00:00:53.240and I've spent my life exploring how other people survive what should have destroyed them.
00:00:58.760I'm Elizabeth Smart, and these are The Survivor Files.
00:01:02.380Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable, abducted, stalked, controlled, and nearly silenced.
00:01:09.920These are stories about what it takes to make it out alive.
00:01:13.740Listen to The Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:01:21.360If your bookshelf and your For You page are equally important to your personality, welcome home.
00:01:27.080Pro Society is a weekly podcast that's part book club, part group chat for anyone who thinks Pride and Prejudice and Love Island deserve the same level of discourse.
00:01:35.740Each week, we're connecting the dots between books, the internet, and pop culture with your favorite writers, book talk creators, and plenty of overthought opinions.
00:06:29.440Um, I, I'm, I can't say that I'm okay. And I don't think that any of us are okay. Um, it's been,
00:06:37.660it's been such an awful experience sort of watching this unfold and be organized online
00:06:43.520so very publicly. And then every day we find out news that says that the attack was much worse,
00:06:49.340I think, even than, uh, what we realized, like the news just keeps getting worse every day.
00:06:54.060And it's very unsettling to think about how many folks who hold elected office up to the president were inciting violence and how many members of Congress and Hill staff and, frankly, support staff, maintenance and food service, have to go back to work with some of these folks every day, less than a week after an attempted coup.
00:07:17.060I'm going to be sitting with that for a long time.
00:07:21.760I think that's one of the things that really breaks my heart.
00:07:24.280You know, nobody should be going through this full stop.
00:07:27.660But then when you think about the other staffers and then just, you know, folks, everyday folks in D.C.
00:07:33.120who don't have the kind of support, who don't have the kind of, you know, who maybe are not being taken care of in this way.
00:07:41.120Like, I remember seeing an image of the largely black Capitol Hill staffers cleaning up.
00:07:46.400And I thought, you know, did these folks also get the benefit of, you know, gas masks or protection or were they just out here on their own trying to do their jobs?
00:07:57.600Yeah, I read a harrowing anecdote about how after 9-11, no one actually came to evacuate the support staff and tell them that it was safe.
00:08:06.540And I was just thinking like, oh, man, I hope I hope that there are better procedures in place now.
00:08:13.920There was also an anecdote about how members of Congress were told that bulletproof vests were a reimbursable expense.
00:08:21.080And I was like, well, I wonder if you're a food service worker who's outsourced.
00:08:24.320I'm guessing it's not a reimbursable expense or even something that's, you know, can be on your radar.
00:09:21.620Trump on December 19th announced this event, and he said, be there, be wild.
00:09:27.620And he crowd-built Ford over Twitter a couple more times.
00:09:30.920Who could have seen the event at the Capitol coming?
00:09:33.800Well, pretty much anyone who was looking.
00:09:36.520In fact, Trump's own administration found that homegrown white supremacist groups were a growing threat in America.
00:09:42.740The Department of Homeland Security called the threat from white supremacists the most deadly domestic terror threat facing the country.0.76
00:09:49.940And yet, the Trump administration chose to instead prioritize what they called, quote, black identity extremists,0.89
00:09:56.840or essentially anyone who was black and happened to be connected to Black Lives Matter, as the bigger threat.
00:10:02.300What's hard for Melissa is the fact that these attacks were so openly planned on social media platforms.
00:10:08.240Folks were just on in MAGA world were so openly organizing.
00:10:12.620They were on the Donald. They were on Parler and Facebook groups.
00:10:16.220And the rhetoric just kept getting increasingly violent.
00:10:19.940They were talking about storming the Capitol.
00:10:22.440They were talking about how they were going to hang and execute members of Congress and anyone who is in the deep state.
00:10:28.380and it was all just happening out in the open
00:10:57.280I mean, it almost kind of feels like a kind of gaslighting where you're thinking, oh, I literally just saw this being planned on Twitter.com in public or on Parler, you know, having all these officials kind of like lean on this language that makes it seem like no one could have seen this coming.
00:11:16.920Yeah, I mean, what I'll say is whiteness is a hell of a drug.0.98
00:11:19.480it's it's i have no doubt in my i mean i think about how we know law enforcement surveils and0.97
00:11:27.380infiltrates uh supposedly groups of all political stripes but we know what happens to folks on the
00:11:32.440left we know it's been happening to black lives matter um i can't imagine if something on a black
00:11:37.740lives matter forum or group or conversation was said that was like a quarter of this vitriolic
00:11:42.840that there wouldn't be just an incredible police presence in response um and that all this was
00:11:48.460happening for weeks. And again, there's no way folks didn't see it was happening. It's just that
00:11:54.400they saw it was happening and chose not to take it seriously. You know, folks like you and other
00:11:59.520organizations and the organization that I represent, Ultraviolet, we've been calling on
00:12:03.380tech platforms to take disinformation and violent rhetoric on social media seriously forever. I mean,
00:12:09.420you and I have been in some of the same meetings with leadership from companies like Facebook and
00:12:13.060Twitter, and we just listen to them say over and over again, oh, we can't do this, we can't do this,
00:12:18.120We can't do this and throw up their hands. And it turns out they could do it this whole time.
00:12:23.860Yeah, all it took was a violent attempted coup. No, I mean, what I go back to is the tech platforms
00:12:29.620and Facebook is the worst actor. But I think, you know, YouTube and Twitter have to take some heat
00:12:34.460too. They've always treated this like a PR problem. And when we see big changes is after terrible,
00:12:40.260tragic events happen. And then it's like no one could have predicted, no one could have prevented.
00:12:45.660Sheryl Sandberg actually had the audacity to say yesterday that this attack wasn't organized on Facebook, which was just I don't even know how still after all these years you can say that with a straight face or what PR person would advise you to do that.
00:12:58.740But again, it's like I think hope, you know, we know from news, public reporting that Twitter seems to indicate that part of the reason that they took down Trump's account and did another round of takedowns was because of intelligence they received about more violence.
00:13:13.980So I'm sure that plays into it as well.
00:13:15.700But after the past four years, it's hard not to be cynical and be like, oh, you just see
00:13:42.740Well, I mean, how much, you know, we talk about being in some of the same meetings. How often have, you know, we've been there with nonprofit organizations who are saying, this is what we're seeing. This is what it is. Here's the list. And then Facebook dances around it like, oh, they've only had two strikes and our review is different. And it's just, you know, abdicating responsibility again and again.
00:14:03.080It's always something. It really is like a crisis of leadership. It's passing the buck. It's blaming content moderators or something. There's always something, I feel, where they're able to really skirt accountability.
00:14:19.500And I think it's interesting to watch how quickly they're moving now with how slowly they've been moving in the past and how they've just been parroting this idea that there's not much they can do when it's clear that's not the case.
00:14:33.080Yeah, you saw that in the early days of COVID, too. I mean, I think Facebook took a lot more proactive action than they have in the past because they could sort of, you know, see what was coming and they still didn't do enough. But it's like, well, we know you can move fast when you need to.
00:14:46.680What was your reaction to Trump being kicked off social media, you know, first Facebook and then Twitter?
00:14:50.420I was, I was truly stunned when he was finally suspended from Twitter, especially when it was
00:14:56.480permanent. I remember just like that night, just like staring at the space where his page used to
00:15:01.660be. I think I tweeted, you know, your moment of Zen. And honestly, like selfishly, I was like,
00:15:06.720oh my God, I'm never going to have to wake up and wonder what he tweeted. I'm never going to have
00:15:10.980to worry if he like started a war or fired someone or anything over Twitter. So personally,
00:15:18.500It was, God, it was like this giant weight had been lifted off.
00:15:23.980I have seen so many people, some of whom are people that I respect or who's, you know, I think are thoughtful people, making this argument of like, well, if they can do this to Trump because they don't like what he has to say, what's stopping them from doing it to me or to you or to anybody else?
00:15:39.060making Trump being deplatformed about a free speech issue. Do you believe that Trump being
00:15:45.340deplatformed from Facebook and Twitter and social media is a free speech issue?
00:15:49.620I don't. Because again, he was inciting violence. And when we're talking about free speech,
00:15:55.620we're talking about free speech of a select few. And it completely ignores everyone who has been
00:16:00.960deplatformed or harassed offline over the number of years by these same folks.
00:18:24.880It's like if you can hide some real messages inside compelling characters, then that is a Trojan horse.
00:18:32.780Whether you're looking for literary deep dives, smart pop culture conversations, or a community of readers who love to think a little too much, you're in the right place.
00:18:41.940Listen to Pro Society on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:20:38.240partly because the idea of newsworthiness
00:20:40.060is silly because world leaders have a million other channels where things that they say are
00:20:44.460newsworthy, but also because it just gives already powerful people an extra weapon to wield against
00:20:50.140their political opposition. Another question I have for you is, you know, I think that for so
00:20:55.900long we had this idea that people who were spreading conspiracy theories and disinformation
00:20:59.900were like fringe groups. What is it? How do we combat it when you have elected officials,
00:21:06.680some of it who took part in the insurrection. How do we combat this idea that we're dealing with
00:21:13.000a handful of fringe people when in fact it's elected officials, it is like the official
00:21:19.340GOP repeating false claims about Antifa being behind the attacks on the Capitol?
00:21:25.220How can we combat it when it's, in some cases, seems to have gone so mainstream?
00:21:30.000Yeah, I mean, look, the biggest purveyor of disinformation in the 2020 election was Donald Trump. And he used his presidential campaign and the White House and every lever of federal government that he had to spread disinformation. That's not fringe.
00:21:46.180We've also had an increasing amount of far-right candidates run for office and win.
00:21:52.800There are currently two members of Congress who are known believers of QAnon, Marjorie
00:21:58.320Taylor Greene and Lauren Bort in Colorado.
00:22:01.300I don't think I said the latter's name correctly, but it's fine.
00:22:04.820And we see an increasing amount, like there's Amanda Littman on Twitter has been keeping
00:22:09.420a list of all the state legislators who showed up at the Capitol and were involved in the
00:22:42.200And I think it's really something that we're acting as if, you know, as if the only avenue, the only avenue that he can do that is social media.
00:22:50.140That might be the way that Trump personally feels, but it is not the case.
00:22:54.420Yeah. No, I really enjoyed Republicans going on national television complaining about how they're being silenced.
00:22:59.880Yeah, it's like, oh, I didn't realize that if when you have your speech suppressed, you get to go on like the major cable news networks to talk about it.
00:23:08.520Exactly. And I also think, I mean, I think it really speaks to this idea of who, of like free speech for who, because, you know, we know that Black activists, progressive groups have long complained about being suppressed on social media platforms.
00:23:25.780And so those are conversations that completely predate what we're talking about. And yet now when it's Trump who is, you know, having his accounts banned for terms of service violations repeatedly, that is the free speech issue.
00:23:37.920But all of the times where progressive groups and Black activists and folks like that have said, oh, we're being suppressed on social media platforms, it didn't seem to be that same issue.
00:23:48.740And all the folks who have been driven, and again, particularly Black people, people of color, women, who've been driven offline by harassment from these folks.
00:29:06.180This is Prose Society, the weekly podcast that's part book club, part group chat for thought daughters, pop culture obsessives, and anyone who thinks Pride and Prejudice and Love Island deserve the same level of discourse.
00:29:18.620I'm Eli Rallo, and every week we're connecting the dots between books, the internet, and the conversations everyone can't stop having.
00:29:25.740I'm going to have to look up this story.
00:31:13.020I think the first thing we need to do as leaders in America is lower the temperature and try to come together.
00:31:19.240I think we need to lower the rhetoric. We need to get some unity going.
00:31:23.580But you can't have unity without accountability, without justice.
00:31:27.920And as one of the half a million Americans who calls Washington, D.C. my home, it's obvious we aren't there yet.
00:31:34.760Today, I'm preparing for an inauguration weekend where it might not be safe to leave my apartment.
00:31:40.900I'm buying groceries and making plans in case the mayor declares an emergency curfew, like she did the day of the riots.
00:31:48.400I'm watching elected officials and far-right media outlets continue to traffic in the same kind of baseless conspiracy theories that got us here in the first place.
00:31:58.300That, quote, Antifa or Democrats were responsible for the terror of the Capitol.
00:32:04.140Here's Representative Matt Goetz repeating a false claim on the House floor that a facial recognition company found, quote, Antifa members were part of the Capitol riots.
00:32:14.540And I don't know if the reports are true, but the Washington Times has just reported some pretty compelling evidence from a facial recognition company showing that some of the people who breached the Capitol today were not Trump supporters.
00:32:29.240They were masquerading as Trump supporters and, in fact, were members of the violent terrorist group Antifa.
00:32:36.060That's a total lie, by the way. The Washington Times retracted the story after the facial recognition company threatened legal action.
00:32:47.440Melissa hopes President-elect Biden can unite the country, but not without accountability for everyone.
00:32:53.240The insurgents who stormed the Capitol, but also the elected officials, media outlets, and social media platforms who helped them get there.
00:33:01.420So you actually published what you called a roadmap to accountability.
00:33:18.020So I just mentioned, you know, where I thought were good places to start.
00:33:22.040And some of them, you know, we've talked about already, the tech companies, Trump and his
00:33:26.820administration, the Republican Party, law enforcement, particularly the white supremacy
00:33:33.620problem that we know and have in law enforcement, and the rioters themselves.
00:33:39.100And I think what's interesting about Joe Biden, most of his rhetoric has been about unity and coming together, but he's also been very specific about the need for accountability.
00:33:50.240He called the rioters seditionists yesterday, which I thought was great.
00:33:57.300And when he was introducing his Justice Department nominees, he talked about the importance of holding these folks accountable, calling them out, calling what they did crimes.
00:34:09.360He called them, you know, he used the words like terrorism and terrorist.
00:34:13.120So I don't necessarily want to discount what Joe Biden is going to do.
00:34:17.260So are you hopeful in this moment? You know, when you think about the state of disinformation and how we got here, are you hopeful for what's on the horizon?
00:34:25.620I mean, I'm not a hopeful person by nature. If I was, I probably wouldn't do this work because it would like kill my soul. You know, I will just say that I can see what's possible.
00:34:37.700I have also seen us, you know, particularly in the past decade of American politics make the wrong choice again and again. But I finally see a landscape where it is possible to start having some of these changes in accountability. You know, we have the Senate, we have Congress, we have an administration that has signaled they're going to take domestic terrorism and white supremacy and disinformation seriously. So we have all the pieces in place.
00:35:04.700Yeah, that's a good way to think about it. So maybe not hopeful, but, you know, cautiously, like, we'll see what happens.
00:38:49.340For more great podcasts, check out the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:39:01.620I survived nine months in captivity, and I've spent my life exploring how other people survive
00:39:12.360what should have destroyed them. I'm Elizabeth Smart, and these are The Survivor Files.
00:39:17.940Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable, abducted, stalked, controlled,
00:39:23.760and nearly silenced. These are stories about what it takes to make it out alive.
00:39:28.960Listen to The Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:39:37.340If your bookshelf and your For You page are equally important to your personality, welcome home.
00:39:43.100Pro Society is a weekly podcast that's part book club, part group chat for anyone who thinks Pride and Prejudice and Love Island deserve the same level of discourse.
00:39:51.420Each week, we're connecting the dots between books, the internet, and pop culture
00:39:54.880with your favorite writers, book talk creators, and plenty of overthought opinions.