Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #1220 - Careless People Rule the World

Transcript

#1220 - Careless People Rule the World · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

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Speaker 1: A few weeks ago on the Happy Families podcast, Missus
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Speaker 1: Happy Families had an entire podcast to talk about one book,
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Speaker 1: rather than doing the usual book club thing where we
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Speaker 1: try to cram about forty books into one episode, we
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Speaker 1: just talked about Kylie's review of The Let Them Theory,
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Speaker 1: Mel Robbin's international best seller that is available everywhere, all
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Speaker 1: over the place and people can't stop talking about it. Well,
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Speaker 1: I've had to read as well. And today on the
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Speaker 1: Happy Families Podcast two books I'm going to chat about
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Speaker 1: the Let Them Theory and also another one that has
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Speaker 1: rocked my world called Careless People Today and welcome to
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Speaker 1: the Happy Families Podcast. Real Parenting Solutions every Day on
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Speaker 1: Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast, where Justin and Kylie Colson
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Speaker 1: and if you like books, this is one to I
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Speaker 1: think have a quick listen to Kylie. For those who
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Speaker 1: missed your review of The Let Them Theory, remind what
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Speaker 1: did you think of it?
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Speaker 2: I think the way that Mel writes is provocative and
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Speaker 2: she's a straight shooter. She just says it how it is.
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Speaker 2: There is no Maudy coddling going on there. So if
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Speaker 2: you are looking for someone to make you feel good
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Speaker 2: about yourself. She's not the person.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, do you remember what you rated it out of five?
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Speaker 2: I didn't give it a rating. Huh at the time
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Speaker 2: when we talked about.
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Speaker 1: It, and maybe you just told people that it was
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Speaker 1: a good book to I.
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Speaker 2: Would read it again.
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Speaker 1: Well, really, you'd read it twice? Yeah, well, what would
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Speaker 1: you give it out of five? Then?
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Speaker 2: Probably a four?
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Speaker 1: Hm?
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Speaker 3: Okay?
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Speaker 1: Asked me what I thought? Do you want to know
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Speaker 1: what I thought?
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Speaker 2: I don't really care what you thought about the book?
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Speaker 1: All that hurts?
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Speaker 4: No?
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Speaker 1: Are you practicing a bit of mel robins? Let them
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Speaker 1: write here? Let justin feel however he feels about the book.
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Speaker 1: I'm glad with how I'm happy with how I felt
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Speaker 1: about it. Is that, yeah, a.
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Speaker 4: Little bit not doing a particularly good job of it.
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Speaker 4: But I already know that you did not do it as.
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Speaker 2: Much as I did.
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Speaker 1: How do you know, pray tell.
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Speaker 2: You told me you didn't even finish it.
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Speaker 1: That's I checked it back on the floor on your
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Speaker 1: side of the bed and said.
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Speaker 4: You put it away, And you said to you, you
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Speaker 4: won't even let me put it into your.
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Speaker 1: Bookshelfs right, you said, I guess we're not putting it on
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Speaker 1: your bookshelf. Then I've got I've got all the books
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Speaker 1: that are worth keeping on my bookshelf. I just good,
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Speaker 1: all right, So let's we won't have a podcast if
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Speaker 1: I don't talk about it. I'll keep it quick, may
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Speaker 1: I Are you okay with that? If I just give
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Speaker 1: it a quick I'm not trying to undo all the
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Speaker 1: good work that you've done. And I'm also not denigrating
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Speaker 1: the way that you viewed the book, because clearly this
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Speaker 1: book is resonating with a lot of people. For me,
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Speaker 1: as someone with a background in psychology, I found that
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Speaker 1: it was about two I think two hundred and thirty
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Speaker 1: two hundred and forty pages something like that that could
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Speaker 1: have been done in five or ten. There's so much
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Speaker 1: science that could support what she's talking about.
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Speaker 2: I just but she's not a scientist, nor is she
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Speaker 2: a psychologist. She's sharing her personal experience and how that
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Speaker 2: has transformed the way she does things. She's not trying
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Speaker 2: to be somebody else.
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Speaker 1: I guess the other thing that I found a bit
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Speaker 1: challenging was that most of the decisions where she shared stories,
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Speaker 1: where she quote unquote let them so that she could
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Speaker 1: then let me let herself do her thing. I would
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Speaker 1: summarize it as what other people think of you is
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Speaker 1: none of your business.
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Speaker 2: That's right.
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Speaker 1: And if other people want to live their lives a
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Speaker 1: way that you're not comfortable with, that's fine. It's actually
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Speaker 1: their life, and so long as they're not causing harm
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Speaker 1: to other people or to property, just let them. Let
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Speaker 1: them have their attitudes, let them have their opinions. This
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Speaker 1: comes from psychology around acceptance, the idea that when you
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Speaker 1: accept where other people are, there's no longer any resistance
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Speaker 1: and everyone just gets along. Like the theory itself or
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Speaker 1: the principle itself is really sound, it's really good for
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Speaker 1: well being. I just felt like she glossed over the
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Speaker 1: really heavy stuff, kept it very very.
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Speaker 2: Light, and just she wasn't writing it for you.
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Speaker 1: Didn't work for men, it didn't work.
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Speaker 2: For me, for the average people. Please are out there
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Speaker 2: for the average person who feels like they need to
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Speaker 2: control everyone in every situation. This is a must read.
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Speaker 5: Yeah.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, it's so funny the way we see things so differently,
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Speaker 1: isn't it? And yet we're still crazy about each other?
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Speaker 2: Maybe not after this?
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Speaker 1: All right, So I want to talk about a book
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Speaker 1: that really really did do it for me.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I haven't read that one.
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Speaker 1: No, no, so this book I'm going to do it
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Speaker 1: I looks boring. After the Break, I'm going to share
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Speaker 1: with you a book that is called Careless People, a
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Speaker 1: cautionary tale of power, greed and lost idealism.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, if you're a careless person, you really need to
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Speaker 2: read the Let Them Fairy as well.
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Speaker 1: This is a memoir. I'm going to give Let Them
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Speaker 1: two out of five. So I was going to do
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Speaker 1: one and a half, but I'm feeling guilty because of
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Speaker 1: the way that you've come at me for it. So
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Speaker 1: I'm going to let you feel a little bit better
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Speaker 1: about it by giving it a two out of five.
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Speaker 1: The book that I'm going to talk about is just
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Speaker 1: it has really captured me. I couldn't put it down.
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Speaker 1: It's a memoir. I love reading a good memoir. Going
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Speaker 1: to talk to you about Careless People right after the Break.
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Speaker 1: Sarah Winn Williams wrote a memoir Careless People, and in
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Speaker 1: doing so, I think that she has put herself in
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Speaker 1: the crosshairs of some of the most powerful people in
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Speaker 1: the world. Careless People is a cautionary tale of power, greed,
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Speaker 1: and lost idealism. Sarah Winn Williams is a former New
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Speaker 1: Zealand diplomat and international lawyer. She joined Facebook after pitching
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Speaker 1: a job that did not exist, convincing them that they
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Speaker 1: had to hire her despite the fact that they didn't
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Speaker 1: believe that it was going to be useful, and ultimately
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Speaker 1: became the Facebook Director of Global Public Policy. After she
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Speaker 1: left the company to work in tech, working on policy
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Speaker 1: and Ai Kylie. The book starts with a quote. The
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Speaker 1: epigraph comes from f. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. They
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Speaker 1: were careless people, Tom and Daisy. They smashed up things
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Speaker 1: and creatures and then retreated back into their money or
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Speaker 1: their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them
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Speaker 1: together and let other people clean up the mess they
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Speaker 1: had made. And that gives you a sense of what
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Speaker 1: the book's about. Essentially. Williams steps into Facebook after convincing
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Speaker 1: them to hire her and discovers that these people they've
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Speaker 1: got a motto, move fast and break things, and they
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Speaker 1: don't care what they break. The absolute I want to say, pride, hubris.
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Speaker 1: They the way that they treat people. They know, they
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Speaker 1: know that they can influence elections, They know that they
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Speaker 1: can influence what's going on with the well being of
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Speaker 1: our young people. They know that they can walk away
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Speaker 1: and nobody can touch them because of the way that
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Speaker 1: things are structured. I could not put this book down.
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Speaker 1: And if I didn't like the people in charge of
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Speaker 1: Meta once upon a time, my disdain, my disregard, my
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Speaker 1: absolute frustration that these people is worse than it has
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Speaker 1: ever ever been. Oh my goodness, blew me away. Let
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Speaker 1: me share an excerpt from the book. This is from
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Speaker 1: chapter forty four, emotional targeting. In April twenty seventeen, a
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Speaker 1: confidential document is leaked that reveals Facebook is offering advertisers
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Speaker 1: the opportunity to target thirteen to seventeen year olds across
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Speaker 1: its platforms, including Instagram during moments of psychological vulnerability, when
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Speaker 1: they feel worthless, insecure, stressed, defeated, anxious, stupid, useless, and
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Speaker 1: like a failure. They're all in inverted commas because they're
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Speaker 1: quotes direct from what Facebook is doing, or they can
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Speaker 1: target them when they're worried about their bodies and thinking
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Speaker 1: of losing weight, basically when a team is in a
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Speaker 1: fragile emotional state. Facebook's advertising team had made this presentation
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Speaker 1: for an Australian client that explains that Instagram and Facebook
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Speaker 1: monitor teenager's posts, photos, interactions, conversations with friends, visual communications,
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Speaker 1: and Internet activity on and off Facebook's platforms, and use
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Speaker 1: this data to target young people when they're vulnerable. In
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Speaker 1: addition to the moments of vulnerability listed, Facebook finds moments
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Speaker 1: when teenagers are concerned with body confidence and working out
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Speaker 1: and losing weight. She goes on to explain what's actually
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Speaker 1: going on here, She says. A statement is quickly drafted,
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Speaker 1: and the response team debates whether Facebook can include the
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Speaker 1: line we take this very seriously and are taking every
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Speaker 1: effort to remedy the situation, since in fact, this is
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Speaker 1: apparently just normal business practice. A comm's staffer points out
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Speaker 1: what should be obvious that we can't say we're taking
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Speaker 1: efforts to remedy it if we're not. This prompts other
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Speaker 1: team members to confirm his take, revealing other examples they
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Speaker 1: know of. Facebook targets young mothers based on their emotional states.
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Speaker 1: Facebook does work for a beauty product company, tracking when
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Speaker 1: thirteen to seventeen year old girls delete selfies so it
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Speaker 1: can serve a beauty ad to them at that moment.
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Speaker 1: We don't know what happens to young teen girls. When
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Speaker 1: they're targeted with beauty advertisements after deleting a selfie nothing good.
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Speaker 1: There's a reason why you erase something from existence, why
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Speaker 1: a teen girl feels that it can't be shared, and
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Speaker 1: surely Facebook shouldn't then be using that moment to bombard
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Speaker 1: them with extreme weight loss ads or beauty industry ads
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Speaker 1: or whatever else they push on teens feeling vulnerable. The
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Speaker 1: weird thing is that the rest of our Facebook coworkers
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Speaker 1: seem unbothered about this. I mean, this stuff's just crazy.
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Speaker 1: Have listened to what Sarah Whin Williams, the the author
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Speaker 1: of Careless People, had to say on the Honestly podcast
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Speaker 1: with Barry Weiss.
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Speaker 5: When any other government, including the US government, would say, hey,
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Speaker 5: how does facial recognition work? Or how does photo tagging work?
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Speaker 5: You know, I would have these conversations with other governments
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Speaker 5: would say, look, sorry, we can't tell you that. That's
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Speaker 5: that's information that's only for us, Like we're not going
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Speaker 5: to sit you down and explain to you how Facebook
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Speaker 5: Live works or how photo tagging works. And yet for
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Speaker 5: the CCP, there were these detailed briefings showing how the
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Speaker 5: technology worked, testing of it to make sure it met
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Speaker 5: like their censorship specifications, and beyond that, there was sort
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Speaker 5: of general briefings on AI or infrastructure, you know, the
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Speaker 5: sort of things that would never be provided to any
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Speaker 5: other government.
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Speaker 3: Are you suggesting that the CCP could sort of use
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Speaker 3: these tools on non Facebook products or simply that Facebook
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Speaker 3: was sort of being very open kimono with the Chinese government.
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Speaker 5: They were explaining exactly how this technology worked, which was
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Speaker 5: being built in a white glove service for the CCP.
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Speaker 1: GOB's making blown Away. Such a great book, such a
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Speaker 1: great conversation. In fact, we will link to the Honestly
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Speaker 1: podcast and this specific interview because it's just such a
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Speaker 1: compelling conversation. But the book, oh my goodness, the whole
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Speaker 1: book is just story after story after story of these
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Speaker 1: careless people who in one breath stand before Congress in
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Speaker 1: the United States and say we're doing everything we can
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Speaker 1: to protect young people, and then in the next breath
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Speaker 1: sell secrets to advertisers so that they can prey on
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Speaker 1: the vulnerabilities of our young people. This book was just brilliant,
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Speaker 1: just brilliant, careless people, a cautionary tale of power, greed,
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Speaker 1: and lost idealism.
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Speaker 2: So how does a book like that help the individual.
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Speaker 1: What it does is it well, I guess as a parent,
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Speaker 1: it reinforces for us why we need to have really
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Speaker 1: clear boundaries around what's going on. And it also helps
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Speaker 1: us to understand the kinds of people who are literally
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Speaker 1: ruling the world. Like politicians won't stand up to them,
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Speaker 1: and you know why, because they can tweak the algorithm
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Speaker 1: so that the politician's opponents end up with the power
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Speaker 1: rather than the politician themselves. And there's evidence of that.
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Speaker 1: There's actual evidence that she describes in the book of
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Speaker 1: Facebook employees at the highest levels doing that. So reading
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Speaker 1: it helps you understand who these people are and what
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Speaker 1: they're doing. Apart from that, it's just an incredible story.
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Speaker 2: So would you give it out of five?
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Speaker 3: Oh?
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Speaker 1: Well, I would give it a five out of five.
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Speaker 1: It's not going to appeal to everybody. It is going
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Speaker 1: to appeal to people who want to be across what
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Speaker 1: is going on in the tech sector, or what's happening
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Speaker 1: with kids and these platforms that they're so compelled to use,
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Speaker 1: and people who are just interested in policy and technology
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Speaker 1: and all that kind of thing. It's also just an
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Speaker 1: incredible memoir. Starts with a story where she's attacked by
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Speaker 1: a shark as a child, and literally the doctor sews
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Speaker 1: her back up and her dad says, well, you'll be
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Speaker 1: right now, and she almost dies because the doctor doesn't
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Speaker 1: do it properly and her dad's still saying no, no, no,
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Speaker 1: you'll be right, and mums are like, I think we
13:14
Speaker 1: probably should take her to the hospital, Like there are
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Speaker 1: so many compelling stories outside of the Facebook thing as
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Speaker 1: well as she's lived an extraordinary life and I loved
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Speaker 1: it careless people will link to it in the show
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Speaker 1: notes and I reckon if you're looking for a great
13:26
Speaker 1: read over the easter break, this is one that you
13:29
Speaker 1: definitely want to take a look at. The Happy Family's
13:32
Speaker 1: podcast is produced by Justin Ruland from Bridge Media. If
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Speaker 1: you are looking for more ways that you can support
13:37
Speaker 1: your family and help them to be happier to flourish.
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Speaker 1: For more information and resources, visit us at Happy families
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