Latest / Question Everything / Drinks for Five: Ira Glass, Zoe Chace, Jonathan Eig, Astead Herndon

Transcript

Drinks for Five: Ira Glass, Zoe Chace, Jonathan Eig, Astead Herndon · Question Everything

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hey, it's Brian here.
• 0:01
  Speaker 2: Before we start, I just want to let you know
• 0:03
  Speaker 2: that you can watch this whole episode on YouTube. We
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: videoed the whole thing. I've never done that before, but
• 0:08
  Speaker 2: it's really great. Check it out on KCRW's YouTube channel.
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: From Placement Theory and KCRW, this is Question Everything.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: I'm Brian Reed.
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: A few months ago, I took four journalists, I put
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: them in a room, gave them drinks, and started rolling tape.
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: Their only instructions were to show up with questions for
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: each other and be open. to talking candidly about the
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: challenges in their jobs. There is, I'm well aware, no
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: shortage of opportunities in this world to hear journalists talk
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: on television, on podcasts, on panels with self-serious titles like
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: Democracy on the Brink, Is the Press Up to the Task?
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: That's one I actually went to, by the way. I'm
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: a guilty participant in the panel industrial complex, so I
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: know that these discussions with journalists can often feel stilted
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: and inaccessible. I dragged my best friend, who's not a journalist,
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: to a panel like this not long ago, and afterwards
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: he used the phrase word soup to describe what he
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: had heard. The goal of this show is to re-examine
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: journalism so we can try to make it better. So
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: while we've been developing it, I wanted to see if
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: I could get journalists to talk about their jobs as
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: if no one else was around, about the things they
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: wanted to discuss, the kind of behind-the-scenes stories I know
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: we talk about when we're hanging out after work.
• 1:19
  Speaker 3: I mean, I usually at some point, like something uncomfortable happens.
• 1:23
  Speaker 4: Yeah, something's going to happen.
• 1:25
  Speaker 5: Someone's going to yell at you and call you fake news.
• 1:27
  Speaker 3: You'll be doing an interview and someone will be like,
• 1:28
  Speaker 3: you married?
• 1:29
  Speaker 6: You're like, oh.
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: Today's episode, what journalists talk about when the rest of
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: us aren't listening. We're calling it Drinks for Five. We're
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: cribbing the name from a TV show from the early
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: aughts that did something similar with actors and directors, Dinner
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: for Five. We've got New York Times political reporter Astead Herndon,
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: Pulitzer-winning journalist and author Jonathan Eig, my former colleague, This
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: American Life political reporter Zoe Chase, and host of This
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: American Life and my old boss, Ira Glass.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: Stick around. Are you stealing my question or what?
• 2:03
  Speaker 5: Yeah, he's doing the interview.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: Never mind, never mind. Guys, have a seat. Help yourselves.
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: Can I get you guys a drink? Yes. All right.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: So what you're about to hear are excerpts from a
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: conversation that took place on a Monday night in May. Which,
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: I guess, just keep that in mind, since a lot
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: has happened since May. My four guests and I met
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: up at a wine store in Brooklyn that agreed to
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: close early and let me serve drinks from a bar
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: next to the cash register. Our executive producer Robin Simeon
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: was there too, producing this experiment, so you'll hear her
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: voice now and again.
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: The four guests sat on stools in front.
• 2:34
  Speaker 7: Of me, and I poured mint juleps. Can we just
• 2:36
  Speaker 7: pause and have a toast?
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: That's Ira Glass, host of This American Life, where I
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: used to work. My mentor and boss for more than
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: a decade.
• 2:45
  Speaker 8: Like it's so sweet that this is like your first
• 2:48
  Speaker 8: show and that we are here in this moment before
• 2:50
  Speaker 8: the thing gets launched. And it's like a perfect little
• 2:54
  Speaker 8: thing that like hasn't been marred and hasn't had a
• 2:56
  Speaker 8: chance to grow.
• 2:57
  Speaker 6: And it's just like we haven't screwed it up for you.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: It hasn't been criticized.
• 3:01
  Speaker 8: It's just like it exists in our imaginations as a
• 3:04
  Speaker 8: perfect future. And it's like I'm so excited for you
• 3:08
  Speaker 8: and so glad to be here for your first show.
• 3:11
  Speaker 7: Show and congratulations.
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: To purity a moment.
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: Of purity all right but wait we got interrupted we
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: were asking you.
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: Jonathan john john is good this is jonathan eig sitting
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: at the bar next to ira Jonathan reported for daily
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: newspapers for years and now writes books about Lou Gehrig,
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: Jackie Robinson, Muhammad Ali. Just a week or two before
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: our get-together, Jonathan won the Pulitzer Prize for his biography
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: of Martin Luther King. And next to Jonathan is Zoe Chase.
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: Zoe does some of my favorite political coverage for This
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: American Life.
• 3:55
  Speaker 3: Oh, right.
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: About?
• 3:57
  Speaker 5: How you had the audacity.
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: The audacity.
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: How did you have the audacity to choose Martin Luther
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: King Jr.
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: To write a biography of? And to feel like you
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: could say something new.
• 4:08
  Speaker 9: I feel like it's probably the same for all of us.
• 4:10
  Speaker 9: Like anybody who's in journalism, anybody who's telling stories, right?
• 4:13
  Speaker 9: It starts with just like a glimmer of an idea.
• 4:15
  Speaker 9: You don't just like wake up and go, I'm going
• 4:18
  Speaker 9: to write a biography of Martin Luther King. No, but
• 4:20
  Speaker 9: like one day you're talking to somebody who knew Martin
• 4:23
  Speaker 9: Luther King.
• 4:24
  Speaker 6: And you go, that's so cool.
• 4:25
  Speaker 4: Oh, I'm not.
• 4:26
  Speaker 7: When were you doing that?
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: Wait, just back up.
• 4:30
  Speaker 3: All right.
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: Where were you?
• 4:31
  Speaker 9: I was talking to Dick Gregory. This was like in 2013.
• 4:35
  Speaker 9: 15 or something like that. I was interviewing him for
• 4:38
  Speaker 9: my Muhammad Ali book. So I'm talking to Dick Gregory
• 4:41
  Speaker 9: and he starts talking about Martin Luther King and about
• 4:44
  Speaker 9: the time that Martin Luther King met Muhammad Ali. And
• 4:48
  Speaker 9: after I left the breakfast with him, I thought, wait, that.
• 4:51
  Speaker 6: Guy knew Martin Luther King. I should have asked him
• 4:53
  Speaker 6: more about that.
• 4:56
  Speaker 9: I kind of blew it, right? Why didn't I just
• 4:58
  Speaker 9: ask him a million questions about Martin Luther King? You
• 5:00
  Speaker 9: guys hung out. So then I I began to think
• 5:03
  Speaker 9: about it. I mean, there's probably a lot of people
• 5:05
  Speaker 9: alive still who knew Martin Luther King. And maybe I
• 5:07
  Speaker 9: should just travel around the country and interview all the
• 5:09
  Speaker 9: people who knew Martin Luther King. So that was my first, like, little.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: Had you read the previous biographies at that point or anything?
• 5:16
  Speaker 6: Oh, I'd read some of them.
• 5:16
  Speaker 9: Like, years ago, I'd read Taylor Branch's, some of Taylor
• 5:19
  Speaker 9: Branch's trilogy.
• 5:20
  Speaker 6: I hadn't read all of it. I read David Garrow's
• 5:22
  Speaker 6: book and Once.
• 5:23
  Speaker 8: Taylor Branch has been there, how do you even think, like, oh,
• 5:25
  Speaker 8: there's something else to do?
• 5:26
  Speaker 9: Well, first of all, that book was kind of old already,
• 5:30
  Speaker 9: and it was really, like, encyclopedic, and I thought, these
• 5:35
  Speaker 9: guys knew Martin Luther King.
• 5:36
  Speaker 6: They knew what it was like to hang with him.
• 5:37
  Speaker 9: They knew what it was like to drink with him
• 5:38
  Speaker 9: and what it was like to tell jokes with him,
• 5:40
  Speaker 9: and that doesn't come through in the big encyclopedic book.
• 5:44
  Speaker 9: And maybe, like, there's a chance to do a more
• 5:46
  Speaker 9: intimate kind of a portrait. So that was the thought process.
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 5:49
  Speaker 9: And also, like, think about what's happened since King became
• 5:53
  Speaker 9: a national holiday and a thousand streets, and we lost
• 5:57
  Speaker 9: sight of his humanity. So maybe a book that actually
• 5:59
  Speaker 9: tells you what kind of jokes he told.
• 6:02
  Speaker 6: Like the person.
• 6:03
  Speaker 9: I would ask these guys, what did he smell like?
• 6:06
  Speaker 9: I'd ask them these ridiculous questions that you guys do too.
• 6:09
  Speaker 9: So you just have to forget for a minute that it's, oh,
• 6:12
  Speaker 9: this is Martin Luther frigging King.
• 6:15
  Speaker 7: Did you get pushback? Like, who's the person you really
• 6:18
  Speaker 7: wanted to talk to?
• 6:19
  Speaker 9: The three kids, there were only two alive now, but
• 6:21
  Speaker 9: there were three when I started.
• 6:23
  Speaker 6: They wouldn't talk to me. And Diane Nash wouldn't talk
• 6:25
  Speaker 6: to me. And that was about it. Almost everybody else
• 6:27
  Speaker 6: agreed to talk.
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: Do you know why they wouldn't talk to you?
• 6:29
  Speaker 6: The kids or Diane Nash?
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: The kids.
• 6:31
  Speaker 6: The kids didn't want to talk to me because.
• 6:34
  Speaker 9: The book included details about his sex life, I think.
• 6:38
  Speaker 9: I think that was the main reason. It's just really hard.
• 6:40
  Speaker 9: And I think it's traumatic for them to think about
• 6:43
  Speaker 9: some of these things and to think about the fact
• 6:44
  Speaker 9: that their dad died.
• 6:46
  Speaker 6: Cheated on them.
• 6:47
  Speaker 9: I've gotten to know a lot of their friends and
• 6:48
  Speaker 9: their cousins and nieces and nephews, and I think that
• 6:51
  Speaker 9: they're convinced that King didn't cheat on Coretta.
• 6:54
  Speaker 6: And they really believe it.
• 6:56
  Speaker 9: So anything that approaches that subject is off-limits for them,
• 6:59
  Speaker 9: I think.
• 7:00
  Speaker 6: Wow.
• 7:01
  Speaker 4: I was going to ask about that.
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: This is Astead Herndon, by the way, our last guest,
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: to my far right at the bar. Astead's a political
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: reporter at the New York Times. You might also know
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: him from CNN.
• 7:12
  Speaker 10: Did you think about how to wrestle with the reveal
• 7:19
  Speaker 10: of personal life, right? Because in some ways I totally
• 7:21
  Speaker 10: see this narrative quality, but it's also like less necessary
• 7:25
  Speaker 10: or could be seen as less necessary, right?
• 7:27
  Speaker 4: So I'm just saying, how did.
• 7:27
  Speaker 10: You decide what illustrative versus what felt indulgent?
• 7:34
  Speaker 6: I think it's just a gut check.
• 7:35
  Speaker 9: Like in any story you write, any book you write
• 7:37
  Speaker 9: or any podcast you make like how much of this
• 7:40
  Speaker 9: goes in and how much doesn't and you just have
• 7:41
  Speaker 9: to trust your instincts like i knew that i didn't
• 7:43
  Speaker 9: want to wallow in it i didn't want this to
• 7:44
  Speaker 9: be i didn't want that to be the the point
• 7:46
  Speaker 9: of the book or for people to take away wow
• 7:48
  Speaker 9: it's really salacious but i also wanted to be honest
• 7:52
  Speaker 9: and just come as close to the truth as i
• 7:54
  Speaker 9: can but you also i've also felt like i had
• 7:56
  Speaker 9: to have his sex life in there because that's what
• 7:57
  Speaker 9: the fbi used more than anything else to try to
• 8:00
  Speaker 9: destroy him so you got to put it in and
• 8:03
  Speaker 9: you got also to show like how sad and lonely
• 8:05
  Speaker 9: he was That's why he's with these other women, partly.
• 8:08
  Speaker 6: So I just felt like.
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: Because you do want to know what it feels like
• 8:12
  Speaker 3: to be Martin Luther King, if possible. Yeah, right.
• 8:15
  Speaker 9: If we can possibly imagine it. You've got to know
• 8:17
  Speaker 9: that he was lonely and he was sad. He was
• 8:18
  Speaker 9: calling these women in the middle of the night saying, yeah,
• 8:20
  Speaker 9: I miss you too. And that's just kind of sad.
• 8:23
  Speaker 9: And it's also true. And we know it because the
• 8:26
  Speaker 9: FBI was recording the calls, which is just the craziest
• 8:29
  Speaker 9: part of all. The people trying to destroy him actually
• 8:32
  Speaker 9: gave us this intimate portrait, intimate view into his life.
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: But I read that you said that, I hope you
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: don't mind me quoting you to you, but you said
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: this thing that I found encouraging, which is you were like,
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: every biography is kind of a failure because you can't
• 8:49
  Speaker 3: know the full life, which I was like, I do
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: feel like that as a reporter, that, like, it is
• 8:56
  Speaker 3: an exercise in failure.
• 8:57
  Speaker 5: Like, you're not going to get to the deepest motivation.
• 9:01
  Speaker 4: Of the person.
• 9:02
  Speaker 3: But, like, I mean, if you're on the one subject
• 9:06
  Speaker 3: and you feel like you're never going to touch the
• 9:09
  Speaker 3: sweet spot, you know?
• 9:10
  Speaker 6: You're going to try to get.
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: What's that link?
• 9:11
  Speaker 9: I think you can touch the sweet spot, but you're
• 9:12
  Speaker 9: never going to really know. Like, I couldn't write a
• 9:15
  Speaker 9: book and really know my mom or my dad, right? Like,
• 9:19
  Speaker 9: even if.
• 9:20
  Speaker 6: So, like, people I know best.
• 9:22
  Speaker 9: I can't tell you why King cheated on his wife,
• 9:25
  Speaker 9: and I can't tell you why he still didn't lose
• 9:27
  Speaker 9: hope after, like, discovering that his own government was trying
• 9:31
  Speaker 9: to destroy him and why he kept believing that he
• 9:34
  Speaker 9: could make change.
• 9:34
  Speaker 6: I can't explain that. Like, that's just something within him.
• 9:37
  Speaker 9: You know, maybe it's faith in God, like, in a
• 9:40
  Speaker 9: way that I can't comprehend.
• 9:42
  Speaker 7: I don't know.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: All I know is.
• 9:44
  Speaker 9: But that doesn't mean I can't get close enough to
• 9:47
  Speaker 9: give the reader a feel about where they could maybe
• 9:49
  Speaker 9: draw their own conclusions.
• 9:50
  Speaker 6: You disagree. All right, go.
• 9:53
  Speaker 8: I don't know, like you have a whole, like if
• 9:55
  Speaker 8: you just think about like what we all do, which
• 9:57
  Speaker 8: is so much smaller than writing a book about somebody.
• 9:59
  Speaker 5: Ira's a lot more positive than I am.
• 10:02
  Speaker 10: Yeah?
• 10:02
  Speaker 8: And, like, you know, going out in the world, you
• 10:04
  Speaker 8: talk to people, you try to, like, be like, okay,
• 10:06
  Speaker 8: here are the interesting things and the important things to
• 10:08
  Speaker 8: understand about this person.
• 10:10
  Speaker 7: Mm-hmm.
• 10:10
  Speaker 8: And I feel like, yes, it's not the complete person.
• 10:13
  Speaker 8: But like, if you're saying that, like somebody who spends
• 10:15
  Speaker 8: how many years on a book?
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: Six.
• 10:17
  Speaker 7: Six years on a book to understand one person.
• 10:20
  Speaker 8: And you're exhaustively talking to everybody who'll talk to you,
• 10:22
  Speaker 8: looking through all the papers. At the end of that,
• 10:25
  Speaker 8: if you can't understand and say, here are the important
• 10:28
  Speaker 8: parts of who they are, if that's hopeless, then what
• 10:33
  Speaker 8: we're doing is so hopeless.
• 10:34
  Speaker 9: No, I'm not saying that.
• 10:36
  Speaker 5: Right in the graph, we're so much farther from the center.
• 10:52
  Speaker 9: So you guys actually enjoy the Trump rallies? Or you
• 10:55
  Speaker 9: just find that they're good stories?
• 10:59
  Speaker 7: Some.
• 10:59
  Speaker 10: I would say seven out of ten times it's like
• 11:02
  Speaker 10: an SEC football game.
• 11:04
  Speaker 4: So it can be enjoyable, but nah, it's mostly like
• 11:06
  Speaker 4: a show.
• 11:07
  Speaker 10: And I was like, three out of ten times it's
• 11:08
  Speaker 10: like the craziest thing I've ever seen.
• 11:10
  Speaker 4: And I'm like, not enjoying myself at all.
• 11:12
  Speaker 10: So I would say the range really matters, but it's
• 11:15
  Speaker 10: like not clear.
• 11:16
  Speaker 6: An SEC football game is more fun if you're drunk.
• 11:18
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I would say there's some parts of it that
• 11:20
  Speaker 4: feel festival-y.
• 11:21
  Speaker 10: I don't know how you feel, but like Your head
• 11:23
  Speaker 10: is too on a swivel to ever feel that comfortable.
• 11:26
  Speaker 3: Oh, yeah. And, like, I mean, I usually at some point, like,
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: something uncomfortable happens.
• 11:32
  Speaker 4: Yeah, something's going to happen.
• 11:34
  Speaker 5: Someone's going to yell at you and call you fake news.
• 11:36
  Speaker 7: Oh, to you, something's going to happen.
• 11:38
  Speaker 10: Yeah.
• 11:39
  Speaker 5: Something is going to, like, go a little.
• 11:40
  Speaker 3: And, like, then I'm going to sort of have that
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: feeling there of, like, people don't want me here.
• 11:47
  Speaker 4: What's happened? Oh.
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: Well, I have, like, the regular, like, female reporter things. It's, like,
• 11:53
  Speaker 3: a very male room. So, like, there's just, like, that where, like,
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: you'll be doing an interview and someone will be like,
• 11:58
  Speaker 3: you married?
• 11:58
  Speaker 5: You know, and you're like, oh.
• 12:00
  Speaker 3: But, yeah. And then also people will say to me
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: a lot, like, I can tell you're a liberal.
• 12:04
  Speaker 5: It's, like, the way you're asking the question, the way
• 12:07
  Speaker 5: you're dressed, by your hair. What are you doing here? Like,
• 12:11
  Speaker 5: you're here to get us. You know, and that for me, like.
• 12:15
  Speaker 6: What do you say?
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: Like, I try to respond, like, kind of diplomatically, but, like,
• 12:19
  Speaker 3: a lot of times I get cut off and, like,
• 12:22
  Speaker 3: I get a little flustered by that. Like, I say,
• 12:24
  Speaker 3: usually what I say is, like, my job is to
• 12:26
  Speaker 3: ask questions. I'm genuinely curious. You don't have to answer anything.
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: I'm just here to ask. But by that time, like,
• 12:33
  Speaker 3: I feel like people are, like, suspicious of me that I'm, like,
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: there to make fun of them, to, like, do something shady.
• 12:40
  Speaker 5: And so, like, that feels bad.
• 12:42
  Speaker 4: Mm-hmm. Yeah, certainly, like, everything happens. I've gotten, like, go
• 12:46
  Speaker 4: back to Africa.
• 12:48
  Speaker 10: They will always say, like, well, how can I be racist?
• 12:50
  Speaker 4: We're talking right now.
• 12:50
  Speaker 10: Was there a time when you really were like, let
• 12:54
  Speaker 10: me explain how.
• 12:55
  Speaker 9: This could be possible?
• 12:57
  Speaker 10: No, I literally, like, I have so, it's a one-way conversation.
• 13:02
  Speaker 4: Like, they'll say it, I move on. Like, I don't
• 13:04
  Speaker 4: acknowledge it.
• 13:05
  Speaker 10: I don't, like, I want to show you're not the
• 13:10
  Speaker 10: first time person I've talked to. I, like, know enough
• 13:13
  Speaker 10: conservative news that you'll, like, think this is a real
• 13:15
  Speaker 10: authentic conversation.
• 13:16
  Speaker 4: They freak out about the New York Times.
• 13:18
  Speaker 10: I say, like, you know, if you think the Times
• 13:19
  Speaker 10: won't represent or hear out people like you, here I am, like.
• 13:22
  Speaker 4: Asking the question. So, like, try me. What do you
• 13:25
  Speaker 4: think I'm going to play? I promise you. So I, like,
• 13:27
  Speaker 4: try to say stuff like that.
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: Does that ever reassure them?
• 13:30
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I like that.
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: Does that ever work?
• 13:32
  Speaker 4: Often. Oftentimes. I think we have a very good success
• 13:35
  Speaker 4: rate of talking to conservatives.
• 13:37
  Speaker 7: It's an actual dare.
• 13:38
  Speaker 10: I'm like, usually you can get away with that, but
• 13:41
  Speaker 10: I'm actually in, I'm here, asking.
• 13:44
  Speaker 4: The question, and seriously interested in your answers.
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: What are you interested in right now, though, if it's
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: a lot of the same? That's what I've been curious
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: about with the rallies.
• 13:52
  Speaker 10: Well, I would say we have tried to get away
• 13:54
  Speaker 10: from rallies. We need to find spaces of people that
• 13:56
  Speaker 10: are not Trump rallies.
• 13:57
  Speaker 8: But you're looking for spaces that are not Trump rallies,
• 14:00
  Speaker 8: but are conservative, but are Trump voters, I imagine.
• 14:03
  Speaker 10: Because I actually think the more representative median voter is
• 14:06
  Speaker 10: not at a Trump rally right now.
• 14:08
  Speaker 4: Elections are fine. Like in New Hampshire, you can travel,
• 14:10
  Speaker 4: you can knock door, you can find people.
• 14:12
  Speaker 10: But at the rallies, I think it has become a
• 14:16
  Speaker 10: hardened set there.
• 14:17
  Speaker 4: And it feels like that.
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: Do you ever think about how much of our work
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: is just trying to strategize how to get people to
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: talk to you? Like just like over the line of
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: every email.
• 14:39
  Speaker 8: That's why I feel like emails should have their own
• 14:41
  Speaker 8: separate Academy Award and they should have.
• 14:43
  Speaker 7: Their own separate Pulitzer.
• 14:44
  Speaker 4: Oh, I love that.
• 14:44
  Speaker 7: I feel like I do some of my best writing
• 14:46
  Speaker 7: in emails. I love that. Give me an example.
• 14:49
  Speaker 4: It's funny.
• 14:49
  Speaker 7: Somebody reminded me the other day.
• 14:50
  Speaker 8: There's a person who I met on a train and
• 14:53
  Speaker 8: she told me this story about getting bit by a
• 14:56
  Speaker 8: shark when she was a teenager.
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: I have a memory about when you were trying to
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: talk her into the story.
• 15:03
  Speaker 8: You know when a story is really perfect, you remember
• 15:05
  Speaker 8: it beat by beat. And you remember every emotion the
• 15:08
  Speaker 8: person has. Because what happens is she gets bit by
• 15:10
  Speaker 8: the shark. A doctor stitches her up. And he doesn't
• 15:12
  Speaker 8: notice that basically the shark's bitten through her bowel. She's
• 15:14
  Speaker 8: going to be dead in 12 hours. And then she
• 15:17
  Speaker 8: goes back to the camp. And she's just getting sicker
• 15:19
  Speaker 8: and sicker. And the doctor told the parents, listen, she's
• 15:22
  Speaker 8: going to feel bad. She got totally cut up. It's
• 15:25
  Speaker 8: totally normal. Like, if she can't, has trouble sleeping, like,
• 15:27
  Speaker 8: it's totally normal. And she's feeling worse and worse and worse.
• 15:31
  Speaker 8: And what's happening is she's dying. God is leaking up
• 15:34
  Speaker 8: all through her body. She's being poisoned from the inside.
• 15:36
  Speaker 8: It's sepsis and peritonitis. And she tries to convince her parents,
• 15:38
  Speaker 8: and they don't believe her. They're just like, well, the
• 15:41
  Speaker 8: doctor said you were going to feel bad. So the
• 15:44
  Speaker 8: story has a lot of beads that were totally memorable.
• 15:48
  Speaker 8: And then I was just like, do you want to
• 15:49
  Speaker 8: talk to that cellist or in the radio? And she's like,
• 15:52
  Speaker 8: what do I get out of that? And nobody ever
• 15:54
  Speaker 8: asked me that question. It's like, why would I do that?
• 15:56
  Speaker 7: What do I get out of that?
• 15:57
  Speaker 8: And she said, like, look, I grew up in New
• 15:59
  Speaker 8: Zealand and I spent my whole life before I came
• 16:03
  Speaker 8: to America.
• 16:03
  Speaker 7: As the girl who got bit by the shark. The
• 16:05
  Speaker 7: very last.
• 16:06
  Speaker 8: Thing I want is to now all these people I
• 16:08
  Speaker 8: know in America for whom I'm passing as a normal
• 16:11
  Speaker 8: adult to know I had this dramatic thing, you know
• 16:15
  Speaker 8: what I mean, that happened to me. And I don't
• 16:17
  Speaker 8: want to be the girl who got bit by the
• 16:18
  Speaker 8: shark for the rest of my life. She's like, what
• 16:20
  Speaker 8: do I possibly get out of that? And I really
• 16:22
  Speaker 8: had to think about like, what does she get out
• 16:24
  Speaker 8: of this to tell the story on the radio? And
• 16:26
  Speaker 8: the only thing I came up with was like, like
• 16:29
  Speaker 8: when people hear a story that they can connect to,
• 16:33
  Speaker 8: it like, it gives you a feeling. This is so corny.
• 16:36
  Speaker 8: And now I've had two cocktails and I'm a little drunk. No, no,
• 16:40
  Speaker 8: but I'm saying like, it just gives you a feeling
• 16:42
  Speaker 8: of like, oh my God, like that could be me.
• 16:45
  Speaker 8: I see myself in you. Like you just feel a
• 16:47
  Speaker 8: sense of like, corny human connection and i said to
• 16:51
  Speaker 8: her this does nothing for you you're giving a gift
• 16:56
  Speaker 8: to all these people who are going to hear the
• 16:57
  Speaker 8: story that's it that's all this is so you can
• 17:00
  Speaker 8: do that or not do that.
• 17:01
  Speaker 11: Wait no what i remember i remember talking about when
• 17:03
  Speaker 11: you were trying yeah you did say all that but
• 17:05
  Speaker 11: then as part of that pitch you either you were
• 17:09
  Speaker 11: either said and it makes the world feel bigger or
• 17:12
  Speaker 11: or it makes the world feel smaller.
• 17:13
  Speaker 4: And I don't know which one's better.
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: But it was, do you remember which one you said?
• 17:18
  Speaker 7: I don't remember.
• 17:20
  Speaker 8: I have to look back at that email. I mean,
• 17:21
  Speaker 8: either way, it's saying the same feeling. It's saying like,
• 17:24
  Speaker 8: it makes us feel like we're like each other.
• 17:27
  Speaker 6: People wrote in.
• 17:28
  Speaker 9: After that story and were like, it made me feel
• 17:30
  Speaker 9: like I fainted while driving my car.
• 17:33
  Speaker 8: That was actually like, it's the only thing we've ever
• 17:35
  Speaker 8: broadcast where like actually people said, like three people wrote
• 17:38
  Speaker 8: to us and fainted during the story because it was
• 17:40
  Speaker 8: so intense.
• 17:41
  Speaker 7: I didn't realize that that was a thing that could happen.
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: And the kicker was, in the fact-checking process, like a
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: day before air, we discovered that it might not have
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: been a shark, but like some kind of toothy seal.
• 17:52
  Speaker 7: No, it wasn't a seal.
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: Maybe I'm thinking of Arrested Development.
• 17:59
  Speaker 4: We couldn't know it was a shark.
• 18:00
  Speaker 8: Well, because of the tooth pattern, when we showed the photographs,
• 18:04
  Speaker 8: we had to confirm that it was a shark. And
• 18:07
  Speaker 8: we showed them to an expert and they're like, we
• 18:08
  Speaker 8: can't totally confirm it. It wasn't a seal, it was
• 18:10
  Speaker 8: like a mackerel or something.
• 18:12
  Speaker 4: It was some other fish.
• 18:13
  Speaker 7: It was some other fish.
• 18:14
  Speaker 6: Nobody faints over that. No, no, it was a mackerel,
• 18:16
  Speaker 6: like this big.
• 18:17
  Speaker 7: No, like, it totally, like, she almost died. Can I
• 18:21
  Speaker 7: just say, like, she did almost die.
• 18:22
  Speaker 4: No, no, of course, of course, of course.
• 18:23
  Speaker 9: But the important thing is she actually went for your
• 18:25
  Speaker 9: email when you said you'd get nothing out of this,
• 18:27
  Speaker 9: it's a gift, and.
• 18:27
  Speaker 7: She went for it.
• 18:29
  Speaker 8: I don't necessarily think that's why she went for it. Like,
• 18:32
  Speaker 8: I'd have to ask her. I'd have to ask her
• 18:34
  Speaker 8: if that's why she said yes.
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: Brian here. We have to take a quick break for
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: some sponsors.
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: But also, while I have you, I want to encourage
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: you to sign up for our Question Everything newsletter for
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: behind-the-scenes stuff from these episodes and more. We'll also link
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: to the video version of this episode there, so you
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: can actually see my bartending skills. You can subscribe at
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: kcrw.com slash question everything. We're back to our experiment, Drinks
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: for Five, where I invited four journalists to drink and
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: talk shop. We have This American Life hosts Ira Glass,
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: political reporters Ested Herndon and Zoe Chase, and Pulitzer-winning author
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: Jonathan Eig. We pick back up with Jonathan.
• 19:15
  Speaker 7: Do you get asked for money a lot for interviews?
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 19:17
  Speaker 7: All the time, right?
• 19:18
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 19:19
  Speaker 9: Wait, you do?
• 19:20
  Speaker 5: That seems normal.
• 19:21
  Speaker 7: You're asking people to give you like an hour or two.
• 19:23
  Speaker 6: That's understandable.
• 19:25
  Speaker 7: It doesn't serve them. It's all for you.
• 19:27
  Speaker 9: It seems normal to me, but I just didn't know
• 19:29
  Speaker 9: it was something that everyone was being asked all the
• 19:31
  Speaker 9: time for.
• 19:32
  Speaker 4: Not all the time, but often.
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: Do you explain why you don't?
• 19:36
  Speaker 4: Yeah, but usually if they're.
• 19:37
  Speaker 10: Asking that, then they're really distant from journalism as a process, largely.
• 19:41
  Speaker 10: So that's just a signal, like, I'll take you through
• 19:43
  Speaker 10: like what we're gonna try to do here but.
• 19:46
  Speaker 8: What do you say when they ask like am i
• 19:48
  Speaker 8: gonna get paid no but what do you say for
• 19:52
  Speaker 8: the reason what what's the reason.
• 19:54
  Speaker 4: Well i feel like we don't pay people.
• 19:59
  Speaker 9: Yeah, but that's not a reason.
• 20:00
  Speaker 4: That's not a reason.
• 20:01
  Speaker 6: It's not satisfying. I've tried that. You can't explain, like,
• 20:04
  Speaker 6: the ethics to them.
• 20:05
  Speaker 7: I've tried the idealistic version, too.
• 20:08
  Speaker 8: Where you say, like, no, there's an idea that if
• 20:10
  Speaker 8: I'm paying you, you just say anything I want because
• 20:12
  Speaker 8: I'm paying you, so that's why we don't pay you.
• 20:14
  Speaker 9: But I think their ethical argument and response is actually stronger.
• 20:16
  Speaker 9: Because what they say is, well, is your story going
• 20:19
  Speaker 9: to be.
• 20:19
  Speaker 6: Better with me in it? And are you going to
• 20:22
  Speaker 6: sell more copies of the book if the book's better
• 20:25
  Speaker 6: because I'm in it? So you're going to make more
• 20:27
  Speaker 6: money if I'm in your book. Why shouldn't I get.
• 20:30
  Speaker 7: A slice of that?
• 20:31
  Speaker 6: I said, because I don't pay.
• 20:32
  Speaker 9: Because I don't pay for interviews.
• 20:35
  Speaker 6: They're like, no, there's no good answer to that.
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: Because still, my experience has been their feeling is you're
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: going to have success.
• 20:42
  Speaker 5: Like, you're going to have monetary success. And it's because
• 20:45
  Speaker 5: of what I'm doing for you.
• 20:46
  Speaker 7: And that's so true. They are right.
• 20:48
  Speaker 5: That's so true that a lot of times I'm just like,
• 20:51
  Speaker 5: I'm so sorry. Like, it just doesn't work that way.
• 20:53
  Speaker 5: I'm just going to ask you it, but you don't
• 20:55
  Speaker 5: have to answer. But when they say that in.
• 20:57
  Speaker 9: The Muhammad Ali book, because it's boxing and because everybody
• 21:00
  Speaker 9: got ripped off in the boxing world, they all wanted
• 21:02
  Speaker 9: to be paid. Almost every single person I interviewed wanted
• 21:06
  Speaker 9: to be paid. And it was really hard. I didn't
• 21:08
  Speaker 9: pay anybody, but I kind of, you know. I cut
• 21:11
  Speaker 9: a few corners here and there, I suppose.
• 21:13
  Speaker 7: Which means what? You took him out to dinner?
• 21:14
  Speaker 6: I took him out.
• 21:15
  Speaker 9: To dinner, or I bought Ali's brother's paintings. He had
• 21:18
  Speaker 9: a room full of paintings. You want to buy one
• 21:19
  Speaker 9: of my paintings? Yeah, I bought one of his paintings.
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: I guess I've never been that persuaded by, like, I'm
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: paying you so you're going to say something untrue or
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: embellish something. I guess that's maybe what underlies the worry, partly. No,
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: it's complicated.
• 21:33
  Speaker 6: It's really complicated.
• 21:34
  Speaker 9: And we know it's transactional, and we know we're doing
• 21:36
  Speaker 9: things to try to get people to talk to us.
• 21:39
  Speaker 9: And sometimes, you know, Telling them that the shark bite
• 21:42
  Speaker 9: story is a gift to the world is enough, but oftentimes,
• 21:46
  Speaker 9: you know, you also have to buy them dinner or
• 21:48
  Speaker 9: buy a painting off of their wall.
• 21:51
  Speaker 4: And it feels a little dirty.
• 21:53
  Speaker 9: One of Ali's wives said to me, well, the last
• 21:55
  Speaker 9: guy who interviewed me gave me $ 6, 000.
• 21:56
  Speaker 6: And that makes it harder.
• 22:00
  Speaker 3: I feel like it's hard when people think that there's
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: going to be a change, like, in the world. Like,
• 22:06
  Speaker 3: it's like, oh, I'm going to get my cause out,
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: and this is good for my cause instead. I think
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: that maybe they're coming into it with an expectation that
• 22:12
  Speaker 3: like won't be met. And I try to be like
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: clear because I'm like, I'm here to.
• 22:17
  Speaker 7: Do a story.
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: My goal is mostly providing an insight, but also entertaining
• 22:23
  Speaker 3: because I feel like sometimes we enter into the interview
• 22:26
  Speaker 3: and they don't totally, they.
• 22:29
  Speaker 5: Still think it's going to be good for like their cause.
• 22:32
  Speaker 10: I mean, I think that I'm thinking about like a time,
• 22:35
  Speaker 10: one time I wrote this story about this guy in St. Cloud, Minnesota,
• 22:40
  Speaker 10: and this group of people who were advocating for their
• 22:44
  Speaker 10: town to change the rules to bring in no more
• 22:47
  Speaker 10: like Somali immigrants.
• 22:48
  Speaker 5: No more refugee resettlement.
• 22:49
  Speaker 4: No more refugee resettlement.
• 22:51
  Speaker 10: And I like hung out with this group that was
• 22:54
  Speaker 10: like the leading group of kick all the immigrants out
• 22:56
  Speaker 10: of our town. And so I spent this two days
• 22:59
  Speaker 10: with this guy as he would sit at Culver's every morning.
• 23:02
  Speaker 10: and basically draw up the plans and send out all
• 23:05
  Speaker 10: these kind of Islamophobic propaganda.
• 23:07
  Speaker 6: And blah, blah, blah, blah.
• 23:08
  Speaker 10: He was saying really wild stuff. He was saying that
• 23:11
  Speaker 10: they don't deserve to be in this country. It was
• 23:14
  Speaker 10: stuff about how he was taking an active role.
• 23:18
  Speaker 4: He was kind of a leading organizer.
• 23:19
  Speaker 10: And then he brought me to their weekly meeting where
• 23:22
  Speaker 10: they talk about how much they hate immigrants and how
• 23:25
  Speaker 10: they're going to try to kick them out. And so like,
• 23:28
  Speaker 10: I remember the day before it came out, I had
• 23:30
  Speaker 10: talked to the mayor for another thing, but I called
• 23:32
  Speaker 10: the mayor back and I was like, I think there's
• 23:33
  Speaker 10: going to be a.
• 23:33
  Speaker 4: Thing, you know, just for a heads up.
• 23:35
  Speaker 5: Oh, that's interesting.
• 23:36
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 23:36
  Speaker 10: And I was just like, I don't want you to
• 23:38
  Speaker 10: feel like, but I can tell from the openness of
• 23:40
  Speaker 10: these people, like, I don't, this is going to hit hard.
• 23:44
  Speaker 4: And so just warn it.
• 23:46
  Speaker 10: I do this story that he agrees to sit down
• 23:48
  Speaker 10: for that, like, that he has this picture of, runs
• 23:52
  Speaker 10: on the front page, of course, massive blowback. And I
• 23:55
  Speaker 10: got this letter from a family member actually after being like,
• 24:00
  Speaker 10: do you consider what this does to us? Like, did
• 24:04
  Speaker 10: you consider like what this impact would be on our family?
• 24:08
  Speaker 10: And I remember saying and writing back, like, it's not, like,
• 24:11
  Speaker 10: I understand that concern, but I walked him through this process.
• 24:17
  Speaker 10: I He told me all this stuff on record. I
• 24:21
  Speaker 10: didn't characterize it. I intentionally left it show, not tell.
• 24:26
  Speaker 10: And I don't think that was a satisfying answer to her.
• 24:29
  Speaker 10: And I thought about it for a little bit, but
• 24:31
  Speaker 10: I don't think that's our role.
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: It's not your role to think about the blowback on
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: that person's family.
• 24:37
  Speaker 4: And I don't really think generally.
• 24:38
  Speaker 10: I think I have to be more aware to tell
• 24:42
  Speaker 10: you about the process because that blowback can be more
• 24:44
  Speaker 10: intense these days. And so I think I take more
• 24:47
  Speaker 10: of a proactive role in terms of calling people back,
• 24:50
  Speaker 10: telling them what's going to be in like that type
• 24:52
  Speaker 10: of thing.
• 24:52
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 24:53
  Speaker 10: But standing in front of that blowback or writing in
• 24:56
  Speaker 10: a way to make it not happen.
• 24:57
  Speaker 4: I'm not sure that's my role.
• 24:59
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 24:59
  Speaker 10: Well, you know, I have theories as to why sometimes
• 25:02
  Speaker 10: folks misunderestimate it, but I don't, I try to make
• 25:05
  Speaker 10: sure from my perspective, I'm being proactive and I can,
• 25:09
  Speaker 10: I'm trying to walk you through it and I'm not
• 25:10
  Speaker 10: trying to be overly, um, use the worst parts and stories.
• 25:14
  Speaker 10: The Times is often pulling me back from like, from,
• 25:18
  Speaker 10: you know, I don't, you've already made the point.
• 25:20
  Speaker 4: You don't need this quote too, you know?
• 25:22
  Speaker 10: And I think that's a good instinct to be like,
• 25:25
  Speaker 10: not every version of the thing that they said has
• 25:27
  Speaker 10: to be true.
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: I don't think all reporters agree.
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: I agree with you, but I like, it reminds me
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: of an experience I had with S-Town. I interviewed this
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: guy who was a white supremacist who said a bunch
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: of white supremacist stuff, racial epithets. Um, And we put
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: some of them in the story. And I remember we
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: sent that episode with a few others to a few
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: reviewers beforehand to listen. And some of the feedback we
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: got from people at major publications was like, aren't you
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: worried about the blowback that guy is going to get
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: for saying these things? Does he understand he's on the
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: radio or going to be in a podcast? Concern for
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: him having shared that stuff, exactly kind of what you're
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: talking about.
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: Anyway, the show came out. That guy, his name was Bubba,
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: Facebook messaged me. He was like, Brian, call me. I
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: was like, okay, all right, here it is. And I
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: call him and.
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: He goes, I loved the fucking story. I listened to
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: it twice.
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: He was like, you captured my views perfectly.
• 26:28
  Speaker 10: I get that experience too. Sometimes we infantilize folks about
• 26:32
  Speaker 10: their own views. He believes what he's saying. It's an
• 26:38
  Speaker 10: earnest belief.
• 26:39
  Speaker 9: I think as long as you're not leading them into
• 26:40
  Speaker 9: saying things that you know are going to be sensational.
• 26:43
  Speaker 9: As long as you're accurately portraying. But we've all been
• 26:46
  Speaker 9: in that boat where you know people are saying stuff
• 26:49
  Speaker 9: where they're going to get in trouble for it, maybe
• 26:51
  Speaker 9: they're going to get fired for it, and you're letting
• 26:55
  Speaker 9: them go on and you're going to put it on
• 26:57
  Speaker 9: the air or put it in print, right?
• 26:58
  Speaker 6: Like, you know it's going.
• 27:01
  Speaker 4: To have some damage.
• 27:02
  Speaker 8: Well, it's telling that it's the family member who reached
• 27:04
  Speaker 8: out to you and not him.
• 27:05
  Speaker 7: Like, he stood by what he believed.
• 27:08
  Speaker 4: Yeah, as much as I know.
• 27:10
  Speaker 10: In that same story, someone got fired because this woman
• 27:12
  Speaker 10: said she was this, like, anti-immigration. She said, it's not
• 27:15
  Speaker 10: like they're coming from Sweden. And that was the quote that, like,
• 27:19
  Speaker 10: got her suspended and laid her from our organization, I
• 27:23
  Speaker 10: wasn't trying to be there to get you to say
• 27:26
  Speaker 10: the most crass version, but I do want you to
• 27:28
  Speaker 10: say the most clear version. And so oftentimes I feel
• 27:31
  Speaker 10: like in my experience, I think particularly because of blackness
• 27:35
  Speaker 10: and a couple other things, people will slight tread and
• 27:38
  Speaker 10: I have to not go there initially. I always let
• 27:41
  Speaker 10: the first five versions of it go. I'm here for
• 27:44
  Speaker 10: the clear one, you know? And I have to your point,
• 27:48
  Speaker 10: It's not like you're trying to, like, you're not itching
• 27:51
  Speaker 10: for you to say, like, a slur. But I don't
• 27:55
  Speaker 10: want them overly sanitized because they're having their, like, I'm
• 27:59
  Speaker 10: talking to a Black person thing.
• 28:01
  Speaker 4: And so I usually have to wait till I feel like, that.
• 28:04
  Speaker 10: Lady didn't say that initially. She basically said it in
• 28:06
  Speaker 10: the third time of saying the same thing. I oftentimes
• 28:09
  Speaker 10: ignore the first couple. So, like, it's not a huge deal.
• 28:12
  Speaker 10: I didn't freak out about the first time you mentioned race.
• 28:16
  Speaker 10: I didn't freak out about the first time you talked about, like,
• 28:18
  Speaker 10: immigrants or whatever, whatever.
• 28:20
  Speaker 4: And I'll come back to it later. You'll probably get
• 28:22
  Speaker 4: a little closer.
• 28:24
  Speaker 10: But once she says the Sweden thing, I don't need
• 28:26
  Speaker 10: to say, what.
• 28:27
  Speaker 4: Do you mean? You know, like, I know what you mean.
• 28:30
  Speaker 4: And so I'm like, okay, thank you. We can move on.
• 28:33
  Speaker 9: I just, I remember a really good story about that
• 28:36
  Speaker 9: along these lines. When I was a brand new reporter,
• 28:38
  Speaker 9: first job in New Orleans, I was assigned to the
• 28:40
  Speaker 9: Gretna Bureau and there was a public housing project in Gretna,
• 28:43
  Speaker 9: the Fisher public housing project. And there were these two
• 28:46
  Speaker 9: white cops that were assigned to patrol Fisher and they'd
• 28:49
  Speaker 9: been assigned to it for years. and they were being
• 28:51
  Speaker 9: reassigned and Fisher wasn't going to have its own dedicated
• 28:54
  Speaker 9: police officers anymore. And the department gave me permission to
• 28:57
  Speaker 9: ride with these guys for like the last week that
• 28:59
  Speaker 9: they were actually on duty. And they decided to like
• 29:02
  Speaker 9: show off for me, like how they were, how connected
• 29:05
  Speaker 9: they were, how bad-ass they were. And they did all
• 29:07
  Speaker 9: this really terrible stuff, like just really harassing people.
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: Um, really terrible.
• 29:12
  Speaker 6: And they knew there was a reporter and a.
• 29:14
  Speaker 9: Photographer in the backseat of their police car while they
• 29:16
  Speaker 9: were doing all this. Right. And they just were really
• 29:19
  Speaker 9: showing off.
• 29:19
  Speaker 6: Like, They arrested this one guy, a white guy who
• 29:23
  Speaker 6: came in to buy drugs.
• 29:24
  Speaker 9: And the guy says, oh, please, before my kids' Christmas
• 29:28
  Speaker 9: presents are in the trunk, would you please just lock
• 29:30
  Speaker 9: up the car before you take me in? And they go, oh, sure,
• 29:32
  Speaker 9: we'll lock up your car. And they go back and
• 29:33
  Speaker 9: they say, so your Christmas presents are all in the trunk? Okay,
• 29:37
  Speaker 9: we're locking your car. And they drive them around the
• 29:39
  Speaker 9: block and come back like in two minutes in the cars,
• 29:41
  Speaker 9: you know, completely.
• 29:43
  Speaker 6: It's up on, it's actually like up on cinder blocks.
• 29:45
  Speaker 6: It's just like a couple minutes.
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: It's just terrible.
• 29:48
  Speaker 9: All over the reporter and photographer in the backseat of
• 29:50
  Speaker 9: the car. So the story ran like the next Sunday
• 29:52
  Speaker 9: and they both got suspended. And then the following week,
• 29:56
  Speaker 9: one of the cops was at the zoo with his
• 29:58
  Speaker 9: kids and another kid like fell into the rhino pen
• 30:02
  Speaker 9: and this cop jumped in and rescued the kid from
• 30:05
  Speaker 9: the rhino pen and he got a medal and he
• 30:07
  Speaker 9: got reinstated.
• 30:08
  Speaker 3: It was just the other cop threw that kid in
• 30:13
  Speaker 3: the rhino pen.
• 30:17
  Speaker 6: Why is the perfect ending to this story?
• 30:19
  Speaker 7: Oh yeah, that.
• 30:21
  Speaker 6: Was all true except for the part you, well, your
• 30:23
  Speaker 6: part's better.
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: See, that's the problem.
• 30:24
  Speaker 6: Yeah, that's perfect.
• 30:25
  Speaker 7: Perfect.
• 30:25
  Speaker 4: Wow.
• 30:27
  Speaker 5: That is amazing.
• 30:28
  Speaker 9: And those guys were like my friends for the next
• 30:31
  Speaker 9: few years. I couldn't get a ticket at Gretna. These guys, they.
• 30:34
  Speaker 4: Still loved the story.
• 30:35
  Speaker 6: Even though they got suspended, they loved the story. Oh,
• 30:37
  Speaker 6: they did? They loved it. It was all true. And
• 30:41
  Speaker 6: it made them look like cowboys.
• 30:50
  Speaker 8: When I think about where journalism is and where it fails...
• 30:53
  Speaker 8: which I'm only thinking about because I know you have
• 30:55
  Speaker 8: a podcast to make about this kind of thing.
• 30:59
  Speaker 6: Which will solve the problem, right?
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: Wait, you really never think about it?
• 31:03
  Speaker 7: No, I do think about it.
• 31:04
  Speaker 8: But, like, I don't know, thinking about, like, oh, wait,
• 31:06
  Speaker 8: we're going to talk about journalism, I feel like, oh,
• 31:08
  Speaker 8: everybody thinks about that more than I do. But, like,
• 31:10
  Speaker 8: when I think about, like, where things are failing, I
• 31:13
  Speaker 8: feel like there's nobody attempting to give fact-based information to
• 31:20
  Speaker 8: the people who are watching Fox News, to the people, like,
• 31:22
  Speaker 8: you know, like I have relatives who are like Fox
• 31:24
  Speaker 8: News watchers and like people you meet in a mega
• 31:26
  Speaker 8: crowd and the people who I met at the Glenn
• 31:28
  Speaker 8: Beck rally years ago, like just like totally, just like
• 31:34
  Speaker 8: people who are just believing stuff that's not true. But
• 31:38
  Speaker 8: I feel like that's such a profound problem is I
• 31:40
  Speaker 8: feel like nobody in mainstream media is trying to create
• 31:43
  Speaker 8: a product that will pierce through to the people who
• 31:45
  Speaker 8: don't believe mainstream media.
• 31:47
  Speaker 7: And I think it's a really interesting project. And when
• 31:49
  Speaker 7: you think about who could do it, it's like you would.
• 31:51
  Speaker 8: Want a daily show that's hosted by a kind of
• 31:54
  Speaker 8: right-wing-ish comedian, like a Bill Burr, or like, you know,
• 31:58
  Speaker 8: just like a whole world of those right-wing guys.
• 32:00
  Speaker 6: Joe Rogan.
• 32:02
  Speaker 7: Joe Rogan were a little more close to the facts. Right.
• 32:05
  Speaker 4: Right?
• 32:05
  Speaker 7: Like, you know what I mean?
• 32:06
  Speaker 8: Like, you wanted somebody who's sort of funny, who you
• 32:09
  Speaker 8: kind of feel like is talking straight in some way.
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: You think it's a personality, like, first question?
• 32:15
  Speaker 8: I think it's the only, like, I mean, as a producer,
• 32:18
  Speaker 8: when I think about it, I think, like, that would
• 32:19
  Speaker 8: be the easiest way to cut through. Because you need
• 32:21
  Speaker 8: somebody who defines categories so people don't see, you know
• 32:24
  Speaker 8: what I mean? Like, if you had a regular NPR person,
• 32:26
  Speaker 8: a regular Times person, like, you can just smell it
• 32:29
  Speaker 8: on them.
• 32:30
  Speaker 7: You know what I mean?
• 32:30
  Speaker 8: Like, you need somebody who chemically feels right, and then you.
• 32:35
  Speaker 7: Might have a chance.
• 32:36
  Speaker 8: And I feel like what's happening is, in the war
• 32:40
  Speaker 8: of facts versus non-facts, facts are losing, or they're not winning.
• 32:46
  Speaker 7: Like, they're losing ground. Like, I don't know, like, how
• 32:48
  Speaker 7: many hundreds.
• 32:49
  Speaker 8: Of thousands of people died because they didn't believe factual
• 32:52
  Speaker 8: information about the COVID vaccine? I mean, I feel like,
• 32:54
  Speaker 8: why aren't we always talking about that? It's just like,
• 32:56
  Speaker 8: there's like a death.
• 32:58
  Speaker 7: Count on this.
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: It's just going on.
• 33:01
  Speaker 7: Like, I'm just going on. Doesn't that mean journalism's failing?
• 33:04
  Speaker 10: Yeah.
• 33:05
  Speaker 5: What do you think about Iris characterizing the problem?
• 33:08
  Speaker 3: Like, in terms of people sort of not having access
• 33:13
  Speaker 3: to facts.
• 33:15
  Speaker 10: In my experience, you know, the massive step back from
• 33:18
  Speaker 10: just fact-based conversation, some of that's been intentional. Like, I
• 33:23
  Speaker 10: think the people around me who aren't in media, who,
• 33:26
  Speaker 10: you know, they actually don't care if.
• 33:28
  Speaker 4: It's true or not anymore, or less.
• 33:31
  Speaker 7: Who doesn't care?
• 33:32
  Speaker 4: I'm saying, if I think about, like, my group chat
• 33:35
  Speaker 4: for me.
• 33:37
  Speaker 10: There was a point four years ago where I could
• 33:40
  Speaker 10: be like, ah, that's from a fake site and that
• 33:43
  Speaker 10: response will be heard because there was a desire for information.
• 33:47
  Speaker 4: Now they're like, who cares? Stop bringing down the vibes.
• 33:50
  Speaker 10: I just think there's a bigger step back from even
• 33:53
  Speaker 10: the desire for fact and truth. And so even making
• 33:57
  Speaker 10: the case of this being misinformation is now, I think,
• 34:02
  Speaker 10: something that doesn't have the same Wait against it. And
• 34:05
  Speaker 10: partially because the institutions that were supposed to be the
• 34:08
  Speaker 10: guardians of trust in media or whatever, I think a
• 34:13
  Speaker 10: lot of people feel have blown that.
• 34:15
  Speaker 1: That's interesting.
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: You think there's not– one of my favorite lines of
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: writing ever is in one of your stories, Zoe.
• 34:20
  Speaker 6: Definitely.
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: About Minnesota.
• 34:24
  Speaker 6: Mm-hmm.
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: Where you're talking about the roadshow, the anti-Muslim immigrant roadshow.
• 34:31
  Speaker 4: I think that came to the same cloud.
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: I think you say in there something to the effect,
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: these people have a desire for information, and this feels
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: like information, even.
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: Though it's actually probably not.
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: I've always kind of held on to that, that that
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: is an underlying truth about people, that people do want
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: to feel informed. There is a desire for information. But
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: you're saying maybe that's changed?
• 34:54
  Speaker 10: I think it's an institutional trust deficit. Trump supporters are
• 34:59
  Speaker 10: the clearest example. And to be honest, the left-wing part
• 35:02
  Speaker 10: is overrated, too.
• 35:03
  Speaker 7: Yeah, right.
• 35:03
  Speaker 10: Like, the amount that the, like, if we put non-conservatives
• 35:09
  Speaker 10: are all in this agreement on what facts are is
• 35:11
  Speaker 10: not true either.
• 35:12
  Speaker 4: I think we focus on Trump supporters.
• 35:15
  Speaker 10: But, you know, the thing that taught me about trust
• 35:17
  Speaker 10: was not Trump supporters was crime reporting in Boston neighborhoods
• 35:20
  Speaker 10: where they actually had never shown.
• 35:22
  Speaker 4: Up before that murder, before that fire, like all of
• 35:25
  Speaker 4: those things.
• 35:25
  Speaker 10: And I feel like the lack of trust in those
• 35:27
  Speaker 10: communities has been really real.
• 35:29
  Speaker 4: And it's part of this too.
• 35:30
  Speaker 10: And my New York Times skepticism does not only come
• 35:32
  Speaker 10: from conservatives.
• 35:34
  Speaker 4: Increasingly now.
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: Ira, how do you feel about the change, how things
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: have changed since you started?
• 35:39
  Speaker 7: I mean, journalism and what?
• 35:45
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: You started at NPR in like an idealistic time where
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: it was this new thing trying to do something new.
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: You then started something new in a very idealistic sense.
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: And, you know.
• 35:59
  Speaker 7: I don't know if my answer to this is so interesting.
• 36:01
  Speaker 8: Like, you know, like I came into journalism feeling like, oh,
• 36:05
  Speaker 8: if you sort of lay out a case with information
• 36:10
  Speaker 8: that's true, like you could persuade people and that would
• 36:15
  Speaker 8: change something. And I feel like what I've seen is
• 36:18
  Speaker 8: that's not true. Like, it's just like, I just want
• 36:22
  Speaker 8: to believe that people can understand each other.
• 36:25
  Speaker 7: You know what I mean?
• 36:27
  Speaker 8: Like, like, and I think that, that if, if you
• 36:30
  Speaker 8: make stories for a living, like, like, I don't know,
• 36:34
  Speaker 8: like part of the reason why you do it is
• 36:36
  Speaker 8: because it's really interesting to go out in the world
• 36:38
  Speaker 8: and talk to people. And it just makes everything seem
• 36:41
  Speaker 8: bigger to like discover stuff that you didn't know.
• 36:44
  Speaker 7: And, connect to people that way either way yeah we're
• 36:48
  Speaker 7: smaller exactly i mean.
• 36:51
  Speaker 8: The same thing part of it is that and it's
• 36:54
  Speaker 8: like it's just interesting to be out in the world
• 36:56
  Speaker 8: and like and to and then like to try to
• 36:58
  Speaker 8: say like here's what it seems to be like that's
• 37:01
  Speaker 8: that act is kind of enjoyable but.
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: Wait do you think there's something to ira's idea or not.
• 37:07
  Speaker 10: I think it runs up against the same barriers i
• 37:08
  Speaker 10: don't think the problem is that we're not making it Oh,
• 37:11
  Speaker 10: maybe some people feel like that.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: I think you're talking about the delivery. No, no, no.
• 37:15
  Speaker 8: I feel like every day there's incredible reporting giving fact-based
• 37:18
  Speaker 8: accounts of how to see the world. The problem isn't
• 37:21
  Speaker 8: that that doesn't exist. The problem is that half the
• 37:23
  Speaker 8: population has no interest in that at all, maybe more.
• 37:29
  Speaker 8: And we live in this country that's so divided, and
• 37:33
  Speaker 8: what can you possibly do? And that's why I think
• 37:36
  Speaker 8: about what could the product be? That's the way I
• 37:38
  Speaker 8: think about a problem. It's like, It's like, how would
• 37:40
  Speaker 8: I do it as a radio producer? And I feel
• 37:42
  Speaker 8: like that's the one tiny opening that I see is like,
• 37:46
  Speaker 8: you just need somebody with enough charisma that they would
• 37:49
  Speaker 8: carry people over the line.
• 37:51
  Speaker 7: And it wouldn't be a traditional journalist.
• 37:53
  Speaker 5: To me, this is smaller.
• 37:54
  Speaker 3: I have trouble like what you do, Ira, where you
• 37:58
  Speaker 3: think about like, what can we do?
• 37:59
  Speaker 5: Because there's like a problem. How can we fix it?
• 38:02
  Speaker 3: I'm so focused on thinking about the ways that, like,
• 38:07
  Speaker 3: we've screwed up. Like, the reasons that people don't trust
• 38:10
  Speaker 3: rather than, like, is there a way back from it?
• 38:13
  Speaker 7: Which means what to you?
• 38:14
  Speaker 5: Like, one example would be, like, COVID.
• 38:17
  Speaker 3: Like, I get really stuck on, like, how completely, like,
• 38:20
  Speaker 3: just fucked the response was. You know, that, like, schools
• 38:24
  Speaker 3: were closed and kids were taken out of schools and, like,
• 38:26
  Speaker 3: people just felt not listened to and there wasn't the
• 38:29
  Speaker 3: right evidence to do that And there was such a
• 38:33
  Speaker 3: like break, like because people kept their kids out of
• 38:36
  Speaker 3: school and now they're so mad. And like, I get
• 38:39
  Speaker 3: kind of like caught up in just like frustration with that,
• 38:45
  Speaker 3: where I'm like, the trust was already so thin. And
• 38:49
  Speaker 3: then we had this COVID experience and there was no
• 38:52
  Speaker 3: kind of like massive, I don't know what it would be,
• 38:54
  Speaker 3: but like reckoning.
• 38:55
  Speaker 9: Like, let's take an issue that's not political. Like, cell phones,
• 38:59
  Speaker 9: this book, this new book, Anxiety Nation.
• 39:01
  Speaker 7: I think it's called.
• 39:02
  Speaker 9: I think people have really been discussing that. And I
• 39:04
  Speaker 9: think it's been really informing people.
• 39:06
  Speaker 6: And will it change the world?
• 39:08
  Speaker 3: I don't know.
• 39:10
  Speaker 9: Julie Jargon at the Wall Street Journal had a story
• 39:11
  Speaker 9: last week about a teacher who quit his job at
• 39:14
  Speaker 9: the age of 35 because he couldn't get his kids
• 39:17
  Speaker 9: to put down their cell phones. And it just drove
• 39:19
  Speaker 9: him to the point where he couldn't, he lost his passion.
• 39:22
  Speaker 7: For his work anymore. And This is a teacher who,
• 39:25
  Speaker 7: it was.
• 39:26
  Speaker 9: Just like a thousand word article, this is the best
• 39:28
  Speaker 9: you know, kind of daily newspaper that I love because
• 39:31
  Speaker 9: she probably wrote this story.
• 39:32
  Speaker 6: In two days.
• 39:33
  Speaker 9: And this is a teacher who really tried, you know,
• 39:38
  Speaker 9: he took his kids on hikes and he offered them
• 39:41
  Speaker 9: incentives on their grades if they put down their phones,
• 39:44
  Speaker 9: and he taught them about meditation, and he gave it
• 39:47
  Speaker 9: his best shot, and he lost to the cell phone,
• 39:49
  Speaker 9: and he said it was like they were addicted to
• 39:50
  Speaker 9: the bottle.
• 39:51
  Speaker 6: They just couldn't, if he.
• 39:52
  Speaker 9: Tried to take it out of their hands, they wouldn't
• 39:53
  Speaker 9: let go of it. And that kind of story, I think,
• 39:56
  Speaker 9: you know, gives me, you know, is the kind of
• 39:59
  Speaker 9: thing that I think that gives me hope.
• 40:02
  Speaker 6: Because those kinds of stories, we write those.
• 40:04
  Speaker 9: Stories because, and I'm sure Julie Jargon wrote that story
• 40:07
  Speaker 9: because she thought it's one little One little blow that
• 40:11
  Speaker 9: she can strike, just like this book is striking a
• 40:14
  Speaker 9: bigger blow against something I think we all agree is
• 40:18
  Speaker 9: a problem, like our phone addictions, right?
• 40:35
  Speaker 10: Yeah, I mean, I think, and maybe this is a
• 40:37
  Speaker 10: consequence of political reporting only in post-Trump, but I think that,
• 40:44
  Speaker 10: for me, changing minds has never been a big priority.
• 40:49
  Speaker 10: For me, it's been like, I want an honest accounting
• 40:53
  Speaker 10: of this time. But I remember the night of the
• 40:56
  Speaker 10: 2016 election, thinking, you know, as a local reporter covering
• 41:02
  Speaker 10: crime at the Globe, Like, I felt like as an
• 41:05
  Speaker 10: ingester of that election, I was not prepared to understand
• 41:08
  Speaker 10: the country in that way. And I remember that being
• 41:11
  Speaker 10: the thing that most upset me about media.
• 41:14
  Speaker 4: It wasn't like, my anger wasn't like, it wasn't like, oh,
• 41:17
  Speaker 4: it's just a specific side or whatever.
• 41:19
  Speaker 10: But I'm saying as a journalist, I felt like the
• 41:21
  Speaker 10: people following that election or writing about that election or whatever.
• 41:25
  Speaker 10: tasked with helping me understand the state of America via
• 41:28
  Speaker 10: that election. That in the Democratic primary, the Republican primary,
• 41:34
  Speaker 10: and the general election did not prepare me to do that.
• 41:37
  Speaker 10: So I feel like that feeling has bottled up in
• 41:41
  Speaker 10: me as like a try to make sense of it
• 41:45
  Speaker 10: for other people so that they don't feel like that.
• 41:49
  Speaker 4: But it's not as if that means.
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: Just actually reflect reality.
• 41:51
  Speaker 10: Yeah, just actually let people know what is around them
• 41:56
  Speaker 10: and what this is about and why. And I think
• 42:00
  Speaker 10: that requires some accountability or whatever, but that's not mind-changing.
• 42:04
  Speaker 5: No.
• 42:04
  Speaker 4: And that's not like.
• 42:07
  Speaker 4: So I don't feel like I'm failing if I don't
• 42:09
  Speaker 4: change minds.
• 42:10
  Speaker 7: But I'm surprised. Were you that surprised in 2016?
• 42:13
  Speaker 4: Yeah. It wasn't my job, to be honest.
• 42:16
  Speaker 10: I don't I didn't I only knew via what I
• 42:19
  Speaker 10: was reading in political journalism.
• 42:20
  Speaker 4: But if I was reading the things in front of
• 42:21
  Speaker 4: me and trusting the people.
• 42:23
  Speaker 10: Who I trusted to talk through elections, they had let
• 42:26
  Speaker 10: me down for a year and a half.
• 42:27
  Speaker 8: Yeah.
• 42:28
  Speaker 10: You know, and so that feeling was really clear to me.
• 42:31
  Speaker 10: And so I remember when the globe like, you know,
• 42:36
  Speaker 10: the globe didn't have a plan. And I think that
• 42:38
  Speaker 10: said this, but like a lot of people didn't for
• 42:40
  Speaker 10: Trump to win. And so I ended up getting moved
• 42:42
  Speaker 10: that next morning as like the young 22, three year
• 42:45
  Speaker 10: old who like had no life and kids to like.
• 42:48
  Speaker 4: Oh, do you want to go in D.C. and help
• 42:49
  Speaker 4: us out for a while?
• 42:51
  Speaker 7: And I was like, oh, I don't know.
• 42:52
  Speaker 10: I feel really weird about journalism right now. I, like,
• 42:55
  Speaker 10: said this, like, really millennial answer about, like, I don't
• 42:58
  Speaker 10: know if, like, I want to be. And I remember
• 43:00
  Speaker 10: the Globe editor saying, like, you have complained too much
• 43:03
  Speaker 10: about how people do this to not try to do it. Like,
• 43:08
  Speaker 10: and I really held on to that as, like, okay,
• 43:10
  Speaker 10: maybe that's my goal for the next time is not to, like,
• 43:15
  Speaker 10: not to like change minds or impact in a traditional
• 43:19
  Speaker 10: journalism way, but just stop more people from having the
• 43:22
  Speaker 10: same feeling I felt, which is like, wait, I thought,
• 43:25
  Speaker 10: how was I not prepared for this?
• 43:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I know.
• 43:28
  Speaker 2: I feel you talking about like journalism's role being to
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: reflect reality or just kind of document that's the best
• 43:32
  Speaker 2: we can do. I believe that for a long time
• 43:34
  Speaker 2: and I've been in this zone of just feeling like
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: it doesn't feel like enough.
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: And that's kind of the spirit of this.
• 43:41
  Speaker 2: It's just like, there's something like that felt like enough
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: for so long. And like, yeah, that that was our
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: role and our purpose. And, and there's something about it
• 43:51
  Speaker 2: that I just hit a point where like, it feels insufficient.
• 43:54
  Speaker 8: But like, but like, but like, honestly, like it's so
• 43:57
  Speaker 8: hard to just do that. Like even like, even doing
• 44:01
  Speaker 8: that well, it's just so hard. When you said that,
• 44:04
  Speaker 8: I was like, the thing that made me think of
• 44:05
  Speaker 8: is years ago, I had this conversation with this guy
• 44:07
  Speaker 8: named John Madison. who was the lead political reporter at
• 44:11
  Speaker 8: the Rand Daily Mail when Nelson Mandela was still in
• 44:13
  Speaker 8: prison and Steve Biko and the whole apartheid.
• 44:17
  Speaker 7: Movement when it seemed hopeless.
• 44:19
  Speaker 8: And the Rand Daily Mail was one free newspaper, the
• 44:23
  Speaker 8: one uncensored newspaper in South Africa. And even they would
• 44:26
  Speaker 8: get fucked with by the government now and then. And
• 44:29
  Speaker 8: he said that it was a little bit like working
• 44:32
  Speaker 8: in a bunker where you're under siege, right? And they
• 44:35
  Speaker 8: felt like we're going to go out there and we're
• 44:37
  Speaker 8: going to like just document what's really happening. And he
• 44:40
  Speaker 8: said the mentality in the newsroom and the thing that
• 44:42
  Speaker 8: they said to each other was kind of we might
• 44:47
  Speaker 8: get shut down. This may go nowhere. But someday when
• 44:52
  Speaker 8: people look back on this moment, we want to have
• 44:55
  Speaker 8: captured it accurately so nobody can say this didn't happen.
• 44:59
  Speaker 4: Yeah, 100%.
• 45:00
  Speaker 7: That's how I feel.
• 45:01
  Speaker 8: It's funny because when John said it, I thought, like,
• 45:03
  Speaker 8: it's such a defensive position. It's sort of like all
• 45:07
  Speaker 8: is lost. We're barely holding on by our fingernails. And
• 45:11
  Speaker 8: so the one thing that's left is let's just, like,
• 45:14
  Speaker 8: please just, like, write this down.
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: Make a record of it.
• 45:16
  Speaker 7: Make a record of it.
• 45:18
  Speaker 6: Yeah.
• 45:18
  Speaker 8: Like, I just want the truth to exist. It's, like,
• 45:21
  Speaker 8: simultaneously so purely idealistic. But it's also, like, a bunch of, like,
• 45:28
  Speaker 8: monks in the last monastery... like, who know how to
• 45:31
  Speaker 8: write being surrounded by, like, people who are about to, like,
• 45:35
  Speaker 8: destroy them or something.
• 45:36
  Speaker 7: Like, I don't know.
• 45:37
  Speaker 8: Like, there's something about this.
• 45:39
  Speaker 10: I don't know if it's defeatist or idealistic. I think
• 45:42
  Speaker 10: it's a little bit of both. But I also believe
• 45:45
  Speaker 10: in journalism. I didn't go work for a political organization
• 45:49
  Speaker 10: or a candidate or whatever like that.
• 45:52
  Speaker 4: And so I definitely think it's not fully defeatist.
• 46:09
  Speaker 2: Astead Herndon, he hosts the podcast The Run-Up from The
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: New York Times. You can hear Ira Glass and Zoe
• 46:15
  Speaker 2: Chase on This American Life. And Jonathan Icke's latest book
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: is called King, A Life. Thanks for listening to Question Everything. Again,
• 46:24
  Speaker 2: you can check out this whole episode and every episode
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: of this show on YouTube. You can also follow us
• 46:30
  Speaker 2: on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you do your listening.
• 46:34
  Speaker 2: On our next episode, two Thursdays from now, I follow
• 46:37
  Speaker 2: this thread. that came up in this discussion over drinks
• 46:40
  Speaker 2: of how journalists are dealing with the decimation of trust
• 46:43
  Speaker 2: in our work. I visit one of the most accomplished
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: investigative reporters of our time who decided just this year
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: that the struggle to get people to hear and accept
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: facts is too challenging right now, that just documenting what's happening,
• 46:56
  Speaker 2: like monks, isn't going to cut it. And so he
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: made the remarkable choice to quit journalism altogether.
• 47:02
  Speaker 11: It started feeling to me like my job was not
• 47:07
  Speaker 11: adequate to our times.
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: That's coming on September 26th. Question Everything is a production
• 47:18
  Speaker 2: of Placement Theory and KCRW. Find us on Instagram at
• 47:21
  Speaker 2: Placement Theory and at KCRW.
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: And I'm Bri H. Reed.
• 47:26
  Speaker 2: Thanks to the wine store Bibber & Bell in Brooklyn,
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: New York, our gracious hosts for the recording of today's episode.
• 47:33
  Speaker 2: It was produced by our executive producer, Robin Simeon, and
• 47:36
  Speaker 2: our production intern, Emily Maltaire. The episode was edited by
• 47:39
  Speaker 2: Lisa Pollack and me. Additional production help by our show producer,
• 47:43
  Speaker 2: Zach St.
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: Louis.
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: Sound design by Brendan Baker. Music by Matt McGinley. Audio
• 47:49
  Speaker 2: engineering by Gabe Kroga. Film production by Ambrose Ang and
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: the team at Stone & Spade. Fact-checking by Kaylin Lynch.
• 47:57
  Speaker 2: Our partners at KCRW include Arnie Seipel, Gina Delvac, Tejal Ajmera,
• 48:02
  Speaker 2: and Jennifer Farrow. Special thanks to Chris Olesovich, Chuck Salter,
• 48:06
  Speaker 2: Kalina Yang, and Cassandra Seto and Matt Klein at O'Melveny.
• 48:11
  Speaker 2: Speaking of facts, obviously drinking and talking off the cuff
• 48:14
  Speaker 2: doesn't always result in the most precise utterances, so there
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: are a few things to clarify and correct after our
• 48:18
  Speaker 2: fact checker went through this. In a Stead story about
• 48:21
  Speaker 2: the anti-immigrant group in St. Cloud, Minnesota, the quote was,
• 48:24
  Speaker 2: these people aren't coming from Norway, not Sweden. And the
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: book John mentioned about adolescent cell phone addiction by Jonathan
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: Haidt is called The Anxious Generation. We have some other
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: clarifications in the show notes. We'll be back with a
• 48:37
  Speaker 2: new episode of Question Everything on Thursday the 26th.