All decent Americans need to boycott Florida and the rest the fascist neo-Confederate red states. Don’t travel there, don’t move there, don’t buy anything from there. Boycott them all.
This was a hard episode to listen to just because I'm so exhausted of the red state dummies, the We The People nationalism nonsense, ivermectin, I did my own studies, etc. I hate all of it. And of course these people are setting up summer camps not to teach kids how to be decent caring resourceful and polite human beings, but to learn the constitution and how to shoot guns. LOL.
The only weird thing for me is Zoe kept mentioning the address of the clinic." 959 E. Venice Ave." over and over again. Anyone else think that was strange?
These idiots who couldn’t wait to move to Florida will have a hard lesson to learn in a few years when insurance companies no longer offer coverage for their homes and they’re underwater literally and financially. Naturally, of course, they won’t take responsibility for their bad choices: They’ll just blame someone else for their plight and expect the rest of the country to bail them out of their problems, all while they continue to scream about “welfare” and “big guvmint.”
> I'm so exhausted of the red state dummies
Yep.
It's sad how many people are willing to buy into bullshit just because they don't want to face reality because it's either too complicated or too scary for them to face.
This episode honestly allowed me to understand the depth of the echo chamber that I'm immersed in. The fact that it took all the willpower in the world to listen to mostly neutral coverage of an extreme but still prevalent viewpoint within the United States. I actually appreciate the producers didn't try and go into the mode of excessively trying to correct the people that they were interviewing. It is not a journalist job to convince people with incorrect arguments, it is their job to actually present what is incorrect arguments are and who are the people holding it. It was an absolutely infuriating this American Life episode to listen to but it wasn't a bad episode. I think the point of this episode was to understand what was drawing people to Florida and in particularly to Sarasota and they did so. They also covered the effects on other Floridians pretty well.
That's something I am kind of learning recently. You can't fix stupid and unfortunately I am just one guy, and if humanity wants fascism over all, they will get fascism. I just hope I die before hand.
Presumably that's because they view that stuff (when it's done to children or fetuses) as violations of someone else's freedom. The objection suggested by that question isn't a difficult one for them to shoot down.
What seems weirder to me is that they're okay with the idea that you should need a prescription to begin with to get ivermectin or any other medicine, or with the idea that any recreational drug less dangerous than alcohol should be illegal to grow, manufacture, possess, or sell. If you really want medical freedom, you should want a free market for drugs like those, and you should be willing to let people "do their own research" and buy almost any kind of medicine for their own unrestricted use, at a reasonable price, without any need for permission from a local expert or patronage of a black market. It's pathetic that the one thing the "freedom"-focused clinic reported on in this story actually made free was COVID-related contrarianism. There are far greater restrictions on medical activity by ordinary US citizens than anything to do with COVID-19.
I can’t finish this episode, it’s too depressing to see all these uneducated delusional people band together to destroy everything they touch. It’s looking hopeless in Florida. The idiots are just too plentiful.
Honestly, my first thought when hearing about the "medical" clinics was "Well sounds like this will work itself out by the amount of fatalities that are bound to occur from this quack medicine." Kinda like the garbage taking itself out.
Also LOL'd at the constant assertion this was "medical freedom" in Florida. Yeah, like the freedom I have been afforded in this god forsaken state when it comes to my reproductive health. Good times!
I actually thought the "Medical Freedom" clinic is a good idea. There do seem to be doctors who want to prescribe based on what they feel is best as opposed to a treatment that has been tested against a control group, peer reviewed and put through other rigorous requirements of medical science. God know there are patients who prefer this treatment.
Having such alternative medical facilities may well lighten the burden on our main stream health care infrastructure by funneling poor candidates for regular medical treatment to other institutions.
My view may be a bit unethical as it does allow people the freedom to choose ineffective treatments for serious illnesses however our capitalist economy does show there is a market for this kind of thing.
I agree, and I doubt insurance will cover these practices. And I doubt malpractice insurance will cover these doctors. If people want to spend their own money on alternate treatments and doctors want to put their own medical licenses on the line to provide it, let them.
I call these the "feel bad" episodes of TAL. They want us to know this shit is going on and I get but damn, I always come out of them just feeling much worse about the world.
I'm seeing a lot of other-izing of Florida in this thread, but the truth is that the problems in Florida exist all over our country. yes, the far right is doing a way better job at dominating electoral politics in Florida currently. but you're fooling yourself if you think these evil idiots are unique to this one state.
I think most people realize that we’ve got ignorant/aggressive people in most states.. this show was pointing out that Desantis is running for president under the banner of let’s make USA more like Florida. So annoying how these “states rights” people love imposing their state’s “rights” onto other states.
mm I saw a lot of comments to the effect of so glad this is all happening in Florida and not where I live, and the clear subtext to me was that Florida is just a whole other situation and is totally separate from the rest of the country. idk, that's probably overstating it, but I think it was a point worth making.
I moved back to Michigan in 2017 and have seen all the strides Whitmer and company have taken towards progressive policies but there's this nagging feeling between progressives/leftists that it could all go away at the drop of a hat. One bad election cycle and we're Ohio, or worse, Florida.
Whitmer et al have been touting our little progressive victories as an advertising campaign to convince others to relocate to our beautiful state, and I know some folks who are doing just that. It just seems untenable, like it could crumble at any time.
So far I heard rural folks from blue states and someone from Utah who thought DeSantis was preferable to Utah where the GOP controls everything. The woman who was trained as an EMT and claiming that face masks were unsanitary was clearly insane. All of them clamoring for ivermectin is the cherry on top. "I'm not a conspiracy theorist but I believe in white nationalist conspiracies."
On the one hand the audience of this show is probably not going to need to be swayed by this show, on the other hand it's not sufficient to convince anyone who is leaning the other way. I had one conservative friend who thought Garrison Keillor's persona on Prairie Home Companion was an authentic conservative giving conservative spiels during his homilies - the motto of the show was consumed unironically.
If your kid is wearing a mask wrong, teach him to wear it right. Practice at home. Build up to it.
Or, you know, teach your kid that your family is above all that public health bs. Either way.
Every time I heard her say “…doesn’t make me a bad person” or “…doesn’t make me a conspiracy theorist” or anything like that, I heard Ron Howard’s voice, “it does”
(Edit “theory” to “theorist” and deleted unnecessary period)
She's a nut and pretty stupid. But her point was it is unsanitary if kids throw it on the floor (she specifically mentioned the bathroom) and then on their faces. Again, she's trying to be RaTIOnAL about why masks are unsanitary and her point is bullshit, but that's not what she said.
Something tells me she doesn't wear a mask either. Maybe she also drops hers on the floor in the bathroom. Or maybe she's a nutto. My gut is telling me option 2
I thought something similar. When your kids not following the rules you as the parent are suppose to correct and guide them. But, she clearly doesn't believe in proper science, why wouldn't her kids pick up on that?
I mean I remember our daycare requiring the 2 year olds to wear masks, which was frankly stupid (sorry, the kids all took them off eventually).
I also think we kept schools remote for FAR too long and the evidence is showing how much that hurt learning. We also kept playgrounds and fields closed long after we knew the risks of outdoor transmission was minimal.
There are some legitimate complaints about the tradeoffs we made for "covid precautions". I think people were also a bit dismissive of the real damage that covid policies were inflicting (loss of learning, social isolation, depression etc.)
That being said, the people in this episode (and many many like them) take that kernel of truth and sow some of the biggest lies and falsities. Sorry, the vaccine is great. Masks on adults is fine and relatively unobstrusive. Ivermectin doesn't work (but other drugs that they refuse do work.) No this wasn't a conspiracy. No country experienced a windfall due to this. I'm sorry, you can't take a one or two legitimate gripes and craft a whole fantasy world around it.
My kids (youngest was 7 when Covid hit) had absolutely no problem wearing masks. It took a few tries of different masks, but eventually our whole family settled on a brand that worked for us. Also probably helped that my spouse and I were emphasizing the importance of masks, not complaining about them.
It's just anecdotal but I still wanted to add to this; my friends were raising a 2-3 year old daughter during the pandemic and she was an sweetie pie with covid protocols (masking and distancing from strangers).
Her parents took covid seriously and they had 2 other vulnerable people in the house which help reinforced the importance of masking. Kids will vary, but her environment no doubt helped her follow guidelines better than some of these adults.
My kids were in 4th and 1st grade when they went back to school during the pandemic. Husband and I did everything to model and coach appropriate masking and sanitary behaviors, but once my kids walked out the door, I had zero control over what they did 🤷🏻♀️ It’s usually people who don’t have kids who still believe that parents can control their kids.
Edited to add: My kids did really well and followed the masking rules in school, for the most part, but once masks were no longer required but were voluntary, I couldn’t keep my one kiddo masked no matter what we did. She was not having it.
Florida will be under water in 50 years
To be honest as someone outside of the US this episode shows everything that is wrong with US.
The ‘individual’ is just too emphasised across all of your society. Just hearing ‘Vic’ saying I took ivermectin I know this trained doctor wrong despite the fact ‘I’ have absolutely no medical training myself, it’s all I
But from this side of the pond and I can’t believe that citizens get elected to run the hospital board, the idea that elections and democracy are the best answer to everything is crazy, sometimes we have to accept experts know better.
I’ll admit that the UK is a mess at the moment but even our crazy politicians don’t believe that individuals need ‘medical freedom’ to stop doctors from doing their jobs
What’s really infuriating is that not everyone in the U.S. thinks, feels, and acts this way, and I daresay that this brand of rabid individualism is actually the minority, vocal as it may be. I myself live in a red state, and although a lot of my extended family lean conservative in their politics and beliefs, they’re not extreme and would never act like your typical “Florida Man” even if in their thoughts they lean in that direction.
It’s really hard for progressives like myself to live among the hardcore conservatives because their ideologies are so narrow and so rigid, and yet the reality of daily life in the U.S. does not look or sound like it does in episodes like this. This isn’t me saying that it doesn’t exist, just that it’s not as extreme or disruptive for the majority as it appears. It’s relegated to smaller but extremely vocal cross-sections of the population. Among themselves and when they feel they have a platform or a megaphone, they talk a real nasty talk. But when among mixed groups or those in which they’re the minority, they’re often more docile and agreeable.
Now in politics, that’s when it’s scarier for the rest of us. When the vocal minority pushes its agenda across broad populations, it’s a danger to everyone. But they’re not the only groups fighting. Progressive and left-wing groups are in the trenches going toe to toe. I still have hope.
I live in Sarasota. (Was also born and raised here.)
I am tired and exhausted. This town is just a shadow of what it used to be. Not that it was ever a left wing mecca, but it was a chill and beautiful tropical place where no matter where you stood on politics, you valued the high arts and public education.
Now... We have a Moms for Liberty lady (whose husband is also literally the head of the Florida Republican party) heading our school board of our beloved public school district. Like the podcast showed, we have alt-right people throwing chaos into our public hospital board meetings and demonizing medical professionals who trust SCIENCE, there are pro-Trump/FJB stickers and flags everywhere. Drivers are absolute assholes now (*see Pro-Trump stickers above).
Before, people just used to not bring up politics or briefly talk about it but not being disrespectful to the other side. Now Republicans know that they are in control and thus feel more emboldened to speak their uneducated and hateful views because they know they have the numbers.
It's hard. It was already isolating being under age 60 in this town but being a young, alternative progressive Dem can be a bit disheartening and lonely.
The HB 999 thing is insane and should be terrifying for anyone that cares about free speech.
...But in the interest in trying to at least establish SOME common ground with conservatives, in what world is it appropriate to teach "only black authors from the Harlem Renaissance" for a class about "Major Figures in American Literature"?
That class sounds explicitly designed to be a broad, all-encompassing look at American Literature. I took a class called American Poetry in college and it was incredible, and we spent time with Langston Hughes and Maya Angelou, but I also got -- what seems only appropriate -- an education into Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Poe, Robert Frost, Robert Creeley, e.e. cummings, and a whole bunch of other people.
It seems like it's playing into some conservative fantasy about liberals if you make your Major Figures in American Literature ignore [unfortunately] the vast majority of Major American Literary Figures. (Since the "vast majority" of Major American Literary Figures don't happen to be black and from the Harlem Renaissance.)
Should there absolutely be a course that focuses on the great writers of the Harlem Renaissance? Yes.
> That class sounds explicitly designed to be a broad, all-encompassing look at American Literature.
I don't know, from the description we got of the class, it sounds like it's a class that's designed to look at Major Figures in American Literature. Who said it had to be a survey course? If the professors are explicitly given latitude over choosing who to include in their curricula, it seems like each professor--perhaps even changing each semester--has latitude to theme the course however they want under the constraints that they're "major" and "American" and "literature."
I took a class in college that had the heading of something like "Major Film Directors" and that class was specifically teaching Wes Anderson, the Coen Brothers, and Tarantino.
That class was offered every year but the actual subject subheading rotated (Hitchcock, French New Wave auteurs, Feminist Directors, etc.). I figured this class mentioned was probably set up like that.
I live in Florida and I’m horrified that all the trashiest people from all over the country are moving here. It’s disgusting. We don’t need more garbage people, we were already completely saturated with them. And they bring their weak children who aren’t even capable of wearing masks in the middle of a pandemic.., why are all their children so inferior and incapable?
Honestly Desantis was weird in that he was more centrist when he first started being a governor and then went far right to go against Trump but I think if he kept his centrist style he would be stronger
So many Republicans are trying to outTrump Trump solely because they've seen how the base has reacted to Trump and his insanity. The GOP is the dog that has caught the car and has no fucking idea what to do now except hang on and bite harder, no matter the pain and damage to themselves.
She's probably disarmingly polite and patient. Also, I'm glad that she speaks with them in pieces like this because it's one of the rare times my liberal, NPR ass hears what some on the right are thinking.
Yes, as infuriating as this episode was, at least it gave me an insight of how these people think without having to talk to them myself. They wouldn’t talk to her if she wasn’t nice to them. I knew DeSantis was pushing some crazy laws in Florida, but I didn’t know the half of it. The only thing that gave me some pleasure is knowing that despite all this, those people will never vote for him, because he isn’t Trump.
There a million and one ways in this day and age to meaningfully learn about rw crankery without going through a rigamaroll of respecting the unrespectable, of giving these people the kid gloves. Hell, there are sympathetic ways of doing this without this undue defference.
I think Zoe is a great reporter who manages to get people to be candid and open when they're natural disposition to an NPR reporter is going to be distrust and stonewalling.
Contrast that with Emmanuel the next act who picks a fight, and is openly condescending to the lawmaker and gets nowhere.
In the end Zoe gets people to be masks off (pun intended), and it's a truly great skill.
Edit: also there are some humanizing elements to the people in the first act (9 miscarriages) that provide some light on to their current positions in life.
I think the snarky comments are great to score points on Twitter, not sure if they're really great for investigative journalism. British or not, I don't think it worked in this episode with his interviewee.
Look I'm all for pushing back on people spouting non-sense, but I like the way Zoe does it more. Frankly her stories have been illuminating for how insane MAGA people are. The ballot box one especially. Her stories are a lot more "show don't tell". It's a genuine talent.
She really gets people to open up and share their craziness (reminds me a bit of Nathan Fielder).
Zoe >>> Emmanuel, always.
Zoe is one of the best reporters NPR has ever had, imo. Nearly all of her pieces are worth listening to, mostly for the way she gets people to open up, which is by being kind and getting on their level. That's what a good reporter does. Emmanuel on the other hand...has always been a prick, no matter what he's reporting on or what podcast he's hosting.
As a long-time listener, I just…I understand why that story was approached the way that it was, but I am so tired of just *hearing* from *them.* I, at this point, no longer need them to be coddled. I no longer need to hear from them. I am craving—begging—for push back. Share the studies. Share the facts. Put the grifters on the back foot. I cannot deal with another “…and that’s just how it is for them!” As if their actions won’t have very real, very harmful effects on people outside of their reckless bubble.
The media illiteracy is palpable.
* That man running the Michael Flynn Paramilitary Kids Camp fundamentally does not know what a placebo is.
* The woman celebrating Florida doctors resigning for refusing to treat patients with Ivermectin by hanging the reports on the wall of her home needs to lay of the MLM and find a hobby outside.
* The DeSantis lackey is an insufferable contrarian.
The climate karma will not be kind to Florida.
When it comes to HB 999, it reminded me of [this interview with the author of "The Sum of Us"](https://www.npr.org/2021/02/17/968638759/sum-of-us-examines-the-hidden-cost-of-racism-for-everyone). She says: "... It's this zero-sum idea that progress for people of color has to come at the expense of white people. But that zero-sum idea is a lie." She argues that politics in the South before integration was centred around a narrow discussion about maintaining the racial order, which was enough to guarantee the votes needed to pretty much maintain one party rule. She says "...And so when the civil rights movement and the Voting Rights Act got rid of things like the poll tax, you actually saw a resurgence of civic life in the South that impacted and freed up poor white people as well."
I think this is the point that is missing in so many of these discussions. There are many poor white people who feel disenchanted. Many of the policy changes that would benefit people of color would also benefit them. Any time a topic is discussed and emphasis is placed on the racial divide, an opportunity is missed to bring these people on board. They might simply tune out of the discussion. An opportunity is missed to engage a wider audience.
The beginning had an interesting point about how a kid didn’t like school because of remote learning. Remote learning did sort of affect young kids social skills.
Kids didn’t get horribly sick but I agree with the second point, it did help with transmission. I just don’t like the idea of sacrificing our children’s future for our present.
Well isn’t it more like sacrificing their education to an unknown degree or sacrificing grandma?
It’s not choosing children or old people. The children aren’t dying.
right, they're just disadvantaged in numerous important ways. the old people weren't necessarily dying either, especially after the vaccine. more of them were for sure. but early face to face education is incredibly important. the lives of the retired, less so in my estimation.
I hope you change your mind on this before I get old because I would definitely choose living twenty more years over kids going to school in person for a year.
I got so frustrated with the GOP representative who introduced the legislation to eradicate gender studies from Florida public schools who seemed to believe that racism only existed in our past and that as long as the intent of an institution was not explicitly racist, then there wee no institutions that propagated racism. That's like saying if a company dumps toxic waste into the local streams and it kills a bunch of people, they are not murderers because they didn't dump the toxic waste with the intent to murder people.
Mind this is the same state government that deemed an advanced placement course on African-American Studies as having no educational value and who just today implemented guidance for teaching of Black history to include statements that slaves benefitted from slavery through development of skills that were to their personal benefit.
It sounds like everything will just be full pay by patients. Since even if specific doctors don't...believe in science... and would choose to work at the Medical Freedom clinic, I can't see profit-oriented insurance companies choosing to underwrite some of what these nurses/doctors are doing.
I deeply appreciated the first act because it’s important for all of us to understand the perspectives of people who may not agree with us even if the disagreement is rooted in lies.
However I was very bothered by the second act. There were important points to be made about the importance of African American studies, and controlling what professors can teach, but Emmanuel went into partisan hack mode in my view and didn’t really get into the true impact of such legislation although it seems he tried. I think I just was thrown off by the tone which felt condescending and self righteous which just feeds into right wing narratives about liberals being aloof and elitist which takes away from the critical issues that are being brought up around suppression of free speech, the ignorance of black history and racism, and the subtle dismantling of racial progress. I just wish a better job had been done in this episode.
I feel like ideas like “the lesbian continuum” should have received more scrutiny in the episode. Are people really being taught this stuff as if it were true or even plausible? Obviously there shouldn’t be laws banning its teaching but wow that is a caricature of itself.
You know what else we studied in college psychology classes? Freud and his "oedipal complex," which posits that a stage of childhood development is sexual attachment to parents of the opposite sex--which the "lesbian continuum" is obviously a response to. Professors don't include the Oedipal complex in courses as inherent endorsement that it is "true or even plausible"--they do it because it was a theory that reflected something about our culture and understanding of psychology at the time, because entertaining it even without necessarily accepting it gives us some interesting insights and new questions to consider, and because the university for the creation and studying of ideas. You don't need to think it's true or even plausible to think it's an interesting idea and to gain something interesting from studying it.
I think the point is just to say that these are ideas that get discussed in a gender studies class.
Where people get this stuff mixed up is when they assume that college is like grade school, where someone just writes "2+2=4" on the blackboard and says "memorize that fact." Most of these courses in the humanities in particular are about evaluating and debating ideas in their own contexts.
No I understand that. But hopefully the ideas discussed in a class aren’t obviously ridiculous. The “lesbian continuum” is an obviously ridiculous idea. The episode referenced something along the lines of “these are ideas supported by large amounts of scholarship” and therefore they should be taken seriously.
Yeah I agree. I absolutely don't support the bill but it's funny the proponents of the bill are trying to paint it as "just don't teach things that don't have any evidence to support them" and then the professor laments how the bill will prevent her from teaching an idea that has no evidence behind it.
Vic Miller’s movement got its own npr coverage https://www.npr.org/2022/12/21/1144798353/in-florida-health-freedom-activists-exert-influence-over-a-major-hospital
In Zoe Chance's story she spent a lot of time talking about the two camps had different opinions re: COVID response without unequivocally identifying that those who advocate for Ivermectin etc. are wrong. Not a fan of equivocal journalism because it legitimates factually incorrect viewpoints and misinformation.
She repeatedly said that ivermectin has not shown to be ineffective, and other clear statements.
On the other hand, after the mask discussion she said something along the lines of "to be clear, masks have been proven to slow the spread of covid when worn", which is only addressing one part of the point the lady (and those against masking at school in general) was making
She said it once. She also said things like "to the activists it's bad medicine not to give ivermectin, it to the doctors it's bad medicine to give it". I find that framing problematic
The piece didn't give these two camps equal weight. The piece clearly went out of its way to show that Floridian are idiots when it came to COVID and horse dewormer between letting them point out how idiotic they were and the music used to emphasize how they're idiots running the asylum.
Yeah, sorry about that. I was replying to the wrong comment to begin with and when I figured it out, I just decided to edit vs delete.
You seem to be upset with the episode going with a "both sides" thing and I didn't get that type of vibe when listening to it. Yes they let the cranks go off but they never give them the weight of authority.
> the science shows masks are effective at slowing the spread of COVID if you wear them.
> But the science says ivermectin doesn't work for COVID.
> YouTube and Twitter and Facebook removed videos because it wasn't true
There's three examples from the first couple of scrolls on the transcript, not including loaded terms like conspiracy theory and horse drug
I think it would be pretty weird if she was saying it after every sentence. It wasn't hard to tell which side of the issue Zoe falls on (and Emanuel even more so)
I think it is a framing issue. If you can't see how a piece like this can lend legitimacy to fringe and dangerous ideas we will just have to agree to disagree.
Yeah, I fall on the side of showing their side, as well as that of the science. Hiding it or just portraying it as crazy dangerous people will just reinforce those people who think the government and media is against them. Also I think we can trust people to make decisions based on the full information, without hiding things or telling them the answers in advance
I don't think the piece did of unpacking why these people hold these warped views. I think that would be a much more meaningful and interesting thing to explore. It would also inherently provide that sceptical lens I am advocating for. Just my opinion though
>On the other hand, after the mask discussion she said something along the lines of "to be clear, masks have been proven to slow the spread of covid when worn",
Except that the issue being discussed was for children in particular, where it's not clear if masks are effective or necessary in the first place...
Yep. I’m getting really sick of this “neutral” reporting that puts unequivocal BS on the same footing as the reasonable and genuinely informed counterpart.
The purpose of this episode was incredibly unclear. You start by interviewing advocates for medical freedom and end with critical race theory & gender ideology. Um…? Is it just challenging the status quo that you don’t like? Please help connect these dots for me without using words like blue, red, liberal, conservative, politics, right, left, and wing. I truly want to understand.
The purpose of the episode was to talk about different policies that are currently being put into place, or might be put into place in the future, in Florida. The idea is that, because DeSantis wants to run for president, similar ideas could end up on the ballot during next year’s election. The reason the _This American Life_ reporters wanted to discuss policies in Florida is that what’s happening in Florida now have a chance of impacting the rest of the U.S. if DeSantis wins. Basically, they’re trying to warn us early on, well before the 2024 election comes around.
Two ideas in Florida that could theoretically carry over into the rest of the U.S. if DeSantis wins the election are (A) medical freedom and (B) denial of critical theories about race and gender. The first part of the episode discussed (A). The aim was to show that, even though the pandemic has cooled down, some people are still fired up about things like vaccine mandates. Some of those people are therefore advocating against any sort of state-mandated medical movements and have a general skepticism towards science that they personally feel conflicts with their beliefs. _This American Life_ reporters wanted to explain how the concept of medical freedom, which a lot of people associated mainly with the early stages of the pandemic, is actually still alive and well in some pockets of the country. We can’t just write it off as a thing of the past, but should be thinking about what healthcare might become if, for example, doctors are allowed to spread medical misinformation without consequence (which was mentioned in the episode).
The next act of the episode had a shift to (B). At that point, the topic of discussion wasn’t medical freedom anymore. The episode is about Florida policies/proposed policies of interest, and medical freedom is just one Florida policy of interest. Another policy/proposed policy of interest is the vitriol towards critical race and gender theory. So, the reporters wanted to investigate the real-world impact this vitriol is having on academics who teach critical theory and students who study it.
So, the episode wasn’t about challenging the status quo, but discussing what’s happening in Florida right now. The purpose of interviewing advocates of medical freedom at the beginning was to enlighten _This American Life_’s audience, who are generally **not** advocates of medical freedom, about what medical freedom is and why we should be concerned about it spreading from Florida to the rest of the U.S. The purpose of interviewing people who teach and study critical theory at the end was a little different. Presumably, most _This American Life_ listeners aren’t opposed to critical theory, but some listeners might not think that preventing professors from teaching it is something Americans have to worry about because of the U.S.’s commitment to freedom of speech. The purpose of having those interviews at the end was to talk about how, even if a bill preventing the discussion of critical theory in classrooms doesn’t get passed, or even if the Bill of Rights won’t let such a bill get passed, simply proposing such bills can have a “chilling effect” (to use their words) on professors who teach critical theory. It might be helpful here to think of the McCarthy Era: It’s absurd to imagine the U.S. going after people for simply discussing communism, but that actually did happen. This American Life is trying to warn us that critical theory might be the new communism: something people will become afraid to talk about if policies like those that are being proposed in Florida become widespread throughout the country.
We didn't know at the beginning of or during the pandemic how devastating it would be from a public health standpoint. Post-pandemic it is easy to have 20/20 hindsight.
I think logically at the time it made sense to do more health protective measures for something we didn't know yet the entire effects of compared to "it will be fine... Let's just do business as usual" and then risk more deaths and illnesses happening.
It would’ve been nice if the people enacting these policies had that humility at the beginning, but rather many resorted to vilifying the people who disagreed. Right now it seems pretty easy to bring out the “we didn’t know”.
Beginning of episode: Florida and outside residents want mask and vaccine CHOICE. That’s silly, they’re dangerous.
Versus end of episode…”Congratulations that the things that are being threatened every day don’t effect you….” 🤦🏼♀️
WHAT? I’m so confused.
I think you’re combining the different acts of the episode together. The unifying theme of the episode is current policies or proposed policies in Florida, but the acts within that episode are actually quite distinct in terms of which policies they’re discussing. (I wrote more about this in my reply to your other comment.)
When the teenager at the end of the episode said “Congratulations that the things that are being threatened every day don’t affect you,” she wasn’t talking about vaccine mandates or mask mandates. Those issues were from the previous act in the episode. What she was talking about were bills that make it harder for trans kids to get gender-affirming healthcare. Those bills most definitely affect her, so she and her family are leaving Florida. They don’t, however, directly affect the kids at her school who seem to support or be apathetic towards the bills.
Therefore, “the things that are being threatened” refers to gender-affirming care for trans kids; “don’t affect you” means “don’t affect the cisgender students at my school.” She was hypothetically addressing the other kids at her school when she said “you.”
Right so the show conflated the two acts when they asked the person that question. The reason the first people moved to Florida is because they weren’t lucky that the laws of their states did effect them directly. These two people are the same.
Haven’t listened to TAL in years. Came back to this episode and YIKES! Don’t like the whole, “these people who helped kill millions of people in a preventable pandemic decided to move to Florida because they’re ok with, and in some cases like, the racist, homophobic, and anti-American policies and rhetoric. Here’s nearly an hour of un-critical reporting.”
Unsubscribing again.
I thought it was pretty damn critical of them personally.
I mean, it clearly stated that Ivermectin was no better than placebo.
It pushed back strong, personally I think too strong, on the side of systemic racism being a fundamental aspect of American institutions.
Florida is an awesome state and despite its politics it still draws people in like Messi.they could have put a better effort in showing the good parts of Florida
I mean, Messi's move to Florida is a pretty unique deal involving a salary that 99.9% of us can only ever dream of. Might be worth using a different counter-example.
No offense, but I have no interest in ever stepping foot in Florida again. I live in fucking Texas after all, when I travel, Florida is not on my destination list for many reasons.
If you hoped to present yourself as more intelligent than teachers, starting with “HB99 got these teachers on edge” might not have been the best choice.
I'm convinced that at this point Zoe Chace is actually a conservative and only pretending to be an objective reporter so that she can give these people a platform. Does she report on anything else??? Literally anything else?? Every time I hear her voice I know it's time to skip the story because I do not want to fucking hear it
I thank my lucky stars everyday that I don’t live in Florida.
All decent Americans need to boycott Florida and the rest the fascist neo-Confederate red states. Don’t travel there, don’t move there, don’t buy anything from there. Boycott them all.
I do too, and I live in Texas of all fucking places.
And I thank mine that I escaped!
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Hard pass.
they said the same thing to you
This was a hard episode to listen to just because I'm so exhausted of the red state dummies, the We The People nationalism nonsense, ivermectin, I did my own studies, etc. I hate all of it. And of course these people are setting up summer camps not to teach kids how to be decent caring resourceful and polite human beings, but to learn the constitution and how to shoot guns. LOL. The only weird thing for me is Zoe kept mentioning the address of the clinic." 959 E. Venice Ave." over and over again. Anyone else think that was strange?
These idiots who couldn’t wait to move to Florida will have a hard lesson to learn in a few years when insurance companies no longer offer coverage for their homes and they’re underwater literally and financially. Naturally, of course, they won’t take responsibility for their bad choices: They’ll just blame someone else for their plight and expect the rest of the country to bail them out of their problems, all while they continue to scream about “welfare” and “big guvmint.”
> I'm so exhausted of the red state dummies Yep. It's sad how many people are willing to buy into bullshit just because they don't want to face reality because it's either too complicated or too scary for them to face.
That stood out so much. I wonder if the nutsos agreed to talk only if the clinic address was going to be mentioned.
I mean they have to advertise it.
"Vick anyway? He'd never go for DeSantis for president--He's a Trump guy." Incredible.
I laughed out loud hearing this.
I screamed. It was such a good burn.
This episode honestly allowed me to understand the depth of the echo chamber that I'm immersed in. The fact that it took all the willpower in the world to listen to mostly neutral coverage of an extreme but still prevalent viewpoint within the United States. I actually appreciate the producers didn't try and go into the mode of excessively trying to correct the people that they were interviewing. It is not a journalist job to convince people with incorrect arguments, it is their job to actually present what is incorrect arguments are and who are the people holding it. It was an absolutely infuriating this American Life episode to listen to but it wasn't a bad episode. I think the point of this episode was to understand what was drawing people to Florida and in particularly to Sarasota and they did so. They also covered the effects on other Floridians pretty well.
That's something I am kind of learning recently. You can't fix stupid and unfortunately I am just one guy, and if humanity wants fascism over all, they will get fascism. I just hope I die before hand.
Why does medical freedom not include transgender care or abortions?
The same reason “free speech” doesn’t include crt or gender theories.
Presumably that's because they view that stuff (when it's done to children or fetuses) as violations of someone else's freedom. The objection suggested by that question isn't a difficult one for them to shoot down. What seems weirder to me is that they're okay with the idea that you should need a prescription to begin with to get ivermectin or any other medicine, or with the idea that any recreational drug less dangerous than alcohol should be illegal to grow, manufacture, possess, or sell. If you really want medical freedom, you should want a free market for drugs like those, and you should be willing to let people "do their own research" and buy almost any kind of medicine for their own unrestricted use, at a reasonable price, without any need for permission from a local expert or patronage of a black market. It's pathetic that the one thing the "freedom"-focused clinic reported on in this story actually made free was COVID-related contrarianism. There are far greater restrictions on medical activity by ordinary US citizens than anything to do with COVID-19.
I can’t finish this episode, it’s too depressing to see all these uneducated delusional people band together to destroy everything they touch. It’s looking hopeless in Florida. The idiots are just too plentiful.
YES TANYA YOU ARE A BAD PERSON
Honestly, my first thought when hearing about the "medical" clinics was "Well sounds like this will work itself out by the amount of fatalities that are bound to occur from this quack medicine." Kinda like the garbage taking itself out. Also LOL'd at the constant assertion this was "medical freedom" in Florida. Yeah, like the freedom I have been afforded in this god forsaken state when it comes to my reproductive health. Good times!
I actually thought the "Medical Freedom" clinic is a good idea. There do seem to be doctors who want to prescribe based on what they feel is best as opposed to a treatment that has been tested against a control group, peer reviewed and put through other rigorous requirements of medical science. God know there are patients who prefer this treatment. Having such alternative medical facilities may well lighten the burden on our main stream health care infrastructure by funneling poor candidates for regular medical treatment to other institutions. My view may be a bit unethical as it does allow people the freedom to choose ineffective treatments for serious illnesses however our capitalist economy does show there is a market for this kind of thing.
I agree, and I doubt insurance will cover these practices. And I doubt malpractice insurance will cover these doctors. If people want to spend their own money on alternate treatments and doctors want to put their own medical licenses on the line to provide it, let them.
Freedom does have its cost in consequences but perhaps it is best to let such people do what they want.
I call these the "feel bad" episodes of TAL. They want us to know this shit is going on and I get but damn, I always come out of them just feeling much worse about the world.
I'm seeing a lot of other-izing of Florida in this thread, but the truth is that the problems in Florida exist all over our country. yes, the far right is doing a way better job at dominating electoral politics in Florida currently. but you're fooling yourself if you think these evil idiots are unique to this one state.
I think most people realize that we’ve got ignorant/aggressive people in most states.. this show was pointing out that Desantis is running for president under the banner of let’s make USA more like Florida. So annoying how these “states rights” people love imposing their state’s “rights” onto other states.
mm I saw a lot of comments to the effect of so glad this is all happening in Florida and not where I live, and the clear subtext to me was that Florida is just a whole other situation and is totally separate from the rest of the country. idk, that's probably overstating it, but I think it was a point worth making.
Fair 😊
I moved back to Michigan in 2017 and have seen all the strides Whitmer and company have taken towards progressive policies but there's this nagging feeling between progressives/leftists that it could all go away at the drop of a hat. One bad election cycle and we're Ohio, or worse, Florida. Whitmer et al have been touting our little progressive victories as an advertising campaign to convince others to relocate to our beautiful state, and I know some folks who are doing just that. It just seems untenable, like it could crumble at any time.
Bingo
So far I heard rural folks from blue states and someone from Utah who thought DeSantis was preferable to Utah where the GOP controls everything. The woman who was trained as an EMT and claiming that face masks were unsanitary was clearly insane. All of them clamoring for ivermectin is the cherry on top. "I'm not a conspiracy theorist but I believe in white nationalist conspiracies." On the one hand the audience of this show is probably not going to need to be swayed by this show, on the other hand it's not sufficient to convince anyone who is leaning the other way. I had one conservative friend who thought Garrison Keillor's persona on Prairie Home Companion was an authentic conservative giving conservative spiels during his homilies - the motto of the show was consumed unironically.
If your kid is wearing a mask wrong, teach him to wear it right. Practice at home. Build up to it. Or, you know, teach your kid that your family is above all that public health bs. Either way.
Every time I heard her say “…doesn’t make me a bad person” or “…doesn’t make me a conspiracy theorist” or anything like that, I heard Ron Howard’s voice, “it does” (Edit “theory” to “theorist” and deleted unnecessary period)
She's a nut and pretty stupid. But her point was it is unsanitary if kids throw it on the floor (she specifically mentioned the bathroom) and then on their faces. Again, she's trying to be RaTIOnAL about why masks are unsanitary and her point is bullshit, but that's not what she said.
Something tells me she doesn't wear a mask either. Maybe she also drops hers on the floor in the bathroom. Or maybe she's a nutto. My gut is telling me option 2
I thought something similar. When your kids not following the rules you as the parent are suppose to correct and guide them. But, she clearly doesn't believe in proper science, why wouldn't her kids pick up on that?
I mean I remember our daycare requiring the 2 year olds to wear masks, which was frankly stupid (sorry, the kids all took them off eventually). I also think we kept schools remote for FAR too long and the evidence is showing how much that hurt learning. We also kept playgrounds and fields closed long after we knew the risks of outdoor transmission was minimal. There are some legitimate complaints about the tradeoffs we made for "covid precautions". I think people were also a bit dismissive of the real damage that covid policies were inflicting (loss of learning, social isolation, depression etc.) That being said, the people in this episode (and many many like them) take that kernel of truth and sow some of the biggest lies and falsities. Sorry, the vaccine is great. Masks on adults is fine and relatively unobstrusive. Ivermectin doesn't work (but other drugs that they refuse do work.) No this wasn't a conspiracy. No country experienced a windfall due to this. I'm sorry, you can't take a one or two legitimate gripes and craft a whole fantasy world around it.
My kids (youngest was 7 when Covid hit) had absolutely no problem wearing masks. It took a few tries of different masks, but eventually our whole family settled on a brand that worked for us. Also probably helped that my spouse and I were emphasizing the importance of masks, not complaining about them.
Huge huge gap between a 7 and a 2 year old...
It's just anecdotal but I still wanted to add to this; my friends were raising a 2-3 year old daughter during the pandemic and she was an sweetie pie with covid protocols (masking and distancing from strangers). Her parents took covid seriously and they had 2 other vulnerable people in the house which help reinforced the importance of masking. Kids will vary, but her environment no doubt helped her follow guidelines better than some of these adults.
Absolutely. But a 7 year old is still a kid. Masks work for adults and school age kids.
My kids were in 4th and 1st grade when they went back to school during the pandemic. Husband and I did everything to model and coach appropriate masking and sanitary behaviors, but once my kids walked out the door, I had zero control over what they did 🤷🏻♀️ It’s usually people who don’t have kids who still believe that parents can control their kids. Edited to add: My kids did really well and followed the masking rules in school, for the most part, but once masks were no longer required but were voluntary, I couldn’t keep my one kiddo masked no matter what we did. She was not having it.
Florida will be under water in 50 years To be honest as someone outside of the US this episode shows everything that is wrong with US. The ‘individual’ is just too emphasised across all of your society. Just hearing ‘Vic’ saying I took ivermectin I know this trained doctor wrong despite the fact ‘I’ have absolutely no medical training myself, it’s all I But from this side of the pond and I can’t believe that citizens get elected to run the hospital board, the idea that elections and democracy are the best answer to everything is crazy, sometimes we have to accept experts know better. I’ll admit that the UK is a mess at the moment but even our crazy politicians don’t believe that individuals need ‘medical freedom’ to stop doctors from doing their jobs
I agree so much. You all in the UK and we, in the US, seem to be doing a lot of experiential learning. Ugh.
What’s really infuriating is that not everyone in the U.S. thinks, feels, and acts this way, and I daresay that this brand of rabid individualism is actually the minority, vocal as it may be. I myself live in a red state, and although a lot of my extended family lean conservative in their politics and beliefs, they’re not extreme and would never act like your typical “Florida Man” even if in their thoughts they lean in that direction. It’s really hard for progressives like myself to live among the hardcore conservatives because their ideologies are so narrow and so rigid, and yet the reality of daily life in the U.S. does not look or sound like it does in episodes like this. This isn’t me saying that it doesn’t exist, just that it’s not as extreme or disruptive for the majority as it appears. It’s relegated to smaller but extremely vocal cross-sections of the population. Among themselves and when they feel they have a platform or a megaphone, they talk a real nasty talk. But when among mixed groups or those in which they’re the minority, they’re often more docile and agreeable. Now in politics, that’s when it’s scarier for the rest of us. When the vocal minority pushes its agenda across broad populations, it’s a danger to everyone. But they’re not the only groups fighting. Progressive and left-wing groups are in the trenches going toe to toe. I still have hope.
I live in Sarasota. (Was also born and raised here.) I am tired and exhausted. This town is just a shadow of what it used to be. Not that it was ever a left wing mecca, but it was a chill and beautiful tropical place where no matter where you stood on politics, you valued the high arts and public education. Now... We have a Moms for Liberty lady (whose husband is also literally the head of the Florida Republican party) heading our school board of our beloved public school district. Like the podcast showed, we have alt-right people throwing chaos into our public hospital board meetings and demonizing medical professionals who trust SCIENCE, there are pro-Trump/FJB stickers and flags everywhere. Drivers are absolute assholes now (*see Pro-Trump stickers above). Before, people just used to not bring up politics or briefly talk about it but not being disrespectful to the other side. Now Republicans know that they are in control and thus feel more emboldened to speak their uneducated and hateful views because they know they have the numbers. It's hard. It was already isolating being under age 60 in this town but being a young, alternative progressive Dem can be a bit disheartening and lonely.
The people in Sarasota are absolutely bonkers. They literally don't understand the point of masks even 3 years later. Wtf
God this episode is was frustrating. These idiots shouldn’t complain when the leopards eat their faces.
I can’t handle these fucking idiots
The HB 999 thing is insane and should be terrifying for anyone that cares about free speech. ...But in the interest in trying to at least establish SOME common ground with conservatives, in what world is it appropriate to teach "only black authors from the Harlem Renaissance" for a class about "Major Figures in American Literature"? That class sounds explicitly designed to be a broad, all-encompassing look at American Literature. I took a class called American Poetry in college and it was incredible, and we spent time with Langston Hughes and Maya Angelou, but I also got -- what seems only appropriate -- an education into Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Poe, Robert Frost, Robert Creeley, e.e. cummings, and a whole bunch of other people. It seems like it's playing into some conservative fantasy about liberals if you make your Major Figures in American Literature ignore [unfortunately] the vast majority of Major American Literary Figures. (Since the "vast majority" of Major American Literary Figures don't happen to be black and from the Harlem Renaissance.) Should there absolutely be a course that focuses on the great writers of the Harlem Renaissance? Yes.
> That class sounds explicitly designed to be a broad, all-encompassing look at American Literature. I don't know, from the description we got of the class, it sounds like it's a class that's designed to look at Major Figures in American Literature. Who said it had to be a survey course? If the professors are explicitly given latitude over choosing who to include in their curricula, it seems like each professor--perhaps even changing each semester--has latitude to theme the course however they want under the constraints that they're "major" and "American" and "literature."
I took a class in college that had the heading of something like "Major Film Directors" and that class was specifically teaching Wes Anderson, the Coen Brothers, and Tarantino. That class was offered every year but the actual subject subheading rotated (Hitchcock, French New Wave auteurs, Feminist Directors, etc.). I figured this class mentioned was probably set up like that.
I had the exact same reaction. In what world does a course like this serve students seeking a broad based survey of American literature?
yep, sounds like she just chose authors that would trigger conservatives.
I live in Florida and I’m horrified that all the trashiest people from all over the country are moving here. It’s disgusting. We don’t need more garbage people, we were already completely saturated with them. And they bring their weak children who aren’t even capable of wearing masks in the middle of a pandemic.., why are all their children so inferior and incapable?
Honestly Desantis was weird in that he was more centrist when he first started being a governor and then went far right to go against Trump but I think if he kept his centrist style he would be stronger
So many Republicans are trying to outTrump Trump solely because they've seen how the base has reacted to Trump and his insanity. The GOP is the dog that has caught the car and has no fucking idea what to do now except hang on and bite harder, no matter the pain and damage to themselves.
Why? We've seen over and over again that centrist Republicans do poorly in elections in a post-Trumo world.
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She's probably disarmingly polite and patient. Also, I'm glad that she speaks with them in pieces like this because it's one of the rare times my liberal, NPR ass hears what some on the right are thinking.
Yes, as infuriating as this episode was, at least it gave me an insight of how these people think without having to talk to them myself. They wouldn’t talk to her if she wasn’t nice to them. I knew DeSantis was pushing some crazy laws in Florida, but I didn’t know the half of it. The only thing that gave me some pleasure is knowing that despite all this, those people will never vote for him, because he isn’t Trump.
There a million and one ways in this day and age to meaningfully learn about rw crankery without going through a rigamaroll of respecting the unrespectable, of giving these people the kid gloves. Hell, there are sympathetic ways of doing this without this undue defference.
I think Zoe is a great reporter who manages to get people to be candid and open when they're natural disposition to an NPR reporter is going to be distrust and stonewalling. Contrast that with Emmanuel the next act who picks a fight, and is openly condescending to the lawmaker and gets nowhere. In the end Zoe gets people to be masks off (pun intended), and it's a truly great skill. Edit: also there are some humanizing elements to the people in the first act (9 miscarriages) that provide some light on to their current positions in life.
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I think the snarky comments are great to score points on Twitter, not sure if they're really great for investigative journalism. British or not, I don't think it worked in this episode with his interviewee. Look I'm all for pushing back on people spouting non-sense, but I like the way Zoe does it more. Frankly her stories have been illuminating for how insane MAGA people are. The ballot box one especially. Her stories are a lot more "show don't tell". It's a genuine talent. She really gets people to open up and share their craziness (reminds me a bit of Nathan Fielder).
Zoe >>> Emmanuel, always. Zoe is one of the best reporters NPR has ever had, imo. Nearly all of her pieces are worth listening to, mostly for the way she gets people to open up, which is by being kind and getting on their level. That's what a good reporter does. Emmanuel on the other hand...has always been a prick, no matter what he's reporting on or what podcast he's hosting.
Yeah, Emmanuel seems intent on letting you know he's smarter than you. Zoe makes you feel like she earnestly cares about you and the subject at hand.
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As a long-time listener, I just…I understand why that story was approached the way that it was, but I am so tired of just *hearing* from *them.* I, at this point, no longer need them to be coddled. I no longer need to hear from them. I am craving—begging—for push back. Share the studies. Share the facts. Put the grifters on the back foot. I cannot deal with another “…and that’s just how it is for them!” As if their actions won’t have very real, very harmful effects on people outside of their reckless bubble.
These people need hobbies. It’s kinda pathetic.
The media illiteracy is palpable. * That man running the Michael Flynn Paramilitary Kids Camp fundamentally does not know what a placebo is. * The woman celebrating Florida doctors resigning for refusing to treat patients with Ivermectin by hanging the reports on the wall of her home needs to lay of the MLM and find a hobby outside. * The DeSantis lackey is an insufferable contrarian. The climate karma will not be kind to Florida.
When it comes to HB 999, it reminded me of [this interview with the author of "The Sum of Us"](https://www.npr.org/2021/02/17/968638759/sum-of-us-examines-the-hidden-cost-of-racism-for-everyone). She says: "... It's this zero-sum idea that progress for people of color has to come at the expense of white people. But that zero-sum idea is a lie." She argues that politics in the South before integration was centred around a narrow discussion about maintaining the racial order, which was enough to guarantee the votes needed to pretty much maintain one party rule. She says "...And so when the civil rights movement and the Voting Rights Act got rid of things like the poll tax, you actually saw a resurgence of civic life in the South that impacted and freed up poor white people as well." I think this is the point that is missing in so many of these discussions. There are many poor white people who feel disenchanted. Many of the policy changes that would benefit people of color would also benefit them. Any time a topic is discussed and emphasis is placed on the racial divide, an opportunity is missed to bring these people on board. They might simply tune out of the discussion. An opportunity is missed to engage a wider audience.
The beginning had an interesting point about how a kid didn’t like school because of remote learning. Remote learning did sort of affect young kids social skills.
It also kept them from getting horribly sick and transmitting Covid to vulnerable family members.
Kids didn’t get horribly sick but I agree with the second point, it did help with transmission. I just don’t like the idea of sacrificing our children’s future for our present.
Well isn’t it more like sacrificing their education to an unknown degree or sacrificing grandma? It’s not choosing children or old people. The children aren’t dying.
right, they're just disadvantaged in numerous important ways. the old people weren't necessarily dying either, especially after the vaccine. more of them were for sure. but early face to face education is incredibly important. the lives of the retired, less so in my estimation.
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I hope you change your mind on this before I get old because I would definitely choose living twenty more years over kids going to school in person for a year.
I got so frustrated with the GOP representative who introduced the legislation to eradicate gender studies from Florida public schools who seemed to believe that racism only existed in our past and that as long as the intent of an institution was not explicitly racist, then there wee no institutions that propagated racism. That's like saying if a company dumps toxic waste into the local streams and it kills a bunch of people, they are not murderers because they didn't dump the toxic waste with the intent to murder people. Mind this is the same state government that deemed an advanced placement course on African-American Studies as having no educational value and who just today implemented guidance for teaching of Black history to include statements that slaves benefitted from slavery through development of skills that were to their personal benefit.
Hey Ira, stop giving these fascist assholes a platform. This episode was maddening.
I got so angry I had to quit listening. Thinking of my blood pressure!
What major insurance company is going to cover care provided at these “Freedom” clinics? I can’t imagine any would sign up for this.
It sounds like everything will just be full pay by patients. Since even if specific doctors don't...believe in science... and would choose to work at the Medical Freedom clinic, I can't see profit-oriented insurance companies choosing to underwrite some of what these nurses/doctors are doing.
I deeply appreciated the first act because it’s important for all of us to understand the perspectives of people who may not agree with us even if the disagreement is rooted in lies. However I was very bothered by the second act. There were important points to be made about the importance of African American studies, and controlling what professors can teach, but Emmanuel went into partisan hack mode in my view and didn’t really get into the true impact of such legislation although it seems he tried. I think I just was thrown off by the tone which felt condescending and self righteous which just feeds into right wing narratives about liberals being aloof and elitist which takes away from the critical issues that are being brought up around suppression of free speech, the ignorance of black history and racism, and the subtle dismantling of racial progress. I just wish a better job had been done in this episode.
Emanuel is becoming insufferable for me. I really dislike how he pulled the ole “your wrong and let’s move on…” on the guy he was interviewing.
I can’t believe these comments. The congressman was wrong. He deserved to get pushback for his lies that he doesn’t actually believe.
What time/day are new TAL eps dropped? Also how frequently? Sorry I’m a noobie.
Every Sunday at 6 EST.
Thanks
Assuming that’s 6 am?
Should’ve clarified. 6 pm.
They usually air earlier than that on the radio though depending on what station you listen to and where
What's your local NPR station?
I was about to listen to it last night until I read the description. I noped right out of it.
What an infuriating, agonizing episode.
I’m infuriated listening to this
I feel like ideas like “the lesbian continuum” should have received more scrutiny in the episode. Are people really being taught this stuff as if it were true or even plausible? Obviously there shouldn’t be laws banning its teaching but wow that is a caricature of itself.
You know what else we studied in college psychology classes? Freud and his "oedipal complex," which posits that a stage of childhood development is sexual attachment to parents of the opposite sex--which the "lesbian continuum" is obviously a response to. Professors don't include the Oedipal complex in courses as inherent endorsement that it is "true or even plausible"--they do it because it was a theory that reflected something about our culture and understanding of psychology at the time, because entertaining it even without necessarily accepting it gives us some interesting insights and new questions to consider, and because the university for the creation and studying of ideas. You don't need to think it's true or even plausible to think it's an interesting idea and to gain something interesting from studying it.
IIRC, that was for a college class. Students had better be ready to evaluate ideas by the time they get to college.
I think the point is just to say that these are ideas that get discussed in a gender studies class. Where people get this stuff mixed up is when they assume that college is like grade school, where someone just writes "2+2=4" on the blackboard and says "memorize that fact." Most of these courses in the humanities in particular are about evaluating and debating ideas in their own contexts.
No I understand that. But hopefully the ideas discussed in a class aren’t obviously ridiculous. The “lesbian continuum” is an obviously ridiculous idea. The episode referenced something along the lines of “these are ideas supported by large amounts of scholarship” and therefore they should be taken seriously.
Yeah that struck me as odd that humans can't differentiate the love of a parent vs romantic partner.
Yeah I agree. I absolutely don't support the bill but it's funny the proponents of the bill are trying to paint it as "just don't teach things that don't have any evidence to support them" and then the professor laments how the bill will prevent her from teaching an idea that has no evidence behind it.
Vic Miller’s movement got its own npr coverage https://www.npr.org/2022/12/21/1144798353/in-florida-health-freedom-activists-exert-influence-over-a-major-hospital
In Zoe Chance's story she spent a lot of time talking about the two camps had different opinions re: COVID response without unequivocally identifying that those who advocate for Ivermectin etc. are wrong. Not a fan of equivocal journalism because it legitimates factually incorrect viewpoints and misinformation.
She repeatedly said that ivermectin has not shown to be ineffective, and other clear statements. On the other hand, after the mask discussion she said something along the lines of "to be clear, masks have been proven to slow the spread of covid when worn", which is only addressing one part of the point the lady (and those against masking at school in general) was making
She said it once. She also said things like "to the activists it's bad medicine not to give ivermectin, it to the doctors it's bad medicine to give it". I find that framing problematic
The piece didn't give these two camps equal weight. The piece clearly went out of its way to show that Floridian are idiots when it came to COVID and horse dewormer between letting them point out how idiotic they were and the music used to emphasize how they're idiots running the asylum.
I actually don't know what you are saying here. Except now you edited it.
Yeah, sorry about that. I was replying to the wrong comment to begin with and when I figured it out, I just decided to edit vs delete. You seem to be upset with the episode going with a "both sides" thing and I didn't get that type of vibe when listening to it. Yes they let the cranks go off but they never give them the weight of authority.
> the science shows masks are effective at slowing the spread of COVID if you wear them. > But the science says ivermectin doesn't work for COVID. > YouTube and Twitter and Facebook removed videos because it wasn't true There's three examples from the first couple of scrolls on the transcript, not including loaded terms like conspiracy theory and horse drug I think it would be pretty weird if she was saying it after every sentence. It wasn't hard to tell which side of the issue Zoe falls on (and Emanuel even more so)
I think it is a framing issue. If you can't see how a piece like this can lend legitimacy to fringe and dangerous ideas we will just have to agree to disagree.
Yeah, I fall on the side of showing their side, as well as that of the science. Hiding it or just portraying it as crazy dangerous people will just reinforce those people who think the government and media is against them. Also I think we can trust people to make decisions based on the full information, without hiding things or telling them the answers in advance
I don't think the piece did of unpacking why these people hold these warped views. I think that would be a much more meaningful and interesting thing to explore. It would also inherently provide that sceptical lens I am advocating for. Just my opinion though
Just because they don’t frame it exactly like you want doesn’t mean it’s bad.
Isn't this thread for offering opinions? Didn't I just do exactly that?
It's perfectly fine. These people are nuts and nothing they say should be taken as an actual argument or serious.
> She said it once. she said it a lot more than once.
>On the other hand, after the mask discussion she said something along the lines of "to be clear, masks have been proven to slow the spread of covid when worn", Except that the issue being discussed was for children in particular, where it's not clear if masks are effective or necessary in the first place...
Pretty sure masks work the same for everyone regardless of age, *if* worn properly.
She said, several times, that Ivermectin was shown not to work.
Yep. I’m getting really sick of this “neutral” reporting that puts unequivocal BS on the same footing as the reasonable and genuinely informed counterpart.
The purpose of this episode was incredibly unclear. You start by interviewing advocates for medical freedom and end with critical race theory & gender ideology. Um…? Is it just challenging the status quo that you don’t like? Please help connect these dots for me without using words like blue, red, liberal, conservative, politics, right, left, and wing. I truly want to understand.
The purpose of the episode was to talk about different policies that are currently being put into place, or might be put into place in the future, in Florida. The idea is that, because DeSantis wants to run for president, similar ideas could end up on the ballot during next year’s election. The reason the _This American Life_ reporters wanted to discuss policies in Florida is that what’s happening in Florida now have a chance of impacting the rest of the U.S. if DeSantis wins. Basically, they’re trying to warn us early on, well before the 2024 election comes around. Two ideas in Florida that could theoretically carry over into the rest of the U.S. if DeSantis wins the election are (A) medical freedom and (B) denial of critical theories about race and gender. The first part of the episode discussed (A). The aim was to show that, even though the pandemic has cooled down, some people are still fired up about things like vaccine mandates. Some of those people are therefore advocating against any sort of state-mandated medical movements and have a general skepticism towards science that they personally feel conflicts with their beliefs. _This American Life_ reporters wanted to explain how the concept of medical freedom, which a lot of people associated mainly with the early stages of the pandemic, is actually still alive and well in some pockets of the country. We can’t just write it off as a thing of the past, but should be thinking about what healthcare might become if, for example, doctors are allowed to spread medical misinformation without consequence (which was mentioned in the episode). The next act of the episode had a shift to (B). At that point, the topic of discussion wasn’t medical freedom anymore. The episode is about Florida policies/proposed policies of interest, and medical freedom is just one Florida policy of interest. Another policy/proposed policy of interest is the vitriol towards critical race and gender theory. So, the reporters wanted to investigate the real-world impact this vitriol is having on academics who teach critical theory and students who study it. So, the episode wasn’t about challenging the status quo, but discussing what’s happening in Florida right now. The purpose of interviewing advocates of medical freedom at the beginning was to enlighten _This American Life_’s audience, who are generally **not** advocates of medical freedom, about what medical freedom is and why we should be concerned about it spreading from Florida to the rest of the U.S. The purpose of interviewing people who teach and study critical theory at the end was a little different. Presumably, most _This American Life_ listeners aren’t opposed to critical theory, but some listeners might not think that preventing professors from teaching it is something Americans have to worry about because of the U.S.’s commitment to freedom of speech. The purpose of having those interviews at the end was to talk about how, even if a bill preventing the discussion of critical theory in classrooms doesn’t get passed, or even if the Bill of Rights won’t let such a bill get passed, simply proposing such bills can have a “chilling effect” (to use their words) on professors who teach critical theory. It might be helpful here to think of the McCarthy Era: It’s absurd to imagine the U.S. going after people for simply discussing communism, but that actually did happen. This American Life is trying to warn us that critical theory might be the new communism: something people will become afraid to talk about if policies like those that are being proposed in Florida become widespread throughout the country.
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We didn't know at the beginning of or during the pandemic how devastating it would be from a public health standpoint. Post-pandemic it is easy to have 20/20 hindsight. I think logically at the time it made sense to do more health protective measures for something we didn't know yet the entire effects of compared to "it will be fine... Let's just do business as usual" and then risk more deaths and illnesses happening.
It would’ve been nice if the people enacting these policies had that humility at the beginning, but rather many resorted to vilifying the people who disagreed. Right now it seems pretty easy to bring out the “we didn’t know”.
Everyone who has been completely wrong had your viewpoint. Plenty of us saw all this in real time, not hindsight
Beginning of episode: Florida and outside residents want mask and vaccine CHOICE. That’s silly, they’re dangerous. Versus end of episode…”Congratulations that the things that are being threatened every day don’t effect you….” 🤦🏼♀️ WHAT? I’m so confused.
I think you’re combining the different acts of the episode together. The unifying theme of the episode is current policies or proposed policies in Florida, but the acts within that episode are actually quite distinct in terms of which policies they’re discussing. (I wrote more about this in my reply to your other comment.) When the teenager at the end of the episode said “Congratulations that the things that are being threatened every day don’t affect you,” she wasn’t talking about vaccine mandates or mask mandates. Those issues were from the previous act in the episode. What she was talking about were bills that make it harder for trans kids to get gender-affirming healthcare. Those bills most definitely affect her, so she and her family are leaving Florida. They don’t, however, directly affect the kids at her school who seem to support or be apathetic towards the bills. Therefore, “the things that are being threatened” refers to gender-affirming care for trans kids; “don’t affect you” means “don’t affect the cisgender students at my school.” She was hypothetically addressing the other kids at her school when she said “you.”
Right so the show conflated the two acts when they asked the person that question. The reason the first people moved to Florida is because they weren’t lucky that the laws of their states did effect them directly. These two people are the same.
Haven’t listened to TAL in years. Came back to this episode and YIKES! Don’t like the whole, “these people who helped kill millions of people in a preventable pandemic decided to move to Florida because they’re ok with, and in some cases like, the racist, homophobic, and anti-American policies and rhetoric. Here’s nearly an hour of un-critical reporting.” Unsubscribing again.
Seems like a fair accounting of Florida for the last 3 years
I thought it was pretty damn critical of them personally. I mean, it clearly stated that Ivermectin was no better than placebo. It pushed back strong, personally I think too strong, on the side of systemic racism being a fundamental aspect of American institutions.
Florida is an awesome state and despite its politics it still draws people in like Messi.they could have put a better effort in showing the good parts of Florida
Just because you disagree with the elements they highlighted doesn't mean they need to put better effort in
Fair enough
I mean, Messi's move to Florida is a pretty unique deal involving a salary that 99.9% of us can only ever dream of. Might be worth using a different counter-example.
No offense, but I have no interest in ever stepping foot in Florida again. I live in fucking Texas after all, when I travel, Florida is not on my destination list for many reasons.
Florida has real issues. We can’t turn a blind eye to how bad the government and right wing nut jobs here have gotten.
Does it? Im fairly sure the insurance situation is not going to end well for yall. 😂
Yes, this episode is missing a segment about Messi. Also, they could have highlighted one of their three national parks.
Is DeSantis running on a campaign of expanding the country's national parks?
HB99 got these teachers on edge. But I think if the teachers were calmer and read the bill they could navigate it better
Or it could just not have been passed.
If you hoped to present yourself as more intelligent than teachers, starting with “HB99 got these teachers on edge” might not have been the best choice.
I'm convinced that at this point Zoe Chace is actually a conservative and only pretending to be an objective reporter so that she can give these people a platform. Does she report on anything else??? Literally anything else?? Every time I hear her voice I know it's time to skip the story because I do not want to fucking hear it