Over in the Sunshine State. Ronda Santis has declared himself a general in the
War on Woke, and he's attacking teachers, medical providers, and marginalized communities
all to score political points. Schools have become political battlefields, and educators are
fleeing faster than Floridians in a rainstorm. Florida's teacher to population ratio has plummeting
faster than a roller coast. Also, strict anti abortion and anti translaws are
scaring away medical provider leading to longer wait times than ers and less attention in
Classter. It's like a never ending roller coaster over there in Florida, and
these battles are leaving more scorched earth than sunny days. But grab your popcorn
and stay tuned for more drama. This article is from The Sun Sentinel by
Ray Liner from October twenty ninth, twenty twenty three. Jimmy Junior, what
do you have to say? I thought that the author's comment that these policies
and laws have created an incubator for harm in similar states was really brilliant,
because I've never really associated the term incubator with kind of the birthplaces, if
you will, of some of these more harmful laws that seem to transcend state
lines. And so we know that a lot of these states that share maybe
similar values, similar demographics, kind of have these same harmful laws taking effect.
They've seen it all across maybe the Deep South. But I really don't
want to harp too much on that because I want to pivot to another point.
Just a personal pet peeve of mine, and that's hearing politicians, among
others, use warlike terms and inflammatory rhetoric to describe issues regarding legislation. So
when I hear like athletes, for example, talking about, you know,
we're at war or we're bringing out the big guns, or hear certain groups
taking a certain position, politicians, you know, political parties, whatever that
may be, it always strikes me as like being a little bit cringe worthy.
Might be due to some of my military service, maybe some of the
images that I have in mind, but whatever the case, I try not
to romanticize this kind of thinking or this kind of imagery or stance. But
while it may not necessarily be warlike, or I think it might be cringe
worthy. Like I said, on the other hand, this kind of thinking
really does make it warlike for the people that are being victimized and who are
on the receiving end. So we have like members of the African American or
LGBTQ excuse me, LGBTQ communities that have really been impacted by harsh laws that
really seek to discriminate people, and so they might feel like they are in
some kind of crisis, some existential threat is taking place because they have people
with this warlike combative mindset. And I really just think that it's this kind
of language and this kind of attitude that causes people to fear for their own
safety, their own futures, their children, really is quite divisive. So
I'm sick and tired of hearing politicians equate legislation to battlefield because it does nothing
but put other people on edge and makes everybody anxious, and it's really just
inappropriate in my mind. What do you think? Yeah, I think the
entire JOPI movement right now is based on fascist principles and nothing else, the
main one being the strong man defense. You know that you need, you
absolutely need a strong man in order to get out of whatever solution situation you
are right now, and the idea that only a strong man can solve the
party or the country's issues. It runs deep in the US is psyche.
Uh, it's because it's intertwined with the gun culture, exceptionalism, misogyny,
and and other deeply deeply rooted ways of thinking. And you know, every
hero needs a villain, so if you don't have a villain, you just
make one up. And that's what the UP has been doing since pretty much
Reagan, with increasing strength and precision. Work is great because it's a vay
word, and every time you see on camera a right winger asked to define
it, they just can't because it's too vague, and so it's it's it's
it's really great for for for them because you can ascribe to it whatever you
want, whatever you don't like. So it's pretty much like communism back in
the day, the previous iteration of the same trigger world. So it's not
surprising to realize that this so called war on woke basically shoots itself in the
foot because the population is meant to attract is already known to vote against its
own interest very very often. They're against socialism, as they say, well
at the same time being the population with the highest use of footstems and federal
assistance so yeah, you have one population that's flamed up with with the use
of that of that world so that they can vote against their own interest by
people who just want to rule them and not lead them. So it's I
don't see how the US can can get out of this in the current situation.
One quick point note that Jimmy Jr. You were talking about the warlike
language, and it always seems like the people who use that kind of language
aren't the people who have actually been there, So you know, it's kind
of a weird dichotomy to me. But I'm going to be the odd man
out on this segment. I think one of the things I really had a
real problem with this article about was that the author seems to think that the
whole thing started in Florida. It's all about Florida. The whole war on
woke is Florida, and it's just spreading out from Florida, And that's not
the case. DeSantis is just following a playbook that was already established. Has
he been able to implement it better? Yes, Because he's the governor of
a large state. He's gotten a lot of press lately because he's running for
president. As he runs for president and he's losing. He's getting a little
bit more radical and a little bit more anti woke. But I don't think
we can blame this all on DeSantis. I don't think he's a good guy
in any way, shape or form. But I think we have to remember
that this isn't just a Florida thing. This is a nationwide thing. And
just this week he was endorsed by the governor of Iowa, of all places,
Kim Reynolds, and she's been overseeing her state in pretty much the same
exact way. So, like I say, I want to make it clear
that this is not just Ron DeSantis. This is going on everywhere, and
I'm going to pass it down to Aaron. Yeah. So don't forget that
the word woke they seem to kind of be using as a pejorative, but
what really means just being kind to people and listening to what they have to
say, and listening and believing them when they share their experiences, When they
when they share their experiences that are negative in the world and that cause them
pain, we just we just need to they want us. We need to
listen and help them and make the world a better place for everybody. And
this war on Woke is really annoying at best because it just shows that the
GOP really they really have no policy platform anymore. They really have no laws
that they want to put forth other than culture war bs. They just they
want they want people to be who they want them to be instead of trying
to make this country a better place and pass laws that actually help people,
laws that actually help move us forward and make our country a better place.
And how do we get out of this mess? I think Cindy asked that
is going to take a lot of work from a lot of people to combat
these ideas and to stand up and show up and and and and you know,
counteract these policies and these these ideas. Jimmy, Yeah, I like
that you kind of pointed to Cindy's analysis because I thought it was very astute.
And I think the idea of needing a strong man, especially in the
GOP or what we understand now to be the GOP. I think that some
former Republicans would argue that the Republican Party is dead and is long gone,
but what we identify now as the Republican Party, I think it's it's very
much in their playbook and to Kelly's point about Rod DeSantis becoming more enraged,
more more boisterous in his approach to how he kind of sends his message out,
I think is very much the playbook as well. I think we're seeing
a person that realizes they're probably not gonna achieve the goals that they want,
I'll say that, and so they're just reacting harshly. I also think that
while it's not spreading in Florida, or not necessarily only in Florida, Kelly,
I will say that the Governor of Iowa's endorsement is probably just made in
an attempt to kind of divert away from the MAGA crowd, and they probably
see DeSantis is the only real alternative instead of going down the road of MAGA,
which surprisingly I think a lot of Republicans actually don't want to do.
Probably many of them feel compelled to do it. But anyway, what I
wanted to get to though, was that this all is not in just Florida.
To Kelly's point, you know a lot of these states are attacking doctors,
they're attacking teachers. The mass exodus of teachers that this article references is
something that is incredibly important I think to our country because as we see them,
as we see them move on because they're expected to take on more for
not any increased pay, things like you know, expecting to provide security and
overall health and welfare to children, when when they're really not getting recognized for
those things, they're dealing with heavy government intervention telling them how they can and
can't teach, what they can and can't do in the classroom. That is
so far outside of what's expected for a teacher. You know, a teacher
should be able to relate to their students, but this kind of anti woke
legislation is preventing them from doing that. And so we're starting to see that
this warlike tone, this strong man trying to lash out at whoever they can,
often victimizing teachers and doctors and students in states like Florida, but not
only Florida, And so I think everybody's analysis kind of comes together in that
way. How does this relate to what we do at the ACA, Well,
it's because Christianity and these rights wingers tend to hijack the moral high ground
and kind of point the finger at the rest of us who don't agree with
him and call us woke. As a pejorative like Aaron manche Sidney. Yeah,
the summer thing that I wanted to address. The first one is the
reason why the article calls Florida the incubator of this war on woke is because
the scientists made it his trademark and he was elected for that. And remember
he was elected in a landslide. So on one hand, it's what he
wants, But on the other hand, he's also stuck now because even though
he realizes that many of his positions are too extreme to be accepted by most
of the population of Florida, he's stuck with it because people ask for it,
and he knows that if he doesn't provide, he won't be re elected
and he wants to be president one day, so he cannot fail. So
he is stuck right now. And I would love to be in his inner
circle, to be able to speak to him and see what's what's in his
mind, because how do you succeed in in flaming people if you don't believe
yourself what you're selling. I mean, it's and I'm not trying to evoke
sympathy for him because he really doesn't deserve it, but it's still quite interesting
a position to be in in my opinion. So yeah, Kelly, Well,
I did do a little bit of diving into some of the problems that
were mentioned in this and one of them was that there was a shortage of
obgy obgyns in Florida. And it turns out it's not about the war and
woke and it's again something that's happening all across the United States. In fact,
the US Department of Health and Human Services estimates the will be a shortage
of into it, there'll be a shortage of five thousand obgyns and twenty thirty
all across the country. And this isn't a new trend either. It's been
going on for decades because of the ever increasing population, and Florida is one
of the states where the population has been increasing the fastest and the longer the
problem goes on. The more people are being born, and they just aren't
getting enough people to do the doctoring, which may be an economic problem since
the job doesn't pay as well as it did, say thirty years ago.
Cost of education insurance is skyrocketed. Doctor Ashley Hill with Advent Health in Florida,
whose job it is to recruit obgyns says the lack of doctors applying to
these programs in central Florida has little to do with state restrictions and more to
do with the population. In fact, she says, one of the reasons
we have a shortage is we are not training enough younger doctors who are taking
the place of older doctors who are retiring and all of the people moving into
this area. And then she goes on to say that only a handful of
prospective recruits have actually mentioned Florida as abortion restriction, so apparently that's not causing
a shortage of doctors in the area. However, and you mentioned it,
teachers, this has on the other side of the coin, this has hurt
edge vucation really really bigly on the Is there a single school with or library
board actually anywhere in the country that hasn't experienced something like this or had to
deal with somebody. I live in a place where there's like very few people
on our library board and our local school board has both had war on woke
people running for the boards been very vocal at meetings and yeah, it's happening
everywhere, just everywhere. I want to get like quick thirty second answers and
ask because I think education is probably what's hurt been hurt the most, but
I'd like to get a quick thirty second answer from the panel to see what
they think. Aaron, what do you think has been hurt the most by
the war on Woke? Well, education certainly has been hurt. Education is
critical to a functioning democracy. I think the war on Woke is just our
ability. The biggest thing that's been hit is our ability to listen and believe
people and compromise and try to make the world a better place. I mean,
when you when you turn other people's experiences into a war, that's you're
just You're not going to be able to move forward. You're not going to
be able to be harmonious and come together. Jimmy, I think the quality
of education that students are going to receive is going to decline, if it
hasn't already having a mass exodus of teachers who have already gone through the training
and education to be able to do their job leave, who are they getting
replaced with people that are you know, fast tracking their training or who maybe
are not as qualified and a probably the second or third tier in the hiring
pool. And so I think that the education system as a whole, especially
in these states that have these laws that target teachers, are probably going to
suffer. Sure, I think that'll be a long term problem to analyze,
but it's certainly not a good thing when one of the professions that's so critically
undermanned starts to see a mass excidity. Yeah. I agree that education is
going to suffer a lot. But to me, the worst thing about this
so called on woke is that, as Aaron said earlier, Walk is just
trying to be nice. And when this is uh turning too being the bad
the bad guy, it means that the assholes are being the nice ones and
and and and that reverse is to me, uh, the scariest part of
of all of this, because suddenly you live in a society where collaboration is
not seen as neither beneficial or even even a good thing. So the US
is already very very uh a place where being competitive and uh and where singiler
people are are always always a better view than than collectivities. And so I
think that this is getting worse, much worse, And and I again I
don't see how you can go back against that. All right, thanks,
And nobody mentioned the marginal as of minority communities, including the LGBTQ community,
which I think is a big problem to you. I'm not sure which is
worse that one or the education, but they're right up there with each other.
To me quick update, in the recent elections, the War on WO
candidates did not do very well in school board elections all across the country,
so that's maybe a hopeful thing. And I want to mention that if you
want to check out lots of cool ACA merchandise, you can go to tiny
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