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War is immoral, poverty is immoral,
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racism is immoral,
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police brutality is immoral,
00:00:06.652 --> 00:00:07.753
oppression is immoral,
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genocide is immoral,
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imperialism is immoral.
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This country represents all those things.
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Hello.
00:00:17.672 --> 00:00:20.253
Emily Gorsenski may be most well-known for
00:00:20.272 --> 00:00:22.835
her writings on far-right extremism or her
00:00:22.875 --> 00:00:23.975
digital activism,
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but that's not the only reason she's
00:00:26.076 --> 00:00:27.716
today's guest on Global Warning.
00:00:28.217 --> 00:00:29.858
Emily didn't just attend the Unite the
00:00:29.897 --> 00:00:31.359
Right rally in Charlottesville.
00:00:31.719 --> 00:00:33.539
The Nazis chanted blood and soil,
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marching through her hometown with tiki
00:00:35.441 --> 00:00:37.762
torches, and she was assaulted repeatedly.
00:00:38.344 --> 00:00:38.704
Worse,
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this was only the beginning of what would
00:00:40.445 --> 00:00:42.587
amount to years of on and offline
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harassment and endangerment at the hands
00:00:44.828 --> 00:00:45.908
of far-right actors.
00:00:46.588 --> 00:00:47.348
If you know me,
00:00:47.429 --> 00:00:48.848
then you know Unite the Right was a
00:00:48.908 --> 00:00:49.750
rallying cry.
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I came out of musical retirement to record
00:00:52.811 --> 00:00:53.970
the song, Heather Heyer,
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and later interviewed Heather's mom,
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Susan Brough, on my first podcast,
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The Awkward Interviews.
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Heather, as many know,
00:01:00.654 --> 00:01:02.795
was murdered by a Nazi who ran her
00:01:02.835 --> 00:01:04.394
down with his pickup truck in one of
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the first documented instances of a now
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spreading trend.
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As for Emily,
00:01:09.498 --> 00:01:11.218
she's one of my heroes for what she's
00:01:11.278 --> 00:01:13.740
endured and how she's bravely persevered.
00:01:14.341 --> 00:01:14.822
Like me,
00:01:14.921 --> 00:01:16.703
Emily believes strongly in building an
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equitable internet that fosters
00:01:18.525 --> 00:01:20.966
collaboration, community, and autonomy.
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She wants the same for the physical world.
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Today on Global Warning episode four,
00:01:26.131 --> 00:01:28.272
I speak with Emily Gorsensky about what
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it's really like to face the ire of
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the far right,
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her background in data science and its
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role in her daily work,
00:01:34.879 --> 00:01:36.599
her take on the national landscape,
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and finally,
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her visions for a more humane internet and
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world.
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Emily.
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Welcome to the show.
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Everybody, please be sure to like,
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subscribe, follow Emily on Blue Sky,
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and be sure to super fan, member,
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et cetera,
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because that's how you get the exclusive
00:01:57.448 --> 00:01:57.929
extras.
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Emily,
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I know everyone wants to hear about your
00:02:01.072 --> 00:02:03.253
experience being doxed and swatted,
00:02:03.974 --> 00:02:05.015
but we'll close with that.
00:02:05.474 --> 00:02:05.855
First,
00:02:06.036 --> 00:02:07.917
tell me how you got into data science
00:02:07.956 --> 00:02:09.658
and how you leveraged that for your work
00:02:09.679 --> 00:02:11.961
today, exposing far-right extremism.
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Sure thing.
00:02:13.455 --> 00:02:14.637
And thanks for having me here.
00:02:15.317 --> 00:02:17.679
I guess to start, you know,
00:02:17.919 --> 00:02:19.760
I got into data science because I was
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a mathematician.
00:02:21.301 --> 00:02:22.883
I always liked working with numbers.
00:02:22.924 --> 00:02:23.905
I liked working with data.
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And what I think compelled me about data
00:02:26.426 --> 00:02:30.650
is that you're always trying to find the
00:02:30.670 --> 00:02:31.550
deeper truth, right?
00:02:31.570 --> 00:02:33.552
The universe is constantly lying to us.
00:02:33.712 --> 00:02:35.955
It makes us want to believe easy things
00:02:36.014 --> 00:02:38.257
when more complicated things are sitting
00:02:38.356 --> 00:02:39.117
under the surface.
00:02:39.935 --> 00:02:41.036
And I think as a data scientist,
00:02:41.075 --> 00:02:42.776
what you do or what you need to
00:02:42.796 --> 00:02:44.498
do to be good at data science is
00:02:44.538 --> 00:02:46.460
to learn how to ask the question behind
00:02:46.500 --> 00:02:49.782
the question and to really dig for deeper
00:02:49.823 --> 00:02:50.122
truths,
00:02:50.163 --> 00:02:52.284
whether that is in looking at signal
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processing,
00:02:52.906 --> 00:02:55.228
whether that is looking at text analysis,
00:02:56.288 --> 00:02:58.250
or whether that's trying to understand
00:02:58.310 --> 00:03:02.453
networks of extremists or terror
00:03:02.492 --> 00:03:02.873
movements.
00:03:04.741 --> 00:03:08.062
yeah that makes good sense um so how
00:03:08.241 --> 00:03:09.861
if at all does this impact your
00:03:09.901 --> 00:03:11.701
perspective on the current state of the
00:03:11.741 --> 00:03:14.703
country obviously as a data scientist and
00:03:14.782 --> 00:03:17.223
to your point a minute ago you are
00:03:17.503 --> 00:03:20.704
looking underneath what is out there for
00:03:20.764 --> 00:03:23.485
everyone to see so as someone who may
00:03:23.525 --> 00:03:25.645
know more than you know the average
00:03:25.705 --> 00:03:29.045
mainstream uh media viewer where do you
00:03:29.086 --> 00:03:32.106
see us headed i think you know one
00:03:32.127 --> 00:03:32.627
thing about
00:03:33.913 --> 00:03:35.435
where we are right now as a society
00:03:35.455 --> 00:03:37.657
is we're always looking for easy answers,
00:03:37.717 --> 00:03:37.836
right?
00:03:37.877 --> 00:03:39.277
I think we have this very hyped up
00:03:39.837 --> 00:03:41.879
accelerated media ecosystem.
00:03:42.500 --> 00:03:43.941
We have this sort of full contact
00:03:43.980 --> 00:03:46.443
participatory political system now where
00:03:46.522 --> 00:03:48.784
it's not just enough to be part of
00:03:48.824 --> 00:03:49.205
a party.
00:03:49.264 --> 00:03:50.866
You have to be online.
00:03:50.885 --> 00:03:54.288
You have to be competing in social media.
00:03:54.348 --> 00:03:55.629
I don't even want to say participating
00:03:55.650 --> 00:03:57.350
because it really is all about competing.
00:03:58.632 --> 00:04:00.293
And what that does is that drives people
00:04:00.353 --> 00:04:02.514
to try to find easy answers.
00:04:03.280 --> 00:04:05.219
they're really happy to stop at a headline
00:04:05.360 --> 00:04:06.621
if it tells them what they want to
00:04:06.661 --> 00:04:08.320
believe is true,
00:04:08.401 --> 00:04:10.561
whether that is on their side or against
00:04:10.580 --> 00:04:11.301
their side, right?
00:04:12.181 --> 00:04:14.042
And very few people stop to look through
00:04:14.521 --> 00:04:15.983
and look at the deeper questions,
00:04:16.002 --> 00:04:17.622
you know, what is the actual reality,
00:04:18.583 --> 00:04:20.023
to try to find the nuance and to
00:04:20.062 --> 00:04:21.084
try to find, you know,
00:04:21.603 --> 00:04:23.564
what are the actual factors driving these,
00:04:24.324 --> 00:04:25.064
you know, politics,
00:04:25.103 --> 00:04:26.644
these economic decisions,
00:04:26.685 --> 00:04:28.264
these social situations, right?
00:04:28.759 --> 00:04:30.680
And I think that that's, you know,
00:04:31.440 --> 00:04:32.500
I think that that's unfortunate.
00:04:32.581 --> 00:04:34.081
I think that one of the benefits I've
00:04:34.101 --> 00:04:35.862
had for being a data scientist for my
00:04:35.882 --> 00:04:37.802
entire career is that you really do have
00:04:37.843 --> 00:04:39.283
to stop and say, like, hey,
00:04:39.324 --> 00:04:40.603
is this data too good to be true?
00:04:40.663 --> 00:04:42.944
Because if it feels like it's tailor-made
00:04:43.004 --> 00:04:44.345
for what I want to believe,
00:04:45.906 --> 00:04:47.526
it's probably too good to be true, right?
00:04:47.565 --> 00:04:48.687
So you have to look deeper.
00:04:48.747 --> 00:04:50.367
And I think that if we had that
00:04:50.406 --> 00:04:53.449
skill set, you know, today, more broadly,
00:04:53.728 --> 00:04:54.769
we might be in a better spot.
00:04:55.838 --> 00:04:57.821
Right, if we all had that skill set,
00:04:58.120 --> 00:05:00.041
that would definitely be helpful because
00:05:01.023 --> 00:05:06.786
it's not unknown that not only do people
00:05:06.826 --> 00:05:09.949
make decisions or come to conclusions
00:05:09.990 --> 00:05:11.071
based on headlines,
00:05:11.370 --> 00:05:13.692
but they're also posting based off of
00:05:13.733 --> 00:05:14.033
that.
00:05:14.132 --> 00:05:15.653
And as you said, it's competing.
00:05:16.033 --> 00:05:17.975
Everyone's competing for attention,
00:05:18.675 --> 00:05:20.778
whereas behind the scenes,
00:05:21.237 --> 00:05:22.499
there's collaboration.
00:05:23.959 --> 00:05:25.360
And interestingly,
00:05:25.440 --> 00:05:27.642
one of the fascist platforms, Instagram,
00:05:28.322 --> 00:05:31.404
incorporated this collaboration option.
00:05:32.625 --> 00:05:33.886
So in a weird way,
00:05:34.266 --> 00:05:36.867
we are collaborating now on at least one
00:05:36.887 --> 00:05:39.129
of these apps where we are communicating
00:05:39.170 --> 00:05:41.511
behind the scenes at the very least to
00:05:41.550 --> 00:05:43.713
determine what to share publicly at the
00:05:43.733 --> 00:05:44.452
same time.
00:05:44.872 --> 00:05:48.755
Although obviously there's a lot more than
00:05:48.815 --> 00:05:50.156
just on social media.
00:05:51.524 --> 00:05:54.846
So you pointed at the media and our
00:05:54.985 --> 00:05:59.387
lack of education on how to dissect it.
00:06:00.767 --> 00:06:02.348
That's clearly a major issue,
00:06:02.449 --> 00:06:03.649
has been forever.
00:06:03.709 --> 00:06:04.269
And to me,
00:06:04.329 --> 00:06:06.250
it seems like it's getting worse.
00:06:06.810 --> 00:06:09.930
I've never seen it look more like state
00:06:09.951 --> 00:06:11.992
propaganda than it looks now.
00:06:12.471 --> 00:06:13.632
So if at all,
00:06:13.692 --> 00:06:15.932
how has your outlook changed since Trump's
00:06:15.973 --> 00:06:18.413
reelection and the beginning of the
00:06:18.454 --> 00:06:20.435
incorporation of Project Twenty Twenty
00:06:20.454 --> 00:06:20.855
Five?
00:06:22.067 --> 00:06:23.608
Yeah, you know, I have,
00:06:24.170 --> 00:06:26.071
my outlook hasn't really changed too much
00:06:26.110 --> 00:06:26.591
at all, right?
00:06:26.630 --> 00:06:29.213
Because I think one of the things about
00:06:29.413 --> 00:06:31.415
being from Charlottesville is that we
00:06:31.675 --> 00:06:33.495
already saw this seven years ago, right?
00:06:33.555 --> 00:06:35.918
So, you know, for a lot of people,
00:06:36.038 --> 00:06:37.459
it's starting to hit their communities for
00:06:37.478 --> 00:06:38.298
the first time,
00:06:38.379 --> 00:06:39.841
or it's starting to actually feel real.
00:06:39.980 --> 00:06:41.521
And we saw this, you know,
00:06:42.062 --> 00:06:44.124
for the last almost decade, right?
00:06:44.223 --> 00:06:46.004
Eight years now since the attack.
00:06:46.824 --> 00:06:48.286
And we've been through this whole,
00:06:48.627 --> 00:06:48.887
you know,
00:06:49.608 --> 00:06:51.810
We've been slandered as extremists and
00:06:51.829 --> 00:06:52.411
terrorists.
00:06:52.531 --> 00:06:53.550
We've been, you know,
00:06:53.591 --> 00:06:54.911
we sat through this whole national
00:06:54.971 --> 00:06:55.651
discourse of like,
00:06:55.672 --> 00:06:57.192
did Trump really say that there were very
00:06:57.233 --> 00:06:58.713
fine people on both sides, you know,
00:06:58.733 --> 00:07:00.495
and nitpicking his words and all of this
00:07:00.514 --> 00:07:00.814
stuff.
00:07:02.115 --> 00:07:02.336
You know,
00:07:02.396 --> 00:07:05.216
this whole sort of retconning of what
00:07:05.276 --> 00:07:06.398
actually happened, like, oh,
00:07:06.418 --> 00:07:07.798
they weren't actually chanting Jews will
00:07:07.817 --> 00:07:08.418
not replace us,
00:07:08.519 --> 00:07:10.040
as if I didn't see it with my
00:07:10.100 --> 00:07:11.699
own eyes and hear it with my own
00:07:11.779 --> 00:07:12.180
ears, right?
00:07:13.600 --> 00:07:14.781
And so we kind of have been through
00:07:14.802 --> 00:07:15.062
all that.
00:07:15.081 --> 00:07:16.622
So nothing has really changed for me.
00:07:17.454 --> 00:07:18.915
you know, with Project Twenty Twenty Five,
00:07:18.956 --> 00:07:20.536
with Trump, any of this stuff.
00:07:20.875 --> 00:07:21.495
I think that.
00:07:21.576 --> 00:07:22.757
Interesting.
00:07:22.877 --> 00:07:25.038
If one thing that we need to understand
00:07:25.098 --> 00:07:26.937
is that this is how it works.
00:07:27.098 --> 00:07:27.338
Right.
00:07:27.557 --> 00:07:29.459
And you shouldn't be blindsided by
00:07:29.499 --> 00:07:31.079
something like Project Twenty Twenty Five.
00:07:31.120 --> 00:07:31.240
Right.
00:07:31.259 --> 00:07:32.720
Because people who have been doing
00:07:32.779 --> 00:07:35.040
activist work in this space have known for
00:07:35.141 --> 00:07:35.661
years,
00:07:36.021 --> 00:07:38.081
have named the Heritage Foundation for
00:07:38.182 --> 00:07:40.103
years saying they have an agenda.
00:07:40.142 --> 00:07:41.223
This is how they're going to do it.
00:07:41.242 --> 00:07:42.744
They're walking through a playbook.
00:07:42.903 --> 00:07:43.124
Right.
00:07:44.064 --> 00:07:45.504
And so none of that should have come
00:07:45.545 --> 00:07:46.305
as a surprise.
00:07:47.947 --> 00:07:49.427
So for me, it's really all about,
00:07:49.827 --> 00:07:50.108
you know,
00:07:50.927 --> 00:07:53.369
how come we didn't predict that sooner,
00:07:53.709 --> 00:07:53.870
right?
00:07:53.930 --> 00:07:55.689
How come we didn't seal off against that
00:07:55.810 --> 00:07:56.891
as a society sooner?
00:07:57.651 --> 00:07:59.632
And so nothing has really changed for,
00:07:59.651 --> 00:08:00.411
you know, Trump too,
00:08:00.451 --> 00:08:02.872
because I've already moved on to the next
00:08:02.952 --> 00:08:03.613
thing, right?
00:08:03.694 --> 00:08:05.514
I'm not concerning myself with what he's
00:08:05.535 --> 00:08:07.214
doing, with what the GOP is doing.
00:08:08.235 --> 00:08:08.415
You know,
00:08:08.456 --> 00:08:10.416
I'm looking at how do you solve this
00:08:10.456 --> 00:08:11.596
problem more systematically?
00:08:12.398 --> 00:08:14.879
Okay, so that's a great lead-in then.
00:08:14.999 --> 00:08:15.119
So
00:08:16.456 --> 00:08:17.016
I like that.
00:08:17.077 --> 00:08:18.437
What is the next thing then?
00:08:18.699 --> 00:08:21.139
Um, can you go into further detail?
00:08:21.581 --> 00:08:21.821
Yeah.
00:08:21.841 --> 00:08:23.442
You know, I think that, um,
00:08:23.482 --> 00:08:24.762
we're definitely seeing changes in
00:08:24.802 --> 00:08:25.903
politics globally.
00:08:26.184 --> 00:08:26.264
Um,
00:08:26.324 --> 00:08:28.024
we're seeing the role of the state
00:08:28.365 --> 00:08:30.367
shifting from being a, um,
00:08:30.387 --> 00:08:32.969
service-based state to being a, um,
00:08:33.048 --> 00:08:34.870
authoritarian based state, right.
00:08:34.889 --> 00:08:36.410
Where it's, um,
00:08:36.471 --> 00:08:38.793
moving into policing as a primary form of,
00:08:39.092 --> 00:08:39.933
of, uh,
00:08:40.366 --> 00:08:40.567
you know,
00:08:40.667 --> 00:08:42.931
state influence in the day-to-day life.
00:08:43.892 --> 00:08:45.414
We're seeing that with DOGE, you know,
00:08:45.475 --> 00:08:48.038
all of the erosion of public services and
00:08:48.058 --> 00:08:48.639
things like that.
00:08:49.254 --> 00:08:50.495
But this isn't just happening in the U.S.
00:08:50.556 --> 00:08:51.716
This is happening globally.
00:08:51.736 --> 00:08:53.217
We're seeing this in Germany, right,
00:08:53.778 --> 00:08:55.299
where I just moved back from Germany,
00:08:56.701 --> 00:08:59.423
where we're starting to see things like at
00:08:59.442 --> 00:09:02.504
the municipal level when the CDU,
00:09:02.585 --> 00:09:04.826
the Conservative Political Party,
00:09:04.866 --> 00:09:05.847
took power in Berlin,
00:09:05.868 --> 00:09:07.989
they started shutting down parks and they
00:09:08.028 --> 00:09:09.250
started, you know,
00:09:09.289 --> 00:09:10.892
canceling bike lane projects and things
00:09:10.932 --> 00:09:11.331
like that.
00:09:11.392 --> 00:09:12.692
And they're moving more things into
00:09:12.732 --> 00:09:13.153
policing.
00:09:13.173 --> 00:09:14.474
They're moving more funding into,
00:09:14.934 --> 00:09:16.495
you know, supporting arms development.
00:09:20.053 --> 00:09:24.376
This walking back of that sort of service.
00:09:24.397 --> 00:09:26.979
Down to parks, down to bike lanes.
00:09:27.840 --> 00:09:29.240
Down to the level of parks and bike
00:09:29.280 --> 00:09:29.541
lanes.
00:09:30.601 --> 00:09:32.602
And this has happened at the municipal
00:09:32.623 --> 00:09:34.125
level in the States for years,
00:09:34.164 --> 00:09:36.746
where you look at the average U.S.
00:09:36.927 --> 00:09:37.787
city's budget,
00:09:38.168 --> 00:09:39.428
look at what percentage of it goes to
00:09:39.469 --> 00:09:39.948
policing.
00:09:41.105 --> 00:09:42.846
I'm so glad you're bringing this up.
00:09:43.466 --> 00:09:44.768
As an abolitionist,
00:09:44.947 --> 00:09:47.529
the awkward interviews was nearly entirely
00:09:47.570 --> 00:09:49.912
focused on that subject.
00:09:50.493 --> 00:09:53.535
And you mentioned at one point,
00:09:54.216 --> 00:09:56.258
if something seems too good to be true,
00:09:56.398 --> 00:09:58.960
it probably is when it comes to data,
00:09:59.000 --> 00:10:00.601
when it comes to media reporting.
00:10:00.961 --> 00:10:01.903
And oddly enough,
00:10:02.243 --> 00:10:03.965
that can be the case even in the
00:10:04.125 --> 00:10:05.144
opposite direction.
00:10:05.586 --> 00:10:06.787
Samuel Sinyongwe,
00:10:06.826 --> 00:10:08.748
who I had on Awkward Interviews,
00:10:09.528 --> 00:10:11.370
is also a data scientist,
00:10:11.510 --> 00:10:14.913
and he focuses on predominantly police
00:10:14.952 --> 00:10:17.995
crimes, police murders of people.
00:10:18.716 --> 00:10:21.999
And he's kind of the most often cited
00:10:22.099 --> 00:10:23.940
source of that information.
00:10:24.259 --> 00:10:27.602
And that's where the statistic remains
00:10:27.643 --> 00:10:31.024
current at three people per day killed by
00:10:31.065 --> 00:10:32.145
cops in this country.
00:10:32.886 --> 00:10:35.469
Then a New York Times article came out
00:10:35.609 --> 00:10:39.851
citing this lengthy meta study where it
00:10:39.892 --> 00:10:42.693
was determined that potentially a hundred
00:10:42.754 --> 00:10:43.274
percent
00:10:44.375 --> 00:10:48.155
of the police killings are not reported in
00:10:48.216 --> 00:10:50.557
other words this the number could be six
00:10:50.616 --> 00:10:53.197
plus so that's always what i talk about
00:10:53.277 --> 00:10:55.457
is i say three to six plus because
00:10:55.477 --> 00:10:56.937
that's the best i can do with the
00:10:56.977 --> 00:10:59.418
data i'm really glad on a side note
00:10:59.578 --> 00:11:01.219
or you know to the next point that
00:11:01.239 --> 00:11:04.379
you brought up this global aspect um
00:11:04.580 --> 00:11:06.600
you're absolutely right if people are
00:11:06.620 --> 00:11:09.441
paying attention beyond the united states
00:11:09.701 --> 00:11:11.182
we are seeing this everywhere
00:11:11.621 --> 00:11:15.304
So on the flip side of that,
00:11:16.186 --> 00:11:21.049
we are organizing across state borders.
00:11:21.090 --> 00:11:23.011
We're organizing internationally.
00:11:24.111 --> 00:11:25.693
So how does this struggle,
00:11:25.734 --> 00:11:27.455
the struggle against fascism,
00:11:27.495 --> 00:11:31.018
the struggle against all government
00:11:31.077 --> 00:11:32.719
funding going to policing,
00:11:33.179 --> 00:11:35.662
carceral nonsense and war,
00:11:37.222 --> 00:11:39.065
how do our struggles connect across the
00:11:39.105 --> 00:11:39.365
globe?
00:11:40.456 --> 00:11:40.655
You know,
00:11:40.696 --> 00:11:42.336
I think it's really important to
00:11:42.756 --> 00:11:47.178
understand perspectives and to understand
00:11:47.219 --> 00:11:48.339
what people are going through in other
00:11:48.379 --> 00:11:48.739
countries.
00:11:48.798 --> 00:11:51.860
I think that my time living abroad has
00:11:52.201 --> 00:11:54.562
opened my eyes into, you know, not just,
00:11:54.802 --> 00:11:57.023
you know, how bad the systems can be,
00:11:58.062 --> 00:12:00.124
but also, you know, how,
00:12:00.764 --> 00:12:03.865
like how broad the spectrum is that where
00:12:03.884 --> 00:12:04.806
this can go, right?
00:12:04.885 --> 00:12:05.265
You know, I've
00:12:06.173 --> 00:12:08.053
um i talk sometimes about how i did
00:12:08.094 --> 00:12:09.916
refugee support at the beginning of the
00:12:10.556 --> 00:12:13.398
war in ukraine and um i went over
00:12:13.418 --> 00:12:15.038
to the border and i saw the these
00:12:15.339 --> 00:12:17.640
you know huge crowds of of refugees
00:12:17.660 --> 00:12:19.522
looking to come in cross into poland and
00:12:20.602 --> 00:12:22.884
you know i think it was something that
00:12:22.924 --> 00:12:25.927
helped anchor me um and give me
00:12:25.966 --> 00:12:27.648
perspective because no matter how bad i
00:12:27.687 --> 00:12:29.109
felt like things were in germany or in
00:12:29.129 --> 00:12:30.629
the united states or things like that it's
00:12:30.750 --> 00:12:32.671
still not like as bad as somebody shooting
00:12:32.691 --> 00:12:33.451
a missile at your house
00:12:34.125 --> 00:12:34.365
Of course,
00:12:34.384 --> 00:12:36.285
we can see what's going on in Gaza.
00:12:36.326 --> 00:12:38.027
We can see what's going on in Sudan.
00:12:38.368 --> 00:12:40.649
We can see what's going on in other
00:12:40.688 --> 00:12:41.629
parts of the world, right?
00:12:41.889 --> 00:12:43.269
And I think that that helps us have
00:12:43.331 --> 00:12:43.951
perspective.
00:12:44.311 --> 00:12:46.211
And as an American,
00:12:46.692 --> 00:12:50.575
I tend to see American culture as being
00:12:51.355 --> 00:12:53.355
exceptional to both the positive and
00:12:53.395 --> 00:12:53.716
negative.
00:12:54.437 --> 00:12:56.197
So we think that everything bad happens to
00:12:56.238 --> 00:12:57.438
us is the worst thing that's happening in
00:12:57.458 --> 00:12:57.719
the world.
00:12:58.876 --> 00:12:59.976
I think if we can stop,
00:13:00.256 --> 00:13:01.658
if we can decenter ourselves,
00:13:01.957 --> 00:13:04.498
if we can start listening to what other
00:13:04.518 --> 00:13:05.857
people are doing in other countries and
00:13:05.918 --> 00:13:11.499
how authoritarianism manifests for them,
00:13:11.558 --> 00:13:14.320
how they survive under authoritarianism,
00:13:15.419 --> 00:13:17.039
how they thrive under authoritarianism
00:13:17.100 --> 00:13:17.299
even,
00:13:17.840 --> 00:13:19.341
I think we can learn useful skills that
00:13:19.360 --> 00:13:23.561
we can take to our everyday.
00:13:23.841 --> 00:13:25.961
If you have somebody that's living in a
00:13:26.001 --> 00:13:26.861
country that has
00:13:27.673 --> 00:13:30.096
um tight internet controls right they they
00:13:30.116 --> 00:13:31.898
have different ways of getting information
00:13:32.018 --> 00:13:33.620
out right and we can learn from that
00:13:34.441 --> 00:13:37.003
because there is always another thing that
00:13:37.023 --> 00:13:39.265
can come up uh for us here right
00:13:39.365 --> 00:13:40.706
if we don't have if we don't start
00:13:40.746 --> 00:13:42.749
developing those skills now then we're
00:13:42.769 --> 00:13:45.091
going to be sorely missing them when the
00:13:45.130 --> 00:13:47.494
time comes that we should need them so
00:13:47.514 --> 00:13:50.096
for me internationalism is a process of
00:13:50.155 --> 00:13:51.677
decentering and listening and learning
00:13:53.043 --> 00:13:53.783
I love that.
00:13:53.803 --> 00:13:54.605
That is gold.
00:13:55.184 --> 00:13:58.126
And you had said earlier that for a
00:13:58.167 --> 00:14:00.028
lot of people, this isn't anything new.
00:14:00.128 --> 00:14:01.328
As someone who was living in
00:14:01.389 --> 00:14:02.168
Charlottesville,
00:14:03.090 --> 00:14:05.030
who saw this nearly ten years ago,
00:14:05.410 --> 00:14:06.692
nothing new.
00:14:06.731 --> 00:14:08.972
For black, indigenous, brown people,
00:14:09.033 --> 00:14:11.374
trans people, this is nothing new.
00:14:11.594 --> 00:14:15.216
What's making this be such a...
00:14:16.356 --> 00:14:18.038
big talking point now is that it's
00:14:18.078 --> 00:14:21.341
affecting white, cis, Christian people,
00:14:21.562 --> 00:14:22.883
right?
00:14:23.244 --> 00:14:25.686
And likewise,
00:14:26.787 --> 00:14:29.870
I feel like we've long been doing the
00:14:29.929 --> 00:14:34.333
studies of Frantz Fanon, Kwame Nkrumah,
00:14:34.374 --> 00:14:34.734
whatever,
00:14:35.654 --> 00:14:37.277
We just haven't been doing, I guess,
00:14:37.317 --> 00:14:39.278
a good enough job collectively,
00:14:39.317 --> 00:14:41.701
those of us who have been talking to
00:14:41.740 --> 00:14:43.081
people or reading these books,
00:14:43.461 --> 00:14:45.264
of getting that message out there.
00:14:45.663 --> 00:14:46.825
How do we learn?
00:14:48.066 --> 00:14:49.927
But we just have to keep doing what
00:14:49.947 --> 00:14:50.528
we're doing.
00:14:50.729 --> 00:14:54.011
And it's because of what we're doing that
00:14:54.072 --> 00:14:56.193
the far right doesn't like people like us.
00:14:56.333 --> 00:14:58.355
Even having these conversations goes
00:14:58.395 --> 00:15:00.256
against everything that they're preaching
00:15:00.817 --> 00:15:01.678
and fighting for.
00:15:03.739 --> 00:15:05.600
We're the people who counter protest their
00:15:05.620 --> 00:15:07.640
hate rallies, expose their crimes,
00:15:07.701 --> 00:15:09.600
fight for equality and justice.
00:15:10.860 --> 00:15:11.682
So to that end,
00:15:11.881 --> 00:15:13.402
that's why you and I have both been
00:15:13.442 --> 00:15:14.022
targets.
00:15:14.942 --> 00:15:16.942
I am thankful I've never been swatted.
00:15:17.163 --> 00:15:18.624
I doubt I would have handled it as
00:15:18.663 --> 00:15:19.524
well as you did,
00:15:20.323 --> 00:15:21.965
but I have been doxxed by the likes
00:15:22.004 --> 00:15:22.825
of Andy Ngo.
00:15:23.245 --> 00:15:25.686
And so I can relate to that part
00:15:26.166 --> 00:15:27.145
and it's not fun.
00:15:28.145 --> 00:15:29.746
I'm now prepared, I'll say that.
00:15:30.346 --> 00:15:32.269
So let's close out with that.
00:15:32.589 --> 00:15:34.410
I hate closing on the negative.
00:15:34.431 --> 00:15:36.373
So maybe you can give us a lesson
00:15:36.452 --> 00:15:36.932
from this,
00:15:36.972 --> 00:15:38.914
something positive we can take away from
00:15:38.995 --> 00:15:39.075
it.
00:15:39.475 --> 00:15:43.519
But it is obviously such a big theme
00:15:43.578 --> 00:15:45.221
for all of us who are doing this
00:15:45.280 --> 00:15:45.600
work.
00:15:45.760 --> 00:15:46.341
And of course,
00:15:46.381 --> 00:15:48.543
it's like the clickbait for listeners.
00:15:48.624 --> 00:15:51.866
So tell us what happened after
00:15:51.907 --> 00:15:53.087
Charlottesville happened.
00:15:53.327 --> 00:15:54.989
How did you end up being doxed and
00:15:55.048 --> 00:15:55.589
swatted?
00:15:56.028 --> 00:15:58.269
What was the physical and emotional toll?
00:15:58.630 --> 00:15:59.311
And again, like,
00:15:59.551 --> 00:16:00.932
did you learn something from this?
00:16:00.971 --> 00:16:02.893
Did you take something positive away?
00:16:02.913 --> 00:16:05.014
And if so, what was it?
00:16:05.153 --> 00:16:06.995
Yeah, I think, you know, of course,
00:16:07.195 --> 00:16:08.735
in the aftermath, as I was,
00:16:09.956 --> 00:16:11.537
I was pressing charges against the Nazi in
00:16:11.576 --> 00:16:14.118
the aftermath of Unite the Right.
00:16:14.378 --> 00:16:15.938
And I was doing a lot of work
00:16:15.958 --> 00:16:17.379
to expose a lot of the people who
00:16:17.419 --> 00:16:18.821
came in and did a lot of violence
00:16:18.841 --> 00:16:19.480
to our community.
00:16:20.884 --> 00:16:21.284
And of course,
00:16:21.304 --> 00:16:22.326
that was going to make me a target.
00:16:22.405 --> 00:16:24.046
And people did dox me and they swatted
00:16:24.086 --> 00:16:24.206
me.
00:16:24.225 --> 00:16:26.586
And there's only so many things that you
00:16:26.607 --> 00:16:27.947
can do to prevent that, right?
00:16:28.048 --> 00:16:29.249
I'm a homeowner, right?
00:16:29.349 --> 00:16:31.109
I bought a house in my wife.
00:16:31.168 --> 00:16:33.671
And I can't do much about those public
00:16:33.711 --> 00:16:34.091
records.
00:16:34.150 --> 00:16:35.530
And that's kind of out there, right?
00:16:35.591 --> 00:16:36.711
I could sell the house, I can move,
00:16:36.772 --> 00:16:38.091
but we don't want to do that.
00:16:38.231 --> 00:16:41.433
And so there's only so much that I
00:16:41.453 --> 00:16:41.793
could do to
00:16:43.101 --> 00:16:44.322
I do think that we have a small
00:16:44.361 --> 00:16:46.802
community here in Charlottesville.
00:16:46.842 --> 00:16:49.004
And part of that means that you do
00:16:49.024 --> 00:16:50.303
have to look at the community
00:16:50.364 --> 00:16:51.283
holistically, right?
00:16:52.644 --> 00:16:54.085
And, you know, I don't love the police,
00:16:54.144 --> 00:16:55.585
but I can definitely talk to the police
00:16:55.605 --> 00:16:56.164
and be like, hey,
00:16:56.225 --> 00:16:58.105
so I just want you to know that
00:16:58.125 --> 00:17:00.405
I'm not going to cause a mass shooting.
00:17:00.525 --> 00:17:01.405
I'm not going to go do a mass
00:17:01.426 --> 00:17:01.726
shooting.
00:17:01.767 --> 00:17:02.647
So if you do get one of these
00:17:02.667 --> 00:17:04.027
calls, it's probably a SWAT thing.
00:17:04.067 --> 00:17:04.646
Here's my number.
00:17:04.686 --> 00:17:05.826
Call me first.
00:17:07.067 --> 00:17:07.728
You can always do that.
00:17:07.768 --> 00:17:08.307
If I pick up,
00:17:09.127 --> 00:17:10.449
I'll pick up and tell you, you know,
00:17:10.608 --> 00:17:11.288
this is not the case.
00:17:11.308 --> 00:17:12.288
And that's actually what happened.
00:17:13.326 --> 00:17:13.846
I wasn't home.
00:17:13.906 --> 00:17:15.127
Thankfully, my wife wasn't home.
00:17:15.528 --> 00:17:15.988
They called me.
00:17:16.008 --> 00:17:17.147
They said, hey, we got this call.
00:17:17.188 --> 00:17:17.688
Of course, they did.
00:17:18.067 --> 00:17:19.588
They called me after they sent out the
00:17:20.068 --> 00:17:20.628
men with guns.
00:17:20.669 --> 00:17:23.670
But you can do things like that.
00:17:23.789 --> 00:17:25.430
And I do think that even as we
00:17:25.450 --> 00:17:26.290
work towards abolition,
00:17:26.310 --> 00:17:28.851
we also have to look at the community
00:17:28.871 --> 00:17:30.432
and the world that we live in today.
00:17:31.991 --> 00:17:33.211
And so I think that that was part
00:17:33.251 --> 00:17:33.472
of it.
00:17:33.752 --> 00:17:35.212
I think what I took away from
00:17:36.086 --> 00:17:37.167
This experience, you know,
00:17:37.268 --> 00:17:38.969
I did move to Germany to try to
00:17:39.128 --> 00:17:41.570
lower the heat a little bit and largely
00:17:41.611 --> 00:17:43.372
for my safety and my mental health and
00:17:43.612 --> 00:17:44.613
to, as I said,
00:17:45.213 --> 00:17:47.375
put myself in a different perspective.
00:17:49.135 --> 00:17:50.938
But one thing that I learned in the
00:17:51.057 --> 00:17:52.919
sort of, you know,
00:17:52.959 --> 00:17:55.141
full aftermath of Unite the Right was I
00:17:55.181 --> 00:17:59.804
was surprised by the people I knew that
00:18:00.023 --> 00:18:01.224
suddenly didn't have my back.
00:18:02.384 --> 00:18:04.506
People I'd known for years who didn't even
00:18:04.546 --> 00:18:05.685
call to say like, hey,
00:18:05.726 --> 00:18:06.507
how are you doing?
00:18:06.707 --> 00:18:07.307
Are you all right?
00:18:07.326 --> 00:18:08.146
Do you need anything?
00:18:09.307 --> 00:18:10.508
And I was surprised by the people who
00:18:10.548 --> 00:18:10.768
did.
00:18:11.188 --> 00:18:13.388
And I think that if there's a positive
00:18:13.429 --> 00:18:14.609
that I've taken away from that,
00:18:14.730 --> 00:18:18.530
it was that it made me value certain
00:18:18.570 --> 00:18:20.231
relationships a lot more.
00:18:21.067 --> 00:18:24.832
um it really sharpens like you know what
00:18:25.392 --> 00:18:26.712
i need to look for in the people
00:18:26.732 --> 00:18:28.694
that i have around me what they're trying
00:18:28.714 --> 00:18:31.076
to do um you know how we can
00:18:31.116 --> 00:18:33.459
help each other uh how we can rely
00:18:33.499 --> 00:18:36.122
on each other and uh you know i've
00:18:36.162 --> 00:18:38.022
not always been perfect they've not always
00:18:38.042 --> 00:18:40.005
been perfect but it it puts it in
00:18:40.144 --> 00:18:43.587
like it makes community more of a concrete
00:18:43.868 --> 00:18:45.569
thing like community is more of a verb
00:18:45.789 --> 00:18:46.310
at that point
00:18:47.607 --> 00:18:48.528
And so I think that that's what I've
00:18:48.568 --> 00:18:49.269
taken away from it.
00:18:49.328 --> 00:18:50.489
That's a lot of the reason why I
00:18:50.528 --> 00:18:53.589
moved back is I want to be in
00:18:53.609 --> 00:18:54.089
my home.
00:18:54.150 --> 00:18:55.471
I want to be with my people,
00:18:55.570 --> 00:18:56.230
my community.
00:18:56.990 --> 00:18:57.832
And I want to be able to do
00:18:57.852 --> 00:18:59.251
the things to build the world that I
00:18:59.271 --> 00:18:59.751
want to see.
00:19:00.712 --> 00:19:02.492
And a lot of that is not,
00:19:02.772 --> 00:19:03.433
you know,
00:19:03.453 --> 00:19:04.973
we're not going to react to every single
00:19:05.013 --> 00:19:05.854
thing that Trump does.
00:19:06.114 --> 00:19:07.315
You know, we can't stop that.
00:19:08.535 --> 00:19:09.655
What we can do is we can help
00:19:09.695 --> 00:19:12.257
feed the hungry people in our community.
00:19:12.457 --> 00:19:14.797
We can help provide shelter and warmth to
00:19:14.817 --> 00:19:16.417
the houseless people in our community.
00:19:17.115 --> 00:19:18.176
And those are the things that I think
00:19:18.217 --> 00:19:18.916
we're doing, right?
00:19:19.857 --> 00:19:21.398
And whatever he wants to do about
00:19:21.439 --> 00:19:23.240
bathrooms and Project Twenty Twenty-Five
00:19:23.300 --> 00:19:24.000
and all of that stuff,
00:19:24.142 --> 00:19:25.442
I can't do anything about it.
00:19:25.702 --> 00:19:26.864
I can get angry about it.
00:19:28.605 --> 00:19:30.926
I can call my senator for a lot
00:19:30.946 --> 00:19:32.087
of good that that does, right?
00:19:33.509 --> 00:19:34.348
At the end of the day,
00:19:35.750 --> 00:19:37.751
I'm focusing on things that I can actually
00:19:37.771 --> 00:19:38.553
make an impact on.
00:19:39.032 --> 00:19:40.134
That's going to be local.
00:19:40.173 --> 00:19:41.994
That's going to be here with my people,
00:19:42.015 --> 00:19:42.655
with my community.
00:19:43.479 --> 00:19:44.298
That's beautiful.
00:19:44.779 --> 00:19:47.461
I'm really thankful that you were able to
00:19:47.520 --> 00:19:52.022
return and feel part of your community
00:19:52.063 --> 00:19:52.462
again.
00:19:52.903 --> 00:19:56.444
And that is becoming a running theme
00:19:56.644 --> 00:19:59.726
across experts, across industries,
00:19:59.786 --> 00:20:01.606
so to speak, or specialties.
00:20:01.926 --> 00:20:03.827
Everyone is kind of saying the same thing,
00:20:03.948 --> 00:20:06.028
and it's exciting to me because it's what
00:20:06.068 --> 00:20:08.150
I've been preaching for a very long time,
00:20:08.650 --> 00:20:09.371
mutual aid.
00:20:10.070 --> 00:20:11.752
Thank you so much, Emily.
00:20:11.834 --> 00:20:12.914
This was amazing.
00:20:13.675 --> 00:20:15.459
What a great guest for Global Warning.
00:20:15.538 --> 00:20:17.902
I've learned a ton, as has my audience,
00:20:18.001 --> 00:20:18.623
I'm sure.
00:20:19.344 --> 00:20:20.085
Be safe.
00:20:20.766 --> 00:20:22.268
Keep up the incredible work.
00:20:22.528 --> 00:20:24.049
Thank you again.
00:20:24.069 --> 00:20:24.391
Thank you.
00:20:27.480 --> 00:20:28.922
Okay, well, if you're listening,
00:20:29.001 --> 00:20:31.364
be sure to like, comment, and share,
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and then subscribe.
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And for exclusive benefits,
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become an official member.
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This episode was sponsored by Zevo Life
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Superfood, Good Feels Cannabis Seltzer,
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and Shimmerwood CBD Infused Seltzers.
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Exclusive discounts using code WARNING.
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Link in video description.
00:20:48.676 --> 00:20:51.118
Thank you again to Emily Gorsensky for an
00:20:51.159 --> 00:20:52.259
incredible episode,
00:20:52.519 --> 00:20:54.121
and we'll see you for Global Warning
00:20:54.320 --> 00:20:55.021
number five.
00:20:57.259 --> 00:21:00.040
War is immoral, poverty is immoral,
00:21:00.340 --> 00:21:01.622
racism is immoral,
00:21:01.883 --> 00:21:03.604
police brutality is immoral,
00:21:03.824 --> 00:21:04.944
oppression is immoral,
00:21:05.164 --> 00:21:06.365
genocide is immoral,
00:21:06.586 --> 00:21:07.886
imperialism is immoral.
00:21:08.208 --> 00:21:10.429
This country represents all those things.