Latest / Conspiracy! The Show / Dope is Death

Transcript

Dope is Death · Conspiracy! The Show

0:05
Speaker 1: Short winter insurance?
0:11
Speaker 2: Did I true?
0:12
Speaker 3: The troth? I'm a checked out both insurance good?
0:15
Speaker 1: I true? There is the.
0:30
Speaker 2: Hey, everybody, welcome to Conspiracy The Show. I'm your host,
0:35
Speaker 2: Adam Todd Brown joining me as co host this week,
0:39
Speaker 2: my favorite co host of all no co host, but
0:41
Speaker 2: I do have a couple of guests, very uncharacteristic for
0:44
Speaker 2: this podcast. We don't usually have guests. It's usually just
0:48
Speaker 2: me and a co host. Case in point, Caitlin Cutt,
0:51
Speaker 2: my co host on Pretty Scary, which I would describe
0:55
Speaker 2: as the sister podcast to Conspiracy.
0:57
Speaker 1: Pretty Scary boo, Pretty scary boo. I'm supposed to say
1:00
Speaker 1: that now. Still it's still my vibe. Yeah, I feel yeah.
1:04
Speaker 2: Doing a little crossover episode here, Wow, so cool. And
1:09
Speaker 2: Caitlin and I are here to talk to Mia Donovan,
1:13
Speaker 2: filmmaker uh here to discuss her new documentary Dope Is Death. Mia,
1:18
Speaker 2: how's it going well?
1:19
Speaker 3: Thanks thanks for having me, Yeah.
1:21
Speaker 2: Thank you for being here. We Caitlyn and I talked
1:23
Speaker 2: to Mia before on an episode Pretty Scary about her
1:26
Speaker 2: previous documentary, which is called Dprogrammed. If you've never seen it,
1:30
Speaker 2: it's really good. It is about a cult deprogrammer with
1:33
Speaker 2: a whole lot of personality and Ted Patrick.
1:37
Speaker 1: Very charming cult deprogrammer. He's got a lot of verve.
1:42
Speaker 2: Black lightning man, very interesting guy. Yeah, but uh, we're
1:47
Speaker 2: talking about me as new documentary today which is called
1:49
Speaker 2: Dope as Death. If he could give us just a
1:52
Speaker 2: quick elevator pitch synopsis of what it's about.
1:55
Speaker 3: So Dope as Death traces the history of community occupy
2:00
Speaker 3: puncture to the Black Panthers and the Young Lords in
2:03
Speaker 3: the South Bronx who in the early seventies found it
2:07
Speaker 3: the first community acupuncture clinic that treated people with heroin
2:12
Speaker 3: addiction issues.
2:13
Speaker 2: And this story seems like one that was kind of
2:16
Speaker 2: lost to history. How did how did you first come
2:20
Speaker 2: across it?
2:20
Speaker 3: Well, I in Montreal, I have a I was visiting
2:24
Speaker 3: an acupuncturist for I have chronic migraines and he was
2:27
Speaker 3: recommended to me. He's kind of an eccentric guy, was
2:31
Speaker 3: working out of his apartment and there was this poster
2:33
Speaker 3: on the wall that which we see in the documentary
2:36
Speaker 3: that said, we will fight heroin and methadone by all
2:39
Speaker 3: means necessary acupuncture heels educate the people, and there were
2:44
Speaker 3: illustrations of black hands holding acupuncture needles and it said
2:48
Speaker 3: doctor Matula Chakor just this really fascinating poster. So I
2:51
Speaker 3: started asking him about it, and then he just sort
2:54
Speaker 3: of told me nonchalantly how he went to the South
2:56
Speaker 3: Bronx and the seventies and taught to Bakshakor's dad, how
3:00
Speaker 3: some Black Panthers came to Montreal. And I was like, whoa, like,
3:03
Speaker 3: you know, it just started telling me this, and at
3:07
Speaker 3: first I didn't. I was like, is he embellishing? Is
3:09
Speaker 3: this really happened this? You know, I'd never heard about this,
3:12
Speaker 3: So I started digging around. And back then that was
3:15
Speaker 3: like ten years ago, there was very little information online,
3:17
Speaker 3: but you could find it. So then, I but you
3:20
Speaker 3: had to know what you were looking for, because this
3:22
Speaker 3: history has really been buried for many reasons. But so
3:26
Speaker 3: that's how I learned about it. I think it was.
3:29
Speaker 3: I mean, the reason the most obvious are the most
3:32
Speaker 3: probable reason why we don't know about it is because
3:35
Speaker 3: of the connection with the Black Panthers and the Young Lords.
3:39
Speaker 3: And you know, they were rejecting methadone maintenance, and they
3:43
Speaker 3: were politicizing users or former drug users, and so this
3:49
Speaker 3: eventually saw them as a threat. So, I mean that's
3:53
Speaker 3: that's kind of what the film covers is like, how
3:55
Speaker 3: was this clinic considered a threat?
3:57
Speaker 2: And it center kind of centers around, at least the
4:01
Speaker 2: acupuncture part, because you mentioned the acupuncture centers around something
4:06
Speaker 2: called the NATA Protocol or NADA. Can you talk about
4:09
Speaker 2: that a little bit.
4:10
Speaker 3: Yeah, So today there's the NATA Protocol is a National
4:14
Speaker 3: Acupuncture Detox Association, which is a standardized five point your
4:20
Speaker 3: acupuncture protocol that's been used that's being used all over
4:23
Speaker 3: the world to treat people with anxiety, trauma and heroin
4:26
Speaker 3: withdrawal symptoms. Wow, it was and it was founded in
4:29
Speaker 3: nineteen eighty five by this white doctor named doctor Michael Smith.
4:33
Speaker 3: But what doctor Michael Smith was at the Lincoln Detox
4:36
Speaker 3: in the South Bronx with the Black Panthers and the
4:38
Speaker 3: Young Lords in the seventies and then after that clinic
4:40
Speaker 3: got closed by the city in seventy eight, Michael Smith
4:44
Speaker 3: revamped it in nineteen eighty five, but didn't give credit
4:46
Speaker 3: to the real history. So the so the film is
4:49
Speaker 3: really about, like this is where this history really comes from.
4:52
Speaker 3: You know, it's from these people who have been written
4:54
Speaker 3: out of the history. Because they've been criminalized for the
4:56
Speaker 3: political views and right really.
4:59
Speaker 1: Really criminalized too. I mean your documentary gets into it,
5:03
Speaker 1: but we're talking long term prison sentences, like not just
5:07
Speaker 1: a smear campaign. I mean they they were dragged out profoundly.
5:14
Speaker 1: I mean their lives were completely dismantled for trying to
5:18
Speaker 1: help people. It's fascinating and.
5:20
Speaker 2: Said, yeah, yeah. People always point to the Black Panthers
5:25
Speaker 2: carrying guns as the point where the government got scared,
5:28
Speaker 2: and no, I think it's when they started giving out
5:30
Speaker 2: free breakfast and things of the like. And I'm assuming
5:35
Speaker 2: you looked into the Black Panthers a whole lot for
5:37
Speaker 2: this documentary. What do you think are some of the
5:40
Speaker 2: biggest misconceptions about them and similar groups that were really
5:46
Speaker 2: active in the sixties and seventies.
5:48
Speaker 3: Well, it's like what you just said. They were their
5:50
Speaker 3: primary you know, they were providing services for the community
5:55
Speaker 3: that like services like free breakfast programs, daycare centers. You know,
6:02
Speaker 3: they were giving they had free health clinics. They were
6:04
Speaker 3: providing services to a community that wasn't that was being
6:07
Speaker 3: underserved by the government. And Jay Edgar Hoover in nineteen
6:13
Speaker 3: sixty nine said that the Black panthers were the greatest
6:15
Speaker 3: threat to the nation because they were organizing on their
6:19
Speaker 3: own outside the system.
6:20
Speaker 1: Lovely, I've got a question for you. I mean, you're Canadian, correct,
6:25
Speaker 1: so you know, this is such an interesting topic for
6:29
Speaker 1: a Canadian to cover, in my for anybody outside of
6:32
Speaker 1: America to cover. So I want to know what your
6:35
Speaker 1: draw to this story. I mean, it's a fascinating story
6:38
Speaker 1: all on its own. I get why you're like, this
6:41
Speaker 1: totally needs to be a documentary, but this is a
6:44
Speaker 1: real deep dive into a wacky country that lives south
6:48
Speaker 1: of you. So i'm you know, as a Canadian, how
6:52
Speaker 1: did you process this story and how does it change
6:55
Speaker 1: or solidify your views of the United States. I mean,
6:59
Speaker 1: it's a big question, and I'm sorry, but that's what
7:01
Speaker 1: I'm most curious about.
7:04
Speaker 3: I mean, it is a big question, but I think
7:06
Speaker 3: it touches because this this project touches on so many
7:09
Speaker 3: different themes. And I think access to healthcare, Like, we
7:12
Speaker 3: have free health care here. It's not never been an
7:14
Speaker 3: issue for anyone. I know, nobody's ever had to pay
7:17
Speaker 3: for Like, it's just not it's not something we have
7:20
Speaker 3: to worry about. We don't have to worry about having insurance.
7:23
Speaker 3: We don't have to worry about you know, think twice
7:26
Speaker 3: about going to the doctor or spend money to a
7:28
Speaker 3: baby or all these things, you know, like it's just
7:30
Speaker 3: not a thing. And also the criminal justice system, like
7:35
Speaker 3: it's in the US. It's so we we have political prisoners,
7:39
Speaker 3: we have we still have systemic racism obviously here too,
7:45
Speaker 3: but everything is just so the history is just so deep.
7:49
Speaker 3: And I think the racial system in the US with
7:51
Speaker 3: medical I mean, I don't want to say that Canada
7:54
Speaker 3: is that much different, but I would just focus on
7:57
Speaker 3: the medical like healthcare for one thing. That sure political
8:02
Speaker 3: like it's.
8:03
Speaker 1: Just it's got to be confounding to just be like
8:06
Speaker 1: why the hell wouldn't you want this for the people? Why?
8:09
Speaker 1: Why wouldn't you want your population healthy? Like why? So
8:13
Speaker 1: I understand that does the systemic racism aspect look more
8:17
Speaker 1: flagrant from the outside as somebody who isn't from the
8:20
Speaker 1: United States compared to other places.
8:22
Speaker 3: Well, definitely now, but I think I'm not. It's when
8:26
Speaker 3: I first started this project. So my entry point in
8:30
Speaker 3: this film was meeting my occupunctures much sure, writing and
8:34
Speaker 3: then writing letters to doctor Matula Shakur who's incarcerated. So
8:37
Speaker 3: visiting him, wow, since getting to know him and really
8:42
Speaker 3: diving into the story, like, I'm not sure that the
8:45
Speaker 3: racism was and you know, it's in such sharp focus
8:48
Speaker 3: that I just see white supremacy everywhere. I'm so sure,
8:52
Speaker 3: and it's hard for me to think back how I
8:55
Speaker 3: saw things before. Maybe there was some I was a
8:57
Speaker 3: little bit more, it was easier to not see before. Again,
9:01
Speaker 3: this is before when I started. This was before Trump
9:03
Speaker 3: and before the events they were coming to the forefront eventually. Anyway,
9:11
Speaker 3: you went on quite a journey with this documentary. It
9:13
Speaker 3: sounds like it's like personally, so that's that's fascinating. Yeah,
9:17
Speaker 3: And I mean, I think what's interesting is just how
9:20
Speaker 3: political health care is. I think essentially it's like it's
9:24
Speaker 3: so it makes sense that the Black Panthers now, it
9:27
Speaker 3: makes so much. It makes it's so clear why the
9:29
Speaker 3: Black Panthers and the Young Lords were concerned with health
9:31
Speaker 3: care because interesting there is so political and it's about
9:36
Speaker 3: taking care of the needs of the people. If you're vulnerable,
9:39
Speaker 3: if your health is at the hands of the government
9:41
Speaker 3: and you don't have access to that, then that makes
9:44
Speaker 3: you so vulnerable. Like their goal essentially was let's not
9:49
Speaker 3: just they were interested in not just learning acupuncture to
9:52
Speaker 3: treat addiction, but also to be towards self determination, like
9:55
Speaker 3: how can we treat our own people so we're not
9:57
Speaker 3: on this medical system that uses us, that has exploited us.
10:03
Speaker 3: So there was a lot. Now it's like, oh, yeah,
10:05
Speaker 3: it makes total sense, you know, Like they did things
10:08
Speaker 3: that the Young Lords took over a before they took
10:11
Speaker 3: over the hospital to do this acupuncture program they took over.
10:15
Speaker 3: They hijacked an X ray truck that they had going
10:18
Speaker 3: around Manhattan and it never went above one hundred and
10:21
Speaker 3: tenth Street, and there was TV issues in the South Bronx,
10:25
Speaker 3: so they went to the uppers side, took over the truck,
10:29
Speaker 3: and the X ray technicians were on board with them,
10:31
Speaker 3: so they went up to the South Bronx to start
10:32
Speaker 3: treating people. And these were like nineteen twenty year old
10:36
Speaker 3: activists who were doing this.
10:37
Speaker 2: It's amazing, aspiring. Yeah. Around the time this was all happening,
10:44
Speaker 2: someone else decided methadone was a viable treatment for heroin.
10:51
Speaker 2: Can you talk about some of the drawbacks of that,
10:53
Speaker 2: because that's all that's a thing that's always seemed weird
10:56
Speaker 2: to me. It doesn't seem like so much of a
10:59
Speaker 2: treatment as just like a government sanctioned version of heroin.
11:04
Speaker 2: I've never understood how that could possibly.
11:06
Speaker 3: Help well, from my understanding and talking to doctor Peter Bourne,
11:11
Speaker 3: who was involved in drug policy under Reagan and Carter,
11:15
Speaker 3: I'm sorry, not Reagan Nixon. Right, it's really clear that
11:19
Speaker 3: methadone was like used as a part of a political campaign.
11:24
Speaker 3: It was a way to say, like, because heroin was
11:26
Speaker 3: such a huge social problem in New York and San
11:30
Speaker 3: Francisco and other cities, the city blamed crime on heroin.
11:34
Speaker 3: Like everything in New York at that time was really
11:36
Speaker 3: blamed on heroin addiction. That's what made the city so dangerous.
11:41
Speaker 3: So these politicians were offered, you know, doctors were saying,
11:44
Speaker 3: methadone is a way to treat this social problem. We
11:47
Speaker 3: just give the methadone. They won't want to go out,
11:50
Speaker 3: people won't want to steal, it'll reduce crime, it'll it's
11:54
Speaker 3: like a band aid way of like fixing a situation.
11:58
Speaker 3: So there was like thing that people believed, and the
12:01
Speaker 3: people believed that heroin addiction was kind of a chronic
12:04
Speaker 3: illness that in a sense you know that there was
12:06
Speaker 3: a different attitude towards it. So the chemical treatment was
12:10
Speaker 3: you know, just it just made sense at that time.
12:11
Speaker 3: So they started putting a lot of money into methodone programs.
12:14
Speaker 3: But the Black Panthers and the Young Lords were like,
12:17
Speaker 3: wait a second, why should we Why are you trying
12:19
Speaker 3: to treat these problems with another drug? And they recognize that,
12:23
Speaker 3: you know, you have to go once a day, like
12:25
Speaker 3: you're to get your methadone treatment, so you're dependent on
12:28
Speaker 3: the state, can't travel anywhere. They understood it was for
12:32
Speaker 3: you know, that it was addictive, you had to go
12:34
Speaker 3: through withdrawal symptoms to get off of it. There was
12:36
Speaker 3: side effects, you know.
12:37
Speaker 2: Like wow.
12:38
Speaker 3: So they were the first, you know, like we see
12:41
Speaker 3: that more now there's more understanding. It's still the standard
12:44
Speaker 3: treatment for heroin and opioid addiction, like methadone is still
12:48
Speaker 3: huge now. But they understood the pharmaceutical like who it
12:51
Speaker 3: served most. They understood the you know, the system, how
12:55
Speaker 3: it was like how the government and the pharmaceutical companies
12:58
Speaker 3: could capitalize and exploit people and control people with methadone.
13:02
Speaker 1: Yeah.
13:03
Speaker 2: Right, So they set up an all alternative which was
13:08
Speaker 2: called the Lincoln Detox. Was it Lincoln Detox Center, Well.
13:13
Speaker 3: The real name was the Lincoln Detox People's program that
13:16
Speaker 3: it became know this is Lincoln Detox.
13:18
Speaker 2: And can you talk a little bit about how that
13:21
Speaker 2: came about and who was behind it.
13:24
Speaker 3: It's kind of crazy. So basically, in nineteen seventy, the
13:27
Speaker 3: Lincoln Hospital in the South Bronx was completely dilapidating, like
13:31
Speaker 3: children were getting lead paint poisoning. There was rats, there
13:34
Speaker 3: was like people who were you know, there was major
13:37
Speaker 3: medical neglect at this hospital. The neighbors called it the
13:40
Speaker 3: butcher Shop. It was, you know, condemned twenty five years earlier.
13:46
Speaker 3: The building it was in such terrible shape. So these
13:49
Speaker 3: and they it was a predominantly Puerto Rican neighborhood, and
13:52
Speaker 3: the staffed and nobody really spoke Spanish, like it was
13:56
Speaker 3: just really not and it was served. It was there
13:59
Speaker 3: for four was like serving four hundred thousand people. So
14:02
Speaker 3: it was just like a really you know, substandard hospital.
14:06
Speaker 3: So they, the young Lords and the Black Panthers took
14:09
Speaker 3: it over to how to say, because they wanted community
14:13
Speaker 3: involvement and how to care for the community. They wanted
14:17
Speaker 3: Spanish speaking doctors. They wanted a drug treatment center that
14:21
Speaker 3: wasn't methodome maintenance. They had a bunch of usks.
14:24
Speaker 1: Well, what I love about what you captured here is
14:27
Speaker 1: and not to just completely tell everybody was in the documentary,
14:31
Speaker 1: but you know, you had these women that collected over
14:34
Speaker 1: two thousand specific complaints about the hospital before they wage
14:38
Speaker 1: this takeover, which I don't want to get into detail,
14:41
Speaker 1: and because it's amazing and I just wanted to wash
14:44
Speaker 1: over people the way it washed over me. But that
14:46
Speaker 1: was their leverage, and it was brilliant because it was like, yeah,
14:49
Speaker 1: you can tell us that we're doing these things, but
14:51
Speaker 1: we collected two thousand egregious complaints about this medical facility
14:57
Speaker 1: and that's what leveraged all of the change. And I
15:00
Speaker 1: just it's incredible. I had no idea this happened, no idea.
15:05
Speaker 3: It's totally amazing because they were all they really were
15:08
Speaker 3: serving the community in that direct way. It's like, we're
15:11
Speaker 3: not going to decide what people need. We're going to
15:12
Speaker 3: ask them what they need, and we're going to present
15:14
Speaker 3: these demands to the hospital and if they don't, they
15:17
Speaker 3: gave them a year like they to do something, and
15:19
Speaker 3: then finally they're like, well we have no choice. You
15:21
Speaker 3: have to take this into our own hands and demand
15:24
Speaker 3: and at that time, like they it's pretty incredible that
15:27
Speaker 3: they were able to negotiate with the city and the hospital,
15:32
Speaker 3: Like it's like a whole other era, you know, Like
15:35
Speaker 3: I can't imagine this happening now. Like they were, there
15:37
Speaker 3: was a lot of communication. They were able to have
15:39
Speaker 3: some of their demands met for at least until the
15:43
Speaker 3: end of the seventies when things changed again.
15:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, that feel like that whole hospital takeover scene in
15:50
Speaker 2: the documentary is fascinating. I love that so much.
15:53
Speaker 1: Sorry to cut you off, Caitlin, go ahead, no, no,
15:55
Speaker 1: I was just kind of amusing about the I couldn't
15:58
Speaker 1: help but think about the acts that I see now,
16:02
Speaker 1: And this was so specific, everything about the Young Lords
16:06
Speaker 1: and the Black Panthers, everything they did came with such
16:09
Speaker 1: a specific aligned to action, and it was really inspiring
16:13
Speaker 1: to watch and to see how effective that is. But
16:16
Speaker 1: also it just kind of made me think about a
16:18
Speaker 1: lot of the activism I see now, and I feel
16:21
Speaker 1: like so much of that energy gets deluded by things
16:23
Speaker 1: like social media, and then the the point of it
16:26
Speaker 1: gets lost, the messaging gets weird, and everything kind of
16:31
Speaker 1: falls apart. Would you agree with that, Mia, I mean
16:34
Speaker 1: with with what you with what you spent your time
16:37
Speaker 1: putting together here, What are the what are the differences
16:40
Speaker 1: in parallels and activism that you see now?
16:42
Speaker 3: Well, I mean I like what you said. It's true
16:44
Speaker 3: like that at that time, it was very community localized,
16:49
Speaker 3: you know, and that's I don't even know if we
16:52
Speaker 3: can go back to there right now because everything is
16:55
Speaker 3: because of social media. The I think if we look
16:58
Speaker 3: at the activism back back know what these groups in
17:01
Speaker 3: particular we're trying to do. They were just they were
17:03
Speaker 3: looking around their community and trying to see how they
17:06
Speaker 3: could serve the people around them directly. And I think
17:08
Speaker 3: that model is important. I think people want to go
17:11
Speaker 3: back to that we the community knows best their own community. Yeah,
17:15
Speaker 3: And I think with policing and defund the defund the
17:19
Speaker 3: police movement, it's it's kind of going back to that,
17:22
Speaker 3: like we ask, let's find out in our community what
17:26
Speaker 3: the best way is to deal with certain needs. And yeah,
17:31
Speaker 3: I agree with you.
17:32
Speaker 1: I think people get overwhelmed by how big these problems feel.
17:36
Speaker 1: And you know, from the standpoint of an American, you know,
17:40
Speaker 1: there is a lot of local clout that you can build.
17:44
Speaker 1: I mean, there's a reason why so many different layers
17:46
Speaker 1: of government exist within a community and then a city
17:50
Speaker 1: and then a county, and because you can get really
17:52
Speaker 1: really specific if you want to. But I can't help
17:54
Speaker 1: but wonder if because of social media, the ideas get
17:58
Speaker 1: so broad stroked. That's not even a term. They turn
18:02
Speaker 1: into broad strokes, thank you very much. They get broad stroked.
18:05
Speaker 1: That sounded very sexual. I don't know what broad stroke is,
18:09
Speaker 1: but I'm sure there was an item at the Bunning
18:11
Speaker 1: ranch for it. Okay, so it turns into broad strokes.
18:14
Speaker 1: And I mean maybe I am just speaking for myself.
18:19
Speaker 1: It's just is like, man, like, how can I make
18:21
Speaker 1: an impact? And I feel like this documentary is such
18:24
Speaker 1: a great reflection on very extreme activism, like this is
18:30
Speaker 1: radical activism, not extreme and effective activism. And I just
18:35
Speaker 1: admired the focus of this community. Also side out. I
18:39
Speaker 1: have a crush on half of the people in this documentary.
18:42
Speaker 1: What a bunch of charismatic individuals. Oh my god, were
18:46
Speaker 1: you just like sorry, what did you say?
18:49
Speaker 3: Half of the time it was in all with everyone,
18:52
Speaker 3: Like every time I was in an interview, I was like,
18:54
Speaker 3: you know, everybody. It's so charismatic there, I think, what, oh,
19:00
Speaker 3: what's I mean? We just made this point, but this
19:02
Speaker 3: direct it's like their goal. They set goals, yeah, like
19:06
Speaker 3: one goal at a time, and they did it, and
19:08
Speaker 3: it was goals that were within reach.
19:10
Speaker 1: But I feel like I only see that with like
19:12
Speaker 1: fitness people on Instagram now, like just set manageable goals
19:15
Speaker 1: and this is a spinach day or whatever. With this,
19:17
Speaker 1: I was just like, oh my god, all these people
19:20
Speaker 1: look like they can dance, and they're handsome and they're
19:23
Speaker 1: beautiful and oh my god, you know, and then also
19:26
Speaker 1: they're like going to take over a fucking hospital, Like
19:28
Speaker 1: these are the coolest people I've ever seen in my life,
19:30
Speaker 1: and they were like twenty, Yeah, I was such an
19:33
Speaker 1: idiot at twenty. I Like I was thinking about that
19:37
Speaker 1: watching the documentary about how I once got my car
19:39
Speaker 1: towed because I forgot to pay my registration at twenty.
19:42
Speaker 1: That's who I was at twenty. Like, I wasn't helping
19:44
Speaker 1: anybody anyway. Good job, Kaitlin.
19:48
Speaker 2: So one of the things I found really interesting about
19:51
Speaker 2: this is after they would detox people and get them
19:56
Speaker 2: off of drugs, then they would move into trying to
19:59
Speaker 2: get those people a little more involved in revolutionary things
20:04
Speaker 2: and helping the community. And oh man, how much did
20:08
Speaker 2: the government hate that?
20:09
Speaker 3: Well, that's exactly you know, they were being so the
20:13
Speaker 3: programs that they developed, the Lincoln Detox drug Detoxification program
20:17
Speaker 3: was run you know, it was funded by the Health
20:20
Speaker 3: and Hospital Corporation and the so it was the state
20:24
Speaker 3: was funding it. And then you know, by nineteen seventy
20:28
Speaker 3: five they started to have major problems with getting funding
20:33
Speaker 3: and because the city was trying to get out of it.
20:37
Speaker 3: They were like they were because their model of treatment
20:40
Speaker 3: was not something that was really understood. You know, like
20:45
Speaker 3: typical methodome maintenance treatments. You could just say, okay, the
20:48
Speaker 3: methadone costs this much. Ye, it all made sense. But
20:51
Speaker 3: they were doing these political education classes, but they were
20:55
Speaker 3: like community therapeutic groups where people would talk about identity, racism,
21:01
Speaker 3: you know, who drugs serve in a society. So it
21:05
Speaker 3: was what's what I found interesting was like a lot
21:08
Speaker 3: of the models of drug therapy or twelve step programs,
21:12
Speaker 3: it's a lot of it is like you have to
21:14
Speaker 3: take personal responsibility. So everything's like you know, in the eye,
21:19
Speaker 3: like you know, this is my yeah thing. But they
21:23
Speaker 3: were framing drug addiction in a culture, socioeconomic situation, so
21:28
Speaker 3: it was less like, you know, we're oppressed. You know
21:31
Speaker 3: how drugs serve in oppressed, like to oppress people, yea.
21:38
Speaker 3: So they were really putting it in this context where
21:42
Speaker 3: they were trying, where they were empowering the community to
21:45
Speaker 3: come together and to resist drugs as a political action
21:49
Speaker 3: towards self determination. So this of course, like the City
21:55
Speaker 3: of New York and including Assemblyman Chuck Schumer who call
22:00
Speaker 3: the program a ripoff drug treatment program and accuse them
22:04
Speaker 3: of indoctrinating drug addicts into domestic terrorists. Like so, I
22:07
Speaker 3: don't know if they use the word domestic terrorists, but
22:10
Speaker 3: they were you know, sure there was a lot. I'm
22:13
Speaker 3: not sure if that word was used that back then,
22:15
Speaker 3: but that's sort of that was the meaning, right, And
22:18
Speaker 3: so you know, the program basically like was they shut
22:22
Speaker 3: it down in nineteen seventy eight, so it lasted eight years.
22:25
Speaker 3: And it's pretty amazing that this political program lasted that long.
22:30
Speaker 3: You know, like they were they were over it about
22:32
Speaker 3: the political classes, and they were like, this is what
22:35
Speaker 3: we're doing, this is what we have to do, and
22:37
Speaker 3: you know, they weren't doing anything wrong.
22:38
Speaker 1: They were helping people.
22:40
Speaker 3: They were helping people, they were educating people, they were
22:42
Speaker 3: telling them about their their rights as tenants. They were
22:46
Speaker 3: providing like transportation to visit relatives in jail or prisons,
22:51
Speaker 3: like they were doing so many, so many things like
22:54
Speaker 3: rent strikes, just you know, like they were they were
22:58
Speaker 3: it was a whole less stick treatment to addictions with everything,
23:02
Speaker 3: you know.
23:03
Speaker 1: One of the parts of the documentary that really struck
23:05
Speaker 1: me was there's an individual that you interviewed who was
23:10
Speaker 1: getting acupuncture today today in a you know, and it
23:15
Speaker 1: was so sweet to hear him talk about how the
23:18
Speaker 1: acupuncture helped him with his anger, and then how helping
23:21
Speaker 1: with his anger helped him uncover that he wasn't angry,
23:24
Speaker 1: he was just sad. And it really registered with me
23:29
Speaker 1: how much emphasis of like healing there was in this
23:34
Speaker 1: community and really viewing this wave of heroin addiction as
23:39
Speaker 1: an attack on beautiful pieces of their community and recovering
23:44
Speaker 1: the individual was part of recovering the community. And I
23:47
Speaker 1: just I thought it was so sweet and beautiful and
23:51
Speaker 1: so different from the recovery culture that I grew up around.
23:54
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm not an attict. But my dad spent
23:56
Speaker 1: a lot of time in AA, and it's it's all
23:59
Speaker 1: very into visual you know, I I, I, ME, ME
24:03
Speaker 1: me kind of stuff, and yeah, they're all there for
24:06
Speaker 1: each other. And listen, if somebody's listening to this in
24:08
Speaker 1: AA has helped you, I'm not trying to knock you
24:10
Speaker 1: off that that cart by any means, but it just
24:13
Speaker 1: is such a different way to look at sobriety and
24:17
Speaker 1: ensuring that when these people held their hand out for help,
24:19
Speaker 1: somebody was there to grab their hand is really what
24:22
Speaker 1: that model looked like to me. It was very beautiful.
24:25
Speaker 3: Thanks. Yeah, you did it good.
24:27
Speaker 1: You did a good job. You know, you did a
24:28
Speaker 1: good job capturing it. No, I was moved. No, yeah,
24:31
Speaker 1: it was beautiful.
24:32
Speaker 2: That wasn't a question, Caitlin, keep it sorry.
24:36
Speaker 1: I'm a podcaster, God damn it. I'm just going to
24:38
Speaker 1: talk sometimes.
24:41
Speaker 2: So all of that helping the community gets the Lincoln
24:45
Speaker 2: Detox basically wrapped up in Cointelpro.
24:49
Speaker 1: Nothing more dangerous than helping people in the United.
24:52
Speaker 2: States, Absolutely not. And co intel Pro is a thing
24:56
Speaker 2: we've talked about on various episodes. We've never done a
24:59
Speaker 2: whole episode about Can you just for people who are unfamiliar.
25:02
Speaker 2: Can you talk a little bit about what co intel
25:04
Speaker 2: pro was.
25:05
Speaker 3: Yeah, So cointelpro was a secret FBI program that surveyed.
25:13
Speaker 3: It started out surveying with secret surveyance of commune people
25:18
Speaker 3: that were alleged communists. Communists, Yeah, and sorry, it's hard
25:23
Speaker 3: to say basic things. And then it attacked. They really
25:27
Speaker 3: start to heavily survey black nationalist groups, Puerto Rican groups,
25:33
Speaker 3: student movements like any sort of new left or movements
25:37
Speaker 3: that the government sought as a threat to the American
25:41
Speaker 3: stability of the time the late sixties early seventies, So
25:45
Speaker 3: the government launched campaigns to also specifically against the black community.
25:50
Speaker 3: They had a mission to disrupt and neutralize and prevent
25:54
Speaker 3: the rise of a black messiah. So they were really
25:57
Speaker 3: that's why they were surveying Malcolm Martin, Luther King, Malcolm X,
26:01
Speaker 3: like Fred Hampton, any particularly black leaders who they felt
26:06
Speaker 3: could rise and unify the black movement. So they wanted
26:11
Speaker 3: to stop this. So doctor Matulu Shakura ended up on
26:15
Speaker 3: this list. I mean, so many people were being surveyed,
26:17
Speaker 3: like people like James Baldwin was surveyed even like.
26:23
Speaker 1: Sorry, James Baldwin.
26:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, the list of people who were followed by co
26:27
Speaker 2: Intel pro is insane. Yeah, like jazz musicians, like everyone.
26:33
Speaker 1: Well, and what's interesting about it too, is there's a
26:36
Speaker 1: gentleman in your documentary that really beautifully articulates the way
26:41
Speaker 1: Heroin divided the community and create and did create crime
26:45
Speaker 1: and did create gang factions and things like that, So
26:48
Speaker 1: that that was real and so there, you know, and
26:52
Speaker 1: many systems benefited from that divisive element and had to
26:57
Speaker 1: have someone come along and say, like, let's get you
26:59
Speaker 1: clean and bring you into this fold and create a
27:02
Speaker 1: community like uh oh, that's that's not good. And also
27:05
Speaker 1: like let's not forget there's a lot of money in
27:07
Speaker 1: methadone's I mean, that's really what this was about, is,
27:11
Speaker 1: in my opinion, is like making sure methadone still had
27:16
Speaker 1: a place to be in these communities.
27:19
Speaker 3: Well by and by nineteen seventy five they were they
27:23
Speaker 3: practically stopped prescribing methadone and that's when the heat, that's
27:26
Speaker 3: when they really came under.
27:28
Speaker 1: Oh okay, Yeah.
27:31
Speaker 3: In the early days, they did a ten day methadone detox,
27:34
Speaker 3: which was still against the norm because that's the only
27:38
Speaker 3: way they could get funding and most programs were methodone maintenance,
27:42
Speaker 3: so you would just go every day, and they did
27:44
Speaker 3: the methadone Detox, which was a ten day detox program,
27:48
Speaker 3: and they they the reason and it sort of goes
27:51
Speaker 3: hand in hand with how they learned about acupuncture because
27:54
Speaker 3: it's very you know, it's very traumatic and like painful
27:59
Speaker 3: to go through withdraw and they saw people would get nervous,
28:01
Speaker 3: you know, like about day eight, day nine, So they
28:03
Speaker 3: started to introduce acupuncture at first to help people help
28:07
Speaker 3: ease the transition, and then people started to just come
28:10
Speaker 3: in just for the acupuncture.
28:12
Speaker 1: Adam, did this make you want to get acupuncture? Oh?
28:14
Speaker 2: One hundred percent.
28:16
Speaker 1: It really made me want to get acupuncture.
28:18
Speaker 2: Well, being that this is a conspiracy podcast, I also,
28:22
Speaker 2: just a couple of weeks ago, in researching Jonestown and
28:26
Speaker 2: mk Ultra, it was suggested in one source that I saw,
28:31
Speaker 2: and I don't know how much I believe this, but
28:34
Speaker 2: it was suggested that at one point the CIA happened
28:37
Speaker 2: upon this acupuncture technique that opens up a person's psychic
28:43
Speaker 2: abilities and that now they just commit, which I don't
28:46
Speaker 2: know if that's me up. I mean, yeah, I want
28:51
Speaker 2: all of that, but too what we're talking about today
28:55
Speaker 2: seems a little more possible.
28:57
Speaker 1: You're right, there's a little bit more of the rubber
28:59
Speaker 1: hit in the road here. I can't argue with it.
29:02
Speaker 1: But you know, hey, that that Eastern medicine, there's a
29:07
Speaker 1: lot to it. I'm just saying, Internet police, I know
29:11
Speaker 1: you can hear me. Let's try it. I mean, you know, hey,
29:13
Speaker 1: let's I'll do the psychic acupuncture and let's see what happens.
29:16
Speaker 2: I'll do it all. Uh, the kind of a change
29:20
Speaker 2: in course here. Ronald Ronald Reagan is the fucking worst
29:25
Speaker 2: and there is a great scene in the documentary of
29:30
Speaker 2: him interacting with a group of black people like the
29:34
Speaker 2: awful racist he was.
29:35
Speaker 1: How did you find this footage? I well, what couldn't
29:40
Speaker 1: believe how great that clip was. And also I've never
29:44
Speaker 1: seen a president. I've never seen footage of a president
29:48
Speaker 1: like that ever in my life.
29:49
Speaker 2: And also what was his role in all of this?
29:52
Speaker 2: If you can talk about that too.
29:53
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, I just have to do a shout out
29:56
Speaker 3: to Edmund Duff, who is my archival producer who found and.
30:00
Speaker 1: Wow, that guy rules. I mean, you guys are a
30:04
Speaker 1: great team. I have to say that that I don't
30:06
Speaker 1: know how he found that. I've never seen footage like that.
30:10
Speaker 1: I know, I've already said this of a president in my.
30:12
Speaker 3: Life, and I so Reagan. After the shutdown, So Lincoln
30:16
Speaker 3: Detalk shutdown in nineteen seventy eight, doctor Mitula Shacorns and
30:20
Speaker 3: many of the acupunctures start at BANA, which was a
30:22
Speaker 3: Black Acupuncture Advisory Association of America.
30:26
Speaker 1: Wow, look at you. That was really good. It was good.
30:29
Speaker 3: And they were a private clinic in Harlem, so they
30:32
Speaker 3: had they no longer had subsidies that the Lincoln Hospital had.
30:36
Speaker 3: They were on their own, and they became more of
30:39
Speaker 3: a full body acupuncture clinic, doing the detox but just
30:44
Speaker 3: treating everything. Sure, they were certified, as Mitula had gotten
30:49
Speaker 3: his degree from Montreal and three. So they were doing
30:54
Speaker 3: real medicine full body. And at that time when Reagan
30:58
Speaker 3: came in the early eighties, there was a wave of
31:01
Speaker 3: repression that was coming down on all these the leftover
31:05
Speaker 3: activists groups of the seventies, let's say. And so Reagan
31:10
Speaker 3: represents that sort of shift, you know, like you have
31:12
Speaker 3: the community like the early seventies, the late sixties that
31:16
Speaker 3: gave birth to a lot of community programs and then
31:19
Speaker 3: it's like Reagan comes in and everything's you know, like
31:22
Speaker 3: he's just the way he the way he amped up
31:25
Speaker 3: the war on drugs, like what he did for social services,
31:28
Speaker 3: like just so that sort of thought. He comes in
31:31
Speaker 3: there to represent that collide and you see him visiting
31:34
Speaker 3: the South Bronx to give God Walk to the people,
31:37
Speaker 3: and he's just he's just so you just see the
31:40
Speaker 3: total disrespect, the total like disdain even for this community
31:45
Speaker 3: of the South Bronx.
31:46
Speaker 1: He's just he's so acrid. I mean it is like
31:49
Speaker 1: I couldn't believe it. I watched it twice because I
31:53
Speaker 1: was like, whoa, this is the spirit of it that
31:55
Speaker 1: I always knew was there and I have never actually
31:58
Speaker 1: seen it in action. Yeah, you know, because all of
32:01
Speaker 1: his stuff is always was so well produced and executed.
32:05
Speaker 1: I mean you got to give him that. You know,
32:07
Speaker 1: all of his speeches, all of his appearances, he was
32:10
Speaker 1: so quaffed and calm and you know, glossy.
32:14
Speaker 2: And this he was a Ronald Reagan was a less
32:18
Speaker 2: sloppy Trump. Like everything about his policies and his rhetoric
32:22
Speaker 2: was the same as Trump. He was just an actor
32:25
Speaker 2: instead of Trump.
32:26
Speaker 1: I have to say, though, even this, I have to say,
32:29
Speaker 1: this footage of Reagan yelling at that woman is more
32:33
Speaker 1: embarrassing than anything I saw Trump do on camera, mostly
32:36
Speaker 1: because I guess with Trump, I kind of saw it
32:38
Speaker 1: coming from one hundred miles away and I never took
32:40
Speaker 1: him seriously. It's so frayed and embarrassing. He looks like
32:45
Speaker 1: he's yelling at someone to get off of his lunch,
32:47
Speaker 1: like for real, that.
32:48
Speaker 2: Is it is insanely condescending. She's just asking what are
32:54
Speaker 2: you going to do for us? And he's like, I
32:57
Speaker 2: can't do anything until you elect me. It's like, that
32:59
Speaker 2: is not how elections.
33:00
Speaker 1: Work, sir, Oh my gosh.
33:03
Speaker 2: And he still wanted a landslide. Crazy. Yeah.
33:06
Speaker 3: I think that that scene represents like the eighties, like
33:09
Speaker 3: the tension, you know, the the you know, the kind
33:12
Speaker 3: of he brought in this new wave of heart on crime.
33:15
Speaker 2: Is that the term like yeah, tough on crime stuff.
33:19
Speaker 3: And you know, like the whole Nixon started the war
33:22
Speaker 3: on drugs and Reagan just amped it up completely and
33:26
Speaker 3: just this sort of like Christian I don't know, like
33:29
Speaker 3: this this wave ideological conflict with Yeah, and also just.
33:34
Speaker 1: He really represents the criminality coloring the addict is the criminal.
33:40
Speaker 1: You know, he really solidified that. You know, when you're
33:43
Speaker 1: fighting a war on drugs, you're fighting the drug addict,
33:47
Speaker 1: you know. And that was the other thing that's so
33:49
Speaker 1: remarkable about this program is that it's so integrated and
33:53
Speaker 1: recognizing there's a human being stuck in this rather than
33:58
Speaker 1: an accomplice to a to a insidious movement in these communities.
34:02
Speaker 1: You know. And he really does just come in there
34:05
Speaker 1: like he's talking to criminals. It's it's unreal, it's really crazy.
34:10
Speaker 3: Well in that scene because he's you know, he's talking
34:13
Speaker 3: to this this woman in the South Bronx and you
34:15
Speaker 3: see in the midst of like the South Bronx as
34:18
Speaker 3: the ependy of urban decays, so like the God it
34:21
Speaker 3: looks like Berlin.
34:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was New York in the seventies and eighties.
34:26
Speaker 2: It was special.
34:27
Speaker 3: And he's talking to her, it's like he's criminalizing the
34:30
Speaker 3: poor as well, you know, like he's talking to her
34:32
Speaker 3: like she's.
34:34
Speaker 1: Oh, yeah, welcome to America. We can that. That's a
34:38
Speaker 1: whole other documentary criminalizing the poor in general. But you're
34:41
Speaker 1: doing a great job breeding a lot of these issues
34:44
Speaker 1: together with this, with this one, it's tough. It's a lot.
34:47
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a lot. That's why it's I mean there
34:50
Speaker 3: was it was a fast. Yeah, it's a fast, fascinating era.
34:55
Speaker 3: I don't know if that's the right way to say it.
34:57
Speaker 2: No, it's yeah, it's it is fast. I feel like
35:01
Speaker 2: the American government in general, from the end of World
35:06
Speaker 2: War Two through like at least the mid eighties is
35:09
Speaker 2: fascinating in a really bad way. It's it's almost like
35:13
Speaker 2: a true crime thing where if you dig into it,
35:17
Speaker 2: you're just kind of marveling at the achievements of master criminals.
35:21
Speaker 2: Like there's nothing, it's not even a cold case. We're
35:24
Speaker 2: never going to bring them to justice. It's just like,
35:27
Speaker 2: this is what this is what our government does.
35:29
Speaker 1: I've always wondered if that is why we have our
35:33
Speaker 1: fascination with organized crime and the mafia and just this
35:37
Speaker 1: subconscious understanding that we're watching something else play out. It's
35:41
Speaker 1: a way to project the way we deal with the
35:43
Speaker 1: rest of American politics. You know, there's that group. There's
35:46
Speaker 1: that great line in The Godfather where Kay is like,
35:49
Speaker 1: you know, so and so is working with politicians, not murderers,
35:52
Speaker 1: and Michael says, you know, who's being naive now, Okay,
35:56
Speaker 1: you know, it's just it's so it's so fascinating, and
36:00
Speaker 1: that's that's all governments in my opinion, to a certain degree.
36:03
Speaker 1: But we were we were on one for a while there.
36:07
Speaker 2: I mean we really Oh oh yeah, I'm glad that
36:09
Speaker 2: stopped me too.
36:10
Speaker 1: I bet it's over. I'm glad we're.
36:12
Speaker 2: Done, yea, all of them. I'm glad our government is
36:14
Speaker 2: so much better now.
36:15
Speaker 1: Oh soly it's all better.
36:18
Speaker 2: There's an kind of an inciting incident that happens in
36:22
Speaker 2: this documentary where I mean it happened in the world,
36:26
Speaker 2: but there's an armored truck robbery and three people are killed,
36:30
Speaker 2: and the government or the authorities, however you want to
36:35
Speaker 2: say it, blame this on leftist activists. And I have
36:39
Speaker 2: two questions about that. One do you think they were
36:42
Speaker 2: really that deeply involved in this crime, the people who
36:45
Speaker 2: were accused of it? And two can you just talk
36:48
Speaker 2: a little bit about what happened after that?
36:51
Speaker 3: Well it's a it's a very complicated case, so i'll
36:56
Speaker 3: just speak to so basically, in nineteen eighty one, there
36:59
Speaker 3: was it's been like a famous Brinks armed truck robbery.
37:03
Speaker 3: There were people who a few people arrested on the
37:07
Speaker 3: scene who were members of the Weather Underground and the
37:11
Speaker 3: Black Liberation Army, the Black Panthers, and there was when
37:15
Speaker 3: the government laid basically accused doctor Matula Shakur being the
37:20
Speaker 3: ring leader of this organized crime, this group of people.
37:25
Speaker 3: And what I can say is with doctor Shakur, there
37:27
Speaker 3: was no evidence connecting him to the scenes of the crime,
37:31
Speaker 3: but they did have they do have pamphlets with his
37:35
Speaker 3: finger political pamphlets with his fingerprints on it that were
37:37
Speaker 3: found in safe houses. So they alleged that because all
37:41
Speaker 3: these people were connected politically, they said this is an
37:46
Speaker 3: organized crime. And then they charged them under the Rico Act.
37:51
Speaker 3: And when you get charge of the Rico Act, you
37:53
Speaker 3: don't like it's a lot of it is on. You
37:57
Speaker 3: don't need hard evidence, Like it's like a really hard,
38:00
Speaker 3: really hard cases to fight. And so Mitulu, they were
38:05
Speaker 3: all sentenced to lengthy prison sentences. Mitulu was sentenced to
38:10
Speaker 3: sixty years and then a bunch of other people were
38:15
Speaker 3: also sentenced. So what we try and do is really
38:18
Speaker 3: just focus on, you know, like why is this case
38:21
Speaker 3: political and how do the sentences measure in terms of
38:26
Speaker 3: like the crime that's been committed, and you know, like
38:29
Speaker 3: how much are they being prosecuted for their criminal actions
38:33
Speaker 3: because the government denies that there's any political prisoners.
38:37
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think there's a thing that you mentioned at
38:40
Speaker 2: the very end of the documentary that I think speaks
38:43
Speaker 2: to how much of a political prisoner he is, which
38:46
Speaker 2: is that he's been diagnosed with bone marrow cancer and
38:51
Speaker 2: has been denied compassionate release twice. That's crazy, That is
38:56
Speaker 2: absolutely crazy.
38:57
Speaker 3: Well, it's like you know now with mass incarceration, and
39:01
Speaker 3: they're the problem of elderly's, elderly people being incarspated, and
39:07
Speaker 3: by the FBI's own numbers people individuals over seventy there's
39:12
Speaker 3: like a zero percent chance I think it is literally
39:15
Speaker 3: zero of recidivism or like recommitting crimes. So the idea
39:20
Speaker 3: is to so it doesn't make sense why they would
39:23
Speaker 3: continue to encourase if it wasn't because for political reasons.
39:29
Speaker 3: And the judge. I just these are some things that
39:32
Speaker 3: I found out about the American legal system that really
39:35
Speaker 3: surprised me was, for instance, the parle board that he
39:38
Speaker 3: goes before. It's been the same people for years, Like
39:43
Speaker 3: he's gone before the parle board, the same people like
39:47
Speaker 3: four times or something. I'm not sure if its exactly
39:49
Speaker 3: four times, but many times. And the judge who's supposed
39:52
Speaker 3: to sign for his compassionate release is the same judge
39:56
Speaker 3: that sentenced him in nineteen eighty six. So this ninety
39:58
Speaker 3: one year old judge hate who Wow. So it's just
40:01
Speaker 3: like these things, like you're like, why would you not?
40:04
Speaker 3: How can that be? You know, like what it just
40:07
Speaker 3: doesn't feel fair that you would ask the sentencing judged too,
40:12
Speaker 3: I don't need the spot to make this decision.
40:15
Speaker 1: Wow. I don't even know what to say to that.
40:18
Speaker 1: It's so discouraging to hear. That's very depressing.
40:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was for me. It was almost the craziest
40:24
Speaker 2: thing in the documentary when I saw that. It's like,
40:27
Speaker 2: how much more blatant can you be? That there's more
40:30
Speaker 2: to this than just an armored truck robbery? So, oh,
40:35
Speaker 2: go ahead, I got.
40:37
Speaker 3: To But another point too, in that we interviewed Susan
40:40
Speaker 3: Rosenberg in the documentary, who was also sentenced.
40:44
Speaker 1: I love her, Yeah, I mean, what a cool lady.
40:49
Speaker 3: Oh my god. And when you see in the documentary
40:51
Speaker 3: she's so soft spoken and petite and like, you know,
40:54
Speaker 3: she's such a kind, loving person, and she was considered
40:57
Speaker 3: one of the America's most dangerous fugitive at one time
41:01
Speaker 3: when she was So it's like she she talks about
41:06
Speaker 3: so when she was actually she was indicted under the
41:09
Speaker 3: same crop case as Matulhu, but then they caught her
41:14
Speaker 3: on a different they charged it with a different crime,
41:16
Speaker 3: and then once they charged her with a different crime,
41:18
Speaker 3: they dropped all the charges in relation to Metulu, which
41:21
Speaker 3: sort of speaks to the lack of evidence right in
41:23
Speaker 3: that original Brinks case. So it's it's a very complicated
41:28
Speaker 3: thing to talk about, and the reason why I don't
41:31
Speaker 3: go into detail because it's you know, it's yeah, it's
41:34
Speaker 3: just it's very you.
41:36
Speaker 1: Know, it's not what your focus was.
41:37
Speaker 3: It couldn't.
41:38
Speaker 1: That's its own documentary. I mean that really, that could
41:40
Speaker 1: be its own two hour conversation.
41:45
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's so much unpack in terms of the history. Sure,
41:49
Speaker 3: it's just it's hard to just sum it up.
41:52
Speaker 2: So the government got really involved in shutting this program down.
41:58
Speaker 2: Were you ever worried that they would somehow intervene to
42:02
Speaker 2: try and shut this documentary down or did you have
42:05
Speaker 2: any weird or scary experiences along those lines.
42:10
Speaker 3: I haven't, but I other. You know, it's mostly when
42:13
Speaker 3: I would speak to the contemporaries of Matulu, Like a
42:16
Speaker 3: lot of the people who I interviewed did not want
42:19
Speaker 3: to speak on the phone. You know, there was you
42:21
Speaker 3: could a lot of people. It's more in my interactions
42:24
Speaker 3: with people from who have been victim victims of cointelpro
42:28
Speaker 3: and who lived through that type of surveyance, who you know,
42:33
Speaker 3: told me stories. Luckily I may be on some some lists,
42:38
Speaker 3: I don't know, but nothing. I haven't felt any. I
42:41
Speaker 3: haven't experienced any anything directly.
42:43
Speaker 1: That's good. That's that's the answer we want fastly.
42:47
Speaker 2: So yeah, sometimes I really do wonder sometimes if the
42:52
Speaker 2: FBI and the CIA are just so cocky about having
42:56
Speaker 2: gotten away with stuff like this, like what's anyone ever
42:59
Speaker 2: going to do? We're not going to bring the FBI
43:02
Speaker 2: to justice over this, so like are there any threats
43:05
Speaker 2: anymore when it comes to stuff like this, like what's
43:08
Speaker 2: anyone going to do?
43:09
Speaker 3: Well? I think, what's like with the release of Judas
43:12
Speaker 3: and the Black Messiah and you know, like there is
43:15
Speaker 3: a lot of talk right now about cointelp pro. I
43:19
Speaker 3: think there was a friend of mine sent me an
43:20
Speaker 3: article last year that even before the release of this
43:23
Speaker 3: film in teen Vogue where they were talking about they
43:25
Speaker 3: had talked to like talked about Cointelpro. So it's quite
43:29
Speaker 3: no people really acknowledge it now. When I first started,
43:33
Speaker 3: even when I first started doing this documentary, some of
43:35
Speaker 3: my friends were like, right, you know, like sounds like
43:38
Speaker 3: they thought it was kind of conspiracy, very but it's
43:41
Speaker 3: actually real, Like, but yeah, yeah, we found in you know,
43:46
Speaker 3: the activists, the anti war activists found the papers in
43:49
Speaker 3: Media Pennsylvania exposing cointel Pro, Like this was real, Like
43:53
Speaker 3: there's you know, we don't know the scope, we don't
43:56
Speaker 3: know all the details, but.
43:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, that that actually brings up another question, which is
44:02
Speaker 2: kind of a more general question, which is what are
44:05
Speaker 2: your thoughts on the term conspiracy theory? Because the reason
44:09
Speaker 2: I ask is things like mk Ultra co intel Pro,
44:14
Speaker 2: Like even after Jonestown, there were people in the government
44:17
Speaker 2: who were like, did the CIA do that? It's very weird,
44:20
Speaker 2: But now we've seemed to come out this other end
44:24
Speaker 2: now where anything that's labeled a conspiracy theory is just
44:29
Speaker 2: kind of immediately discredited. And I feel like things like
44:33
Speaker 2: your documentary are proof that we shouldn't be that quick
44:37
Speaker 2: like and understand I'm not like advocating for QAnon or
44:41
Speaker 2: Sandy Hook or anything like that, but we know our
44:45
Speaker 2: government does bad things all the time. And what are
44:50
Speaker 2: your thoughts on I guess kind of the demonization of
44:53
Speaker 2: the term conspiracy theory.
44:55
Speaker 3: I mean, I've never really thought of it, but it's
44:57
Speaker 3: in that way. But it's experiences. When I was first
45:01
Speaker 3: pitching this film, which was like I guess the first
45:05
Speaker 3: time I would start pitching it was twenty fourteen or
45:07
Speaker 3: twenty fifteen, there was some people who were like I
45:11
Speaker 3: sort of toned down the co intel, like I had
45:14
Speaker 3: to be careful with how I pitched it because of that.
45:16
Speaker 3: Like I think, as soon as it starts somebody even
45:19
Speaker 3: suggests that it sounds like a conspiracy theory, suddenly it's
45:22
Speaker 3: like questionable, you know, like people are suddenly open to
45:27
Speaker 3: doubt in a way. But like things like MK Ultra,
45:32
Speaker 3: I went to a press release a few years ago
45:34
Speaker 3: here for the hospital, the mcguil hospital where they were
45:38
Speaker 3: treating where they were doing there were some victims.
45:42
Speaker 2: From lots of MK Ultra stuff in Montreal.
45:45
Speaker 3: From the hospital and speaking about it, and then just
45:48
Speaker 3: to see there's a class action suit that's going on
45:52
Speaker 3: finally years later. I mean, I think it's it's a
45:56
Speaker 3: label that can really you know, like concern of the
46:00
Speaker 3: misinformation and to distract people from the truth.
46:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it's it's tricky.
46:07
Speaker 3: It's a tricky thing.
46:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, it really, it really is. Yeah.
46:11
Speaker 1: But I also feel like there's a giant swath of
46:15
Speaker 1: particularly Americans, that because things are labeled a conspiracy, they
46:18
Speaker 1: also immediately believe them. Okay, yeah, I mean both of them.
46:23
Speaker 2: I feel like I've said before on this podcast, I
46:27
Speaker 2: feel like both of those reactions are not necessarily healthy.
46:30
Speaker 2: Like you can't believe every conspiracy theory, but also you
46:35
Speaker 2: can't trust the government enough to believe that everything that
46:38
Speaker 2: someone calls a conspiracy theory is a conspiracy theory. Like
46:42
Speaker 2: the Iraq War is a conspiracy theory. We went there
46:46
Speaker 2: based on weapons of mass destruction that didn't exist.
46:49
Speaker 1: That they knew weren't there.
46:51
Speaker 2: When the police cover up a police shooting, it's a
46:54
Speaker 2: conspiracy theory, Like it's not that uncommon, and it really
47:00
Speaker 2: like I hate that things like this ever get labeled
47:04
Speaker 2: as a conspiracy theory because I'm assuming there's probably documents
47:08
Speaker 2: about this that have been declassified, like the information is
47:12
Speaker 2: out there.
47:13
Speaker 1: Like, yeah, I think I think the other thing that
47:15
Speaker 1: would be interesting to see from and maybe you got
47:18
Speaker 1: a little bit more information on this in your process, Mia,
47:21
Speaker 1: But just how many other kinds of community based efforts
47:25
Speaker 1: of socialized medicine have been shut down one way or another?
47:30
Speaker 1: You know? Was it just this one where there? I mean,
47:33
Speaker 1: was it just convenient that it happened to be connected
47:35
Speaker 1: to the Black Panthers, you know what I'm saying, Like,
47:37
Speaker 1: I'm just curious if there were other clinics around the
47:40
Speaker 1: country things like this that had that much effort to
47:43
Speaker 1: be shut down.
47:44
Speaker 3: I mean, I don't I don't have like like specific facts,
47:49
Speaker 3: but I mean we do know that the Black Panthers
47:51
Speaker 3: were neutralized or stopped for the programs there, you know,
47:57
Speaker 3: the program they and then the and then the the
48:00
Speaker 3: United States started to serve free breakfast programs in their schools,
48:05
Speaker 3: you know, like in public schools after the Black Panthers
48:08
Speaker 3: did it. The Black Panthers were also the first to
48:11
Speaker 3: do to have daycare centers in New.
48:13
Speaker 1: I mean, it's wild. I was raised told the Black
48:17
Speaker 1: Panthers were only criminals. That's what I was told growing up.
48:20
Speaker 1: I mean, that's just flat out what I was told,
48:24
Speaker 1: and then I saw Forrest Gump, and then later in college,
48:30
Speaker 1: somebody finally was like, you need to spend a little
48:33
Speaker 1: bit more time on this topic. And I was shocked
48:36
Speaker 1: by how wrong I, you know, had been and had been.
48:42
Speaker 1: It's just sad to think about.
48:44
Speaker 3: Actually, another part of the Cotel program that was so
48:49
Speaker 3: effective was the misinformation that they like the stories they
48:53
Speaker 3: would leak to the press. They actually made the CIA
48:57
Speaker 3: or the FBRCAA made a fake coloring book that they
49:02
Speaker 3: said was a Black Panther coloring book that to promote
49:07
Speaker 3: to give the impression that the Black Panthers were anti white,
49:11
Speaker 3: and so it's you can look at it online, but
49:14
Speaker 3: it's like this terrifying coloring book that's not surprised and
49:19
Speaker 3: it was this you know, they didn't, so they were
49:21
Speaker 3: They went to great lengths to make a lot of
49:23
Speaker 3: these groups appear like dangerous criminals so that the community
49:27
Speaker 3: would turn against them, because they knew they couldn't just
49:29
Speaker 3: go and arrest them for for you know, having giving
49:32
Speaker 3: it free breakfast, so they had to, you know, give
49:34
Speaker 3: them like this. They had to create tension and divide
49:38
Speaker 3: them from and fear so it's like when you really
49:41
Speaker 3: start looking into it, you're like the resources that went
49:44
Speaker 3: into this, you know, like they must have had like
49:46
Speaker 3: artists on like just everyone they had like artists on
49:49
Speaker 3: staff like doing this and it's really disturbing, and why
49:52
Speaker 3: would it stop completely?
49:54
Speaker 2: Yeah that I feel like it hasn't stopped, and people
49:58
Speaker 2: know it hasn't stopped. There's things like in New York,
50:01
Speaker 2: we know the NYPD was running something called the Rap
50:04
Speaker 2: Squad that was just tasked with following rappers around the city.
50:09
Speaker 2: Like that's not any different. That is the exact same thing.
50:13
Speaker 2: And we hear it now and we're like, oh, that's funny,
50:17
Speaker 2: Like if the NYPD's following rappers, no, that's co intel
50:20
Speaker 2: pro still carrying on, Like it's the exact same thing.
50:24
Speaker 2: And I feel like we've just gotten kind of desensitized
50:27
Speaker 2: to the idea that the government is always watching and
50:30
Speaker 2: they're always especially watching people of color, and we pretend
50:34
Speaker 2: like we hate it. But what do we do about it? Now?
50:36
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's true, I mean what do we do?
50:38
Speaker 1: Well, you're doing something. You made a great documentary about it.
50:41
Speaker 1: So let me want to ask you, just from a
50:43
Speaker 1: practical standpoint, how long did it take you to put
50:45
Speaker 1: this together because it's so comprehensive.
50:48
Speaker 3: I mean, I mean, well, when I first when I
50:51
Speaker 3: first wrote Matulu, it was in twenty thirteen, and then
50:54
Speaker 3: I was still finishing deprogrammed and I started visiting him.
50:58
Speaker 3: He was in he was in a pretty outside of
51:00
Speaker 3: LA But it took a good like four or five
51:03
Speaker 3: years to really since the first shoot. And you know,
51:06
Speaker 3: there's always the process of like you start a demo,
51:10
Speaker 3: you get a little bit of funding to shoot. And
51:14
Speaker 3: also there was originally Doctor Schrow was supposed to be
51:18
Speaker 3: released in twenty sixteen. So the original pitch of the
51:21
Speaker 3: film was like, Matula's going to get out. We're going
51:24
Speaker 3: to film him while going back into the community and
51:27
Speaker 3: continuing his work. But the government, he did not get released.
51:32
Speaker 3: They kept him because there was a law that before
51:35
Speaker 3: nineteen eighty eight, if you were sentenced to sixty years,
51:38
Speaker 3: there was a mandatory parole. They changed the rules, let's say,
51:42
Speaker 3: and they're still you know, he didn't get released. So
51:44
Speaker 3: at that point I was like, okay, well now what
51:47
Speaker 3: do I do? And I was so emotionally invested in
51:51
Speaker 3: telling the story, and then it became like okay, let's
51:54
Speaker 3: approach it this way is more of like a you know,
51:57
Speaker 3: a bit of a different angle one focusing on the
52:01
Speaker 3: political cut and trying to find a way to keep
52:03
Speaker 3: Mitulu as the center of the film without having any
52:06
Speaker 3: access to him because they would not grant him. He
52:08
Speaker 3: wasn't allowed to We tried to get interviews with him.
52:11
Speaker 3: Well then given he hasn't been granted permission to do
52:15
Speaker 3: an interview since two thousand and three, which again is well,
52:19
Speaker 3: you know, it's like a political thing.
52:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, that very much speaks to him being more than
52:26
Speaker 2: just a prisoner. He's a political prisoner. Like there's no
52:29
Speaker 2: like we let criminals talk about their crimes all the
52:32
Speaker 2: time on true crime shows.
52:35
Speaker 1: And I know how to book them.
52:36
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, there's there's an obvious reason why he wasn't
52:40
Speaker 2: allowed to be interviewed for this.
52:42
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that's again this is all yeah, like speaking
52:45
Speaker 3: to the you know, this what it means to be
52:47
Speaker 3: a political prisoner and how they treat political prisoners differently,
52:51
Speaker 3: Like Susan, A lot of these prisoners, people who were
52:54
Speaker 3: in the film were held in I in solitary confinement
52:58
Speaker 3: for years. Whoa you know, separate it from the population.
53:02
Speaker 2: That's a thing. I feel like in the United States,
53:05
Speaker 2: we pretend we don't have we pretend we don't have
53:08
Speaker 2: political prisoners, and we very obviously do. And I appreciate
53:13
Speaker 2: that this documentary shed some light on things like that,
53:18
Speaker 2: Like it's not like we know. I feel like a
53:21
Speaker 2: lot of people know the government really cracked down on
53:24
Speaker 2: the black panthers and whatnot. But I think people feel
53:27
Speaker 2: like that's ended and it clearly hasn't. And I thank
53:31
Speaker 2: you for doing this documentary. It's really great. Last question,
53:36
Speaker 2: where can people watch it? And where can people find
53:39
Speaker 2: out more about your other work? And do you have
53:42
Speaker 2: any final thoughts?
53:43
Speaker 3: So the film is available, the documentaries available for free
53:46
Speaker 3: in the US on Vice. It's shortlist dot vice dot com.
53:50
Speaker 2: Well we'll link to it also, okay.
53:53
Speaker 3: And I encourage everyone to check out Mitulushakur dot com
53:57
Speaker 3: with it, which is a website run by his family
54:01
Speaker 3: and friends. Is support team and there's updates, cons there's
54:05
Speaker 3: there's always updates on his health and the case and
54:07
Speaker 3: you know, calls to action for help. Yeah, I mean
54:10
Speaker 3: there's We can check out other documentaries by by me
54:14
Speaker 3: at I still film dot com. And I'm now editing
54:18
Speaker 3: a medium length film about a cult I met that
54:22
Speaker 3: live in the desert in Hemmet, California. Oh Man, been
54:27
Speaker 3: filming for a few years. I met them while shooting Deprogrammed.
54:31
Speaker 1: Oh wow, so would that makes that checks out?
54:35
Speaker 2: Did you visit the iconic Hemet Mays Stone while you
54:38
Speaker 2: were there?
54:39
Speaker 3: I didn't.
54:40
Speaker 2: I it's a ridiculous monument.
54:43
Speaker 1: Don't it's not don't go, don't don't do that.
54:47
Speaker 3: I missed it.
54:48
Speaker 1: Nope, you didn't miss it.
54:49
Speaker 2: You are You just didn't see it?
54:51
Speaker 1: Not going?
54:53
Speaker 2: I'm sorry. Go on.
54:54
Speaker 3: So, yeah, that's what I'm doing now, and I'm working
54:56
Speaker 3: on a couple fiction first fiction progress.
55:00
Speaker 2: Oh wow.
55:01
Speaker 1: Oh that's so exciting.
55:04
Speaker 3: So that's yeah.
55:05
Speaker 2: Well, thank you very much for doing the episode. We'll
55:09
Speaker 2: link to where people can watch the documentary. You should
55:11
Speaker 2: watch it. It's really good, Caitlin, Do you have anything
55:16
Speaker 2: to any final thoughts before we get out of here?
55:19
Speaker 1: Just that me is really cool?
55:20
Speaker 2: Adam agree?
55:22
Speaker 1: You notice how cool she is. She's also just very cool.
55:26
Speaker 2: I would agree that.
55:28
Speaker 1: I honestly, I really cannot say enough about how much
55:32
Speaker 1: I enjoyed this documentary. A lot of times these are
55:35
Speaker 1: hard watches, you know, and they're they're not pleasant. They're
55:38
Speaker 1: just infuriating. And I think, I'm I think a lot
55:42
Speaker 1: of people are kind of tapped out right now, and
55:44
Speaker 1: this doesn't feel that way at all. It's cool, it's interesting.
55:48
Speaker 1: Everybody's super charismatic, and it is an unbelievable story. And
55:54
Speaker 1: that clip of Reagan alone is worth seeing this thing.
55:57
Speaker 1: It's it's weirdly satisfying. It's very validating. It's like, yeah,
56:02
Speaker 1: see I do it.
56:04
Speaker 3: Yeah, you're just like he is such an.
56:07
Speaker 1: Yeah, he really is in this. It's like, what a
56:10
Speaker 1: horrible man. Yeah, he's like just going into people's neighborhoods
56:14
Speaker 1: and screaming at them for being in that neighborhood. It's wild.
56:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's that's what I want to plug before we
56:19
Speaker 2: get out of here. Fuck Reagan. Oh he was the worst. Yeah, agreed,
56:24
Speaker 2: Caitlyn say fuck Reagan. Okay, Reagan, thank you all right,
56:28
Speaker 2: we should get out of here. Mia say goodbye.
56:31
Speaker 3: Thank you guys so much.
56:34
Speaker 2: Thank you for doing it. We appreciate it. Caitlyn say goodbye, goodbye, goodbye, everybody.
56:39
Speaker 2: We love you. He content to juting contempt