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The Duke of Edinburgh is Literally a God in Vanuatu · Ridiculous History

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  Speaker 1: Ridiculous History is a production of I Heart Radio. Recently
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  Speaker 1: on Twitter, I was asking some uh, some friends about
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: which books we find ourselves rereading again and again in
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: this sort of inevitable way, Like you read this, you
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: know a few years later you're going to reread it.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: For me, one of my favorite books in the world
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: is a book called The Atlas of Remote Islands. So
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: we ever talked about this book? I don't think so. Ben,
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  Speaker 1: my name is Null by the way, yes, and I'm Ben.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: And we are joined with our guest super producer Paul
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: Mission Controlled Decad, who you may recognize for another show
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: stuff they don't want you to know. Uh, Paul, do
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  Speaker 1: you have a sound Do we have a sound effect?
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: Paul is nodding, Oh, there it is, And it's always
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  Speaker 1: shout out to our super producer Casey La Bush Pegram,
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: who is pursuing his double life. I just think it's
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: a delight that he's able to do that, you know,
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  Speaker 1: and only receive mild ragging from from us. My ragging, No,
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: say it ain't so. I I have immense respect for
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: anyone who Ken Kaiser sociated to that degree. Let's just
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: hope his French friends never listened to this English language
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: podcast where it's all over for the bush. Uh. The
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  Speaker 1: one thing about this book, now, I'll get you a
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  Speaker 1: copy because it's a tremendous book. It's one of those
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  Speaker 1: books that I end up having to buy copies of
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  Speaker 1: repeatedly because I keep giving it away. One thing about
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  Speaker 1: this book is it's an atlas and uh, an anthology
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  Speaker 1: of short true stories that happened on some of the
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  Speaker 1: world's most remote islands. And when we think here in
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  Speaker 1: the States of traveling, we think of places like, you know, Europe,
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  Speaker 1: maybe Africa, South America, Asia, But we often and there's
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  Speaker 1: not a ding on us. I'm just saying the general
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  Speaker 1: we people in the US, we often forget about the
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  Speaker 1: thousands and thousands and thousands of tiny islands around the globe,
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  Speaker 1: you know what I mean. They have their own distinct, rich,
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  Speaker 1: amazing history that you will not find anywhere else on
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  Speaker 1: the planet. And a bunch of them are in the
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  Speaker 1: South Pacific. Oh yeah, and if you've seen the the
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  Speaker 1: musical South Pacific, but it's very accurate about the life
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  Speaker 1: on these islands in that they're in the South Pacific
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  Speaker 1: and they sing constantly. Everything's in song form with occasional
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  Speaker 1: snatches of dialogue. Um, everyone's washing men out of their hair.
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  Speaker 1: You know. Their showers are these little stalls with little coke.
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  Speaker 1: Not I think everything is made of coconuts. It's like
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  Speaker 1: Gilligan's Island kind of situation, you know, right. I have
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  Speaker 1: to say I have not I have not seen the
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  Speaker 1: musical South Pacific. Well, the most famous song I think
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  Speaker 1: is than this Ballya We'll call you Ballet Highs, like
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  Speaker 1: the kind of shangri law. It's like this sort of
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  Speaker 1: like paradise. Yeah, maybe I'll check it out. Uh. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: The thing about this area of the world is that
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  Speaker 1: it is populated with thousands and thousands of islands grouped
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  Speaker 1: in different places, you know, Micronesia, Uh, Malaysia, Indonesia. Where
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  Speaker 1: are good pal Christopher Haciotes has spent some time Indonesia, Indonesia. Yeah, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: he's he's deep in the Indonesia game. We should ask
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  Speaker 1: him about it one day. Today's story takes us to
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  Speaker 1: the South Pacific. We are traveling to Melanesia M E.
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  Speaker 1: L A N E s I A, and we're examining
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  Speaker 1: a religious movement that may be familiar to some and
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  Speaker 1: completely out of the blue for others. We're going to Tanna,
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  Speaker 1: a small island in the southern part of the Vanuatu
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  Speaker 1: Archipelago where devoted believers await the second coming of a god,
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  Speaker 1: an American god, a US god who will bring divine gifts.
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  Speaker 1: And they're specific. Yeah, there there's a pigeon English word
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  Speaker 1: that I didn't know this, but a cargo is pigeon
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  Speaker 1: English for like stuff. Basically, right, this god will bring
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  Speaker 1: television's refrigerators, Coca cola. This belief system, this religious movement
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  Speaker 1: is often referred to as a cargo cult. And the
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  Speaker 1: idea just like you said, nol u for for a
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  Speaker 1: lot of US, cargo means like something you would haul
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  Speaker 1: on a ship, but here it means stuff gifts. So
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  Speaker 1: there will be in this belief a new age of
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  Speaker 1: blessing and it will be signaled by the arrival of
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  Speaker 1: a special cargo of goods from supernatural sources. But Ben,
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  Speaker 1: this god had doesn't have a particularly godlike name, does he?
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  Speaker 1: And one there is John from f r U m
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  Speaker 1: uh so it's an odd name for a god. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: So this there's a documentary called Waiting for John. An
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  Speaker 1: Islands cult worships American materialism, and it's about the John
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  Speaker 1: From movement on Tanna. This is commonly called a cargo cult,
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  Speaker 1: which may seem like an advice of word for people,
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  Speaker 1: but in the belief system John From is a soldier
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  Speaker 1: who visited Tanna during World War Two bringing cargo. So
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  Speaker 1: what this is to me, uh and and too many
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  Speaker 1: um anthropologists that have examined this phenomenon is sort of
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  Speaker 1: a clashing of modern culture with indigenous culture. Right then, right, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: there's real there's syncretism of a type going on here.
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  Speaker 1: So the John From movement has its greatest stronghold in
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  Speaker 1: a village called Lama Carra, and many villagers have still
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  Speaker 1: according to a Great Slate article written in many villagers
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  Speaker 1: in this in this area have left the movement for
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  Speaker 1: other religions, typically Christian alternatives. The idea becomes um become
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  Speaker 1: sticky because it is a real thing, right, and it
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  Speaker 1: is a genuine belief system. But also there's a little
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  Speaker 1: bit of mothering that occurs when we're talking about this.
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  Speaker 1: You know, it's very easy perhaps for people to be
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  Speaker 1: condescending about this, but we know that the cargo colts
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  Speaker 1: existed before World War Two. One of the first occurrences.
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  Speaker 1: Was the took up movement that began in Fiji in
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  Speaker 1: five around the British colonial plantation era. And it's it's
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  Speaker 1: kind of the same grand theater written out, there's gonna
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  Speaker 1: be a there, there's gonna be a stranger who has
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  Speaker 1: tremendous power, who is going to bring these this unending
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  Speaker 1: cycle of goods and gifts. And usually when we talked
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  Speaker 1: about cargo colts. Today we're talking about the Melanesian Islanders
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  Speaker 1: in the years during and after World War Two because
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  Speaker 1: these people we're not living you know, uh, globally connected lives.
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  Speaker 1: And then in the because of the tragedy of World
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  Speaker 1: War Two, they see the largest war ever fought by
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  Speaker 1: you know, high tech nations. Right, you see Japan bringing
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  Speaker 1: a great deal of supplies and then later the Allied forces.
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  Speaker 1: So what would you think, you know what I mean,
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  Speaker 1: if you wake up one day people dressed the way
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  Speaker 1: you've never seen. Right, they're coming out of machines that
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  Speaker 1: you have never seen. Are they machines? It's tough to know.
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  Speaker 1: And then they're bringing tons of tons are really cool stuff,
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  Speaker 1: really cool stuff. And they not only sought the blessings
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  Speaker 1: and the the largesse of these items that would rain
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  Speaker 1: down from the sky in theory, Um, they had to
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  Speaker 1: sacrifice some stuff, or at least they created this system
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  Speaker 1: that was again this kind of East meets West or
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  Speaker 1: kind of you know, clashing of cultures where they were
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  Speaker 1: able to kind of adapt their traditional beliefs into this
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  Speaker 1: kind of new sort of hybridized religion. And some of
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  Speaker 1: it involved sacrificing, right, like what what kind of sacrifices? Well, Um,
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  Speaker 1: the some of the native folks would want to butcher
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  Speaker 1: all of their pigs because they knew they were going
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  Speaker 1: to receive a blessing of great pigs that would rain
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  Speaker 1: down from the sky. Um, So they would hoard what
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  Speaker 1: food and firewood, and they would stockpile all these things
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  Speaker 1: for the arrival of the great pigs that they would
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  Speaker 1: then used to to feed them. This is my favorite part,
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  Speaker 1: and this is really fascinating. All that gear we were
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  Speaker 1: talking about, all that stuff that they would see. They
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  Speaker 1: built their own kind of like stand ends for some
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  Speaker 1: of these things like radio towers may have bamboo and rope.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, and uh would dress in ways that were
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  Speaker 1: reminiscent of the what what they believed these other people
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  Speaker 1: had looked like I think you're talking specifically about when
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  Speaker 1: the Australian government went into New Guinea right in the
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  Speaker 1: nineteen forties and people went nuts. Can you imagine how
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  Speaker 1: surreal the situation would be because they were slaughtering all
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  Speaker 1: their pigs, right, that was the sacrifice before the They thought,
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  Speaker 1: because they saw these forces, that it was a sign
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  Speaker 1: the world was going to end, right, three days of
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  Speaker 1: darkness the millennium. Yeah, and then as you said, Nold,
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  Speaker 1: great pigs appear from the sky. And what interesting about
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  Speaker 1: this is that there are multiple versions of these of
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  Speaker 1: these religions, and they appear to have arisen independently a
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  Speaker 1: sort of a parallel response to social stress and strain.
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  Speaker 1: There's the Taro cult and againy the Vila madness of Papua,
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  Speaker 1: the naked cult of his Spiritu Santo, the John From
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  Speaker 1: movement when you mentioned earlier, and the took occult from
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  Speaker 1: you know, the late eighteen hundreds. It's strange that this
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  Speaker 1: applied to troops on either side of World War Two.
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  Speaker 1: So access forces land and somewhere on an island and boom,
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  Speaker 1: it's a sign of the apocalypse. Allied forces arrived, Boom,
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  Speaker 1: it's a sign of the same. And there's a story
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  Speaker 1: about g I s who are moving towards the conflict
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  Speaker 1: on Guadalcanal. When they arrived in the New Hibrides, they
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  Speaker 1: found native people preparing these air fields, these roads, and
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  Speaker 1: these docks that you mentioned. Uh, And they said, we're
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  Speaker 1: preparing for the ships and planes that were coming from
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  Speaker 1: russel Felt, which was there their word for Roosevelt. They
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  Speaker 1: thought he was the King of America. But they also
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  Speaker 1: saw him as a benevolent king, didn't they been? They did? Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: it's true, he was, he was. If the preparations were
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  Speaker 1: made correctly, then this King of America would show favor
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  Speaker 1: to people who kept the faith. In the lack of
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  Speaker 1: a better word, how about the Japanese ben They they
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  Speaker 1: had their own kind of encounter with this sort of thing,
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  Speaker 1: didn't there they did? They did not. So here's one
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  Speaker 1: of the stranger instances in Dutch New Gutting. Japanese forces
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  Speaker 1: had to be turned against the local Papua and inhabitants
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  Speaker 1: of the Guilvink Bay region. At first, they had been
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  Speaker 1: received with great joy because the the native people living
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  Speaker 1: there saw them as harbingers of a new world that
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  Speaker 1: was dawning, and they saw the arrival of the Japanese
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  Speaker 1: forces as a sign that the creator of their islands
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  Speaker 1: and their people, named mons Rin, would now return, bringing
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  Speaker 1: with them the great ancestral dead. And the religious leaders
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  Speaker 1: said that this was all not this was all public knowledge.
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  Speaker 1: But the Dutch were trying to control the island, and
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  Speaker 1: they had torn out the first page of the Bible
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  Speaker 1: where the true story was inscribed. And when Mansarin returned,
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  Speaker 1: the existing world order would be entirely thrown on its head.
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  Speaker 1: Uh people would change skin color, broot crops would grow
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  Speaker 1: in trees, coconuts, and fruits would grow on the ground
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  Speaker 1: like tubers. And then they started getting together in large
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  Speaker 1: towns and renaming their villages. Even they adopted military uniforms,
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  Speaker 1: they imitated military drills. The US turned the tide against
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  Speaker 1: the Japanese forces, how so they UH They became very unpopular.
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  Speaker 1: They were trying to disarm and disperse UH these communities,
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  Speaker 1: and eventually canoe loads of fanatics sailed out to attack
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  Speaker 1: Japanese warships. They believed they were invulnerable because of the
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  Speaker 1: holy water they had sprinkled themselves with power of belief. Right,
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  Speaker 1: the power of belief. Let's go, you know, what's interesting here, Uh,
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  Speaker 1: I think we should go back to John From. So
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  Speaker 1: we've we've shown that there are multiple iterations of this thing,
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  Speaker 1: and John From wasn't the only deity. It was sort
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  Speaker 1: of parallel thinking, right, yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. So there
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  Speaker 1: is a rich folkloric ecosystem. Which is probably the most
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  Speaker 1: pretentious thing I've said in a while, but you know
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  Speaker 1: what them it had to be that. I'm glad that's
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  Speaker 1: the one it was, because that is a very smart sounding,
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  Speaker 1: pretentious thing you just said. Thanks, thanks so much. The
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  Speaker 1: uh so, John From is still celebrated Every year on
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  Speaker 1: February fifteen, natives of Tanna Island hold a celebration in
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  Speaker 1: honor of From. People clue themselves in US Army pants,
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  Speaker 1: they paint USA on their chest, they have a replica
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  Speaker 1: of the US flag alongside the Marine Corps emblem, and
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  Speaker 1: then the celebrance of this stressed as soldiers march in
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  Speaker 1: the shadow of the island's active volcano, and they have
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  Speaker 1: replica rifles red tipped bamboo slung over their shoulder. This
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  Speaker 1: is considered the holiest religious service that followers of the
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  Speaker 1: John From religious movement can do. And and it's so
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  Speaker 1: difficult This is a big topic. We talked about this
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  Speaker 1: a little bit off. Era is a big topic that
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  Speaker 1: we could probably return to. There are so many incredible
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  Speaker 1: cultural impacts that were made by these encounters with US
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  Speaker 1: and Allied forces. Islanders were first off, they were astonished
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  Speaker 1: that these that these visitors, at least from the Allies side,
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  Speaker 1: were way better than the British missionaries have been. And
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  Speaker 1: then imagine their surprise too when they saw, wait, some
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  Speaker 1: of these soldiers have skin like ours, and they're getting
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  Speaker 1: all the benefits of this cargo. You know what I mean,
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  Speaker 1: the food, the medicine, the treats, the shelter, the technology.
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  Speaker 1: And in the past, because of their skin color, people
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  Speaker 1: who lived on these islands had been denied any of
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  Speaker 1: these benefits by the British and by other European powers.
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  Speaker 1: So of course they see this, there's there's something aspirational
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  Speaker 1: about it, and we see human propensity to create religion.
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  Speaker 1: But we should go you know what, we would be
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  Speaker 1: remiss if we didn't cover one of the most infamous
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  Speaker 1: examples of a quote unquote cargo cult. That's the story
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  Speaker 1: of Prince Philip, the infamous Prince Philip movement. No No
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  Speaker 1: No is that the Prince Philip. Oh, yes, yes it is, yes,
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  Speaker 1: it has been. It's the Prince Philip. So the Prince
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  Speaker 1: Philip movement began on that very island we talked about
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  Speaker 1: at the top of the show Antana in the nineteen sixties.
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  Speaker 1: They believed that the Prince was some sort of deity
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  Speaker 1: unto himself, a god among men, right like, brought to
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  Speaker 1: this earth to fulfill some sort of ancient prophecy. That
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  Speaker 1: he was the son of some kind of mountain spirit
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  Speaker 1: who would take the form of a very conveniently pale
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  Speaker 1: skinned man. As we know, Prince Philip was, you know,
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  Speaker 1: a little pasty, a little bit on the pasty side,
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  Speaker 1: a little ghostly in his uh you know, visage, right um.
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  Speaker 1: And that this man would travel abroad, marry a powerful
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  Speaker 1: woman check check, and eventually returned to the island. And
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  Speaker 1: when the villagers saw this portrait of Prince Philip, I'm
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  Speaker 1: quite sure how they happened upon said portrait. Man, Have
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  Speaker 1: you heard this part of the story? Yeah, yea. So
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  Speaker 1: we know that this belief probably arose sometime in the
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  Speaker 1: fifties or sixties, nineteen fifties or sixties, and it really
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  Speaker 1: picked up steam when the royal couple visited the island
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  Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy four and some villagers were able to
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  Speaker 1: see physically see Prince Philip from a distance right. He
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  Speaker 1: was not aware, by the way of any of this.
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  Speaker 1: He did not know what was happening until later a
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  Speaker 1: guy named John Champion, the British Resident Commissioner of the area,
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  Speaker 1: informed him about this belief system. And Champion is the
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  Speaker 1: one that said, hey, Prince Philip, you should send them
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  Speaker 1: a picture of you that makes sense. So he sends
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  Speaker 1: the picture and he signs it. The villagers respond by
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  Speaker 1: sending him a traditional club used to kill livestock. It's
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  Speaker 1: called a no No and he complies with their request
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  Speaker 1: to send them a picture of himself posing with the club.
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  Speaker 1: So he sends it. And I think there was another
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  Speaker 1: photograph that was sent as recently as the year two thousands,
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  Speaker 1: was recently as nineteen years ago. And there's a really
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  Speaker 1: great mental fluss article. You know how much we love
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: mental fluss articles. Uh, it doesn't have a writing credit
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  Speaker 1: on it, which is strange. I guess it's just the
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  Speaker 1: staff writer, or maybe it was written by committee who
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: knows not to ask will in Mangesh But It is
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  Speaker 1: about the cult of Prince Philip, and it talks about
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  Speaker 1: how so many world movements, machinations of you know, cultural
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  Speaker 1: shifts were attributed by these native folks to Prince Philip
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  Speaker 1: and his influence, his spiritual kind of uh web of influence.
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  Speaker 1: They actually claimed that his powers gave black men um
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  Speaker 1: the ability to become President of the United States, and
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: that he possessed a kind of magic that allowed the
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: US forces to locate Osama ben Latten. Interesting, right, Interesting.
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  Speaker 1: He was also said at times to be a brother
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  Speaker 1: to John. From what I think will startle many people
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  Speaker 1: is to know that this this continued so far into
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  Speaker 1: the modern age. In two thousand and seven, BBC's Channel
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  Speaker 1: four broadcast a reality show called Meet the Natives, which
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: I think is a tone deaf name. Uh. Five men
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  Speaker 1: from the Prince Philip movement went on a visit to
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  Speaker 1: Britain and their trip culminated in a audience with Prince Philip.
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  Speaker 1: They actually met, physically met him, talked to him, They
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  Speaker 1: got a new photograph, they exchanged some gifts. Can you
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  Speaker 1: imagine how cool that must be if you really believe
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  Speaker 1: this stuff. It would be like meeting Jesus Christ. That's
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  Speaker 1: the amazing thing. Yeah, it's kind of makes you think
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  Speaker 1: about the ideas of various ancient civilizations where there were
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  Speaker 1: god emperors. How powerful is it to meet someone who
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  Speaker 1: has at the center of your religion. Now, this also
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  Speaker 1: goes into an ethical thing that I wanted to I
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  Speaker 1: wanted to ask everybody listening about if you found out
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  Speaker 1: that there was some part of the world where you
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  Speaker 1: had never been, maybe even never thought about visiting, and
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  Speaker 1: that people in this part of the world knew about
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  Speaker 1: you and worshiped you, what would you do? Would you go,
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  Speaker 1: would you allow yourself to be worshiped? Or would you say, Hey,
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  Speaker 1: I'm just a person, you know what I mean? I
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: you know, I burned my bell bottoms one leg at
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  Speaker 1: a time, like everybody else in the post disco era.
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  Speaker 1: That's right. I put my sacrificial robes on with a
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  Speaker 1: draw string, just like the rest of you. I too,
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  Speaker 1: love Toshie bidats and Miller like and pina coladas and
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  Speaker 1: occasionally walks in the rain. So what would you do?
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  Speaker 1: It's an interesting question. It's an ethical dilemma. We what
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  Speaker 1: Prince Philip did. He kind of leaned into it a
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  Speaker 1: little bit. It really did Yeah, that's almost kind of problematic,
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  Speaker 1: is it not. It's I would say, I would say
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  Speaker 1: almost kind is a good qualifier. He has other stuff
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  Speaker 1: he's done and things that he said that we're vary racist,
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: more offensive. That's also true. But here's the thing, though, Ben,
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: is it more or less offensive if it's truly these
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: people's belief to like bigin on their belief, party on
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: their faith parade? Or is it? Is it more respectful
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: just to go along with it, even if you happen
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: to be at the center of it. Yeah, I don't know.
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: It's I mean, it's a quandary. It's a quagmire. I'm
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: not sure what the right thing to do would be. Uh.
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: If somebody has such tremendous faith in you, you don't
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: want to let them down, you know. So we want
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: to hear from you. Let us know what you think,
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: let us know what your decision would be. You can
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: tell us along with your fellow listeners on Instagram, on Twitter,
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: on Facebook, and as always, we we look forward to
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: hearing your takes and to hearing your discussions. These are
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: active religious movements, they're still around, so let's all be
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: respectful of people's beliefs. What would you do though, if
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: folks worshiped you and revered you and held you up
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: as a god, would you burst their bubble? Or would
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: you go with it? Let us know. You can write
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: to us at Ridiculous at my heart radio dot com.
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: The aforementioned Facebook page we recommend you joining is called
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: Ridiculous Historians. Think. All you have to do is name
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: one of our names, or I say something clever that
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: lets us know you actually sen to the show, and
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: then you can be part of a really cool group
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: of like minded history buffs that you know post a
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: lot of memes and ask a lot of fun questions,
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: and we learn in there occasionally and pop into threads
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: from time to time. You can also find me and
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: Ben collectively individually rather at our our own Instagram handles.
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: Mine is at how Now Noel Brown. Mine is at
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: Ben Bolan. Uh tune in. I don't remember when this
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: episode come out, but I'll probably be on some more
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: uh strange shenanigans and misadventures, so uh so let me
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: let me know. I'll also be asking for some travel advice.
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: Uh And if you if you log into that Facebook
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: honestly just like make us laugh, do something to make
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: us laugh. We're in big thanks to our guest super
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: producer Paul Mission Controlled Decade, Paul Invisible Air, High five, Up,
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: Top Boom and as always big Big thanks to Casey
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: La Bouche, Pegram Banksed Alex Williams who composed our theme.
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: Thanks to our Reach associate Gabe Losier, and thanks to
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: Christopher Aciotes. Here in Spirit as per usual and PNN,
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: thanks to you buddy. Thanks to you know uh. I
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: almost called you buckaroo, but those are fighting words for
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: people over. No fighting here, Sarah, We're all about peace.
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: See you next time. For more podcasts for my Heart Radio,
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows,