Unlearn16: Class is in Session - The One Where The School Boards Sue Social Media

00:00:00.000 classes in session how you doing and welcome to unlearn 16 classes in session guys today

00:00:08.720 i'm sitting with dean dean blendell right here oh hi dean hi buddy how are you i had to text dean

00:00:15.680 because um guys social media especially that lovely little bird app uh has really it's really

00:00:23.720 bid you know a situation and then we get the tdsb and the york board here in ontario trying to sue

00:00:32.060 social media groups and try to ban them and whatever it is they're trying to do and i thought

00:00:37.380 unless i start speaking to some real people i'm gonna lose my mind so yeah that was a weird you

00:00:44.900 know how weird it was to get a text from you last night saying hey i really would like to talk to

00:00:51.500 some smart people on a podcast and i almost sent back who do you want me to book for you

00:00:57.340 i just the thing about social media and then we're gonna i'm gonna explain to everybody

00:01:04.400 who's listening because obviously a lot of people who are listening aren't from ontario but

00:01:07.880 i'm gonna the thing about social media you can have this incredible reach but it can feel very

00:01:14.200 isolating it can because you're doing it by yourself but all of these people can listen

00:01:20.240 to you and respond to you and do whatever. And so it's this very weird one-way thing. And I'm a very

00:01:28.080 social person. I like social media because I'm a very social person. But what I realized is I'm not

00:01:33.840 getting from posts on TikTok or whatever. I don't get that back and forth, right? The town hall that

00:01:41.040 I think I would really enjoy, I don't get that because nobody's in the room, quite literally,

00:01:47.860 maybe anna maybe my cat uh but in ontario so the tdsb which is the toronto district school board

00:01:55.540 the york board and two other boards i don't know who they are but do they really matter peel yeah

00:02:00.820 yeah peel's another one yeah just a gta school boards i'm gonna get calls i'm gonna get emails

00:02:07.060 well you got to know that stuff if you're a teacher right oh yeah whatever um they have

00:02:12.020 they have collectively suing or going to sue interestingly enough with an outside lawyer so a

00:02:18.500 litigation lawyer about um damages like that kind of thing they're going to sue all major media

00:02:25.060 companies social media tick tock tick tock um instagram snapchat and uh facebook and i'm

00:02:35.300 assuming twitter they're going to sue them all because of the damage that is being done to kids

00:02:42.820 to to the addiction centers and the neural pathways that everybody's arguing that these

00:02:48.900 social media things tap into and then the distracted student that we then have to

00:02:57.780 get through the educational system so that that's the premise of it i mean i have my own

00:03:03.220 version like response to this but what do you what do you think oh man yeah it's a great

00:03:10.260 question you know i'm of the opinion that you can't really as you aptly put it put the genie

00:03:18.040 back in the bottle like ever very few instances in in human experience or time where people have

00:03:25.640 been given a right or been given access to something and we've been able to successfully

00:03:31.160 remove access or that right from that person groups of people right like it's just not something

00:03:35.920 that happens it's you know they say it all the time be careful who you give your rights to because

00:03:41.720 the chances are they'll never give them back government's famous for it uh authoritarianism

00:03:46.700 is famous for it where it's like hey we're gonna do this to protect you from you right and that's 0.88

00:03:51.700 really what this is but it's like you know i hate to shit on the party but it's like 10 years too 0.96

00:03:57.240 late. You know, we've known about the rewiring of neural pathways due to social media. We're well 0.95

00:04:05.180 aware of the studies that Meta, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter buried in regards to what

00:04:11.200 social media, what those notifications, what serotonin and dopamine hits meant to people,

00:04:16.980 how they were rewiring our systems for on-demand. And, you know, we are destroying our attention

00:04:22.260 span and and these tech and media companies knowingly did this like they knew what they were

00:04:27.700 doing right and and you know the really kind of messed up part and we'll get to the lawsuit in

00:04:33.620 just a second is that through all of this they managed to convince the government of the united

00:04:38.020 states and the government of canada that no one should be allowed to sue them for any of it

00:04:43.940 you you shouldn't be allowed to have take take legal exception with anything that social media

00:04:50.500 might have had a hand in because they're just a tool for messaging we're just that's all we are

00:04:54.820 we're just a tool but the psyop the psychology the academia that went into the psychology of

00:05:02.660 social media isn't something that everybody understands and if you've seen you know anything

00:05:07.380 about what it is that people that have left those platforms you know whether it's uh eli roth

00:05:14.180 whether it was uh i can't remember the gentleman that left facebook i'll come to me he's now a

00:05:19.300 social media educator they've been doing netflix specials they've been doing symposiums they've

00:05:25.060 been trying to warn people they've been appearing in front of congress for the last five six years

00:05:30.820 like the last five six years they've been saying hey this is not just a problem you know teens are

00:05:36.260 killing themselves because of facebook and instagram and social media people are being

00:05:40.740 hunted down and and our attention spans are being destroyed i mean you know it is

00:05:46.580 It is a foregone conclusion that these apps have changed our lives,

00:05:51.120 but it's an even more foregone conclusion for children

00:05:54.680 who have been brought up in it who don't know anything else, right?

00:06:00.560 That in some states, like in Florida,

00:06:03.380 they're going to have that app taken away from them.

00:06:06.100 It might be the only thing those kids know.

00:06:08.100 It might be the only way they know how to get information,

00:06:10.020 and it's a terrible way to do it.

00:06:11.740 Yeah, TikTok, right?

00:06:13.020 In the case of Ron DeSantis in Florida,

00:06:15.020 we'll just game this out a little bit.

00:06:17.520 The Toronto District School Board plans on suing those people, TikTok, Meta, all the big tech companies, for $4.5 billion for destroying our children.

00:06:30.040 This is not in a microcosm.

00:06:31.560 They have done this.

00:06:32.500 They have done this all over the world.

00:06:35.080 However, however, they're not talking about the benefit of social media as well, right?

00:06:42.380 They're just not.

00:06:43.180 It is becoming grained in a younger generation to just be able to use these things, connect, contrast, have communities.

00:06:50.220 There are great benefits to the way social media was originally engineered and identified.

00:06:54.920 But the reason why people are angry is because it's not only changed our behaviors.

00:07:00.540 Bad people have figured out a way to get the algorithm to work.

00:07:04.360 and it's with bad content that has continued to destroy you know children's lives destroy their

00:07:11.260 how they feel about themselves in some capacity destroy their habits in some capacity and i'd

00:07:16.580 like to get your thoughts this is just kind of the running tally that people talk about in terms of

00:07:21.060 like hey the the all the issues if you want to put them all in a bucket you're seeing people now

00:07:26.440 10 years after the fact tell these kids who have grown up with this telling these these children

00:07:32.380 have communities here that by the way it's bad for you and we're going to sue them for making you

00:07:40.060 these little social media robots that can't pay attention in class right that's and to me that i

00:07:46.140 don't understand that i understand i've watched the education system try to comport themselves

00:07:51.420 and use it as a way to kind of stay in kids lives but i'd be very interested to get your response

00:07:56.460 because you're a teacher you've seen the evolution of people using social media in class right

00:08:01.700 Well, and I'm obviously on social media.

00:08:04.060 So let's not forget that in here and bias.

00:08:06.040 Yes.

00:08:06.920 Number one.

00:08:07.860 So let's, because I really, I just feel as though it's the next thing that we are going

00:08:14.140 to point our finger to and in, take the addiction part away for a second.

00:08:21.360 Let's just take the, and I'm going to have to put the algorithm over here because I'm

00:08:25.980 not perfectly educated on that.

00:08:27.440 I will admit that the point is dopamine and serotonin and hit with a notification and do

00:08:33.580 this and do that. But I'm going to put that over here for a second because the same arguments

00:08:38.160 that seemingly get made with every new invention that's been put into our society and that

00:08:46.060 inundates our society, it's this is what's destroying your kids. You know what I mean?

00:08:50.980 Like you have radio. Oh my God, but you have people controlling the radio. And then they're

00:08:55.960 saying this and they're saying that what what happens when the the phone like the government

00:09:00.440 controlled that are we saying there was no ill effects that back in the day when it was just

00:09:05.620 radio you you had it at a full pace propaganda machine then you have you know around the same

00:09:13.900 time you have telephones and then you have televisions and then tv is going to rot your

00:09:18.760 brain and i know what gives kids bad body images it's vogue magazine and it's all the pictures of

00:09:25.000 the models and what kids are doing. And I know what's going to rot their stomachs because it's 0.74

00:09:30.560 McDonald's and McDonald's shouldn't exist. I just would love somebody to point out the difference

00:09:39.300 because I would argue there isn't much of one, even algorithmically. Because if you're going to

00:09:45.960 tell me that advertisers and television producers and movie makers don't understand how to tap into

00:09:53.280 those things, how to push those. That's the whole point of their existence. The whole point of their

00:09:58.680 existence is to tap into what the culture is afraid of, what they like, what sparks their

00:10:05.160 kind of gladiator, worse nature, and then push it back out. Why do you think we all watch the

00:10:10.800 Real Housewives for crying out loud? We're waiting for somebody to flip a table. We're waiting. 1.00

00:10:16.940 That's the only thing I'm waiting for. I'm waiting for NeNe Leakes to throw down because somebody

00:10:22.720 went in her closet or I'm waiting for like, you know, I don't know, the people on Beverly Hills,

00:10:29.140 Lisa Vanderpump to lose it on. Look, those are the things we're waiting for. And so I just don't

00:10:35.900 understand because I've been a teacher right through this whole thing. I'd say when I started

00:10:39.320 teaching, computers were, so 2002, computers were a thing, but not really. Like they didn't have

00:10:47.560 computers in class no no one had a smartphone they knew what a library was they knew how to

00:10:53.000 use the card catalog they might have had to look at microfiche like when i was in university

00:10:58.560 all of it was done in the school okay so microfiche i asked a guy for microfiche i went for a tour with

00:11:06.840 my friend's kid at um sheridan college and we were in one of the libraries i said can you show me

00:11:12.460 the microfiches this guy looked at me like i asked him like show me the leprechauns in the back room 0.94

00:11:20.380 like there he's like what is that again i've heard of that i'm like screw you son get out 0.97

00:11:26.380 i don't even want screw you sonny 0.98

00:11:30.620 but you know and so i started then and and it's funny 0.86

00:11:37.340 and i'm so many teachers are going to disagree with me but let me say this too i work in a very

00:11:46.760 particular environment right i have 12 to 15 kids in my class different than 30 to 35 kids and that's

00:11:55.100 what i think the school boards aren't really acknowledging and they should be pushing this

00:12:00.380 a little more full court if i'm going to say what's caused more harm to our students and you're

00:12:06.260 not going to sue the government. You're not going to sue the defunding of education. You're not

00:12:13.520 going to sue the idea that every kid passes no matter what. You're not going to sue the government

00:12:18.680 based on tons of different learning abilities and IEPs and learning strategies in one classroom

00:12:27.020 and then putting one teacher in charge of that and wondering why they're not making

00:12:31.340 so much more input into their child's work i'm just telling i'm telling you statistically

00:12:38.080 what's more work and what's what what's a bigger weight because kids have always had a short

00:12:45.960 attention span yeah i want to know besides the kid that sat there straight and stared at the

00:12:53.280 board because somebody's going to hit them with something heavy i want to know where these great

00:12:57.700 attention spans were. Somebody said to me the other day, like, yeah, you know, it was so much

00:13:03.520 better back in the day. We didn't have our phones. I'm like, do you have any idea how much effort went

00:13:07.400 into writing a note, folding a note, and transporting the note from me to my friend

00:13:14.260 across the room? That's a two-hour expedition. So, time-wise, is it quicker for me to be like,

00:13:23.520 um i like so and so what do you think they think of me let's have lunch in the cafeteria at this

00:13:29.040 time um i'll see you after school send or me sitting there writing out a full page of note

00:13:38.320 folding it like i have a phd in origami and then judiciously yeah secretly covertly getting it

00:13:48.860 across the room so my french teacher doesn't grab it and read it in front of the whole class

00:13:53.760 yeah well you gotta your pass game has to be awesome uh in school if you don't have a smartphone

00:13:59.160 i'm just wondering you know and i also think whole like we're really taking the responsibility

00:14:08.060 way away from barrett's well any responsibility anymore well only in the prairies they want all

00:14:15.400 it um you know i i have to and i have to i it is worth saying there are different aspects there's

00:14:23.080 minutiae to the social media conversation when it comes to kids right there really is and i i i can't

00:14:29.880 project that onto my kids i can't say it's bad for you because when i grew up and you brought

00:14:34.080 something up earlier in the conversation when i grew up i would always you know i'd be in front

00:14:38.540 of the tv when my parents got home i would go get a snack during commercials i mean my tv never was

00:14:44.540 i love lucy little love boat right after that yeah cap and steubing remember him julie mcruise

00:14:51.260 julie mccoy the cruise director she was awesome um and and if i watch too much my parents would go

00:14:58.780 why are you rotting your your mind like you're why are you like go do something outside and i'm like

00:15:05.260 oh okay yeah i get that and i feel guilty about watching too much tv and i go outside and eventually

00:15:10.620 the draw of tv came back because it was informing me i was taking information in i would get dopamine

00:15:15.740 hits from the excitement on television that's what we were all the original social media fast

00:15:20.540 forward 50 years right i said to my son the other day dude why don't you turn on the tv and watch a

00:15:27.180 movie all night long and he's like why i got youtube i can watch like 5 000 movies in an hour

00:15:35.500 and i don't have to worry about it that's the kind of stuff i'm talking about and i'm wrestling with

00:15:40.700 the idea if that's bad or not right you know my kids my kids said the other day um joanne i was

00:15:50.140 watching this tick tock and it talked about the jfk because we we did the whole jfk thing these

00:15:54.940 are great eights okay talked about the jfk thing so i went and looked it up this is the part where

00:16:03.580 i have an issue this is the part where if in my opinion instead of trying to ban something that

00:16:09.980 you're not going to ban you're not gonna it's just i i feel like it's an asinine uh a goal

00:16:16.780 but is that the goal of the lawsuit in in toronto with the toronto district school board is it to

00:16:20.540 ban certain apps from school it's to well they're suing them for money so i'm assuming when they

00:16:25.500 sue them for money if they can prove a direct causal which they won't be able to sue between

00:16:30.780 the creation of the algorithm and then an individual kids right who by the way who by

00:16:39.640 the way are only on social media because their parents have allowed it they gave them the phone

00:16:45.780 unless there's a 14 year old going out and get a rogers plan i don't know when i got my rogers plan

00:16:50.420 i had to give a blood sample i had to give a bank statement i had to give eight months like

00:16:55.380 they're a serious company, right?

00:16:57.180 Co-dell clippings, like government ID, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:17:01.920 Your parents are getting you that.

00:17:03.800 So, and I understand that computers can access it

00:17:07.040 and everything can access it.

00:17:08.320 So you have all of these points of access.

00:17:11.560 And I'm just wondering, if they try to blame,

00:17:15.560 I mean, the point is if we can blame them for this,

00:17:17.940 then maybe we can get them to change their algorithm.

00:17:20.360 Let me tell you what their algorithm's goal is,

00:17:23.160 to make money.

00:17:25.380 But if we would finally have the conversation that we need to have, that the right wing refuses to have, and mostly the left, to be perfectly honest, is the fact that when we set up corporations in this country, their only goal, legal goal, is how much money can you make for your shareholders?

00:17:48.420 And the minute you stop trying to make more money, the minute you do something ethical or, you know, in the essence of justice and fairness, the minute you do that and it costs you money, you're going to get sued as a company because that's not what corporations are trying to do.

00:18:04.040 In my opinion, the goal of social media and television and everything in our food, we're going to let go of our food, by the way, we're going to talk about and ban and sue social media for addictive possibilities, and nobody's going to talk about sugar?

00:18:31.500 No. Nobody is.

00:18:34.700 Nobody's going to talk about sugar.

00:18:36.120 Nobody's going to talk about gambling ads,

00:18:37.920 fire hosed at them.

00:18:39.420 Nobody's talking about any of that stuff.

00:18:40.780 Nobody's talking about sugar.

00:18:42.480 The single worst thing coming from somebody,

00:18:46.220 let's understand the hypocrisy of what I'm about to say right now. 0.98

00:18:48.480 You're a bit of a sugar maven, yeah. 0.97

00:18:51.160 Okay, I'm serious.

00:18:52.300 You got Popeye candies, got a little Popeye candies.

00:18:54.920 Oh, there you go.

00:18:55.580 It's the great pumpkin, Charlie Brown cereal, little Kellogg's.

00:18:58.520 I am a product of that.

00:19:00.400 But what I am saying is we are just picking and choosing, and there is no real concerted effort to really do what's in the best interest of a society as whole.

00:19:13.180 Because again, as soon as we start doing that too, to a different level, somebody gets to decide what is, if you're going to say what's bad, you're going to have to start saying what's good.

00:19:26.500 And I'm telling you from firsthand experience because I educate about it.

00:19:31.320 I talk about it.

00:19:32.340 I put it in the curriculum, which, by the way, 10 years ago, it should have been a class.

00:19:36.860 Media literacy, social media advocacy, and support, and how to protect yourself, and

00:19:43.160 what the pitfalls are, and what this looks like, and how easy it is to manipulate.

00:19:47.980 We should be teaching our kids that across the board.

00:19:51.760 Yeah. 0.99

00:19:51.980 Instead of just telling kids, get the hell off your phone, are we dumb? 0.99

00:19:56.460 It's bad for you. 0.99

00:19:57.400 Teach them how to use it.

00:19:59.220 Because there's a huge component of it where they can now watch videos of a kid in Russia.

00:20:08.960 They can now listen to explanations about historical events in South Africa.

00:20:17.820 They can do all this stuff. 0.99

00:20:19.440 and we constantly treat our kids like they're morons and they're not they they will go down 1.00

00:20:25.960 the roads of just watching stupid crap well i've just re-watched felicity we all have our crosses 1.00

00:20:31.960 to bear we all watch stupid crap but if they're going to go down that road there are still so 1.00

00:20:38.200 much better things that they can access they can control they can curate when it comes to social 1.00

00:20:45.200 media that they cannot curate when it comes to sitting in front of one teacher all day myself

00:20:50.640 included when it comes to sitting in front of the television when it comes to reading you know only

00:20:55.520 one newspaper or watching one news program all of that to me is much more controlling contrived

00:21:04.880 and manipulative than social media it's such a great point uh you you you know i love talking

00:21:12.400 to you because you have this ability to um say okay well if that is what it is let's hold it up

00:21:18.720 let's beta test what that is against against what we think it is what we use it for in the case of

00:21:25.600 social media you know you look at let's just do it tdsb lawsuit 4.5 billion we're going to sue all

00:21:34.080 the big tech people for screwing over our kids it's because they need 4.5 billion because doug

00:21:39.040 four took it. There you go. They had a 4.1 billion shortfall over the past couple of years. So they

00:21:45.440 think they're going to grab a little easy money for tech giants. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there's a

00:21:50.220 performative nature to that too, right? And then you look at, as you've pointed out, not just the

00:21:56.960 lack of funding, class sizes, the inability to keep kids in school, keep kids engaged. I can tell

00:22:04.020 you this from my son's perspective. He went to school for half a day, grade 12, and had to take

00:22:08.160 a night class at seven o'clock this year grade 12 taking a night class this is because there was

00:22:13.220 no room for him in the school that he goes to there was no room in the classroom so they had 0.87

00:22:18.960 a runoff class and they're like you're gonna fucking go to this night school class ace all 0.81

00:22:23.780 of it because he's he's an honor roll student he got into the uh to to guelph he's a happy smart 0.73

00:22:28.760 kid uh and we don't complain about those things but to your point you want to talk about what's

00:22:33.160 good let's talk about what's bad let's talk about the wholesale context of what this lawsuit is all

00:22:38.000 about yeah to your point they've burned down the education system in this country they continue to

00:22:42.280 underfund it um and they need somebody to blame they need like a wag the dog sort of they need

00:22:47.700 they need a straw man they need someone they can point out and go look at that they wrecked our

00:22:50.860 kids they've wrecked the inner education system so put that aside there's a little bit of context 0.73

00:22:55.140 there and then put this aside is that all of the teachers in that school use tiktok and every

00:23:01.620 single version of those social media platforms to communicate with their kids. My son has a great

00:23:09.220 relationship with his English teacher, teaches a little bit of philosophy as well. They catch each

00:23:13.080 other on DMs. They show each other. They share information. Those are good, good things, right?

00:23:20.120 Those are great things. Sharing information with your friend, finding out how they do different

00:23:24.420 versions of who, what you are, activities your age in different countries, connecting with

00:23:28.400 classrooms. We did an anti-bullying thing on social media for the past two years with Pink

00:23:32.680 Shirt Day. And we absolutely targeted that at younger people because we wanted younger people

00:23:39.360 to hear about how older people had gotten through bullying. There are wonderful, wonderful aspects

00:23:44.740 to social media in terms of sharing and educating. But generally speaking, it's not what it's being

00:23:50.000 used for. However, however, I love the performance part of this for the government of Ontario.

00:23:58.400 and I also love the performance part of this for Florida and I want to read this to you

00:24:02.640 this is these are performative things we can talk about the damage that social media has done in

00:24:08.240 terms of behaviors that's one thing right and in terms of bad actors that's another thing

00:24:12.640 but in itself it is inherently just this thing it's this thing that that rewards you when you

00:24:19.740 use it the goal is for them to make money and keep you on the app there are tips tricks psyops

00:24:24.540 that you do for it they affect all of us not just our kids don't tell me that you're not addicted

00:24:29.280 to your phone at times you don't tell me you're not flipping for an hour at night two hours at

00:24:33.300 night going through your social media accounts but in florida the bill is called hb3 okay it's

00:24:39.640 considered the most restrictive social media ban bill in the united states it takes effect january

00:24:45.120 1st of 2025 if it passes now the law is interesting some critics said it's not going to stand up

00:24:51.260 because too many people use it.

00:24:52.860 However, the bill was championed by

00:24:55.000 super conservative Republican speaker, Paul Renner,

00:24:59.360 who highlighted the social media's addictive technologies.

00:25:05.060 Okay?

00:25:06.000 This is a big problem.

00:25:07.440 So a child in their brain doesn't have the ability

00:25:09.680 to know they're being sucked into these addictive technologies

00:25:12.160 and see harm and step away from it.

00:25:14.960 Because of that, we've got to step in for them.

00:25:18.020 We've got to step in for them.

00:25:19.200 We need to teach them.

00:25:21.260 about how to not be addicted to technology 0.99

00:25:23.980 we're all addicted to technology that that is the loosest dumbest argument on the planet 0.72

00:25:33.300 we are all addicted to it we all use it we cannot function without it he's telling he's telling

00:25:40.480 children you're too young to have it you're just too young to have it you're not going to benefit

00:25:46.420 from it the damage outweighs anything you could possibly use see anything to make you feel good

00:25:52.800 you'll never be able to figure it out because we don't trust your parents to teach you and we think 0.99

00:25:57.140 you're too stupid to understand it that's the message that gets sent there florida we're and 0.99

00:26:02.300 by the way the ban if you're under the age of 13 you're not allowed to have a social media account 1.00

00:26:06.840 at all when you turn 14 in florida that's the design of this bill when you turn 14 you can have

00:26:12.180 one, but it has to come with the consent of the parents and they need to give their government

00:26:17.480 identification. Oh, so that's how they monitor it. Government identification. Listen, part of me

00:26:25.760 doesn't mind the idea. There's a problem and a benefit from this. Part of me doesn't mind the

00:26:35.540 idea that if you are going to create a social media account and you are going to interact with

00:26:40.180 it part of me really doesn't mind the idea that that account needs to be connected directly to a

00:26:47.140 person so when that person let's be like ignore the 13 year old that person goes off and says

00:26:54.100 and does horrible things and harasses and blah blah blah you know exactly whose door to knock at

00:27:00.340 to deal with them in the real world that i like that i don't mind i am so tired of people on

00:27:05.940 social media this is where i think the flaw is who get to stand behind anonymity and have complete

00:27:14.100 purview to say and do and and harass or or whatever however they deem appropriate

00:27:23.060 i do have a huge sure i have a huge problem now people have said to me yeah but i can't i can't

00:27:28.420 say who i am or else i can't have an opinion because of my job because of my family because

00:27:33.620 of this because of that and i'm like okay but there should there still should be a connecting

00:27:40.100 so when you cross a legal line when you are defaming when you are writing libelous claims

00:27:48.100 about people on the internet i don't even it should be simple you know you called me you know 0.89

00:27:55.540 everybody likes the everybody's favorite freaking word is a groomer you better have proof or you

00:28:02.420 now get to pay me five thousand dollars for the claim that's an easy that just that just goes

00:28:07.700 right to the ticket office yeah it's like you get a red light ticket oh somebody something with no

00:28:13.860 proof cool here it is you called somebody a criminal you called some you know whatever the

00:28:19.060 case may be yeah i think teaching kids how to have better conversations because the biggest problem

00:28:27.780 aren't the kids the biggest and most disgusting problem on social media apps adult or adults

00:28:37.140 the kids aren't on there it's so funny we keep talking about kids getting bullied and this and 0.94

00:28:41.540 that and blah blah blah i'm like oh my god but kids just will be like oh your shirt's ugly

00:28:46.980 adults go so hard in the paint that people are getting lawyers and suing and and and security

00:28:56.420 and cameras and and and and that's what adults are doing yeah you know what i would really like

00:29:03.060 to see somebody make a somebody make laws talking about when you over i'm also not a big fan of

00:29:09.940 censorship you and i have spoken about this yeah absolutely go ahead you potatoes say everything

00:29:14.260 you want to say just know that libel and defamation and and harassment and threats

00:29:24.900 all have very legal consequences do they though anymore that's what they should well they should

00:29:32.500 i know and i had this why are we upping those laws can you imagine dean if we up those laws

00:29:38.100 if we made twitter and ticked and all of these things if we said listen when you if you somebody

00:29:44.420 prints liable and you don't do anything about it then we want their name to be sent to the police

00:29:51.940 so they can be charged or they can be sued or whatever needs to happen. And you need to take

00:29:56.120 that crap down. You either have proof or just like everything else, stop talking about the 0.99

00:30:02.900 damn person and talk about the issue, which is what I say to everybody who likes to talk about 0.99

00:30:07.980 my hair, talk about blah, blah, blah. And I'm this person and I'm woke. And I'm like, give me an 1.00

00:30:12.860 issue. What specifically have I said or have I stood for that you disagree with? I would love

00:30:20.660 to have that conversation we're babies aren't we the adult species we're babies you know the kids

00:30:28.680 the kids are just parroting the kids everything that is being um what's the word i'm looking for

00:30:36.700 modeled by their parents by everybody else the way they interact it that is being we are modeling it

00:30:45.340 for them so everything that is disgusting that goes on in the internet that's not the 13 year

00:30:50.320 and you know it's it's funny how they're the target of every solution in that space of course

00:30:57.600 they are and they're also the reason and the victim of every major thing in that space but i

00:31:04.120 haven't seen a 13 year old call another 13 year old a name and go and uh sue that 13 year old i

00:31:13.560 I haven't seen, you know, a mobbing, social media mobbing of a 13-year-old.

00:31:18.320 I've seen it by adults exclusively. 1.00

00:31:22.440 And those adults are now trying to say, kids, kids, this is how stupid it is. 1.00

00:31:27.520 This is so bad for you. 1.00

00:31:28.860 Kids, this is so bad for you.

00:31:30.080 You need to leave this to us.

00:31:32.160 And all they do is misappropriate it all the time.

00:31:34.820 You know, and it's funny because it is hypocrisy at its finest.

00:31:41.700 you know when anybody says we need to take care of the kids and it's always the focus of everything

00:31:47.720 now isn't it right we extrapolate that out yeah well that's you know it's like your button that

00:31:53.460 they're pressing right yeah oh we can't we can't allow we need to like think about this the

00:31:58.060 government of ontario is suing they're suing suing big tech for for saying you know what our kids

00:32:04.380 aren't learning anymore we're suing big tech do you think the school boards and this is obviously

00:32:09.840 my ignorance snowflakes the school boards have to be friends with doug uh every school board

00:32:17.360 involved in that lawsuit has uh a big swing and you know what that was put there appointed by 0.85

00:32:24.600 doug ford there we go absolutely same with police boards that did absolutely nothing during

00:32:30.620 the gen the uh convoy same thing yeah yeah yeah yeah right oh this is an operation don't that's

00:32:39.200 not it like because when i think about a school board and what they should be demanding i forget

00:32:45.440 that they're an arm of whatever government is in power because i think so friggin like

00:32:53.680 sometimes i am a potato i think that they're there to fight for better education better conditions

00:33:00.320 better classroom facilities better teachers blah blah no they're not that's what the union does

00:33:05.440 yeah the game is fighting for all of those classroom things all of those educational

00:33:17.120 things i i i don't know even the union because at the end of the day the union's job is to fight

00:33:22.080 for teachers that's their job that's that's a collective bargaining labor union whose job is it

00:33:28.880 to advocate and then i think is it the ministry of education or they all work for whoever's in

00:33:36.240 charge now like if if i joined if i got a job at the ministry of education sometimes i'm like i

00:33:41.840 want that job i think do i because then i have to push all of the crap i just talked to somebody who

00:33:48.800 works in the simcoe board and he said you know what you can't you can't fail anybody i said what

00:33:56.240 what is that still a thing remember we used to mock that all the time because i got failed a lot

00:34:02.100 and i'm and my son's like nobody fails anymore nobody fails here's what happens a kid doesn't

00:34:07.020 come to your class they come to 10 classes they don't hand anything in they get 27

00:34:10.820 you fail them it goes to the principal do they fail sometimes the principal just says nope we're

00:34:16.540 going to pass them. And then if it doesn't, it goes to remediation. So their file, let's say

00:34:25.240 history 10, their file then goes to a remediation team and they call this kid in and they sit down 0.98

00:34:31.300 and write another test or a couple of papers and they get the goddamn credit. You want to see the 0.97

00:34:37.300 damage being done for accountability, for responsibility, for why would a kid ever have

00:34:44.540 an attention span. What is the, right? And then I think to myself, okay, because I always try to

00:34:50.760 think of the other side. There are lots of kids who just don't want to be in school and would

00:34:56.440 rather at 14 years old, been out the door and getting a job. And 20 years ago, Dean, they would

00:35:01.620 have been, they would have been kicked out. They would have quit. They would have just left and

00:35:05.800 nobody would have done anything about it. Now we want them to get their high school diploma.

00:35:10.400 and so by doing this remediation thing we're at least going to get them their high school diploma

00:35:16.880 but what value does that have anymore if they can't read or write not much how you

00:35:23.000 nothing it has zero value you don't just hand it out when they're born then here's your high

00:35:28.420 school diploma here's your high school diploma have a good day go about your you know everybody's

00:35:32.820 talking about how school doesn't mean anything and and college and blah blah blah here's why 0.89

00:35:38.260 we have changed the expectations because they're a damn business yeah everything we do that gets 0.91

00:35:47.080 messed up comes right back down to when you when you magnify or you highlight or you um put 0.97

00:35:56.680 capitalistic money gain ahead of intelligent thoughtful critical analysis that needs to be

00:36:05.200 had every time you do that you lessen the education so in high school guess what the

00:36:11.360 government doesn't want to pay for you to retake the courses so you pass that's all that is

00:36:15.620 university they want to keep you you want to be a kid that barely well the university you're still

00:36:22.840 a meal ticket now yeah that's a business yeah and and you know it's funny how they'll even change

00:36:30.040 those businesses certain governments depending on the ideology will even change those

00:36:35.060 educational business models for people, depending on, you know, we just went through that

00:36:38.680 foreign student thing, right? You know, where foreign students in Canada, for people that don't

00:36:42.760 know, are allowed to come to Canada. In some cases, there are dozens, maybe hundreds of

00:36:49.100 para organizations that will help these students also get visas to come to Canada. Canada,

00:36:53.760 very well sought after democracy, social democracy, where people from all over the world

00:36:58.420 want to send their kids to go to school. It's incredibly safe. We have really strict gun laws,

00:37:03.000 the education system and institutions here are very good but i've only come into this information

00:37:08.040 over the past few years right because i've got sons that have been through university are going

00:37:13.240 to university and they pay seven to twelve thousand dollars for their school for the year

00:37:18.200 right depending on i got just just the actual tuition one of my sons goes to school in fact

00:37:25.080 is dating someone who is from another country who is here as a foreign student

00:37:29.400 she pays six times that amount oh yeah six times that amount for the same education uft

00:37:38.520 is like balling down there because you got to know uft is the only school in china that has

00:37:46.200 any value you you don't if you're if you're coming from china and you're going to and you're

00:37:50.220 maybe waterloo for the engineering but i would say 90 percent they want them to go to uft and

00:37:57.880 uft is making insane money now here's the funny part i don't care i don't care that foreign

00:38:08.500 students are competing with our students because a lot of people they're taking our spots and i'm

00:38:13.060 like get smarter what i do care about though is that i love that this is the same dude that's

00:38:20.420 like the same guy that's driving a truck and he's like really pissed off that a guy came from

00:38:24.940 afghanistan and opened up a medical clinic and he's like they're taking our jobs i'm like you're

00:38:30.180 in no danger of becoming a physician anytime here's my here is my issue when you have them

00:38:36.580 paying so much more there's a vested interest in them filling spots that is a capitalistic flaw

00:38:44.740 absolutely i want the best and the brightest in the world absolutely but the best and the

00:38:49.940 brightest isn't being determined by the system. The people with the most money, as it always

00:38:54.780 frigging is, is determining this system. And we have an inability, and this has always been a

00:39:02.300 thing, and I don't even know the solution. I know I pretend to know everything, but I don't know the

00:39:06.700 solution to adequately compare student versus student, because I know it's not standardized

00:39:13.020 tests but i also know it can't be like test scores i it also can't be because if it's just

00:39:23.740 what what percentage i got in high school well i went to anderson whippy and i'm gonna i'm gonna

00:39:28.400 do this shout out right now everybody and their brother knew that if you went to anderson you got

00:39:32.520 a 90 that was a real 90 if you went to henry which is the other opposing high school when you

00:39:38.880 got a 90 it meant like a 70 but they just really liked it and every football team they're all like

00:39:48.920 study the test here are the main concepts and they just put down the test look that happens

00:39:54.440 all over the place so in that situation and again it's a money issue but in that situation

00:40:01.640 because that's what's going on in a lot of private schools right you give me you give me

00:40:05.400 five thousand dollars i'll give you a 90 have a nice day sir when that's happening that's the

00:40:12.200 biggest problem and and the ministry of education in my opinion i don't know how you mitigate that

00:40:20.760 because for example the ministry comes into every private school and they'll sit down

00:40:24.840 and they'll go for for like an afternoon every two years and they'll sit down let's say they're

00:40:31.080 the ministry comes into my classroom which they don't because mostly they just care about english

00:40:35.160 science and math but if they were to sit in the lowly history classroom they're going to look at

00:40:40.520 my book right my curriculum am i following the curriculum what do my notes look what do my tests

00:40:45.560 look like blah blah blah dean i can make up that freaking package in about 37 minutes and it would

00:40:55.080 look beautiful it would look there is no way to accurately assess the truthfulness of that by you

00:41:03.960 spending a half an hour in my room you really want to understand what's going on in a school

00:41:11.020 you got to talk to parents you got to talk to former students who are willing to sell them

00:41:14.700 down the river because they will and time in that classroom watch me teach don't i don't know how

00:41:24.140 this happens by the way because you're using your phone and you get the old uh thumbs up anytime you

00:41:28.260 do a hand gesture you might yeah there you go there you go no i know i can't either my girlfriend 0.98

00:41:34.020 and i do it all the time where i'm like trying to do a thumbs up i can't find it i suck well you

00:41:38.360 should um but all of these things these things that we're trying to assess right and we've been

00:41:43.920 trying to assess them for so many years and everybody's like we got to go back to the old

00:41:48.120 school ways we can't we can't go back to basics we're no longer living in a basic world you want

00:41:56.100 to go back to basics i don't need to churn my own butter and i sure as hell don't need to use an

00:42:00.420 abacus what i do need to understand is what media literacy looks like what a valid source looks like

00:42:06.820 how to have actual intellectual debates and discussions about truth versus fiction about

00:42:14.020 how truth is very nuanced and perspective matters all of that needs to be happening

00:42:20.020 all of that needs to be happening in every single course you teach the first thing I do and I know

00:42:26.400 I've said this to you before but I'll hold up my history book and it's like 450 pages and in

00:42:32.440 Canadian history it's from 1914 to 2000 and I'll hold up the 450 pages and I'll say to the students

00:42:39.140 what's the problem with this book and they'll be like history's boring I'm like dial it down

00:42:45.320 fine history's boring what's the second problem with this book and usually i'll have one kid

00:42:51.560 that'll say well it seems a little dated well besides that yeah some kid will be saying well

00:42:57.280 it was written in you know 2010 i'm like okay but let's assume let i know this is a big assumption

00:43:04.600 let's assume that they actually wrote history they you know nothing's changing again huge

00:43:10.000 assumption because we ignore residential

00:43:12.040 schools forever

00:43:13.040 yeah finding out about those

00:43:16.000 at the age of 50 wasn't fun

00:43:17.480 growing up in this country by the way

00:43:19.640 but let's assume

00:43:21.640 that the fact checking of the books has gotten

00:43:24.000 a lot better and

00:43:25.660 there's a lot more real information in there

00:43:27.920 let's assume for a minute

00:43:29.280 100% of those 450

00:43:31.620 there's not a single lie

00:43:33.200 and then I'll have one kid go

00:43:35.480 what's missing

00:43:36.980 99 of history is missing that's what's missing from that book and i'm gonna sit you down i'm

00:43:47.600 gonna tell you this is it no you can't well and that's the problem that we face today in in media

00:43:55.640 in education in conversations is that we all want to point fingers right

00:44:06.180 what makes us feel good and safe

00:44:08.320 I know we all want to point fingers

00:44:10.880 well you know if you

00:44:12.680 know about the world's history and you do

00:44:14.560 how many times the world's history has been

00:44:16.660 wiped out by people who don't want you to know the truth

00:44:18.700 about the world's history your government's history

00:44:20.640 your people's history the history of

00:44:22.640 your religion the history of your culture

00:44:24.720 the history of the British people the history of

00:44:26.540 the Greeks the Romans

00:44:28.320 the history of

00:44:29.480 the Khan dynasty like there

00:44:32.600 are a lot of people who don't want to know the

00:44:34.560 uncomfortable truths and those uncomfortable truths have been changed over time right so

00:44:37.840 like we all understand that to your point that history book is not a real accurate look at

00:44:42.580 history it's the institution of canada as a whole and whoever curated that back in the day it's their

00:44:49.300 best guess according to the lies that those researchers were told were part of our history

00:44:55.400 some of them are not true right like you point out residential schools or the genocide of

00:44:59.720 indigenous people smallpox blankets like absolutely not involved in our text i remember when i was in 0.54

00:45:04.400 fifth grade going isn't that nice we came over here on these boats and these natives right

00:45:08.880 absolutely the indian people he was corn and we gave them like a couple of belts and taught them

00:45:14.000 how to read and they taught us how to farm how awesome is that that's what i learned when i was

00:45:18.320 a kid that was a history book that was grade five grade six remember mr hassen teaching me that in

00:45:22.480 class and me going what a lovely place canada is colonialism sounds like a fun barbecue

00:45:28.560 but you have a real-time look at history every time you open up social media every time you go

00:45:39.180 online depending on who you trust and what you read this is what i'm talking about exactly i

00:45:43.820 have a kid look if we're only relying on your grade five history teacher or we're relying on

00:45:50.180 a kid that can watch seven minute videos on the history of you know seven minute videos on the

00:45:57.500 history of the i don't know the han dynasty i'm telling you right now that kid's more educated

00:46:04.140 than we were in grade five by a landslide and we're all bitching and complaining he only can

00:46:09.140 watch seven minutes that's better seven minutes than we ever spent and he was enthralled for all

00:46:13.700 seven minutes because it came with a multimedia presentation and it came with slide decks that

00:46:17.720 he could understand and information that was easily digestible and maybe it was real like

00:46:22.640 there's the off chance that maybe it was real history he was consuming in seven minutes to your

00:46:26.460 point right yeah go ahead sorry no no maybe it was the off chance it was like real information

00:46:32.620 that kid like like you know yes people try to misguide you but what technology has been able

00:46:37.580 to do is be the antidote like you know the truth that we antidote we have exactly isn't that totally

00:46:47.820 go ahead it was in quebec that's where she got her i she she said this to me the other day she goes

00:46:52.620 well because she learned about for those who don't know any history about canada obviously

00:46:59.380 originally all the indigenous people but apparently we ignore that the first founding people that

00:47:05.720 settled and colonized here were french and then the english came and then they went to war

00:47:09.160 anyways when anna was learning about i'm really the english one that's why it's an english-speaking

00:47:14.080 country and we can find the french to come back yes learning about the plains of abraham and that

00:47:18.380 fight and you remember the cliff that they came up that everybody learns and they snuck up at

00:47:22.360 night well when edda was being taught it she was taught i can't even say it out loud she was taught

00:47:29.600 by her teacher that the british broke the rules of war because they fought at night and there was

00:47:36.700 a rule there was no night fighting so she grew up thinking that the plains of abraham was won

00:47:45.140 because the british were sneaky bugs who who just ignored the rules of war and had the audacity

00:47:54.420 to sneak up on us at night yeah class didn't talk about the slaughter of the indigenous people and 0.97

00:48:01.060 colonization and residential schools but those british people really did screw us over yeah 0.99

00:48:07.700 there was this rule you only fought during the day and those sneaky they came after us at night 0.74

00:48:14.020 what about the genocide what about all that i'm like i want i want whatever your history notes i

00:48:21.140 would go for history notes from 30 years ago i really truly my history notes i'd kill dean i'm

00:48:27.620 going to pause you i'm going to pause everybody who's listening right now yes ma'am we are going

00:48:32.340 to flip over to dean's podcast so this is going to be part one or dean will be yeah this will be part

00:48:38.500 one your part one yeah flip over to dean's podcast and you guys can catch us for part two

00:48:43.660 because we have a lot more to argue there you go come and join us the dean blundell show next

00:48:48.800 dean blundell this will come out tuesday morning he'll put it out tuesday morning you can go from

00:48:53.080 one to the other clean as day and i'll see you guys over on his channel and i'll see you back

00:48:59.700 here next tuesday same bat time same bat channel dismissed

Unlearn16: Class is in Session - April 02, 2024

The One Where The School Boards Sue Social Media

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