see the lizard eyes and they're like it's he's the conspiracy theorist that other

00:24:56.040 conspiracy theorists distance themselves from at least i'm not david ike man it's not even

00:25:03.420 trash in the conspiracy theory garbage bin it's like the juice at the bottom of the garbage can 0.98

00:25:10.380 sour garbage juice it's the sour garbage juice of conspiracy theories just distilled and fermented 0.99

00:25:16.440 and terrible right in this particular video that pete evans shared david ike gives a three-hour 0.99

00:25:22.480 interview in which he takes a bold garbage stance that effectively announced to plandemic oh this 0.85

00:25:30.560 is the plandemic time this is this fucking little subplot so this is where pete evans gets it's a 0.95

00:25:38.800 fake pandemic and that it's actually the result of 5g and he says in this video that public health 0.93

00:25:46.080 measures to stop the spread of covid are akin to quote nazi germany fascism oh yeah of course this 0.89

00:25:53.480 is yeah the funny thing is this is so fucking mainstream now that it doesn't even shock me 0.88

00:25:58.140 like yeah yeah yeah comparing public health measures to the nazis yeah get get to the good 0.85

00:26:03.300 stuff, Aubrey. So this is how the fucking Guardian covered this issue. Oh my fucking God. Okay. 0.97

00:26:11.340 In his Instagram post linking to the interview, Evans wrote, here is an alternative view. I would

00:26:17.060 be keen to hear your thoughts on this video as to whether there's any validity in this man's

00:26:21.080 message, especially as there seems to be a lot of conflicting messages coming out of the mainstream

00:26:26.160 these days. What is the truth? I personally loved the last 30 minutes talking about heart frequency

00:26:31.780 and love evans told his 231 000 followers ike has denied being anti-semitic and a holocaust denier

00:26:38.780 the guardian has contacted evans for comment there is no suggestion evans holds anti-semitic

00:26:44.980 or racist views no evidence that he holds anti-semitic or racist views he just keeps 0.99

00:26:51.060 posting racist shit on his fucking forward-facing public accounts but this is my whole beef with 0.99

00:26:58.260 coverage of these kinds of cultural figures because on one level in a sort of bloodless 1.00

00:27:05.060 debate club way you could say that like just because you have someone on your podcast does

00:27:12.060 not mean that you hold all of their views yeah it is possible to be the kind of person who just like

00:27:17.340 wants to hear out literally everybody right and you have a podcast where like people of all stripes

00:27:22.880 come and they tell you their wacky ideas right but it doesn't sound like that's what Pete Evans

00:27:27.300 this doing? This is not a podcast where it's like one day there's a COVID denier and the next day

00:27:32.040 there's like a COVID doctor. No, he's he's sure not. After this, he's having like very famous

00:27:38.340 anti-vaxxers. Oh, yeah. The podcast is entirely him just laying out a clear worldview, which I

00:27:45.680 don't think it's a leap to presume that it's his clear worldview. Right. I feel like journalists

00:27:50.020 are constantly doing this thing where they try to divine what somebody's quote unquote real

00:27:55.740 beliefs are. Like, oh, it's not clear if Pete Evans agrees with David Icke, when actually it's

00:28:02.700 totally irrelevant whether he agrees with David Icke. The fact is, Pete Evans is very consistently

00:28:07.320 delivering extremely fringe, odious views to a mainstream audience.

00:28:13.760 It's lending credibility and the benefit of the doubt to a dude who's been publicly

00:28:17.340 torching his credibility for eight years at this point.

00:28:21.040 Yeah.

00:28:21.420 Right?

00:28:21.560 yeah well there's no suggestion i'm like there's eight years of suggestion there's a lot of

00:28:27.320 suggestion aubrey what if this turned into like a methodology queen episode where we debunked the

00:28:32.080 idea that like there's lizard people like the methodology oh my fucking god it was a small n 0.68

00:28:39.600 on that study so it is not a good time for pete evans and what he decides to do is to go on 60 0.86

00:28:49.620 minutes what what i think you were gonna say that he like points his own front-facing camera at

00:28:55.680 himself in his car and like talks at his camera for like two hours you decide you decide what

00:29:01.560 energy he's bringing to this interview we have to watch 60 minutes australia again i know i'm so

00:29:06.760 sorry i could very easily disappear you know some people would like me to disappear no doubt and

00:29:13.200 i'll just make this one statement if i disappear or i have a freaking weird accident it wasn't an

00:29:19.440 accident okay i you know and that's probably the most conspiratorial thing that i will say

00:29:24.800 that i am of what i believe complete sound mind and body and spirit this says to me you don't

00:29:33.140 always feel safe there's been too many coincidences out there in the world for people that have

00:29:39.900 questioned certain things sometimes those people don't last very long and that could just be a

00:29:47.440 coincidence or you think that could be you i don't know what yep it's bizarre i mean i will

00:29:57.420 say as a person who has gotten like pretty explicit death threats there would be no reason for me to

00:30:03.000 be oblique about it yeah this to me reads as someone who has not been threatened but who has

00:30:08.000 been swimming in the soup of conspiracy theories long enough yeah yeah that they just sort of come

00:30:14.700 to believe that anything is possible and of course there's no specifics and it's just this weird like 0.99

00:30:20.700 they killed jfk for his views or whatever the fuck this shit is exhausting it's just like 0.97

00:30:28.080 what do you even do with this i mean i feel like at some point this stuff tilts closer into like 0.99

00:30:32.300 mental illness slash like becoming untethered from reality than any kind of like statement you

00:30:37.720 can even like parse or debunk yeah i just don't know what you do with somebody once they're like

00:30:42.180 once they're this far gone basically yeah i'm not sure either i don't know what the intervention is

00:30:47.080 here at this point but i also feel pretty certain that the intervention here does not include uh

00:30:55.160 there's no suggestion that he has racist or anti-semitic views yeah nor does it include 0.95

00:30:59.800 giving him airtime so what's the actual episode like the actual episode is a bunch of shit like 0.72

00:31:05.360 this where he's sort of speaking in these weird cryptic terms he's sort of like refusing to 0.74

00:31:11.160 clarify his position on a bunch of things. He's just doing like, I don't know, you make the

00:31:16.480 connection like that is his like favorite thing. It's just him coming off as not responding to the

00:31:24.360 same observable reality as many viewers. Yeah, like it just really feels like it's getting into

00:31:29.920 the territory of just like, oh, you've lost the thread of like, maybe even being able to communicate

00:31:35.160 with other people about what your ideas are. This mechanism is just fascinating to me,

00:31:39.040 where you can so quickly become a person like this with no like major stressor, like, you know,

00:31:46.480 the loss of a child or something. You know, the pandemic was really stressful and becoming a

00:31:50.840 celebrity is stressful and, you know, all this other stuff. But it's sort of, it's like normal

00:31:55.060 stuff. But then it seems like something just like broke in his brain. It is very hard to know.

00:32:01.440 All of those things are things that could cause someone to feel way less anchored in their world,

00:32:06.760 way more hungry for sort of different explanations of the world, all of that kind of stuff.

00:32:12.200 But none of that really explains why this is the one that you would land on.

00:32:17.060 Right.

00:32:17.540 If you're experiencing a bunch of pressure points in your life and you like need something

00:32:21.720 to help you feel anchored in your life, you could just as easily get into like LARPing. 0.99

00:32:26.440 You could join a fucking trivia team. 0.98

00:32:28.740 There's like so many things that you could do. 0.99

00:32:31.180 You don't have to be the guy who's like, I got to publicly get up and be a David Icke

00:32:36.200 stan right it seems like it's much more rare that it pushes people in like a pro-social direction

00:32:41.420 it seems like it oftentimes pushes these people down these like very well trodden paths of like 0.93

00:32:48.200 it starts with like wellness woo stuff and then i mean fuck we did a whole episode on this yeah yes

00:32:53.360 i really want to understand it because it feels like one of the like extremely important mechanisms

00:32:58.020 for understanding like what the world is going to be like for the next 50 years absolutely and i

00:33:04.240 think it's worth noting as we're trying to understand that mechanism that there were also

00:33:09.120 several and quite pronounced signs of this kind of thinking prior to the pandemic for him right

00:33:15.480 prior to the pandemic is when he was talking about how fluoride is a neurotoxin prior to the

00:33:20.880 pandemic is when he was talking about how like basically autistic people exist because not

00:33:25.720 everyone eats paleo yeah like it's tricky because like definitely something shifted in the pandemic

00:33:30.620 but also it was definitely there before it's interesting i mean we come across this all the

00:33:35.580 time the the weird intersection between health and politics this weird health stuff can be

00:33:40.860 a gateway drug to political radicalization in a way that often doesn't look like political

00:33:46.300 radicalization because a lot of this q anon stuff sort of seems apolitical because it's like they're 0.88

00:33:51.180 kidnapping kids and like drinking the adrenochrome and it's just so it's so out there yeah you're 0.98

00:33:55.660 like okay whatever it's like people believing in bigfoot or whatever it doesn't necessarily have

00:33:59.520 of political valence. But then once you actually investigate these online groups where people are

00:34:04.280 getting this like sewage, it's extremely political. Like QAnon was very explicitly a movement to like

00:34:11.580 defend Donald Trump and the idea that Donald Trump was like speaking in code.

00:34:15.220 Totally, totally. It feels like the health stuff lays the foundation for the rest of it.

00:34:20.160 Yeah.

00:34:20.460 The health stuff is where he really starts kind of exploring the space around this idea of like,

00:34:25.400 oh, I don't actually have to take care of you. You have to take care of yourself.

00:34:28.880 Right. That is majorly softening the ground for extremely right wing thinking about sort of like resisting any idea of collective care. All of those things like the starting point for all of that really appears to be Pete Evans investment in paleo and investment in the deeply ableist arguments about paleo.

00:34:51.860 we are canceling the shit out of paleo the last two episodes all it took for me was reading the 0.50

00:34:57.700 first book and having them be like you know what we could use more of is eugenics genuinely the 0.67

00:35:02.980 thing that has stayed with me throughout this whole story and again we have two more acts of

00:35:08.080 the fall to cover oh my god yeah we've got we have a lot more this was not the end i thought

00:35:13.940 we were like wrapping up no michael how is there more actually you know what let's just get into 0.93

00:35:22.600 the more and then we'll circle back to this conversation because holy shit so in june of

00:35:28.340 2020 pete evans is on 60 minutes you know he just gets like a bunch of bad press after that it 0.74

00:35:33.740 doesn't look good for him sort of whatever your position is on this dude the consensus is he

00:35:39.020 didn't do well in that interview right he has also been continuing on his social media nonsense

00:35:44.660 taking big swings blah blah blah the sydney morning herald did a piece called oh for pete's sake the

00:35:52.080 rise and fall and possible rise of pete evans that is great they did a little recap of like

00:35:58.220 previously on pete evans okay and here is what they said over time the pronouncements became

00:36:04.440 less funny. COVID-19

00:36:06.600 was a hoax. Fluoride in

00:36:08.500 water was bad for you. Vaccinations

00:36:10.680 were dangerous. He took

00:36:12.580 to wearing MAGA hats,

00:36:14.600 sharing posts from

00:36:16.520 and in favor of Donald Trump.

00:36:18.740 He hosted conspiracy

00:36:20.300 theorists on his podcast. He

00:36:22.420 shared the conspiracy theories of

00:36:24.280 QAnon, according to which a cabal

00:36:26.760 of pedophiles ruled the world 0.91

00:36:28.720 and manipulates the sheeple. 0.75

00:36:30.700 Catching up with Pete. Right.

00:36:32.600 Yeah. So now he's doing MAGA. Now he's doing QAnon. Now he's gone explicitly pro-Trump.

00:36:39.920 Then in November of 2020, he makes a post on social media that really, after all of this shit, 0.99

00:36:49.360 this turns out to be the uncrossable line. Okay. I would like to say before we get into this. 0.99

00:36:56.300 Oh, is it going to be like the biggest trigger warning imaginable? Holy shit. 0.99

00:37:00.640 My mind is racing. Big old trigger warning for very explicit antisemitism 0.99

00:37:07.160 and for Nazi references. What? So here's what I'm going to do. I am going to send you

00:37:15.720 the meme that he posted. Oh no, it's a meme. It's a meme. Oh my god. Which I just sent to you.

00:37:23.900 okay wait i don't understand this i'm livid how is there something problematic on the internet

00:37:34.400 and i don't know what it means oh buddy so it's a cartoon drawing of a caterpillar and a butterfly

00:37:41.480 and they're sitting at like they're having coffee it's like a political cartoon type of thing i

00:37:46.780 believe they're having wine oh sorry i believe that is stemware which i find just like a very

00:37:52.060 funny little detail the caterpillar has a maga hat on and the butterfly is has like big black 0.96

00:37:58.920 wings and has some sort of sign that you're about to tell me is like super fucked up but it's like 0.62

00:38:04.360 some sort of like aztec sun symbol something deeply not aztec but yes something round with 0.79

00:38:12.000 little spokes yep and the caterpillar says you've changed and the butterfly says we're supposed to

00:38:19.660 correct i do not i i am at no no no i have no idea what this is supposed to mean oh you've

00:38:27.200 been listening to some uh some old reply all a couple reply else okay you've changed we're

00:38:32.580 supposed to so the implication here is that the butterfly is the next natural evolution

00:38:37.980 of the caterpillar right yes the thing that makes this meme especially troubling is the symbol on

00:38:45.960 the butterfly's wings. Okay. That symbol is called the Black Sun. Okay. It is a variant on an ancient

00:38:53.860 Norse symbol called the Sonnenrad. The Sonnenrad looks different. This is the Black Sun. The Black

00:38:59.860 Sun was first used by Heinrich Himmler. Oh. He used it as a floor mosaic in a castle that was

00:39:09.920 used as the headquarters for the SS. It is believed to have stood for victory amongst the

00:39:18.160 Nazis. This is according to, there's a Brandeis scholar who has done a ton of work on far-right

00:39:23.040 extremism. Basically, throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, the Black Sun has been embraced

00:39:29.920 by white nationalists, by neo-Nazis, and by other far-right and specifically anti-Semitic and racist

00:39:36.060 groups and individuals. Most notably, this was a prominent symbol used at Charlottesville.

00:39:42.620 It was an image displayed by the Christchurch mosque shooter. And it's been repeatedly used

00:39:48.220 in very public ways by specific neo-Nazi groups in Australia itself. If you know this symbol,

00:39:55.300 you know it from Nazi movements. So this cartoon, the MAGA caterpillar is saying you've changed

00:40:03.220 and the Nazi butterfly is saying we're supposed to. So the MAGA movement is supposed to grow into

00:40:09.140 like a black pilled Nazi SS situation. Yes, correct. Man, I wish I didn't know about this. 0.89

00:40:17.440 I wish. Oh, buddy. I wish this was still gibberish to me. I'm sorry. And also I'm not.

00:40:22.820 Also, you might argue maybe Pete Evans just didn't know. And he thought this was like a

00:40:27.500 MAGA shit posting meme. Right. I would like to introduce you to the fucking comments on this 1.00

00:40:32.140 meme i just sent you a screen grab so a commenter says the symbol on the butterfly is a representation 0.98

00:40:38.140 of the black sun and then pete evans replies i was waiting for someone to see that so they're like 0.65

00:40:44.720 yo dude this is like some nazi shit and he's like i know he's like right i did this he fully 0.63

00:40:50.400 acknowledged on the post itself that like he knew what the symbol was and that he was like waiting 0.98

00:40:56.220 for someone to see it lol the other thing that makes this even rougher is that gizmodo did some

00:41:03.900 reporting where they did a google reverse image search when this first came out where they were 0.74

00:41:08.940 like where the fuck else has this shown up i've never seen this before it's like a weird shitty

00:41:13.580 meme yeah and they reported that they found that it had been previously posted one other time that 0.89

00:41:19.960 they found on the internet okay and that was on a neo-nazi website oh like a straight up like

00:41:26.120 neo-nazis.com swastika gifts whatever else yes so like that genuinely appears to be where it

00:41:34.220 came from when you were like what's he reading where is he getting this stuff i was like oh my

00:41:37.660 god oh this dude is fully apparently on neo-nazi websites there hasn't been i didn't find other

00:41:46.460 reporting that confirmed that also like as soon as pete evans posted it it popped up on a million

00:41:51.160 in other places on the internet so it's hard to do that search at this point so i can't confirm

00:41:56.260 that but also i don't have any reason to believe that gizmodo was like making that shit up i don't

00:42:00.220 know why they would also it's like at best he didn't find it on the neo-nazi website but he 0.79

00:42:04.860 was like dming with somebody who right did get it from the nazi website and he was like that's lit

00:42:09.500 i'm gonna post it right which is not that much better i'm gonna post it and i'm going to show

00:42:14.440 my work like i'm in grade school math class and be like see i really get it see i understand this

00:42:20.740 Nazi symbol. So what is the fallout from this? Oh, Michael. First, we're going to talk about

00:42:26.060 his response. Okay. He said that the image was, quote, like a Rorschach test and that people

00:42:31.920 should, quote, be careful to jump to conclusions. What? He's like, you guys are all jumping to

00:42:36.840 conclusions. This is just an inkblot and you're seeing what you want to see. And what you want

00:42:39.820 to see is a Nazi symbol and a MAGA hat. What? It's literally like a political cartoon with

00:42:45.040 like words and like very legible symbols in it it's so explicit and clear it's not like a photo

00:42:52.940 of a cloud so then he goes forth and publishes a full non-apology on instagram oh just like yeah

00:43:03.300 i did it and it whips like this was cool and you shouldn't be mad at me nope i just sent you a 0.70

00:43:08.360 quote oh my fucking god yeah it says sincere apologies to anyone who misinterpreted a previous 0.72

00:43:14.820 post of a caterpillar and a butterfly having a chat over a drink and perceived that I was 0.90

00:43:20.340 promoting hatred. I look forward to studying all the symbols that have ever existed and

00:43:25.840 research them thoroughly before posting. Fuck this guy. Right. Right. Right. So earlier you 1.00

00:43:35.220 were like, hey, maybe there's some mental illness stuff happening. Blah, blah, blah.

00:43:39.000 Yeah. Counterpoint, maybe he's a master horrible troll. Counterpoint, fuck this guy. 1.00

00:43:44.200 counterpoint here's what he actually says and does i hate this shit where it's like somebody 1.00

00:43:48.960 posts something with an extremely obvious intended meaning and then you're like oh that intended 0.95

00:43:55.020 meaning is bad it's like oh i guess you just don't understand a cartoon about a butterfly

00:44:00.300 sorry you brought all your weird baggage to it to these nazi symbols that i'm posting in an

00:44:06.300 affirming way this is not how like words and symbols work they are in fact intended to convey 0.74

00:44:11.800 meaning also i have done the thing where i've posted shit online and then somebody like hey 0.94

00:44:16.840 like that's actually from like a bad source or like there's there's shit in there that like you

00:44:20.480 don't know what you mean with that and i have like deleted it immediately and apologized having a

00:44:25.200 having a grandma moment where you post something that like you didn't totally understand is

00:44:29.340 something that happens but like much more telling than what happens is what happens afterwards yep 0.51

00:44:34.980 totally because like i don't know what the fuck this black sun symbol means i like i can see

00:44:38.520 myself posting some like weird like here's a design i found on the internet whatever but then 0.98

00:44:42.460 if somebody's like hey mike that's a nazi symbol i'd be like oh fuck sorry jesus you wouldn't go 0.97

00:44:46.540 hey man sorry you saw a picture of a butterfly and you decided to get all your panties in a bunch 0.99

00:44:51.920 or whatever like that's absolutely not a response of a thoughtful and considerate human i guess

00:44:58.800 somebody doesn't like internet humor like no it's the most condescending possible way to tell 0.96

00:45:05.720 yeah fuck off right fucking god so i'm gonna do some real quick hits here on all of the 0.98

00:45:11.680 consequences because it is like a little avalanche right okay november 2020 his publisher drops him 1.00

00:45:17.640 and tells booksellers to get in touch with them if they want to return any of his books

00:45:21.480 that same month the network that he was uh had sort of signed a deal with to be on i'm a celebrity

00:45:29.160 get me out of here oh nice drops him from that show his fee was rumored to be between 100 and

00:45:35.420 $200,000. In November, that same month, Kohl's, Kmart, Target, and Woolworths all pull all of

00:45:46.820 their Pete Evans branded products from their shelves. He has like a branded foods line.

00:45:51.440 And all of their statements emphasize that they have quote unquote, no direct business

00:45:57.320 relationship with him, but that they have been getting his products through a third party

00:46:01.420 distributor okay like they're fully going i don't know her about someone whose products they have

00:46:06.900 had on their shelves for quite some time right one of the products that they pull from their

00:46:11.280 shelves is something called his jamaican simmer sauce okay which had fish in it and the label

00:46:18.460 didn't disclose that it had fish in it good god in december the next month facebook shuts down

00:46:25.740 his account. In January, Spotify pulls his podcast from their platform for spreading COVID

00:46:33.580 misinformation. Whoa. And then in February, Instagram shuts down his account. It is amazing

00:46:40.820 what you have to do to actually get canceled. Absolutely. A little coda to this part of the

00:46:48.720 story. And then we've got a coda to the story more broadly. Coda, coda. In February of 2021,

00:46:55.080 an academic comes forward named Dr. Kaz Ross, who is a university professor who studies sort

00:47:02.620 of far right and extremist movements. She comes forward and says that she was sent screenshots

00:47:08.420 of neo-Nazis discussing Pete Evans as a recruitment target years earlier.

00:47:14.740 oh what right i mean so grain of salt here i don't have any reason to believe that this

00:47:20.220 doctor is not a credible source but this story was published in the daily mail so like a gigantic

00:47:25.620 grain of salt at the same time like i don't know why this person would make up screenshots

00:47:30.200 so what's in the screenshots it's it's nazis talking among themselves about like this guy

00:47:34.320 would be great to recruit so the screenshots the press that i saw was like we've reviewed the

00:47:38.720 screenshots but we're not printing the screenshots for whatever reason so they're just saying there

00:47:43.160 was discussion happening that was explicit about recruiting pete evans pete evans responds okay i

00:47:49.620 just sent you a quote go for it i am definitely not the right fit as i celebrate and love all

00:47:54.600 of the different cultures on the planet as i believe that biodiversity and our wonderful

00:47:58.880 uniqueness is the key for harmony if somebody says like mike are you a nazi i don't know if

00:48:05.020 i'd say like i'm not the right fit i think i'd say something slightly more forceful yeah i feel 0.97

00:48:12.500 like my honest to god response to that would be like jesus christ fucking no god the schedule

00:48:17.740 doesn't suit me i can see why he would be an asset to their movement and why they would see 0.77

00:48:22.720 him as a credible target it's unclear whether or not they did right it sounds like the only thing

00:48:27.700 we have evidence of is that they wanted to recruit him yes because like me and you can sit around and

00:48:32.140 say like we should have oprah as a guest on the show but like that doesn't mean that we've reached

00:48:36.640 out it doesn't mean that she's receptive i mean people talk about recruiting all kinds of other

00:48:41.660 people i think the fact that nazis were thinking about him as a target and like fairly early on

00:48:47.320 seeing him as somebody who could be a vessel for their message is like very telling absolutely even

00:48:53.060 if it doesn't seem like there's any evidence that it went further than that or at least that we know

00:48:56.860 of yeah and again he's already laid his cards on the table so much prior to this instance right

00:49:03.860 that like folks who are part of active neo-nazi movements are like hey you know who we should get

00:49:08.860 we should get that guy. I would like to think that if my name ever comes up in chat logs between two

00:49:14.080 Nazis, it's like, fuck that Michael Hobbs guy. Yeah, absolutely. That is what I want the Nazis 1.00

00:49:19.620 to be saying about me. I will say this to the aforementioned death threats. Never great to get

00:49:24.140 a death threat to get them from the people I've been getting them from pretty good. That's the

00:49:28.000 bleakest thing you've ever said. But also, yes. Fair and reasonable. Yeah. So you might think that

00:49:35.920 this was the end of pete evans in the public eye you're fucking kidding me this is not the last 0.70

00:49:41.420 chapter here is the coda oh my god that very same month february of 2021 pete evans announced his 0.61

00:49:50.760 newest venture which was running for senate what oh god did he win is he like the president of

00:49:58.180 australia now no he's not he's not and they don't have one of those so he ran as a candidate for

00:50:04.400 senate with a party called the great australian party the gap the gap falling i wonder what their 0.97

00:50:11.480 platform is do you want to guess i mean it's all the it's all this bullshit no of like i don't know 0.99

00:50:18.040 probably closed borders and like but weird like what even is like a eugenics fucking political 0.98

00:50:26.780 party i mean so yes you nailed the first one they believe in zero net immigration okay they think 0.91

00:50:32.680 that enviro groups are quote funded by foreign interests with hidden agendas george soros playing

00:50:38.600 the hits they think that vandalism is a major political issue and they think it's a result

00:50:44.320 of the quote-unquote lack of social responsibility from families schools and courts and they think

00:50:51.140 that parents should be responsible for the costs of all vandalism from their kids until their kids

00:50:56.220 are of age that was just weird on top of all of that they also want to abolish personal income 0.96

00:51:01.080 tax they want to abolish family court like they are arguing for extremely fringe shit abolishing 0.93

00:51:08.680 okay abolishing family court is like this is a bunch of like angry divorced dads isn't it so 0.95

00:51:14.040 that all of the family stuff i was like oh this is all like new world order slash men's rights

00:51:21.000 yeah yeah the thing to note here is that like just to be really clear the great australian party is

00:51:26.740 not a significant threat to any major parties currently. In 2019, they won point zero four

00:51:34.520 percent of the vote in one of their highest vote getting elections, right? One of their best

00:51:40.300 margins. That's like eight people. It's so teeny tiny. So Pete Evans announced his run for office

00:51:47.460 in February. By the fall, he had sort of quietly pulled down his campaign website and a reporter

00:51:54.640 called him to be like hey did you pull out of the race and he sort of confirms okay he has pulled

00:52:00.980 out of the race the story that runs about this has the headline thank evans for that oh that's

00:52:08.460 pretty good really good and it's on a website called crikey just to get it as australian as

00:52:14.840 possible so that's where we stand today he's no longer running for office he's no longer on tv

00:52:21.680 He still has his podcast, which he continues to have extremely questionable guests on.

00:52:27.820 He still has his line of foods that appear to mostly just be sold directly through his website.

00:52:34.660 He is on social media, but he's on like Telegram.

00:52:38.340 Oh, I didn't even know you could like be on Telegram.

00:52:41.280 Okay.

00:52:41.700 He is, you know, still around.

00:52:44.160 He's not completely gone, but also most folks just aren't giving him much oxygen at this point.

00:52:50.800 so the thing that i feel left with in this episode is thinking as you and i often do about like

00:52:57.060 what are the systemic ways that this could have gone differently i think that media could have

00:53:02.300 cooled it much earlier on the like there's no suggestion that he holds racist or anti-semitic 0.85

00:53:08.160 views or we don't know how he feels personally or yeah there is some real garbage both sides ism 0.77

00:53:14.860 that allowed this to continue considerably longer than it needed to. I would say for me personally,

00:53:20.940 it felt very clear pretty early on in this timeline that this was like not a great dude.

00:53:27.600 When you're like, hey man, if everybody ate paleo, nobody would have autism.

00:53:32.040 That's a pretty good sign that that is not A, one of the great thinkers of our time,

00:53:36.720 and B, not one of the great humanitarians of our time. And I do think if someone on his team

00:53:44.840 or in the press or at the TV network or anything at that point, like that feels like the first

00:53:53.660 major line crossed in this story is when he's talking about autism and autistic people.

00:53:59.200 If someone at that point had gone, hey, wait a minute, if this is a dude who's willing to say

00:54:04.160 this thing in public, I bet there's more. I also think that like celebrity and wellness media can

00:54:09.380 also think of themselves as kind of the first line of defense for this stuff. You know what

00:54:14.540 tell you like keep monitoring your mole to see if it becomes like skin cancer yeah you see if like

00:54:19.740 does it have jagged edges and stuff something about this to me these celebrities that will say

00:54:24.820 little hints of potentially more odious views even if it's not necessarily an iceberg of their

00:54:29.740 existing views but it's like oh they're they're in like a media environment that might be sending

00:54:36.800 them down a radicalization pathway and like i just need to check in on this before i give them more

00:54:42.420 attention a lot of media is like well we're just wellness media or like we're just celebrity

00:54:46.660 pop culture media we don't have to think about this stuff but as we've seen so many times this

00:54:51.680 is a gateway drug for people and also like neo-nazis and other radical groups are like

00:54:57.100 monitoring pop culture figures i think that's right and i also think like there are some lessons

00:55:02.700 here to your point just now no it's actually like extra incumbent on health and wellness media to 0.77

00:55:09.360 fact check the shit out of themselves to get to the bottom of stuff to ask tough questions of

00:55:14.540 people like pete evans even when you're doing a food diary of your emu meatballs and activated 0.58

00:55:20.400 right almonds and whatever else right like i think all of this is because of the ways in which

00:55:25.960 both it just sells people like straight up misinformation and disinformation at times

00:55:30.800 but also because of the ways in which it softens the ground for this kind of weird

00:55:34.400 very right wing rhetoric, it feels really important to like get to the bottom of what's

00:55:39.700 going on, right? Because you're bringing somebody into people's homes, and you're establishing them

00:55:44.020 as an authority on health stuff. And so when they turn to their like vaccines are full of metal or

00:55:50.380 whatever, then it's like, well, they're they're cashing in the currency that you've given them.

00:55:55.940 Absolutely. I mean, like, those are some of my sort of like, here are the things that I'm left

00:55:59.860 thinking about. What are some of the things that you're left thinking about?

00:56:02.540 I don't know. I'm in a pessimistic mood lately.

00:56:05.240 Me too.

00:56:05.660 This does seem like some sort of harbinger of what's to come.

00:56:10.200 Yeah.

00:56:10.440 We need to understand these pathways and we need to be really clear eyed about what they are. I

00:56:18.160 think there's a lot of like weird retreat to abstraction where it's like, well, everybody's

00:56:23.720 getting radicalized or like the internet is affecting society throughout. And it's like,

00:56:28.900 no, we have a problem with right-wing radicalization. We're having a resurgent,

00:56:35.380 sometimes violent, anti-democratic right-wing movement that is now emboldened. Whenever we

00:56:41.520 talk about media literacy and misinformation, there is misinformation across the ideological

00:56:47.300 spectrum. Of course there is, right? But the kind of misinformation that we need to worry about and

00:56:52.520 the kind of misinformation that is politically salient is right-wing misinformation it is 1.00

00:56:58.880 misinformation that carries with it this kind of bullshit like conspiratorial like jewish people 0.98

00:57:06.840 minorities people who are going to deserve the crackdown that is coming and so i think there 0.98

00:57:14.500 needs to be a real push to be like very specific of what the actual threat is the threat is not

00:57:19.600 people believing things that are not true. If people believe in Bigfoot, I don't know that I

00:57:23.820 really give a shit. The threat to the country is people who are joining violent, quasi-terror 0.99

00:57:30.480 movements like QAnon and the Proud Boys and whatever the fuck that Black Sun symbol is, 0.98

00:57:37.000 who pose an actual physical threat to other people's safety. 1.00

00:57:39.940 I mean, I think that's exactly right. There's this sort of constant impulse to depoliticize

00:57:45.640 what you are calling internet poisoning, which I think is exactly the right term, right? And

00:57:51.060 there's a clear right wing impulse here that is getting carried much further than any of this

00:57:57.900 kind of stuff on the left goes, right? Right. And is leading to much more dramatic and like

00:58:03.220 physical repercussions, real world repercussions. Yeah, I'm totally with you.

00:58:09.080 I mean, I think the real lesson of all of this is that if we want to save democracy,

00:58:12.780 we have to cancel paleo that's number one but mike then how will we equalize to our natural

00:58:22.320 beautiful proportions how will we become human

00:58:42.780 We'll see you next time.

Maintenance Phase - July 26, 2022

Pete Evans Part 2： COVID & Consequences

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