As a sister episode to last week’s awesome interview with The Raven Corps youth activism group, this week we talk about how our oppressive systems are built to specifically target young people in order to prevent the youth from having political power or, most dangerous of all, hope.

Poppin Off

Callie pops her top over discovering the book White Fragility was authored by a white woman, inspired by an episode of the Low Society podcast. Then Nichole takes a moment, in a testament to the power of The Youth, to recognize the incredible internet activism of Kpop stans and TikTok users after they “catfish” the Tulsa Trump rally, leading the campaign to think there were far more people coming than actually showed up *chefs kiss*

* #032 – White Fragility | Low Society (SoundCloud)* Sick staff and empty seats: How Trump’s triumphant return to the campaign trail went from bad to worse | by Kevin Liptak and Kaitlan Collins (CNN)* ‘These kids are smart, they thought of everything’: TikTok users claim some responsibility for low turnout to Trump’s Tulsa rally | by Taylor Lorenze, Sheera Frenkel, Kellen Browning (Independent UK)

Joke

There are two factors of COVID-19:… (Thanks, Rose!)

Main Topic: How the Youth are Oppressed

In researching this topic, it became clear very quickly that in any way a person can be oppressed, they will be doubly so when young. There was a sharp change after the 1960s, when the government became fully aware from the Civil Rights protests and anti-war protests that the youth had a tremendous amount of political power just by the force of their convictions. After that era, a concerted effort was made to subtly, secretly attack youth through every conceivable system that touches our lives. We outline several, but this is by no means an exhaustive list.

We want young people to hear this episode and feel validated for any time they’ve felt like things are stacked against them. Older folks can understand what youth experience, and also see how they were potentially oppressed when younger as well, depending on what era they grew up in.

Resources

* The Student Vote Is Surging. So Are Efforts to Suppress It. | by Michael Wines on Oct 24, 2019 (NY Times)* Boomers vs. Millennials: A Look at the Financial Gap Between Generations | by Joel Anderson (Yahoo Finance)* 5 facts about student loans | by Anthony Cilluffo (Pew Research Center)* How Biden helped create the student debt problem he now promises to fix | by Ed Pilkington on Dec 2, 2019 (The Guardian)* Learn More: Child Marriage in the U.S. (Equality Now)* Abortion and Parental Involvement Laws (Ad...

Auntie Nicky and Callie are talking to The Youth today, interviewing Melissa and Cami, two absolute badass young people, from The Raven Corps, a youth-organized activism group. We talk about what Raven Corps does, how people can get involved, what a youth-led, decentralized organization looks like, and their tips for young people growing up in today’s extreme world.

Poppin Off

We acknowledge the recent lynchings in California, and discuss the murder of Rayshard Brooks by police when he was reported for sleeping in his car in a Wendy’s drive-thru, connecting it to the defund/abolish police movement. Then we talk about the autonomous zone that is thriving in Seattle, and report on others that are trying to get established.

* Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone website (capitolhillaz.org)* What the F*ck is Going on in Seattle? (medium.com)* The Demands of the Collective Black Voices at Free Capitol Hill to the Government of Seattle (medium.com)* Tweet about autonomous zones by @mbowman (Twitter)

Joke

Why do riot cops get up so early in the morning? (See the original TikTok of the joke here)

Main Topic: Raven Corps Interview

Today we are so honored to have Melissa and Cami with us from Raven Corps. The Raven Corps is a youth-powered, anti-oppression organization. Melissa is the co-founder and Portland lead; Cami the Youth Board member and San Diego co-lead.

We chat with Melissa and Cami about Raven Corps – not just what they do, but really focusing on how they are organized and how they manage to be a truly youth-powered organization with the young activists having true autonomy and power in what actions they take; and also how Raven Corps has changed its focus and strategy in recent years to be a holistic anti-oppression organization and to avoid perpetuating a colonizing approach to activism through chapters. We talk about the importance of community support as a young activist and the ways that young people can get involved with Raven Corps or QuaranTEEN, their Slack-based online community for youths aged 14-22 years old. At the end of the interview, Melissa and Cami both have some deeply moving words of advice for young people who are overwhelmed by current events and the general state of the world they’ve grown up in.

We loved this interview and hope y’all do too. Please share it widely with any young people you know or consider making a donation of either money or skills to the organization!

* Raven Corps website* Raven Corps Instagram account* Email to get involved in QuaranTEEN or find out more about Raven Corps: [email protected]* QuaranTEEN application

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Taking a breath to process what’s been going on over the past two weeks, we delve into the concepts of violence, curfews and looting from an AnCom (anarcho-communist) perspective to help make some sense of all the online chatter and hopefully give some organization of how to talk about these things to friends and family.

Pop Tops

We quickly cover a few news items this week, some good news and some proof of ACAB:

* Minneapolis public school board votes to terminate its contract with police (The Guardian)* University of Minnesota Ending Contracts With Minneapolis Police Department After George Floyd’s Death (Time) – CW this article autoplays a video of George Floyd’s murder at the top* Buffalo Cop Loses Job And Pension After She Intervenes With Fellow Officer Choking A Suspect (Vice)

Joke

How do conservatives get their B12? (Thanks, Dimitry!)

Main Topic: Violence, Curfews and Looting

Property

Before we get deep into the concepts of violence, curfews and looting, we first define property, which is core to really understanding an anti-capitalist perspective:

Property: anarchists put forward a specific definition of property: ownership claims on those things that one neither occupies nor uses. Anarchists usually juxtapose this with possessions, or those things that we use or the homes that we live in (i.e. no anarchist wants to take your home or guitar away). This is how bosses and landlords exploit workers, by claiming to own the things they do not use or the places in which they do not live, then extracting rents and value from the people who do actually use them. In place of private ownership, anarchists put forward visions of a social system in which we produce for the needs of the people instead of the profits of capitalists.

FROM: C.B. Daring; J. Rogue; Deric Shannon; Abbey Volcano. Queering Anarchism (Kindle Locations 160-164). AK Press. Kindle Edition.

NOTE: The distinction of property vs possession is a VERY critical one to understand. This can help make sense of a lot of liberal arguments where these two concepts are often conflated.

Violence

We then explore the idea of violence from an anarchist perspective, of which there is of course no agreement but we generally define this along lines of a willingness to do destruction in order to move towards a goal of community care and breaking systems of oppression, as well as talk about how we see violence in things that expand beyond the borders of physical brutality. To this end, we critique a recent article by Nathan J. Robinson (link below) in Current Affairs that talks about how we define violence. While we agree with his overall premise and respect him greatly as a journalist, we thought the article was missing this anarchist perspective to allow for a larger definition of violence and even a claiming and acceptance of violence in a rebellion (rather than trying to run away from that label being put on destructive actions to try to sugarcoat the rebellion).

Curfews

Nichole snagged an awesome quote from Irami Osei-Frimpong about curfews (link to full video below): “Curfews are an escalation of violence: when you criminalize behavior you are legitimizing the people wh...

This week we kicked off livestreaming our episodes on YouTube, so please join us over there if you want to watch us do this thing live and have the opportunity to interact with us on the topics we cover in real time! We livestream episodes every Sunday at 12pm PT. Podcast episodes post as usual on Tuesdays.

Today, we talk about everything happening with the George Floyd protests that have appeared all over the country, and then move into the main topic discussing why we love Marc Lamont Hill’s framing of these as rebellions instead of riots.

Poppin Off

We start the show by discussing *gestures vaguely at everything*

Joke

How do you make a water bed bouncier? (Thanks Rose!)

These are Rebellions, Not Riots

The main topic is inspired by an Instagram IGTV video by Marc Lamont Hill, link below, in which The Bitches talk about framing the George Floyd / Black Lives Matter protests as rebellions, not riots. This can help frame them properly so that we can stop having exhausting conversations about looting, violence, etc. If you can see these as the start of a rebellion, it puts a lot into perspective. Next week we’ll go into the concept of looting in more detail.

Resources

* Marc Lamont Hill Video about “Riots” that inspired this episode (Instagram)* we are exhausted. (YouTube) – amandabb video very much worth watching about current events + great resources in the video description

Street Action PSA

from

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Transcript

Nichole [00:00:26] Hi, everyone. I’m Nichole.

Callie [00:00:28] And I’m Callie.

Nichole [00:00:30] And today we’re bitching about.

Callie [00:00:32] The fuckin rebellion happening, although I guess we’re not really gonna be bitching about the rebellion. We’re like celebrating it. Yeah, spoiler alert.

Nichole [00:00:44] Speaking of bitching, don’t think we didn’t see your comments coming in. All of you. We started late because other people log in late. It’s also because we’re temperamental artists.

Nichole [00:01:00] Both can be true, ok.

Callie [00:01:02] I know.

Callie [00:01:03] Oh, my God. Those comments. Killing me.

Nichole [00:01:07] Yes. So where the fuck do we even start?

Callie [00:01:15] I don’t know.

Nichole [00:01:16] Um, yeah, I mean, it’s been it’s been a lot.

Poppin Off

Before we get to our analysis of The Platform, we take a VERY LONG ranty ride through our reactions to Joe Biden’s latest “gaffe” (aka he did a racism) this week with his quip to Charlamange Tha God from The Breakfast Club that if black folks still question who they’re voting for then, they “ain’t black.” We also go on a tear about his treatment of Stacey Abrams, and then fall through a whole thing again about vote blue no matter who

Resources

* Joe Biden on Black Woman Running Mate, Democrats Taking Black Voters for Granted + Wiping Weed Crime | The Breakfast Club (YouTube) – the whole interview is BIZARRE and worth watching but this link will take you right to the “you ain’t black” part* Stacey Abrams DEVASTATED when Joe Biden wouldn’t Announce her as his Running Mate on MSNBC | Christo Aivalis (YouTube)* It’s Not that I’m Negative, America Really is Screwed: Why Economics Says America’s Collapse is Probably Irreversible Now | by umair haque (Medium)

Joke

Why don’t cannibals eat clowns?

The Platform Analysis: Is Spontaneous Solidarity Possible?

We both LOVED Netflix’s gruesome yet beautiful Spanish film, The Platform, and so today we’re doing a deep analysis on the messages in the film and what came through for us as two staunch anti-capitalists. We explore what the film says about capitalism, socialism, communism, anarchism, class warfare, limited resources, neoliberalism, and so much more. Plus, Nichole has a few “hot takes” that she hasn’t heard anywhere else on the internet!

Resources

* Desperately Trying Not to be Politicize The Platform | Scaredy Cats (YouTube)

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Transcript

Nichole [00:00:26] Hey, everyone. I’m Nichole.

Callie [00:00:28] And I’m Callie.

Nichole [00:00:30] And today we’ll be talking about.

Callie [00:00:32] The Platform!

Nichole [00:00:33] Woohoo!

Callie [00:00:34] Finally!

Nichole [00:00:37] But first, we are going to pop off about Joe Biden.

Nichole [00:00:44] I’m sure that’s shocking to all of you who have followed the news this week.

Nichole [00:00:51] So, Callie, what did would a good old, good old Joe get up to this week?

Callie [00:00:55] Well, you know, he just made another harmless gaffe, which is just code for he once again is showing his racist ass to the world.

Poppin Off

Though we raged against cops and capitalism last week, these motherfuckers keep murdering people so we go off about it all again this week when covering Breonna Taylor’s murder at the hands of police:

Breonna Taylor, a 26 yr old EMT and aspiring nurse, was murdered in Louisville, KY on March 13 by a drug task force of plainclothes police officers that busted into her apartment at 1 a.m. while she was asleep with a “no-knock” search warrant without identifying themselves. Her boyfriend Kenneth Walker was in bed with her. Walker thought they were being robbed, took his licensed legal gun out and shot a cop in the leg. The cops opened fire in the apartment, shooting more than 20 bullets into the place and shooting Breonna 8 times in her bed. They arrested Kenneth Walker and charged him with attempted murder.

The officers were looking for a different man, and no drugs were found in the apartment. The police officers were not wearing body cams because as they are on the “Criminal Interdiction Division” handling violent and narcotic-based crimes, they don’t have to. Isn’t that nice.

Police claim they knocked on the door several times and announced themselves to the sleeping residents. Four neighbors contradict that claim.

These no-knock warrants are a huge problem in an already fucking terrible situation. In Houston last year, Dennis Tuttle and Rhogena Douglas were murdered after officers busted in on a no-knock warrant and immediately killed their dog with a shotgun, prompting Tuttle to fire at the intruders.

Imagine being completely innocent and thereby having no reason to think people busting into your house are cops.

Also cops are financially incentivized. Fuck capitalism. Fuck cops.

Resources

* The Breonna Taylor Shooting Shows How Reckless Drug War Tactics Lead to Senseless Deaths (reason)* Breonna Taylor Was Murdered for Sleeping While Black (The Nation)* Lawsuit Filed in 2019 Against Cop Involved in Breonna Taylor’s Death Claims He Was Vindictive, Planted Evidence (The Root)* Why Were the Louisville Police Who Fatally Shot Breonna Taylor Not Wearing Body Cameras? (The Root)* ‘If You Ran for Ahmaud, You Need to Stand for Bre’: Breonna Taylor’s Death Isn’t Getting Enough Attention (The Root)* Cuba Giving Hope to Doctors Worldwide Despite US ‘Terror’ Accusation | By Any Means Necessary Podcast (Spreaker) – fourth segment discusses Breonna’s murder.* From Russiagate to “Obamagate,” Blame Game is Bipartisan | By Any Means Necessary Podcast (Spreaker) – second segment discusses five people killed in Houston by police

Joke

I’m sorry, your dad has been pronounced dead…

Main Topic: Our Item and Favorite Dish for The Pit

We recorded an episode doing an analysis of The Platform, a Netflix film,

Poppin Off

There’s so much shitty news this week, it’s hard to even know what to focus on, so we didn’t. We do a loose rant about everything from Ahmaud Arbery’s murder to meat-packing plant workers being forced to work in dangerous conditions.

Related Resources

* Meatpackers and Others to Lose Jobless Benefits If They Refuse Return-to-Work Orders (Democracy Now!)* It is time to get out of here. It’s time to go. | Ti Talks GRWM (YouTube)* Feminism for the 99%: A Manifesto (Verso Books) – HIGHLY RECOMMEND!!!* Buy Nothing Project* Right Wing and Left Wing Populists Can’t Coexist | Millennial Review (Libsyn)* Can’t find which Benjamin Dixon episode it was but highly recommend ALL his episodes (Spreaker)

Joke

What is a procrastinator’s favorite thing to do?

The American Idiot & Freedom

Content warning for explained and intentional use of the word “idiot” in relation to the article linked below.

Inspired by the article linked below, we talk about the concept of freedom in the United States, particularly the idea of freedom from vs freedom to; as well as the the original Greek definition of “idiot” and how it relates to the current political climate.

Related Resources

* How Freedom Became Free-dumb in America (Medium)* What Governments Do. 3/25 | Irami Osei-Frimpong – The Funky Academic (YouTube)

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Transcript

Nichole [00:00:27] Hey, everyone. I’m Nichole.

Callie [00:00:28] And I’m Callie.

Nichole [00:00:29] And today we’ll be talking about.

Callie [00:00:31] Freedom.

Nichole [00:00:33] No!

Nichole [00:00:34] Today we will be bitching about God damn it!

Nichole [00:00:38] I did the transcript for last week and I was like, fuck!

Callie [00:00:43] That makes it even funnier since we’re going to be bitching about freedom because people are going to be like, what?

Nichole [00:00:50] We are going to be bitching about freedom though.

Advice Question: Embracing My Jewish Heritage Later In Life

Hello Nichole and Callie,

I apologize for not letting you know sooner, but I would love if you talk about it.  Ever since the “whiteness” episode I’ve been confused about how to handle my Judaism.  I’ve been “passing” as white my whole adult life… I don’t look Jewish, my father’s family changed their last name so my name doesn’t sound Jewish, and since I rejected the sexist, patriarchal bullshit of the religion in my youth I never identify as Jewish to anyone who doesn’t know where I come from.  My family still identifies as Jewish, but they are mostly on the east coast and I live in California and don’t see them much or for holidays.  Anyway, I would love to embrace my non-whiteness, but don’t know how to separate the religion from the culture, or whatever it is… I’ve heard there’s Jewish DNA but I don’t understand that at all!

Thanks! love you two and the new show!

If you want us to answer a question, submit your query to [email protected]

Joke

What are the only kind of jokes you can tell during the quarantine? (Thanks, Amanda!)

If you have a joke for the show, send it to [email protected]

Update: Thoughts On The Open Country Protests

Nichole gives a quick update about our segment last week re: the open the country protests after discussing it with a listener, mostly highlighting the fascist motivations behind the protests and how the whole topic of who to try to reach out to and who to see as the enemy is one that continues to confound her.

Main Topic: Spoiler-Free Knives Out Discussion

We have a quick chat about Knives Out, highlighting a few things we noticed as themes in the movie but without giving anything away. Mostly, we just liked it and thought it was a fun lil romp.

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Transcript

Nichole [00:00:26] Hey, everyone. I am Nichole.

Callie [00:00:28] And I’m Callie.

Nichole [00:00:30] And today we’ll be talking about..

Callie [00:00:32] Today we are going to do an advice question. It’s been a while since we’ve done one of those, so we are very excited to dip our toes back into that pool. And then we will also be doing a short fun main segment on Knives Out, a movie that we watched last night.

Callie [00:00:49] We are taking a little break from politics for the most part, much as we can ever really turn it off completely and just doing something kind of fun and silly and light.

Callie [00:01:00] So.

Nichole [00:01:01] Yeah.

Pop Tops: Seeing beyond Our anger over the Michigan protests to reopen the country

Callie takes the lead on this week’s Pop Tops section to talk about how we need to see beyond our rage at the Michigan protests where citizens are clamoring for the government to reopen the country – some of whom are doing dangerous shit like blocking hospital entrances and threatening health care workers with their cars.

Equating them to Trump voters, we dissect our complicated feelings around these actions while recognizing that some of these protestors are people who, just like all of us, are not being taken care of by the government and think the only way to care for their families is to reopen the country. How can we reach these people instead of lumping everyone together and vilifying them, “basket of deplorables” style?

Timenergy Information

theory pleeb’s Timenergy Theory Playlist (YouTube) – this is a formalized theory of “timenergy” as developed by the person behind theory pleeb’s channel over years of research. Check it out to get a deeper exploration of the concept!

Help The Show

Fundraising Efforts: Nichole is trying to raise money for transcription services to offer transcriptions on all episodes, if you want to help, you can donate on Patreon or PayPal <3

YouTube: We will start live streaming and publishing educational videos on our YouTube channel soon; we’re trying to get 1,000 subscribers so sign up if you’d like to follow us there!

Joke

What concert costs $0.45?

Bonus Joke:

Main Topic: Racism, Xenophobia and Red Scaring In How We Talk About Other Countries

Nichole then takes lead on the main topic to explore the way that we talk about other countries in our media and politics, and how this ties into Callie’s topic with Michigan protests screaming about “if you want communism, go to China!” The media in the U.S. usually criticizes and villainizes other countries by their name, as a whole, instead of specifically criticizing the leadership or government specifically as corrupt.

This is a clear way to continue the long, nasty tradition of “red scaring” in the U.S. where we have economic systems conflated with brutal dictatorships in other countries, and those countries themselves become emblems of tyranny and corruption (rather than being seen as victims of tyranny and corruption). This increases nationalism in the U.S. to fervent heights, facilitating brutal policies on immigration, sanctions on other countries, and an understanding that to question capitalism or the U.S. government will brand you a traitor and put you in direct conflict with the government and other patriotic citizens.

We use a vicious cycle of this rhetoric to increase racism and xenophobia in the U.S. while also linking socialism, communism, and anarchy to brutality, terrorism, and being a traitor to your country. We talk about how people say socialism and communism lead to tyranny and yet claim that capitalism is equivalent to democracy, if only we make a couple of tweaks to it, it’ll be the most perfect and free system ou...

COVID19 & Mask Information from a Nurse

Question: How are surgical masks suppose to protect the public from COVID19, but are not considered protective against COVID19 to the individual wearing the mask?

TYPES OF PRECAUTIONS: Before diving in to an explanation, I’m going to present the basic infection control protocol that all health care organizations adhere to. There are different categories we have that helps us categorize the disease types with how they infect individuals, and the types of protective equipment recommended—these are the main ones:

* Universal Precautions- also known as “standard precautions”; every patient is considered this— PPE used for this are standard gloves, and hand hygiene before and after contact with the patient.* Contact precautions- PPE used for this are gloves and a protective gown as the pathogen is spread by skin to skin contact. The gown protects us because it is put on over our scrubs, and is removed after patient care. An example of this would be MRSA bacteria in a patient’s wound, or shingles lesions which are scabbed over.* Droplet precautions- PPE used for droplet precautions are gloves, a basic (surgical) mask, and (depending on disease) eye protection. This prevents large droplets from coughs and sneezes from directly entering our mouths and nose. Droplets are considered to be in the air temporarily but the weight from the droplet is too heavy to be aerosolized, so it falls towards the ground. Some diseases include influenza (flu viruses) and rhino viruses (common cold). Doors to these rooms are to remain closed.* Airborne Precautions- With this type, pathogens are in the air around the patient for an extended amount of time. They are placed in a special “negative pressure room”— where air is pulled out of their rooms continuously and diverted through filtration systems in the vents—then to outside. PPE includes gloves, a gown, hair cover, and a type of respirator—- N95 is the most basic, but we also use air purifying respirators that look like a space helmet and have a filtration component; they are battery powered. N95’s are sized for us upon hiring to ensure the size we wear is securely sealed around our mouths and nose. Diseases on this precaution include chicken pox, meningitis, tuberculosis, open sore shingles, and COVID19.* Neutropenia Precautions/ sterile bedside Procedures- used when a patient has very low white blood cells or we are preforming a sterile procedure at bedside— for this, it’s usually our cancer patients and is intermittently used with certain sterile bedside procedures to protect the patient. If it’s a sterile procedure, the patient and I both have a new surgical mask on and I have sterile gloves on. If it’s a cancer patient, I wear a mask because I’m protecting them from me.

WHAT ARE N95s AND SURGICAL MASKS MADE OF: Both N95s and surgical masks are made with “melt blown fabric”— a process in which different polymers are melted down and blown at high speeds to create a randomized “webbing” pattern. Surgical masks typically have two to three layers of this with a hydrophobic—water repelling—outer layer, while N95s have melt blown fabric layers, activated cotton layers, an activated carbon layer, and a hydrophobic outside layer. Basically, the “activated” layers are electronically charged to help “catch” super tiny charged particles and bacteria and viruses. The randomized webbing of the melt-blown fabric helps create inconsistent “holes” in the various layers. In contrast, a homemade mask out of cotton, would have a woven pattern with consistent predictable gaps even upon layering the cotton.

HOW MASKS SLOW COVID19: wearing a mask out in public is super important in helping to REDUCE the amount of virus particles you spread when you cough, sneeze, and breath.