Speaker 1: We're Tom A Lorenzo and this is the Pop Style
Opinion Fest. Hell look at is welcome back to another
edition of the Pso I am the Tea and you're
Telo Tom Fitzgerald, and I'm here with the low and
your Tilo Lorenzo because a little boy, how are you?
Speaker 2: Lovely?
Speaker 3: Hugon thought about it. I don't think I could repeat
that what you just.
Speaker 1: I have tried to repeat it when we're not in
front of microphones and I can't do it. And no
one else knows this, but Lorenzo knows this. I have
to close my eyes when I do it or I
get completely You have no many times. You have no
idea how many times we've had to re record because
I screwed up the INTROI anyway, Yeah, it's not like
one time and we did a live podcast on our
last book tour in New York and I had to
do that in front of a crowd, and I was
I actually said, I'm like, I'm really sorry. I need
to close my eyes while I do this.
Speaker 2: I can't.
Speaker 1: I can't face you all while I'm doing it.
Speaker 4: Funny anyway, Oh, serious, serious, serious topic. That's week and
it's one of those topics that's like, well, do we
want to weigh in on this, and then it became
more like, well, if we don't weigh in on this,
it becomes weird. Obviously, if you clicked on this and
you're listening to this, you already know that the topic
is Jimmy Kimmel's suspension by ABC after the FCC came
down on him for making comments about right wing activist
Charlie Kirk's assassination that the FCC found questionable. So let's
start with this. This is not a podcast about Trump.
We're not talking about Trump. This is damn sure not
a podcast about Charlie Kirk. We're not talking about that
guy at all. I have no interest in making them
part of my work coverage. I just know not doing it,
not doing it, And I would ask that anybody who
comes to our site to talk about this podcast please
remember that we are not talking about that. Part of
the reason, well part of the reason we're not talking
about that is it's not our remit it's you know,
we're we're celebrity style bloggers, we're pop culture bloggers. And
I've had this argument with many readers and social media
people over the years it's not what people come for
us for. And if we start making ourselves part of
the hashtag resistance or whatever, our business well, and this
is not a hobby for us, it's our business. We've
got to keep it afloat.
Speaker 3: I've mentioned this before. We have very strong openions about
a lot of things, you know, we you know, we
read every day what's what's out there. We're we're aware
of what's what's out there, and we're very politically in
a way, but we just don't think that that's the
place our site is the platform for that. We just
don't don't want to do it. And one of the
reasons why we don't want to do it is because
we get attacked and people start turning against us, right
and our business and what we do, which has nothing
to do.
Speaker 1: With it exactly.
Speaker 2: So so we don't see the point.
Speaker 3: I used to tweet a lot, I used to do
a lot of stuff, but then I would wake up
the next day and there was just like stuff that
I had to work on, you know, Like it's so
much work to defend yourself, to defend yourself, to explain yourself,
to tell people that that's not what you said. It's
pretty much it when it comes to social media is
to explain that you didn't say that. So it's just exhausting.
I don't feel like doing that anymore. That's why I
haven't said anything about anything, although many many times I've
wanted to, but you know, it's just not worth it.
Speaker 1: I also think I just want to make the point
here that you know, we we we don't comment on politics,
not out of it's not a fear of that.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 1: No, people tend to read out we have a business
to protect, and they think it's some sort of fear thing.
But I got to ask, is your local pizza parlor
hanging anti Trump signs out in their window? They're not.
They've got a business to run. We all do. You're
not putting anti Trump stuff on your desk at work
because you got to go to work every day.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: It's a very delicate situation for a lot of people,
and that's why, without getting to the YouTube, it's why
so many celebrities are saying things they're saying because they
you know, like any fan base you have, you have
people with various opinions and you know, and ideas of
how things should be done. So people are just I
don't know. Some people are being careful, some people feel
like that the need to be a little more I
don't know, a polite or diplomatic about it. I mean,
it's just a mess out there, and I don't feel
like being part of it, to be honest.
Speaker 1: And yeah, and again it's not a fear thing or
anything like that for myself at least. I think one
of the main problems with our modern politics is that
too many people who don't know what they're talking about
have a literal microph phone. And I'm saying this as
I talk into my microphone. I am not an expert
on policy or politics or any of that. I'm very
well read, but you shouldn't be coming to me for stuff.
You should be coming to experts for that sort of stuff.
Which is why we live in an age where literally
everybody can just weigh in on everything, and subsequently, people
like us who have a platform are sometimes expected to
weigh in on everything, and we refuse to do so.
Having said that, when Kimmel's suspension came down, I don't
even know did we talk about Colbert on the podcast.
I think we might have talked about it briefly, but
when the Kimmel suspension came down and this was just
yesterday where the you know, it was Wednesday night. Actually,
Lorenzo and I had to talk like, well are we
what are we doing here? Like are we talking about this?
Because again, these things all wind up affecting us in
weird ways that maybe the casual reader or listener doesn't understand.
But I would say fifteen percent of our celebrity style coverage.
Twenty percent maybe is late night talk shows.
Speaker 2: We do a lot of yeah shows, Yeah.
Speaker 1: And a lot of times those pictures are sent to
us by the studios because they're promoting their own talk shows,
which means we get those pictures for free, which is
unusual because all the other red carpet pictures on our
site tend to be licensed. We have to pay a
lot of money for those. So from a business perspective,
it was very smart of us to start covering these
things because we didn't always have to pay for the pictures.
It was a lot less. Grandio sent a red carpet
and we were talking about people who at least some
of our viewers saw them on TV the night before
wearing that outfit, so it's a place for them to
come it's actually one of my favorite things. In some ways,
it's more interesting to talk about talk show outfits than
it is about red carpet outfits, because a red carpet outfit,
you're just standing there and posing, like that's really all
you're doing. Millions of people are going to see those pictures,
but only a handful of people are going to watch
the actual videos where you were interviewed on that red carpet.
But you know, millions of people watch a talk show,
and not only that, but you have to talk. You're
not standing there imposing, so you're creating an entire persona
while you're trying to sell a product, And to me,
that's one of the more interesting ways celebrities use fashion.
One of the things we noted in the last year
was that talk show ensembles have become more and more
grandiose in the last year or so. It's not a
it's not a style turn that I'm actually in love with,
because I think the good thing about talk shows is
it allows stars not to be grandios. Anyway, long story,
love rambling here, but my point is the reason we're
weighing in on this is because this stuff actually does
affect us and we wanted to talk about why and
how and not really get into the politics of it,
although that's largely unavoidable. Yeah, let me stayed up front.
This is a serious series, a serious free speech issue,
and we should all be mobilized for whether you like
Jimmy Kimmel or not. We should not be in a
situation where people lose their jobs because they have said
something that the people in power don't like.
Speaker 3: Right, they should be criticized if they say something that
it's way out of line. But exactly, but that doesn't
mean that they Yes, but we also can't have a
so called free speech that it's cited.
Speaker 2: One way exactly. We can't.
Speaker 3: I mean, we can't like, you know, having people criticize
people for saying something when they when they go out
there and say something and I'm not criticized for what
they said. It's not there, right, Uh, it's not right.
It's a serious matter actually, So it's complicated. But you know,
it's not we're not saying that we agree with anything.
It's not we're not saying that we agree with with
Jimmy Kimmel said. It's just that people should have the
right to see certain things. I mean Obviously there is
a limit to you know, what you can do and
not be criticized for it, But you still have the
right to say whatever you want. Yeah, I mean, listen,
I'm as a queer person, I've read and heard so
many things in my life, so many comments, so many
things said about me being queer or queer people in general.
That you know, that hurts me, That makes me very sad.
But at the same time, I can't go after every
person that says something against me.
Speaker 1: Now, of course, even if it's a.
Speaker 3: Horrible thing, I can criticize it, but I can't tell
these people to shut up.
Speaker 1: No, the lady upstairs is running her vacuum, so I'm
gonna looks like a short break and then we'll come
back and unpick this a little further. We're back. She
stopped vauuming upstairs, so one time we complained about her,
and someone came to our site and was so offended
because they thought we were dissing our maid. They thought
when we talked about the woman vacuuming upstairs that they
we were talking about the massive house that we live
in and the hired help. But I was like, boy,
you people, you really have an image of.
Speaker 3: Us, the lady on the back in our second floor.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the east wing was being vacuumed and she was
taking too long and we were complaining about her. Anyway
back to this, Okay, so you know, it is unavoidable
having this conversation and not mentioning Trump or politics at all.
So let me say that if you read Project twenty
twenty five at all, the document that was put out
during the campaign that explained in in tremendous detail what
they were planning to do if they got elected, a
lot of what they are doing is about exploiting loopholes
in systems that already exist, or exploiting weaknesses. It was
all I mean, this was why Project twenty twenty five
was so alarming, is because it was a very well
mapped out plan about exploiting all of these weaknesses in
our institutions and systems. And I'll just say this about
what's been going on for the last eight nine months
in this country. So not not dismissing the real harm
and pain that they have caused real people in large
to a large extent. So much of what the administration
is doing this year is about scaring people. It is
about making sure that dissent is as hard as possible to.
Speaker 2: Do, so that's one way to silence people.
Speaker 1: Right so they're doing it in a way that is
largely legal. And I mean, I don't know what sort
of court you know, people are gonna file charge, you know,
suits against them or anything, you know, court challenges, but
right now, a lot of what they're doing, even the
immigration stuff, a lot of the people it's it's because
of loopholes. It's because of loopholes that were never ever
utilized in the past, and they're they're just using them
to round up people. My point is this, everybody knows
that late night talk shows are dying. So one of
the one of the more insidious things about Colbert and
Kimmel essentially being fired is that they the people who
instituted these events, they don't think there's enough support for
these people too. In other words, they think that people
at Colbert and Kimmel are weakened because late night's not
making a lot of money. And anybody who looks at
television trends could tell you it's been a conversation for
years now. It's what Hacks has been about. The TV
show Hacks has been about. This is that it is
a dying form and it's not going to last another
ten years. Kimmel has said this. So what they what
the administration is doing is is, you know, going after
things that they don't like, that they think are weak
enough that they can get them removed from sight. And
that is what's happening here. I'm sorry, did you No?
Speaker 2: No, that's the thing.
Speaker 3: And the first target is the kind of show that
people have an opinion, that they're expressing their opinions to
millions of people watching.
Speaker 2: So that's not good.
Speaker 3: That's not good, and and that's why they need to
be They feel like they need to be silent. I'm
sure there are, there will be, or there are still
already going on forms of silence people in a way
that we won't even notice, like shows and move I'm
sure yeah, and other ways where you know, it's not
so clear, like talk shows, because talk shows you have
someone up up there talking about something or making fun
of something or mocking somebody, and it's just not acceptable.
Speaker 1: And this is what they're doing openly. This is the
kind of stuff that they are openly censoring. Imagine all
the million little ways people far less powerful than Kimmel
and Colbert are being silenced. And I say this again
as a publisher of independent media. It's scary out there.
I don't think Lorenzo and I are on anybody's radar
in terms of, you know, getting attacked by the administration
or whatever like that, although it's you know, like I said,
we're not talking about Charlie Kirk because I'm not getting
into that. But I guess my point is that we,
as members of independent media and as deep longtime observers
and critics of legacy media, we're in a very scary time.
And I'm not I mean, if people are listening to
this podcast and looking for a way forward or a
mode of action to take, I don't even know what
to tell you. I don't even know what to tell you.
I'm just unpacking all of this. There is a possible Well,
first off, let me tell you this that Disney is
receiving tremendous blowback. Yeah, and there has been some rumbling
in trade magazines like The Hollywood Reporter and Variety that
they're all scrambling. The board is scrambling, executives are scrambling.
They're trying to figure out how to put this fire
out right.
Speaker 3: Because one of the things you have to remember is
that when you make a decision like that, you not
appealing one hundred percent of the people who follow you
or support you by having, you know, subscribing to Year's
channel whatever. So there is going to be a section,
a part of your subscription base that will not like
what you did, right, and that's going to affect you.
Speaker 1: I don't know if people are going to suddenly boycott Disney.
I kind of find that a difficult proposite. I'm not
hanging my hopes on it. Do you I mean, do
you think all those Disney adults are going to stop
going to Disney parks? Do you think Disney World is
going to see I mean, maybe some Disney Plus subscriptions
will be uh, you know, I'm hoping Actually I'm considering
getting rid of ours because I don't really watch anything
on there anymore. I mean, we have subscriptions to every
streamer because of our work we just do.
Speaker 3: Right now, listen. I find it very hard and it's
hardening in a way to uh, for people to support
what is not necessarily affecting them.
Speaker 2: That's one thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's one thing I see out there, and I
see that in my family. I see that everywhere that
that you know, sometimes I see people doing things that
I'm like, but you know, they're against queer people, right right,
but they do it anyway, And what are you going
to do when these people are so close to you?
So I it's it's disappointing in a way, and I
see that people will continue doing the things they do
because it sometimes it's hard, like when we were, you know,
the Target issue going to Target and not shopping at
Target anymore and things like.
Speaker 1: That, you must be using Prime. You have to you know,
get to your subscription to the Washington Post and the
New York Times, and you're not supposed to be on Twitter,
and you're not supposed to be on Facebook, and you're
not supposed to be on Instagram. And can I just
say I need almost all of that to do the
business that I did.
Speaker 3: It is it is very, very difficult. So yeah, people, yes, exactly.
Speaker 1: And I'm not here to judge people who are not
making the choices that I would make. But canceling a
Disney Plus subscription and letting people know why is a
good way of is actually one of the very few
modes of action available to us as consumers.
Speaker 3: The bottom line is that these people only understand money.
That's the only thing to understand. These people have no
affiliation to anything as long as they make money. So
if you hit money, then yeah, you might see a change,
You might see some sort of like response.
Speaker 1: I think Lorenzo is a little more pessimistic about all
this than I am. I could be wrong. We haven't
talked this out, but I do think we are. I
do think change is possible. I do think. Let me
put it this way, Colbert and Kimmel, they're probably not
going anywhere. I mean, they may not be on network
television anymore. But I really don't think those guys are
going to hurt for work. And I don't think and
I don't think they do either. But I do want
to address something. Colbert said something when his show was
canceled about how he has a He has a staff
of two hundred people, so going after him meant that
those two hundred people were losing their jobs, which is awful,
of course, But this goes back to an earlier point
that I was trying to make, which is that the
model for late night talk shows and network television generally
just doesn't work anymore. And when he said he had
a two hundred person stayt. I don't begrudge any of
those people their jobs, but I'm like, we don't live
in an age where you need two hundred people to
put on a talk show. People are putting on talk
show podcasts and you know, talk shows on YouTube. Now, granted,
it wouldn't be the same thing. You probably wouldn't have
a huge studio audience, You probably wouldn't have a string
of assistance or anything like that. But Colbert and Kimmel
and anybody with the talent to do to be a
talk show host, they can continue what they're doing without
a two hundred person staff and a network seat. They could.
I would be a little shocked if like Netflix or
somebody else didn't start talking to these guys because they've
been fooling around with having a talk show with what's
his name now, Delaney, Not Delaney, the guy that's married
to libyam On that everybody got mad at him. I'm
having a form.
Speaker 2: I can't remember.
Speaker 1: Yeah, John Mulaney, I knew I had it right, I
said Delaney, but it was Melanie John Mlaney. He had
a podcast, he had a he has a show on Netflix.
It was a limited series sort of talk show experiment,
and it was a really cute idea. The one thing
I didn't quite understand about what he was doing was
that it it still looked like a network talk show,
and I was like, well, if you're going to do this,
you really kind of you got to get rid of
the traffics. And that usually means, I mean, it should
mean maybe rethinking things like do we need a big set,
do we need a big skyline in the background, do
we need a band? Do you need any of those
things to have a talk show? And you really don't, right.
Speaker 3: The thing is that yes, people working for them, they're
all going to have to look for another job.
Speaker 2: And that sucks.
Speaker 3: It does, It does sucks, and it's not easy. But
the those two they have more money and they can do.
You know, they have more money than God, So it's
not about money. If they really want to make a difference,
then then create a podcast, go to Netflix, go to
something smaller, right, and continue doing what you do. If
that's what you want to do, They're not going to
be They're not going to be suffering those two.
Speaker 1: No, I mean to look at Tucker Carlson got fired
from Fox News and immediately launched design exactly. I don't
know if he's making the same kind of money or
anything like that, but I don't think he's hurting and
I don't think he really lost much of an audience.
I'm not being flipping about this, but I do think
Colbert and Kimmel. Look, a lot of people have been
losing their jobs lately. Seven Wall just got laid off
on the rolling for Rolling Stone. They don't have a
TV critic anymore. Karen Attia the black that she was
the last black opinion columnist at the Washington Post. They
fired her for tweeting about Charlie Kirk. These people are
gonna have a much harder time than Jimmy Kimmel and
and and uh Colbert and Colbert. I was gonna Sayjimmy Fallon,
don't get me started on.
Speaker 3: Oh God, no, that one will always have a job.
Speaker 1: Well, you should have seen this monologue last night. It
was like the most you know, milk toast kind of
response to this sort of thing. Don't even get Yeah, No,
I can't stand that guy anyway, and I'll be perfectly blunted.
I think Jimmy Kimmel is kind of an asshole. I never
really thought he was, you know, and I actually think
Colbert was kind of judgmental and narrowminded in a lot
of ways. Got to a point they don't deserve that now.
Speaker 3: They got to a point that they they they had
too much power, too much money and control of things.
I'm not defending anything. I'm just saying that you get
to a point that you just don't see things the
way you should be seeing things anymore. And I'm not,
you know, justify anything. I'm just saying that maybe it's
time to, you know, rethink things. You know, it's not
about money anymore, it's about your cause or what you
believe in. And then create a podcast, create a small
show somewhere, you know, where you can say what you want.
Speaker 1: That is, yeah, and I totally agree with all that.
And I think we're in such a weird moment in
AH in media that and I do think that the
administration is doing a lot to sort of take charge
of this moment and bend it to their will. I
thought talk shows were growing to end. Kimmel probably wasn't
going to renew his contract, and Colbert, I don't know,
I don't say this with absolute assurance, but every indication
about the state of television is that these shows as
they currently exist, and they are expensive, All of these
guys have huge salaries as they currently exist, they probably
will not be on the air in ten years. And
I want to get back to why that is the case. Apparently,
the viewership on these shows is all still very very good.
And not only that, every day the next day, clips
from their shows tend to go viral online and are
seen by tens of millions on YouTube. I mean, yeah,
we embedded them on that they are well, not just
that they go viral on social media. These guys, all
of them, and you know they're all white guys. Of course,
they have a tremendous influence on the culture. Every time
they open their mouths, everybody talks about it the next day.
And this is why Trump hates them.
Speaker 2: So that's why people hate them.
Speaker 1: And every time someone goes on their show, they you know,
at least one interview clip will go viral. And this
is what I wanted to get to and because this
is where we come in. For seventy years, going back
to before Johnny Carson, major entertainment companies and the studios
and the you know, the music industry and all of that.
They relied on late night talk shows to give a
place for their stars to promote their products.
Speaker 3: Right, I mean, that's why you see people going on
these shows. I mean because they have a TV show,
they have a movie, they have something. That's why they go.
The same thing with magazines. People on the cover of
a magazine they're promoting something. It's very funny because a
long time ago, before the site, I had no idea.
Speaker 2: That's why I'm right.
Speaker 3: I would see someone on a cover of magazine or
on a TV show and I was like, Oh, they're
just there. Now I understand why it's funny because it
gets to a point now that every now and then
I don't know. And I turned to Tom and I
was like, what are they promoting?
Speaker 2: Did they have a new movie? Right?
Speaker 1: And I actually, I'm really glad you brought up magazines
because that's a very good point. We don't have magazine
racks anymore. There are no newsstands where there are fifty magazines,
and the magazine industry, just like all these other media industries,
have collapsed over the last decade or two. And what
happened was a lot of magazines went under of course
we don't have them anymore, but a lot of the
really big ones are now digital, and they found a
way to continue putting celebrities on covers and interviewing them
and making money off that. And the reason I'm saying
that is because I don't think I really firmly believe
we're not seeing the end of the talk show, the
celebrity talk show. We're what we're going to see is
a forced change upon it. Because last I heard, Kimmel
was sitting down with Disney to talk this out with them,
pardon me, and the FCC wants an apology from him.
I don't think it's likely he's going to do that,
but the fact that Disney is sitting down with him
means that they realize that they don't want to cut
this guy loose. They don't want to end this relationship,
so they are all scrambling trying to figure something out.
I don't know where this is going to go, And
we record podcasts on topical things, and by the time
we wrap up the podcast, go online and find out
it was resolved. So I don't know. Maybe this has
been resolved in the twenty minutes since we were twenty
five minutes since we started recording. But I feel that
there's too much money on the line. There's too much
The entire entertainment industry rests upon this sort of scenario,
this situation, so the you know, it may be hard
for these shows to make money, but they actually can't
go away. And I think I should take a quick break.
We should take a quick break and come in and
come back and unpack that part of it. We're back
and we're unpacking the whole Kimmel affair, going back to
you know what we said before the break. The Trump
administration and the FCC are taking advantage of the fact
that media is in so much flux right now, and
something like television talk shows, which are usually places where
you can go to find people satirizing or commenting or
making jokes about the people in power. It always has
been that, that has always been one of the formats
of one of the reasons people go to listen to
Johnny Carson or Jay Lennon where anybody else is to
hear them unpack the events of the day and to
make fun of powerful people.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: And it is a standard in fascistic societies that some
of the first people to get put in jail are
the comedians, Because if there's one thing a dictator does
not like is they do not like being made fun
of and they will not allow it. So Trump, and
like a lot of autocrats, understands that comedy is dangerous
to an autocracy, and he's attacking it. It's the same
reason you went after Saturday Night Live, and he will
go after Saturday Night Live. They're also going after the view.
They talked about that this week, and of course they're
going to try and get the other mail, you know,
the other late night talk show hosts off the air.
I think this has been I think this probably will
be the rubicon crossing for the larger portion of the
American public. I mean, the big reason why the Trump
administration has been able to get away with everything they've
been doing for the last nine months is because, unfortunately,
the vast majority of adults in this country do not
pay much attention to politics, and they actually don't know
what he's doing. People don't know about people getting sent
off to prisons, you know, in El Salvador, or they
don't know any of that stuff. What they do know
is Jimmy Kimmel lost his job and Trump fired him
and people like Jimmy Kimmel and people like Seth Colbert.
And it's interesting to note that when the Colbert thing happened,
there was a huge cry about it, but not a
lot of mobilization. And maybe because he has another year
to go before he hasn't he wasn't yanked off the air,
but for whatever reason, I feel like Kimmel is that's
the one guy you shouldn't have gone after, right, Just.
Speaker 3: To correct you, Stephen Colbert, not South Corbert.
Speaker 1: Oh, I was makeeting a mixed with Seth Meyers. Sorry,
thank you, thank you, Lorenza.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because I know someone will correct you.
Speaker 1: So so okay, there's so much swirling around that I'm
trying to get across here. Paramount owns CBS, which owns
The Colbert Show, and Disney owns ABC, which owns the
uh uh Jimmy Kettle Show. Oh my god, I should
have had a cup of coffee before this podcast and
uh this but this is part of the problem with
our country right now, in our media right now, is
it's all owned by like four people and they're all billionaires,
and they get to decide on a whim whether or
not we get to see things, and that's that's fucking problematic.
But that's at a certain point, Paramount's going to wonder, well,
who do where are we sending people to promote the
stuff on our network because we got rid of our
talk show, right And Disney's going to wonder the same thing. Well,
I'm sure they're wondering it right now. A lot of
these decisions were not made for business reasons. They were
made for personal you know, out of peak and out
of you know, they wanted to punish the wrong people
who were saying the wrong things. So as these things unfold,
I think the people in charge of these networks are
realizing are slowly realizing this is not sustainable. We can't
just yank people off the air because the president doesn't
like them. The public won't stand for that. So I
also think celebrities won't stand for it. They need to
go to places to promote their work. You start yanking
this stuff off the air, And let me tell you,
celebrities loathe red carpets. Ninety nine percent of them loathing.
Speaker 2: They don't like it.
Speaker 1: But if they can sit down and chat with Jimmy
Fallon or Jimmy Kimmel and talk about their latest project.
They will do that in a heartbeat. And you yanked
this away and all they've got left is maybe morning
talk shows and red carpets, and no, they're not going
to go for that at all.
Speaker 3: No, I totally agree they they they feel a lot
more comfortable when they're just talking about it because you're
focused on what they're saying, not necessarily just posing in
pictures and all that. So yeah, if that all goes away,
it it can cause a lot of problem.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I do feel also that we're we're pro because of
especially because of social media, we are approaching criticives in
a way that is just not sustainable. I mean, we
have to allow people to have a criticism, some sort
of criticism of anything of any kind, even if we
don't agree with it, even if it's way out there.
We have to let people criticize things. We can, we
can agree or disagree with whatever they said, but we
have to let people.
Speaker 2: I feel like, uh.
Speaker 3: Whatever you say today, and so everywhere social media, everywhere,
it's people come down on you in a way that
is just not normal anymore. Believe me, I know it's
just not normal. I mean it's this irrational behavior that
we have now with social media, I mean you're allowed
to criticize somebody or reply and say, you know, I
don't agree with you. But we lost, i mean completely,
any mechanism that we had, any sort of like you know,
guide that we had to criticize people or to don't
agree with anybody. I mean we just insult everyone. We
just say the most horrific things online because you're not
in the presence of the person. You know, you're not
in front of the person, right, so you feel like
you can see whatever you want.
Speaker 2: And that has added.
Speaker 3: A lot, I think, to the problem that we have
because it's just people just don't accept anyone having a
different opinion anymore. Or when they I wouldn't even say
don't accept, but they react violently to anyone who has
a different opinion.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think we knew this was going to be
a short one before we got started. We were like,
are we going to talk about any other TV shows?
And I was like, let's just keep it focused on
this because it's all anyone is going to I'm just
looking at this as a site publisher who relies on
this sort of stuff, you know, for my content, and
also as an observer of media. Who understands some of
the forces that are happening underneath all of this. So
to wrap it all up, I can't. I don't know
what the mode of action is for the consumer. I
do think canceling your Disney Plus subscription is they notice
that stuff, And when you canceled, I'm pretty sure there's
a form that you can fill out and explain why
you're doing it. That's the number one thing we have
as a tool, and then speaking out against it as well. Yes,
free speech is under attack in this country in a
way it probably hasn't ever been, because I don't even
think mc McCarthyism was as bad as this, And we
all need to be vigilant. But I also so feel
that we also need to be aware that weaknesses and
institutions are being exploited and those institutions are not going
to come back the same even if we fight for them. So, yes,
Colbert and Kimmel are not going anywhere yet. But the
late night talk show situation as it currently exists is
not sustainable. We cannot be paying tens of millions of
dollars to guys every single year, and the people who
are in charge of this all I mean I'm rambling.
This all goes down to a lot of things. But
one thing that's the problem here is that network television
still has not figured out how to make money in
a streaming era, which is why talk shows have huge
audiences but aren't making any money. A lot of these
clips and everything that go viral get watched the next day,
and nobody's making money off of that. And that's something
you know, ABC, Disney, Paramount, they all got to figure
that shit out. Talk shows on aren't going anywhere, and
they're not going to become state imposed talk shows because
no one's going to watch that ship. If they go
after the view that'll be a huge, huge, huge mistake.
Don't know how many wine moms are going to come
out against that. And I actually think they realized that
the Kimel thing might have been a step to.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well see well that's the thing with with situations
like that is that they try something and see if
it works and how far they can get.
Speaker 2: Always they do.
Speaker 3: That's that's true of any time or if any situation
when it comes to politics, is that you know, you
you open a little door, and if you were able
to go through that door, then you try another door,
and then you keep trying things until you know you
stop somewhere. I do feel like, uh when I say that,
we're very aware of what's out there, they're very politically.
Speaker 2: We do what we can. I mean it.
Speaker 3: It's just that we we try to divide but separate
our work, our site, with our political views and social
views and everything that we do and so on. But I,
you know, I encourage everyone to do whatever you feel
like you.
Speaker 2: Need to do.
Speaker 3: You know, I think that's safe. I think that's it's right,
that's that's that's how it needs to be done. Because
if you don't voice your opinion, if you don't voice
how you feel, then then you just let people, you know,
do whatever they feel like doing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we do have to stand up. We do have
to make stand up, which is why I I think, yeah,
going today to cancel your Disney Plus subscription would probably
be a good idea. But I'm again not telling you
what to do. Like I guarantee six months down the road,
we're going to cover some Disney red carpet and someone's
gonna ask us, why are you covering these? You know, again,
I gotta make my money. I gotta do what I
gotta do. I cannot let someone like Trump tell me
that I can't cover Disney anymore. That's not it. I
can And I urge you to get your to cancel
your subscriptions, all right, and I probably yeah, I mean,
we should all think about are we going to continue
to support television shows on para mount plous television shows
on Disney? Are we going to these movies? That's sort
we have to make decisions. However, all of the people
who are in charge of all of the retail and
all of the entertainment in this country are billionaires and
they're all in the tank for Trump. So it can't
just boycott all of it.
Speaker 3: It's it's a much bigger problem. I mean, we're down
to two people, you know owing everything.
Speaker 1: Yeah that works.
Speaker 2: So yeah.
Speaker 3: So if you if you decide that you're no longer
going to watch something, then you know you have knocked
down like twenty of them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, fucking vote in the mid terms for Jesus Christ's sake.
I don't care if you're pissed at that. I am too.
I'm pissed at the death.
Speaker 3: Listen that that's but that's the only thing that can
do something for real.
Speaker 2: For sure.
Speaker 1: We said we weren't going to get political and vote.
Speaker 3: No, I mean, I'm saying vote, that's all I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Anyway.
Speaker 3: Uh yeah, it's it's a mess. It's a mess. It's
very stressful. I'm I'm upset, I'm disappointed. I'm stressed every day.
I'm not gonna lie, but I'm trying to. And I
urge everyone to focus to find some joy in your
life and action at the same time, you know, do
what you can.
Speaker 2: That's all.
Speaker 1: Okay, I think that's it a little bit of a
serious topic, but we hope we've given you a little
bit of optimism, although I don't even know if that's
my job, but we'd love to hear from you. So
anything you have, any thoughts you have on this, please
come to our site and let us know. And that's it.
We'll be back next week with whatever crosses our eyes
across our desks. Until then, take care of yourself, love
you mean it.
Speaker 2: Bye bye bye,