0:00:00
Ben Radford: Welcome to Squaring the Strange, the podcast that examines all manner of the mysterious and the mundane through a critical lens. So let’s square the strange.

Pascual Romero: Welcome back to Squaring the Strange. I’m your co-host, Pascual Romero, and with me as always is…

BR: Your other co-host, Ben Radford.

PR: How are you doing this week, Ben?

BR: Not too bad, not too bad. I’ve been getting rained on. It’s been a little drizzly here in the Land of Enchantment.

0:00:37
PR: It has been. It’s a very welcome sight. It’s been a little dry lately. But yes, so we just got back from the Podscape Fest, the New Mexico Podscape Fest we did last weekend. Those of you who tuned in to the link that we posted on the Facebook page, you already got to hear it live.

BR: And some of them even got to see it because it was streamed live.

PR: Yeah it was video streaming so if you didn’t check it out that will be released as an episode next week we had a little bit of a lag in getting the audio for it and we were already planning on recording this episode as we teased last week so so this week you’re gonna get the conspiracy episode first and you’ll be getting the live episode next week. So let’s get right to it then. What are you skeptical of this week?

BR: So this week it’s something a little bit different. It’s not so much something I’m skeptical of, it’s something that I don’t get, something I don’t understand.

0:01:54
And you know I’m not the smartest guy in the room. I mean you know sometimes I miss things. No one’s perfect, you know, and I make an effort to understand, you know, things around me, but there’s times when I just, I’m just not getting it. So in this particular case, I’m going to tell you what I don’t understand, and if you can help me sort this out, or listeners afterwards will send me, I’m sure I’ll be corrected if I’m wrong. But I mean, I’m not being facetious. I’m not being sarcastic. I genuinely don’t get it.

0:02:29
And that is, I don’t understand the outrage over Trump’s tweets over the NFL and its policies regarding standing for the national anthem. That of course has been the big news the last four or five days, where Colin Kaepernick of course took a knee months ago, and it was a bit of a controversy there. And then more recently, Trump weighed in and talked about how he suggested that players should be fired. I don’t know if he was hearkening back to his days in The Apprentice firing people or if that’s just sort of…

PR: Right, right. And he used some colorful language in doing so also.

0:03:06
BR: Yes, he did. And so here’s the part that I’m not getting from this. And let me sort of just lay out the premises here. And again, maybe I’m missing something, maybe I’m wrong about something. If so, fine, I’m just telling you how I’m seeing it. So the fact is that Trump, and again, I don’t wanna, you know, this isn’t, we discussed this when we began the podcast, to not really go into politics per se.

0:03:35
There’s lots of political podcasts. You and I don’t need to retread that. So, you know, I don’t, this is not a political rant. This is actually more about the reaction to the social and skeptical or non-skeptical reaction to Trump than it is about Trump. So it touches on politics, but I don’t really see this as about politics per se. The fact is that, you know, when we’re talking about Trump’s tweets and there’s been a lot of discussion about about of course presidential tweets. And we’ve never before have we had a president that makes such use of Twitter. And I remember a couple months back there were debates in the New York Times about whether Trump’s tweets were newsworthy. It’s not a it’s not an official proclamation, it is from him, probably.

0:04:29
It’s like, this is unprecedented. And unpresidential. But the fact is that Trump is well known for, let’s be honest, lying. Exaggerating. Saying things that aren’t true. For example, the size of his inauguration.

0:04:46
Yeah, he started out on that foot, biggest crowds in history. And well, actually, Sean Spicer is like, he’s insisting this is true. And we knew it wasn’t true. I mean, I’m not being partisan here. This is well established.

PR: We have plenty of evidence.

BR: This is just, it just wasn’t true. So he’s, over and over again, I mean, we could spend a couple hours cataloging.

0:05:13
I mean, he says that he talked to the President of Mexico and Mexico agreed to pay for the wall. And then the President’s like, no, I didn’t agree to… Over and over again, and this is not news, this has not shocked anybody, over and over again he says things that are either flat out not true or to be charitable, conditionally true, or just great exaggerations. And again, this is not news. I think everybody would acknowledge this. And he contradicts himself constantly. He says one thing, and then he says something the opposite a couple days or a couple minutes later.

0:05:50
You know, he talks about how he condemns the white racist. And then the next day, well, you know, both sides, right? He plays both sides of the fence.

PR: Yeah, I don’t think he drops a tweet without, or at least a day probably doesn’t go by that we don’t see a side-by-side comparison of a tweet of his from like five years ago, where he’s criticizing Obama for exactly the thing he’s doing. So, yeah, no.

BR: So, I mean, the fact, and again, I’m not saying anything new, we all know this, but the fact is he tweets impulsively whatever’s on his mind, without consideration or thought.

0:06:32
And so the fact is, I don’t assume that anything he says on any topic reflects his genuine beliefs or core values if he has any. So again, I’m beginning with the assumption that he says whatever happens to be in front of his field of vision at the moment. And not necessarily anything that is what he truly thinks, because he may say the opposite a little while later. He’s sort of like a toddler spewing random stream of consciousness thoughts on whatever is in front of him.

0:07:03
And again, I’m not trying to attack him, I’m just, I think this is pretty well established. And so because of that, because of that, whatever tweet you’re upset about, he’ll probably contradict himself the next day. Or the next week. Whatever set of 140 characters that is the current outrage of the day, is probably going to be rescinded, deleted, contradicted soon thereafter. And therefore, because of that, why are people upset about this? What, you know, why are Trump’s critics giving his his tweets any credibility whatsoever? I mean, if you it’s one thing if you have somebody who is known for their considered comments, such as Obama. Obama was well known, whether Democrat or Republican,

0:07:53
I mean, he’s well known for having thought out arguments. He’s, of course, a former lawyer who, you know, he gave a lot of thought to what he said, and you could assume that whatever Obama said or tweeted was reflecting what he actually thinks. That is not the case, demonstrably, with Trump. So this is what I’m trying to figure out. So one response I’ve seen in terms of why Trump’s tweets matter is that Trump reflects the American people’s wishes and position. And, you know, in theory, sure.

PR: I mean, in the broad sense of the president being the face of America, I guess.

BR: Well, yeah, in theory, yes, but in practice, nobody’s fooled.

0:08:46
Nobody believes that. I mean, you know, in practice, it’s clear that what Trump says and thinks and does, does not in fact, reflect the majority of Americans. This is not my personal opinion. This is crystal clear. That’s what the women’s march was about. The huge marches protesting Trump, not just in Washington, D.C., but across the country. That’s exactly what that was about, was the American public saying, no, Trump, you do not represent my position. You know, that’s why his approval ratings are in the toilet. In fact, just today, I had there were there were two pieces, two news pieces here.

0:09:24
The first one is that as of today, Trump has a 64% disapproval rating among millennials. And among whites, this is a this is a MSNBC poll among whites, 53% disapprove of him with 30% approving and the rest apparently somewhere in the middle. So understand what’s going on here is like over half of Americans explicitly disapprove of his approval of his job. Furthermore, then I have in front of me a piece from Washington Examiner that says most Americans believe President Trump is unfit to serve as president and think he’s doing more to divide the country than unite it. A poll from Quinnipiac University found 56% of US voters do not believe Trump is fit to be president and later talks about according to this poll 36% of American voters only 36% approve his job.

PR: Yeah that seems pretty consistent with his general approval rating as the press has been reporting.

BR: Right, so again, this is nothing new, it’s just the most recent and his numbers are going down, not up.

0:10:38
And the point here is that statistically and survey-wide and according to polls, most people don’t agree with him. I mean, just, that’s what that means. If you have over half, literally over half of Americans, the majority think that he’s not fit for office. You have a third, I mean, it’s just the numbers aren’t there. The numbers clearly suggest that Americans do not approve of him. They don’t approve of what he’s doing and what he’s saying.

0:11:11
And keep in mind, of course, that most Americans didn’t vote for him. You know, fewer than 60 million people out of 319 million people voted for Trump. As we all know, he got the electoral college and there are people who dispute that, but I’m willing to give him the… fine. The simple fact of the matter is that numerically, most people did not vote for Trump and numerically more people voted for Clinton than Trump.

PR: By a pretty broad margin, too.

BR: By a pretty broad margin and so and again I mean and you can see this in other cases too right you know where you know Trump wants to build wall with Mexico and he wants to tear down Obamacare. Okay well again polls and surveys consistently show that they’re not with him on that.

PR: Yeah and the the ACA repeal attempts have have every single time failed spectacularly.

0:12:05
The last couple times it came down to a couple people, but he can’t even get his party, who is the majority right now, to agree with him, which says a lot about his approval rating.

BR: Exactly. Exactly. So I don’t want to beat a dead horse here, but I think this seems to get lost a lot in the discussion. I mean, the fact is, given the consistent criticism that Trump has come under, much of which I agree with I should add, it’s puzzling to hear people, especially liberals, claim that Trump represents them and their views.

0:12:36
No! I mean, and it’s interesting, about a month ago, even the Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, this was shortly after Trump’s comments on the Charlottesville, he was asked, Tillerson was asked explicitly, does President Trump speak for the country? And Tillerson said, no, Trump speaks for himself. Now, let’s be very clear about this. You have the Secretary of State of the United States of America explicitly saying that the president does not speak for the country. I mean, but by any measure the evidence shows that Trump’s positions are not widely embraced by most Americans Yeah, so that argument doesn’t hold water the idea that well We should care what Trump tweets because you’ll he reflects what people think. No, no, no, no, no, he doesn’t it’s that’s crystal clear to them to tell most anybody I mean, I could see if Trump’s tweets were, particularly, you know, again, the example I’m using saying the NFL should should pass a rule against kneeling during the anthem. I mean, you know, I could see if that were like, law. Or like, if that like held some, some some sway or something. But they don’t. I mean, Trump’s tweets are not law. And they’re his opinions. Yeah, there’s opinions at that moment.

0:14:03
That opinion may change after he gets some sleep. And, you know, I mean, keep in mind that laws are made by the legislative branch, not the executive branch. And if Trump wants to prepare or propose a law enforcing his tweet, let’s see how that goes. If that’s if that’s really what what you’re saying is that Trump is about to pass a law saying that NFL players must… It’s absurd on the face of it. This is not, this is his impulsive opinion at the moment. So again, he’s not reflecting what most Americans think. He’s not saying anything that can be easily enacted into law, in fact, there’s a whole procedure for that.

0:14:51
And he’s not going through that. So I think part of what’s going on is an exaggerated estimation of Trump’s power and influence. And I actually wrote about this soon after his election. I wrote a CFI blog called On Trump. And I won’t go into it, you can find it, just title On Trump there. And I talk about how that was one of the first things I was seeing soon after his election was this concern of how Trump’s positions and ideas were going to destroy America, single-handedly. And the point that I made, which reigns true nine months later or whatever, is that of course our government has a built-in system of checks and balances, including under the President’s power. Does Trump have power?

0:15:39
Can he do whatever he wants? No, no. Look at his immigration bill, which has been stymied point after point. I mean, just show me where exactly is all Trump’s huge power here? So, you know, it’s just, you know, again, it’s what’s ironic is that Trump’s critics seem to have bought into his myth. This is what I find fascinating. Who is it that is selling the story that Trump is so influential and so powerful? Trump. I don’t buy that. I’m not buying that guy. Trump is the one that wants people to think that he’s powerful and influential. I don’t buy it. I’m skeptical. I’m skeptical. I’m not buying his bullshit.

0:16:28
And it’s odd to me that so many people are, especially people who constantly point out what a liar and con man he is. It’s like, on one hand, you’re telling me that, you know, that Trump is full of it. And this, on the other, on the other hand, you believe him when he says, Oh, I’m going to do this. I’m going to do that. You know, I mean, he’s always bragging about how much is getting done, all the legislation he’s passed. Just today, just today he sent out a tweet saying like, we’ve done amazing, we’ve done amazing things during his administration. And it’s like, no, you’ve done virtually nothing.

PR: Our friend Thomas over at Opening Arguments, he has another podcast called Serious Inquiries Only.

0:17:11
He did a recent episode on Trump’s claimed successes and some of the people that had been talking about it point by point. And he pointed out that the only things that Trump has been successful at thus far are things that he can enact with the stroke of a pen. So literally the only things he’s been able to successfully do, and this is even at mixed levels of success, are things that he can sign an executive order on, meaning other people can’t touch it until it’s put into place. And so, uh, you know, that says a lot about it. Is it the fact that he can’t push anything through Congress in a majority Republican Congress, he can’t get American politicians to cooperate with him across the board.

0:17:54
BR: He’s not getting anything done. And, and, you know, I mean, again, he’s, again, he spends all his time talking about how important he is and how effective he is. Oh, we’re sending all sorts of stuff to Puerto Rico. Everything’s fine there. No, no, no. Oh, look at all the legislation we’re passing. No. Just consistently, his smoke and mirrors, it’s all bluff and bluster. And be skeptical. This is part of the package, guys.

0:18:26
And if you’re believing his exhaust, then you’re buying into his myth. And that’s what I find so bizarre about it. So, you know, so I guess I come down to like, where is the evidence of Trump’s influence and his popularity? Because it’s not reflected in polls. It’s not reflected in surveys. You know, and the idea that people, that Americans are going to embrace some random idea he has in a tweet is bizarre. I mean, keep in mind, he’s tried hard for months explicitly to sell the idea that an immigration ban is good for the country.

0:19:02
Neither the public nor courts accept that. He’s tried repeatedly to influence Americans, telling them what a horrible thing Obamacare is. How’s that going?

PR: He couldn’t even get a Republican majority Congress to pass his, not even his legislation, but just what he wanted, his agenda. And that speaks volumes because in this country, historically, the majority runs the country and it’s led by a president who represents the majority. And we had, Obama, for instance, was up against an opposing majority and still got things done. You know, Trump, on the other hand, has a majority on his side, theoretically.

0:19:46
Yet once the rubber hits the road, nothing nothing takes foot. I mean, nothing takes hold. It just it never takes off. And, you know, it’s it to me is actually kind of encouraging because it shows that the checks and balances are holding. They’re a little shaky because he does still have some pretty strong allies, but at this point, really, I think you’re right, he’s really demonstrated to us how much that he’s all talk that I just haven’t really felt as apprehensive about the things he says. I mean, other than maybe the things he’s been doing with North Korea and inflating tensions with them. But other than that, it’s like, yeah, I mean, you know, what happens?

0:20:32
He says something about the NFL and he is being very inflammatory about it. The response just two days later is that almost the whole of the NFL resists him on it.

BR: And most Americans.

PR: And most Americans.

BR: Are there a handful of people who are like, well, I’m never going to watch it. Sure. Of course. Yeah, of course. There are. Welcome to the internet. Welcome to the world. You’re always going to have a handful of people find that that’s not what we’re talking about. We’re not talking about the isolated incidents.

0:21:01
We’re talking about what the majority of Americans, uh, you know, feel. And consistently over and over again, they are against Trump on virtually every issue. So, so how is it exactly that, you know, it’s just on and on. I mean, we’re, Americans aren’t buying what he’s selling in these, in these important topics, right? They’re not, even on North Korea, you know, over and over again, the polls say, don’t engage this, you know, don’t, don’t escalate. So why in the world, if they’re not buying what Trump is selling on the wall with Mexico, if Americans aren’t buying what he’s selling about Obamacare and how horrible it is.

0:21:38
If they’re not buying all those other things, why in the world would they care about NFL players kneeling during the anthem? Why exactly are Americans going to say, oh, that’s important right there. That’s what I think is important. Let me reread Trump’s tweet to make sure that I follow this.

PR: And on a side note, the whole standing during the anthem thing, the anthem is actually fairly new to NFL games as far as televised games go. That wasn’t a thing until I believe around 2008, 2009.

BR: I think you’re right.

0:22:09
PR: And there was never, people didn’t, it just wasn’t part of the game. You know, that was like a baseball thing. You know, and I’m sure, you know, different fields did it, but it wasn’t part of the televised event. It wasn’t important to the game. And nobody thought anything of it. There was no protocol about it. There was no, you know, and…

0:22:30
BR: It was not a big deal.

PR: And, you know, then all of a sudden, like, because the armed forces put a lot of money into advertising through the NFL, suddenly, you know, that became a very big part of the show. You have these jet flyovers and stuff. And you know, it’s really not very, I mean, it’s not an old tradition to do that. This is a very new kind of… And if anything, it’s kind of a little bit of an artificial thing because it was injected into the sport.

0:23:02
It’s not like the old baseball games where that was just always part of the game since day one. But this is kind of new and people are… Yeah, it’s one of those things the comedian Louis CK made a joke about about a guy finding out for the first time they had internet on an airplane and then getting mad that it wasn’t working well, and and and he’s in it’s kind of like the same mentality it’s like this thing just starts happening not too long ago and now that it’s not working out so well people are getting really mad about it, you know it’s like we’ve barely been doing this.

BR: But I think that it just Again it goes back to I think that there’s a widespread exaggeration of Trump’s influence And I really think it’s exaggerated. I mean it does Trump have power. Of course. He does. He’s a president the United States. But by any measure he’s failing.

0:24:06
It’s just not working. And yet you have, for example, LeBron James. LeBron James, and this is from a couple days ago, he’s quoted in the LA Times, he refers to President Trump as a bum, which I found kind of funny. But this is what’s interesting. So this is LeBron James referring to Trump. He says, he doesn’t understand how many kids no matter the race look up to the president United States for guidance for leadership for words of encouragement. He doesn’t understand that. Now I’m skeptical you know with all due respect to LeBron James I I don’t and you know I’ve talked about this before on the show. I know where he’s going with this. He means well. I think he’s flat out wrong. I think that most kids, most teenagers, most young children, they’re not looking to see what President Trump does.

0:25:16
I mean, it’s just, this is, it’s an easy trap to fall into. Well, you know, he’s a president, everyone looks up to him. No, not really. You know, I mean, we talked about this before. I mean, when I was growing up under Reagan and under Carter, you know, at no point did my parents say to me, well, you know, this is what the president’s doing on TV. Don’t you want to do that?

0:25:42
I’m like, no. Who is this old dude? I don’t care. Whatever. Give me my Nintendo. I mean, this is not an actual thing. And yet we heard this before. I remember about three months before Trump was elected, there was a piece in the New York Times that was lamenting on what Trump is teaching America’s boys and uh… and it was it was a as an op ed I think it was a review of the one first section your time to talk about how it was it was it was predicting catastrophic consequences if trump was elected because here is you know making all these sexist comments that women and grabbing this man you know being dismissive and and the fact is that we know we have not yet seen masses of American boys and men doing the things that Trump did.

0:26:33
That’s not how the… we talked about role models on the last episode. That’s just not how that works. I don’t want to go too far on it, but I’ll just say this. I’m not telling anybody what to do. If you want to be outraged by Trump’s tweets about the NFL, go right ahead. Feel free. I’m not telling you what to do. Do it, don’t do it. But part of the skeptical approach is evidence-based policy, what works. And I would just ask people if you’re going to get out of it.

0:27:03
First of all, I’m jealous of the time and energy you have to be outraged over Trump’s position on kneeling. I genuinely am jealous of that. But what is the track record of success with that like if you if you if you know Trump’s tweets have generated outrage since day one right now. He still does it It’s not working so if you think that you blogging and getting upset about it and and you know and Countering and counteracting and calling him out on it if you think that’s working If you think that Trump is like being more more circumspect. Let me know how because I’m not seeing that. You know, it’s just not doing any good. I mean, he hasn’t stopped. He hasn’t changed his tactics.

0:27:47
It’s not doing any good. It’s adding to the noise. And the bigger problem that I see is that the outrage about Trump’s NFL tweets put him in the spotlight and they make it about Trump. This is the bigger problem that I see. It’s not I’m not I’m not telling people what to be outraged about. Get us out of whatever you want. I’m not telling you what to pick and choose. All I’m saying is that by focusing on that, you’re doing exactly what Trump wants. Trump thinks everything’s about him. And instead of talking about Kaepernick and the course of complaints and all that, the real issue is police brutality and systematic racism.

0:28:25
Instead of talking about that, we’re talking about whether whether Kaepernick has a right to kneel. And of course, everyone agrees he does. Literally nobody says he doesn’t have the actual legal right. Of course he can’t. So it’s sort of red herring here. And so that’s the problem, is that it muddies the waters and it doesn’t help the situation. And getting upset over Trump’s tweet is making it about Trump.

0:28:52
That’s not helping. So, sorry for the rant. I just, I just, that’s, so, what am I missing, if anything?

PR: I mean, I think you pretty much, you know, hit the nail on the head. I think that, you know, the thing with the outrage, with, especially with tweets, and especially something like this, because it’s a very specific and kind of weird thing to have happen. I mean we don’t have We’ve never had such a an adversarial president before he’d he just picks fights with Individuals, I mean I’ve never heard of a president other than like other presidents in the world, you know, like they I mean they don’t pick fights with like citizens and and Organizations within the country. It’s a weird, it’s completely unprecedented.

0:29:40
And so I can see why it invokes such a strong reaction because people are like, what does he do? What? How is this happening? What is happening? Why? Why is he going after people like this? This is so weird.

BR: Yeah, but he’s been doing that since day one. This is not sudden. It’s like, have you heard of Trump? That’s what he does. Trolls and a troll. And you can either recognize that or you can get outraged every third day when he tweets some outrageous BS.

PR: I think that’s what it is. It’s just people still haven’t lost that instinct to just react to it because it’s so off-putting. And I think this situation in particular is interesting.

0:30:21
I think maybe it’s a pretty good thing that the NFL opposed him on this so strongly. I think they made a great statement by showing a good amount of solidarity. Not even necessarily, you know, it’s, they didn’t have to take a stance on the issue of race and police brutality and police murders and things like that. They just had to take a stance on their players’ right to express this opinion. And they did a good job of doing that. Almost every game, I think just about every game, there was either a strong on-field protest or in the case of the Steelers, they didn’t even come out. And this is all, it tells me that people are not allowing him to push them around and the organizations aren’t allowing him to dictate how they operate.

0:31:12
BR: I would agree, I would just add this. I think that there’s a danger there. And that danger is that it muddies the waters in terms of what the message is. Because it’s one thing to support Kaepernick right to kneel and to protest. I mean, few, if anybody, would. I mean, that’s sort of a no-brainer. With all due respect to all the people kneeling and veterans, that’s empowering.

0:31:42
That’s wonderful, but that’s kind of a gimme. That’s not Kaepernick. That’s sort of beside the issue. And so my concern is that all the support is good. I think it’s great. I mean, again, it demonstrates to everyone the world and and Trump that that he that once again his position on this subject is wrong. It’s not widely embraced in fact is widely rejected yes, but again that that doesn’t it’s it’s still sort of a Stealing the spotlight away from the for the real issue. And just because you know a team kneels in solidarity with his right to protest does not necessarily mean that anything is going to get changed or that people are actually addressing racism.

0:32:32
PR: That’s very true. It seems that the focus has definitely shifted a lot to the act of protest and not the content of it. It’s almost in a way kind of becoming the ice bucket challenge of this.

BR: That’s a good analogy.

PR: Because people don’t even remember what it’s for at that point. So no, I definitely agree with you. That’s a good point to bring up. But I think that, you know, that’s, I mean, you make some good points, and honestly, I can’t argue with it.

0:32:58
BR: Well, you know, I make mistakes, I miss things. If I’m wrong, I mean, I’m sure we’ll hear from listeners. Well, I mean, I’m serious. I mean, I’m not trolling anybody. I genuinely, maybe I’m missing something. And if I am, feel free to write in. If they’re in all caps, you know what I’ll do with it, but yeah, I just maybe uh, you know, so anyway, yeah.

PR: All right. Well, let’s Take a quick break and we’ll be right back with our main topic.

PR: Hey strangers, we love sharing our podcast with you But it takes substantial time and money to produce and release each episode If you think our podcast is worth a buck or two, please head over to patreon.com forward slash squaring the strange and consider becoming a patron Not only will you be helping us, but you’ll also receive some cool perks again. That’s patreon.com Forward slash squaring the strange enjoy the show.

PR: So this week we’re talking about the history of Conspiracy theory and conspiracies and you know I have to say as I mentioned teasing this last week I really am a big fan of just the study of conspiracy theory I love the psychology behind it. I love the kind of culty aspects of it and the kind of mystical kind of world that a lot of these these exist in even even very real world conspiracy theories still always have this mystical, you know, others and, you know, grand conspiracy things. But yeah, so I think it’s really cool that we’re going to be talking specifically about the history of conspiracy because that’s something that I’ve never really delved into too much. And, you know, this is understandably something that’s about as old as society.

0:34:53
And so let’s get into it then. Why don’t we walk into this topic?

BR: Sure. Yeah. As you said, conspiracy theories, they’re just fascinating. There’s so much meat to rip into. They’re just so wild. And some of them are kind of plausible. Some are just like the reptilians.

0:35:17
It’s just wacky out there. I first began researching this particular aspect of it a couple years ago for Vice, the network. I was actually going to be doing a six-part series for them. And they wanted, I think 1500 or 1800 words in six different editions. And the the piece ended up falling apart. So I ended up writing I think two or three of them and then it just never got never got never got anywhere. But nonetheless, I was it was I could use that. Dig into this really cool. So again, there’s, there’s lots of different lots of fodder for future shows. For this one, we’re going to be talking about some of the origins and again sort of the conspiracy theories historically. It’s as you said sort of lesser-known aspect to it. So let me begin by talking about some of the some of the psychological origins where they come from. And again you know some of this but our listeners don’t. So what you find and there’s a couple of books that I can recommend. One is called paranormal America And another one is called Americans conspiracy theories by Joseph Lusinski and Joseph Parent And there’s there’s a handful of others I have a shelf full of them, but those those are a couple of good ones well And they sort of give you a good overview and what you find is that studies show the conspiracy theories flourish where people feel anxiety alienation paranoia and loss of control yeah, so that that’s that is a that is a necessary but not sufficient condition. So just because you’re feeling a loss of control doesn’t mean you’re going to embrace conspiracy theory, but it makes it more likely that people are going to do that. And so that’s one of the reasons why, well, during political turmoil, as we’ve had recently, the last few months and years, conspiracy theories just flourish everywhere.

0:37:19
We talked about the Pizzagate case, and I think we’re going to be hearing a little more about it shortly. In times when people aren’t sure what to believe, there’s always this suspicion that someone’s out to get you. Someone’s out to try and do you in. There’s evil forces which you can’t necessarily touch or control that are influencing people. And so that’s one of the things you saw. And previously I’ve written and we’ve talked about Trump’s use of conspiracy theories.

0:37:58
He’s used conspiracy theories like no other president ever has, and embrace them. Just routinely. I mean, as like, that’s what he does, right? Everything from, you know, the anti-vaxxing to Obama being born in, you know, Kenya or the Philippines or both. Both, who knows, right?

0:38:24
So it’s not surprising that we would see these sorts of ideas flourish, especially in times like these. The other thing you find is that conspiracies are a blend of information and predisposition. So it’s basically confirmation bias. And so what happens is that you have a particular mindset, and you have an assumption about the way the world works. You have an assumption about what the government is trying to do to you or your loved ones, or what a particular group of people are trying to do. And of course, there’s lots of racist and really obnoxious conspiracy theories.

0:39:00
And so it’s our old enemy confirmation bias. So when we hear a conspiracy theory that fits our mold, that propels our narrative, we’re much more likely to embrace it. That goes for Democrats and Republicans across the political spectrum. Wherever you are, you’re going to have your own set of conspiracies that align with your general ideas. So, you know, people see and seek information that feeds their beliefs, you know, distrust of government, political rivals, etc. And so, it’s fascinating when you look at some of the both left and right wing ones. So, for example, the Oklahoma City bomber, Tim McVeigh, rife with conspiracies.

0:39:52
And a lot of times, and part of the reason, and you also see it with the Pizzagate case, right, a lot of times what drives people to extreme actions, in some cases deadly violence, is the belief that what they’re doing is right. And it’s like, you know, they’re there, it’s this sort of symbolic protest against, you know, the, the evil government that’s, you know, that’s controlling your minds or spraying, spraying, you know, toxins on people or, you know, doing these experiments on people. And so when you when you believe that when you embrace that sort of ideology, when you believe that a pizza place in Washington DC is trafficking in sex slaves and children, it provokes a reaction, right? You’re like, I’m a good person, I can’t stand for this, damn it, you know, there’s chemtrails, there’s this and that and the other. And I also see this with, for example, a lot of the Sandy Hook people.

0:40:50

The Sandy Hook people, the Newtown people, the people that claim that the Sandy Hook school shooting was faked or false flagged. And I’ve had some discussion with those people. And some of them are really vile people, but what’s interesting is that when you go beyond that you recognize that in their hearts they’re doing the right thing. They believe that children have been harmed. They believe that there are children who are being traumatized, not because they were killed in a school shooting, but because they were traumatized by this false flag operation and all the things that would logically be implied by such a cover-up, they’re upset about.

0:41:39
And so it’s interesting for, again, from the outside, it’s clearly irrational and abusive and toxic and venomous. But from the inside, from their point of view, they’re fighting the right fight. They’re doing the good thing. They’re trying to pull the wool off of people’s eyes and get them to show the truth there.

PR: Yeah, you see a lot of it in social media. Fortunately, I don’t have too many contacts on social media that post a lot of that stuff, but I’ve seen a lot of these people that post things about crisis actors.

0:42:18
They use that term, and it’s people who they believe are being paid to act at these events, and then they always do this thing, there’s always this picture that they do, this montage of this very, you know, generic looking blonde woman in her mid-twenties. Yeah, it’s always like, you know, there’s one girl that they always point out that’s a brunette girl and the first picture is like a really clear one from whatever the first, you know, instance they’re using and the rest of them are all these kind of like really low resolution pictures or screen captures of some nondescript brunette girl. Newsflash, brunette girls are the majority of women on earth. Just FYI, you know, black hair brunette, you know, it’s dark haired women are the majority of human women on the face of the planet. You’re not going to convince me that just because they vaguely have similar features.

0:43:17
But aside from that point, it’s just that they’re always looking for this. These are very easily disputed, not even without taking the pictures into account, but saying, why don’t they hire different actors? It’s just…

BR: You would think, wow, they’re onto us. Let’s use somebody different.

PR: Yeah, so, but anyway, yeah, so that one, that’s very interesting to me is a lot of those types of claims.

BR: Well, yeah, and what you find is also that, you know, that in the conspiracy mindset, we could do a whole show on the conspiracy psychology because that’s its own thing, but you know, that in their mindset, nothing is random.

0:43:56
Everything, there’s a, whenever I hear someone say that, you know, there’s a reason behind everything, everything happens for a reason. A lot of them aren’t necessarily conspiracy theorists, but that’s what my mind’s like, that’s classic conspiracy. What you just said is classic conspiracy. The assumption that there’s a higher power, whether that’s, however you interpret that, Illuminati or US government or unknown entities or invisible dragons, there’s some higher power that is pulling the strings to make this all work out for you.

0:44:32
That is classic conspiracy thinking, magical thinking as well.

PR: Yeah, and like you said, it kind of falls into these, well not just ideologies, but it’s like you were saying before with people kind of needing an explanation for something that makes them anxious or scared. And it’s sort of like what opens the door for them, you know. And I think it follows a kind of path that, you know, if we kind of look at it in a broader sense that a lot of magical thinking and religious thinking and different types of, you know, they’re looking for explanations that fit their angle. And so it’s very, I mean, I really would be interested to delve into that whole aspect of it because the psychology is just fascinating.

0:45:25
BR: It is. I want to touch on one other aspect before we take a break, and that is one of the reasons I thought about it was you were talking about the crisis actors, and you’re exactly right. If you’re trying to avoid detection, why keep going back to the same actor? Because you know the conspiracy theorists are going to call you on it because they’ve been doing this for years. And what you find is that in these grand arching conspiracies assume that clues to solve it have been left in the open. It’s right there. And I’ve always found it just fascinating.

0:46:15
For example, the Paul is dead hoax. The Paul McCartney. A perfect example where there was an assumption that, well, Paul McCartney had died, and if you know what to look for, if you’re smart enough, you can see on these classic Beatles covers that Paul, you know, he’s out of step with the others, or he’s got a hand over, just all these little things. And it’s like, well, hold on here. If they’re trying so hard to cover up the fact that Paul is dead, why are they going out of their way to highlight the fact that he’s not like the rest of them.

0:46:51
Or, for example, in the Denver airport. There’s a, you’ve seen the Denver airport story, right? The story is that it’s laid out in a swastika by Illuminati and Nazis. It’s this whole thing. But my favorite part of the story is, and I’m sure you know this, but my favorite is that there’s a mural, actually there’s a couple of murals, but there’s one main mural in the Denver Airport, which, if you know what to look for, explains the whole conspiracy for everybody going by.

0:47:20
And you read this stuff and you’re like, well, yeah, so there’s the mural and then there’s a symbol and if you look in this part of the thing, there’s someone pointing to this and this means this and that. And like, they put this in the painting? Why would they go through all this trouble, all these people being silenced over the threat of death, all these things, this huge conspiracy, and yet they make sure that they put all these clues that everybody can see where you’re going by.

PR: It’s like every, almost a condition of modern conspiratorial thinking is that the bad guy has to be this Scooby-Doo villain. You know it’s like it’s you know nobody’s ever covering their bases. They’re always giving you clues as if you know they need you to solve something you know it’s just, yeah, I mean that alone is just one of the most ridiculous things about it.

BR: Yeah, I just I mean There’s other examples I can give but anyway. That’s that’s just one of my one of my words. We’ll do a whole show on that. It’s just so much fun.

0:48:25
Just the absurdity of the claims. And their own claims! And I’ve asked people, I’m like, so I’m curious, now that you’ve laid out your whole theory, that you so carefully constructed, listening to Alex Jones, that he so carefully constructed, and it’s funny because a lot of the believers, they’re like, well, it says it on this website, go to YouTube, go to Alex Jones, go to, and I was like, well, you should think for yourself.

0:48:54
And they’re like, yeah, I do think for myself. Like, no, no, you saw a 15 minute video on YouTube and you believe it. Don’t believe everything you see. And they’re like, no, I don’t. Like, yeah, you do. That’s what you just said. So I’ve encouraged, I’ve actually found that to be useful in some cases where I’m dealing with a conspiracy theorist and I’m like, look, you’re not an idiot – although sometimes they are. I say, you’re not an idiot.

0:49:22
Think for yourself. Right? It’s like, don’t believe what I’m saying. Research this for yourself. I’ll give you one quick example. I was contacted a while ago by a Sandy Hook person. And they were trying to tell me about how there were no photographs of the inside of the school that were published publicly available.

0:49:44
And this was like, the person sent me like four or five bulleted item points, and this is one of them, like the fact that this person couldn’t find, this person couldn’t find a photograph of the inside of the school where, at Sandy Hook Elementary, that meant something. That meant that there was a cover up. And I said, I said, I said, well, you know, how do you know there aren’t any photographs? They will, you know, and I asked him, how do you know that? It’s like, well, you know, well, I, I looked online. So I said, so, so because you spent a few minutes looking online, because, because the photograph that you’re looking for didn’t materialize in a Google search within a few minutes, you simply don’t exist, right? And I said, I said, look, I I’m a researcher, I’m an investigator, and I’ll just tell you, just just generally, you can’t always find exactly what you’re looking for right away.

0:50:41
Like, I know that you think there’s some fact or some there’s some statistic, whatever else, sometimes you actually have to research. Sometimes it doesn’t magically appear within a few strokes of a keyboard. So I said, you know, you may be right that these photos don’t exist. You could be right. I don’t think you’re right, but you could be right. But you need to prove that. You need to show that that’s the case. You can’t assume that just because you can’t find it, it doesn’t exist. And I finally just was like, yeah, don’t call me.

PR: Yeah, that’s especially short-sighted when you consider, you know, any major crime situation or crime scene or anything like that. You know, there usually is someone who takes photographs for evidence and things like that, but that is not generally something that they publish online, especially in a sensitive situation where children are killed, you know, and that’s not, you know, so pictures of the inside of the school well I mean who’s putting that on Facebook. You know who’s I mean that’s well not gonna be easily searchable let’s assume for a moment that that there are no photographs that for whatever reason the police didn’t take photos of the inside of the school let’s just let’s just assume that’s true. That does not imply in any way there’s a conspiracy to cover anything up. It does not imply there’s a false flag situation.

0:52:04
There’s no connection there. Even if what you’re saying is true, is it strange? Is it proof of anything? No.

PR: And it’s very curious how conveniently they use the argument that the government goes through all the trouble of hiring actors and doing they don’t have a special-effects budget They don’t you know it’s like what right they don’t they don’t set up something inside to take picture. I mean I don’t know Just feel so it’s like you is it this or is it this yeah because both seem to be kind of conflict with each other.

BR: And in fact I brought that up. I’m glad you’re right. I brought that up I said if you you know you tell me this is all part of this big hoax and if this is true, if this whole thing is staged, why wouldn’t somebody take a photograph of a bloody desk and call it the Newtown school?

0:53:03
That’s very simple to do. I could do that. You’re positing this huge conspiracy involving all these people, all this meticulous preparation preparation and yet somebody didn’t think to photograph what could be the inside of a school? It’s it’s absurd.

Celestia Ward: Hey squares and hey strangers, Celestia you here with another skeptical fortune fortune cookie. Let’s crack it open, shall we? Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. This is a very well-known skeptical sentiment, and it’s from one of our favorite Enlightenment thinkers, the writer known as Voltaire. We learned a bit about his backstory on an earlier fortune cookie, so let’s instead take a closer look at this statement, which he penned in in a 1765 essay, Questions on Miracles.

0:53:56
That piece tackled theological questions while espousing the benefits of a free press and democracy. Now, by absurdities, Voltaire was clearly talking about religious notions. And this statement is often quoted by atheists who hold it up as an expression of how some religious views can lead to violent action. Certainly this was true in Voltaire’s time, as it is today. But there’s a broader meaning that I think escapes some secular Voltaire readers. An absurdity need not be as grandiose as pearly gates of 72 virgins, or the wrath of an all-powerful angry god.

0:54:40
Absurdities can be earthly things, too, like the child trafficking rumor that caused many concerned citizens to harass businesses in Washington, D.C. last year, and culminated in Edgar Welch firing three bullets into a pizzeria called Comet Ping-Pong on December 4th of 2016. Non-supernatural absurdities can also make people commit atrocities. So sharpen your critical eye and help others see through the absurd, and we might just make a difference in how many atrocities the world has to bear.

BR: So thank you Celestia for that that fortune cookie. Always delightful to have those tasty nuggets of wisdom from our esteemed producer Celestia. So let’s move on to the the actual history of conspiracies and conspiracy theories.

0:55:43
That’s the other part of this. So one thing that’s interesting when you’re looking at conspiracies is there was a huge spike in the last, say, 30 40 years. Conspiracies and concerns that there’s some external group trying to do bad things. And it’s usually, you know, classically the conspiracies are about hidden, secretive, evil groups. Because that’s what James Bond fights, right? Secret agent groups, secret and secretive group. So you’ve got, for example, you’ve got the Illuminati. You’ve got the Bilderberg Group. And so, you know, one of the earliest ones is, of course, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the anti-Semitic. And it actually only dates back, you know, a hundred and some years. I mean, that’s a fairly recent one. But, you know, you can in terms of other more toxic conspiracies, one of the first, one of the most obvious ones is, of course, the blood libel myths, which is still around today. I mean, millennia later, people still buy into this because, of course, it’s anti-Jewish sentiment, anti-Semitism, etc.

0:57:08
So that was one of the first and more prominent ones. And then you look at other famous conspiracies throughout the ages. One that jumps to mind is of course the Salem Witch Trials. Which were a conspiracy. That’s what that was about. The idea was that there were these witches and it wasn’t so much that someone was a witch. That wasn’t so much the concern. The concern was that there were many witches and they were consorting with the devil in satanic orgies and all sorts of horrific rites and whatever else, killing children and flying away on brooms to do evil, lustful things.

0:57:50
PR: The original satanic panic.

BR: Yes, exactly. And so that was, when you look at the witch hunts of the late Middle Ages, and the Salem witch trials, et cetera, I mean, that’s what that was about is the people that were concerned about it were convinced that there were these evil others with a capital O and capital E probably as well. That were that you know in that social context in that historical context your belief in the in Satan was very literal. This was not you know these days people throw around you know Satan and you know the devil or else, and it’s not it’s not taken literally except by some fundamentalist sure and others as well, but for the most part. It’s sort of a metaphor. But back and back in that time that was very real. They really thought there were demons and devils behind every tree. And in that context the assumption was that again that there was there were external evil things that were trying to influence.

0:58:54
And of course there was also the sexist notion that women not being as morally pure or not being as intelligent and sort of savvy were more likely to succumb to the devil’s lures. So you had the Salem witch trials and then of course in the 1970s and 80s as well, you also had, as you said, the satanic panic. You had Satan all over again. And you had people like Geraldo Rivera, we talked about this on a previous show. You had many people who, and you and I both lived through this, we were ready for this. This was a very serious thing and this was taken very seriously at the time. And on nightly news shows, and this idea that there were all these cults running around and killing people and killing babies.

0:59:47
There was a woman named Lauren Stratford who wrote a book called The Satanic Underground with these horrific first-person stories about how she had been abducted by a satanic group and put in these rituals. The whole thing is fabricated. I mean, she made the whole thing up. But I think if I’m not mistaken, she later, after her lies were exposed and basically her stories about being involved in satanic cult were completely debunked, she later decided that no, she was actually a Holocaust survivor. Apparently she forgot that. Whatever, Satan, Holocaust, whatever.

1:00:23
It’s just these people and their confabulation story. But again, the common theme here is the idea of a conspiracy. And that going on. But keep in mind that even at this time, the conspiracies were not really that widespread. There were certain pockets. There were certain places where there was the literature and the pre-existing ideology. And of course, that goes back to Gutenberg in the 1440s, the arrival of the printing press. Because before that time, for most of human history, you didn’t hear much news.

1:01:11
The news was that the farmers down the road, cow died. And it’s probably going to be buried next week. And somebody was hit by lightning. And that’s the news. That is the entire news. Nothing happened. Maybe there was a windstorm. Maybe someone dropped dead. For most of human history, all news was local news because there was nothing, you know, you may have heard stories of people traveling to other continents.

1:01:42
It didn’t matter. If I’m on some rural farm in Germany, yes, I may be interested in some traveler who’s been to the Asian lands who tell me stories. That’s all interesting and well and good. I got to get the next morning and plant the corn. So there really wasn’t, there was no conspiracies to speak of because there wasn’t the method of medical communication. And that remained the case for centuries. And then you see, for example, if you’ve seen the documentary Resurrect Dead, the mystery of the Toynbee tiles. Yes.

1:02:26
Great documentary. If you haven’t seen it, fascinating story. Check it out. But basically, this is a story of a guy who was putting out these conspiracy stories. And he did it on, actually, he tried a couple different ways. One was that he would go around driving in a car using front wave radio and hoping that there would be someone who happened to be listening on that channel that would pick it up.

1:02:51
These wacky stories and then eventually, spoiler alert, eventually he began writing, making these tiles that were then planted into streets. In the Northeast, I think I saw one in Buenos Aires, there’s some in New York.

PR: Yeah, Washington DC had a famous one.

BR: DC, yeah. So you know, you had in the 1980s. And in the 70s and 80s, of course, before the internet, these conspiracies spread through books and pamphlets. And I remember this very clearly. I would read magazines and then all of a sudden, it’s like, do you want to know what’s really going on? Send a self-adjusted stamped envelope to P.O.

1:03:51
Box 3580 in Wisconsin, right? And that’s how conspiracy theorists spread their stuff, was pamphlets. And so you would be intrigued enough or bored enough to send this guy 15 stamps and self-adjusted envelope and a couple weeks later you would get something crammed full of badly printed Xerox stuff with weird rants and diagrams and God knows what else. And that was that for many years, for decades, that was how that got spread around. Just like there was nothing else.

1:04:29
Because at the time, very few publishers were going to actually… I mean, today, you can get a conspiracy book published, a drop of a hat. Of course. But back then, only a few decades ago, with only a few exceptions, there really wasn’t a market or publisher for conspiracy theories per se. I mean, you had occult stuff, you had mysticism stuff, you had Robert Anton Wilson, you had Crowley, you had the people who were reprinting Theosophy Tracks and stuff like that.

1:04:59
But in terms of sort of modern conspiracy stuff, there wasn’t a venue for that. Then, of course, what happened was the internet. And so all of a sudden you have this mass proliferation. So then you’ve got people putting websites, you’ve got Alex Jones, you’ve got the rise of cheap, widespread mass communication, podcasts such as this, although not as good as this. The internet, in the same way that the internet really led to an exponential rise in, for example, misinformation and in urban legends. Because in some ways you can look at conspiracy theories as a form of folklore and urban legends. Well certainly folklore. I mean that’s that’s sort of what that is. So it’s sort of a branch of that. And so along with you know the methods of mass communication, you have this explosion in conspiracy theories. And then so then moving up to today, they’re mainstream. You know, you had Megyn Kelly interviewing Alex Jones, who didn’t have a tinfoil on his hat. He didn’t have his own during the interview. But you I mean, you’ve got mainstream you’ve got you’ve got you have President Trump, parroting conspiracy theories. I mean, this is this is unprecedented. And unprecedented. Um, so it’s just it’s just fascinating to think of centuries ago when there essentially wasn’t much, I mean there were rumors and stories, but nothing that was really mass marketed.

1:06:36
And then you have people being able to afford cheap Xeroxes and going to Kinko’s with a couple crumpled dollar bills to spread their crazy crank theory. Then you’ve got shortwave radio, and then these days, boom, it’s everywhere.

PR: Yeah, it was when I was a young teenager, it was like early to mid-90s, kind of before the World Wide Web as we know it, where these BBSs, Bulletin Board Systems, which were these text-based, it was on the Internet and you dialed in, you dialed a number with the modem on your computer, and it called to these servers that were these bulletin board systems, and everyone could be on it at the same time.

1:07:21
It was the earliest place I ever saw chat or messaging, sort of like email, but not exactly. This is like the early 90s, and I was in those. The conspiracy theories were already rampant in BBSs. So it was really interesting to see how that was like this really kind of strange underground because I mean it took a little bit of technical knowledge to even use a BBS. So mostly it’s like these kind of nerdy like, you know, kind of social rejects all kind of collecting onto these servers. And you know, it was very interesting because I saw a lot of stuff happening around that time just leading up to the actual World Wide Web where there was a lot of exchange about conspiracies, a lot of exchange of information.

1:08:14
The place you would find the Anarchist Cookbook, you’d find a digital version of it, and the Jolly Roger Cookbook, which was another one. And these were all very, this sort of underground, you could see it basically building up to what we see now, is that this whole underground really was there before the internet as we know it now even existed, and these people were exchanging these ideas, so it was really just a matter of time for the World Wide Web to kind of catch up to that social networking that was actually already happening on those BBSs in the early 90s, even the 80s. And so it’s interesting to see how that’s all just kind of built up and then become completely mainstream now. And so the seed was planted a long time ago, kind of in the same way you’re saying with the people with their mail-in conspiracy flyers and stuff. It was there, it’s just that you had to know where to find it and it was always in some cryptic ad in the back of a magazine or in some weird number that you were dialing on your modem to…

BR:You know it made it all the more cooler it did It’s like you know that’s that’s one thing that I found because I remember you know the same stuff and and it’d be like You know you had to work to find it. It was it was like like yeah You know there was this sense of like wow this is this is messed up right? I’m like, you know, you must wonder this is before you know FBI was NSA was surveilling us right but it’s always like this sort of Illicit thing right whereas these days any with the internet connection can find whatever weird random stuff totally But then it was like it was like you had to work to get it.

PR: That and I think that was a big part of it cuz like my me and my group of friends I mean we were very aware of all this stuff. None of us held any of this to much of a belief standard. We just kind of were interested in it. And so I think a lot of the people that proliferated it did so not realizing that it’s like, some people are going to believe this. Most of us just think it’s cool and interesting and we’re all smoking weed in the basement. Whoa, that’s tripping me out man. So it’s yeah, but that was a very interesting Place to be in to see that that sort of underground sort of build the framework for modern Conspiracy theory and you know, but it’s not as cool anymore Like now you just go on Facebook and someone’s crazy uncle is posing right?

1:10:50
BR: And I think that’s really my concern is, I mean, there’s always going to be crank theories. There’s always going to be people who have some wild idea about faces on Mars or whether we did or didn’t land on Mars or land on the moon. But to go back to that for a second, what you find is that the technology and the circumstances really dictate the content of them. So for example, before the space age, there was no conspiracy about the moon landing hoax, obviously, or the face of Mars. So anytime there’s, and this goes back to what we were talking about earlier, anytime there’s new information about another planet or new information about psychology or history or whatever else, people will sort of view that through their own prism.

1:11:44
And so the people who distrusted the government 80 years ago for completely different reasons are the same people that distrust the government today, but for a whole fresh set of… It’s just old wine in a new bottle. But it’s the same ideas recycled.

PR: We would like to thank our sponsor level patrons Amy Freshour-Kelley and Dr. Angela Mattke. If you’d like to find out what that is and how to become one head over to patreon.com forward slash squaring the strange patronage starts at just a buck and there are a lot of perks and bonus content just for our patrons. If you’d like to lend your moral support, you can head over to iTunes and give us a review.

1:12:32
BR: Every five star review gets us a little more visibility on the iTunes podcast charts and brings a smile to Pascual’s face.

1:12:53
So that does it for us this week. Make sure to stay tuned next week. Like we said at the beginning of the episode, we’re gonna have that live episode for you next week for those of you who didn’t see it on Facebook last weekend.

BR: It was a good show. I enjoyed it. I watched part of it. I generally don’t like to see, I don’t like to hear myself. As you know, I rarely listen to show out because I just, yeah, it’s like nails on a chalkboard. And I don’t really like to watch myself on TV, but I did briefly look at the video of it, and I was shocked at how much I waved my hands. I’m sure you’ve noticed this because you sit across from me, but I’m doing this karate thing, and I’m like, you know, it’s like yoga, and you know, stretches, and you’re like, okay, dude.

1:13:33
You’re just sort of sitting there by yourself. So yes, so if you’re wondering, as I wave my left hand around, if listeners are wondering what exactly I do when I’m emoting, it’s because I’m probably swaying my hand around.

PR: Yeah, and that video should actually be on our Facebook currently through the link that we shared last weekend while we were broadcasting live. But for those of you who have not seen that or would rather listen to it, there will be an episode next week. So stay tuned for that –

BR: And after that we’re going to do a series of Halloween themed yes, we october is upon us as of as of next week’s episode as a matter of fact We’re going to do a series of weekly Spooky episodes, and I think you guys are really going to like it as most of you know been deals in the spooky more often than not so we’re going to have a lot of fun talking about those. So just stay tuned and we’ll see you next week.

BR: Bye. Bye

PR: Squaring strange is a production of Cronos creative LLC copyright 2017 Theme music by shriek back additional music by memory guitar and feathered and Pascual Romero content producer Celeste reward audio engineering producing and editing provided by Pascual Romero at Acronis Creative Studios.

1:14:51
Additional support provided by Ashley Romero and of course our listeners and patrons. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of Swearing Strange and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of Acronis Creative, Center for Inquiry, our advertisers or any affiliated organizations and employers.