The Cracked Podcast

You need to arm yourself against weaponized old tweets. Not your own tweets, hopefully (though who knows). We’re talking about how every time you open social media, someone’s outrageous words are being used against them. Maybe the frequency of that scares you; after all, every one of us is lucky certain things we’ve said weren’t timestamped for eternity. Or maybe that pile of outrage excites you; justice relies on evidence, so maybe the more evidence there is the better the world will get. But take a look past all these maybes and semicolons (we know we used a lot; we feel fancy today, deal with it). Look at what's actually going on with Internet outrage right now. Is all that handwringing the same across the board? Or is some of it intended to ruin lives just to win a political game?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Amy Nicholson (Unspooled) and Andrew Ti (Yo, Is This Racist?) for an always-timely look at how you can tell worthwhile online activism apart from digital harassment. They’ll examine recent cases from James Gunn to Sarah Jeong to Roseanne Barr. They’ll lay out basic rules of thumb to help you handle the next hashtag that comes along. And they’ll find a fuller answer to all this than Twitter users usually can, thanks to the magic of being human toward each other in more than 280 characters.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/izjyN7

The stock market is even more powerful than you realize. Which is saying something, right? Much like Han Solo is pretty sure he can imagine infinite money, you believe you know the world’s combined wealth is mighty. But did you know a lot of Traditional Upstanding Stock Market Business is simply rich people gambling? And did you know individual rich people, regular people, and even children have steered the entire world economy into a ditch more times than your history teacher can count?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Gaby Dunn for an adventure through modern risk-takers, historical bet-losers, and the creepy way wealthier people are keeping you unaware of the whole thing. They’ll rediscover Scotland’s canal through Panama. They’ll watch entire stock exchanges and currencies collapse because of one guy. And they’ll leave you with ways you can be just as powerful as those mysterious masters of the universe if you think a little bit more about where your money lives.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/pgN5eg

The stock market is even more powerful than you realize. Which is saying something, right? Much like Han Solo is pretty sure he can imagine infinite money, you believe you know the world’s combined wealth is mighty. But did you know a lot of Traditional Upstanding Stock Market Business is simply rich people gambling? And did you know individual rich people, regular people, and even children have steered the entire world economy into a ditch more times than your history teacher can count?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Gaby Dunn for an adventure through modern risk-takers, historical bet-losers, and the creepy way wealthier people are keeping you unaware of the whole thing. They’ll rediscover Scotland’s canal through Panama. They’ll watch entire stock exchanges and currencies collapse because of one guy. And they’ll leave you with ways you can be just as powerful as those mysterious masters of the universe if you think a little bit more about where your money lives.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/pgN5eg

We live in an era of permanent reboots. Everything from ‘Superman’ to ‘Archie Comics’ comes roaring back in one form or another, because we entered a handshake agreement with capitalism that we would pay to see it. You may know a few things you like had a weird sequel or two. But did you know almost every franchise has experimented with going completely off the rails, in public, often with added talking animal friends?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Kristi Harrison and Cyriaque Lamar for a trip through the world’s favorite pop culture, and the bizarre mutations it went through without most people noticing. Discover the truly weird true ambitions of the artist behind ‘Garfield’, the movie studio behind ‘Casablanca’, and every cartoonist who tried to make ‘James Bond’ and ‘The Flinstones’ work for modern kids.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/Fp23hJ

We live in an era of permanent reboots. Everything from ‘Superman’ to ‘Archie Comics’ comes roaring back in one form or another, because we entered a handshake agreement with capitalism that we would pay to see it. You may know a few things you like had a weird sequel or two. But did you know almost every franchise has experimented with going completely off the rails, in public, often with added talking animal friends?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Kristi Harrison and Cyriaque Lamar for a trip through the world’s favorite pop culture, and the bizarre mutations it went through without most people noticing. Discover the truly weird true ambitions of the artist behind ‘Garfield’, the movie studio behind ‘Casablanca’, and every cartoonist who tried to make ‘James Bond’ and ‘The Flinstones’ work for modern kids.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/Fp23hJ

Believe it or not, Abe Lincoln was a real person. Oh sure sure, he SEEMS like a kindly freedom-giant of the mythic past, who strode out of the fog and into kicking Robert E. Lee’s butt. But isn’t it more interesting if he was a real guy? Heck, isn’t it more interesting if EVERY past President was an actual human being, with dreams and sicknesses and fixations like anybody else? And strangest of all, what if the elaborate myths we build around POTUSes are both untrue AND the least interesting thing about them? 

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Elliott Kalan (MST3K, The Daily Show) for a deep dive into the fake facts you’ve been told about Presidents, and the more incredible real facts you deserve to know. Find out why James K. Polk was like Pinhead from the ‘Hellraiser’ movies. Find out how Calvin Coolidge (a very talkative person) revolutionized Presidential communication. And stick around to discover which POTUS wanted to capture a living woolly mammoth, haul it to D.C., and show it off to the Europeans.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/NJDAJA

Believe it or not, Abe Lincoln was a real person. Oh sure sure, he SEEMS like a kindly freedom-giant of the mythic past, who strode out of the fog and into kicking Robert E. Lee’s butt. But isn’t it more interesting if he was a real guy? Heck, isn’t it more interesting if EVERY past President was an actual human being, with dreams and sicknesses and fixations like anybody else? And strangest of all, what if the elaborate myths we build around POTUSes are both untrue AND the least interesting thing about them? 

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Elliott Kalan (MST3K, The Daily Show) for a deep dive into the fake facts you’ve been told about Presidents, and the more incredible real facts you deserve to know. Find out why James K. Polk was like Pinhead from the ‘Hellraiser’ movies. Find out how Calvin Coolidge (a very talkative person) revolutionized Presidential communication. And stick around to discover which POTUS wanted to capture a living woolly mammoth, haul it to D.C., and show it off to the Europeans.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/NJDAJA

The US-Mexico border is many things: a line on a map, a setting for ‘Sicario’ movies, a heinous crime scene. North America’s most famous border is so prominent in our minds and our hearts, it’s easy to forget it’s also a place most of us have never been. Do we really understand what it’s like down there, or has it been misrepresented by every anti-immigration “tough guy” we see on TV? Is it really the unique migration crisis we think it is, or are other countries’ borders even deadlier flashpoints? And most surprising of all: what if that potential wall that dominated the 2016 election ALREADY EXISTS, and has existed for over a decade?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Dr. Reece Jones, a scholar who literally wrote the book on our modern violent borders. They’ll draw on Dr. Jones’s experiences at walled borders from Arizona to Morocco to Bangladesh (fun fact: some “fences” sure are wall-shaped!). They’ll explore 230-plus years of predatory & inconsistent American migration policies. And you know those Executive Branch photo ops where Fearless Leaders examine Strong Border Walls that Make Us Stronger? Turns out they’re even more full of crap than you think they are (and we say that knowing you can imagine a lot of crap).

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/pdbHzZ

The US-Mexico border is many things: a line on a map, a setting for ‘Sicario’ movies, a heinous crime scene. North America’s most famous border is so prominent in our minds and our hearts, it’s easy to forget it’s also a place most of us have never been. Do we really understand what it’s like down there, or has it been misrepresented by every anti-immigration “tough guy” we see on TV? Is it really the unique migration crisis we think it is, or are other countries’ borders even deadlier flashpoints? And most surprising of all: what if that potential wall that dominated the 2016 election ALREADY EXISTS, and has existed for over a decade?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Dr. Reece Jones, a scholar who literally wrote the book on our modern violent borders. They’ll draw on Dr. Jones’s experiences at walled borders from Arizona to Morocco to Bangladesh (fun fact: some “fences” sure are wall-shaped!). They’ll explore 230-plus years of predatory & inconsistent American migration policies. And you know those Executive Branch photo ops where Fearless Leaders examine Strong Border Walls that Make Us Stronger? Turns out they’re even more full of crap than you think they are (and we say that knowing you can imagine a lot of crap).

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/pdbHzZ

As long as real-life gun rampages go unchecked, first person shooter video games will be a major battlefront of The Culture War. After all, today’s new hyper-realistic gun games must be causing today’s hideous violence! But what if twenty years of perfecting virtual headshot tech dovetails with a drop in American violent crime? What if games don't actually trick anyone into being violent, or sexist, or an Italian plumber? And most chilling for you gamers out there: what if games DO trick you into becoming a less ideal person, in a way nobody’s ever warned you about?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Jason Pargin (better known as David Wong) to explore a surprising truth nobody else is covering. They’ll combine decades of gaming experience with a range of studies and reporting. They’ll debunk a lot of the panic about Those Darned Violent Video Games, while also picking out some truths hidden in it. And they’ll explore how gaming DOES change the brains of even the most blood-averse n00bs.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/Ftg8HC