Roald Dahl has recently become a hot topic of debate regarding censorship, sensitivity, and posthumous changes to art. At the start of 2023, Puffin Books decided to make hundreds of revisions to Dahl’s large collection of works due to feedback from sensitivity readers. Many of these revisions change or erase any text which discusses weight, race, gender, and violence. These changes have many people, including ourselves, asking, “What do we think about this?” In this episode, we discuss our opinions on these revisions, the implications of censorship, and if an author can be separated from his works.
Transcription Below
Dexter (00:00:31): All right. Welcome to the Deprogram podcast. I am Dexter co-host Shannon.
Shannon (00:00:38): Hello.
Dexter (00:00:40): And, uh, this is, uh, actually take two. We had a little bit of a, of a catastrophe <laugh> the last time that we, uh, tried to record this episode, so we just decided to scrap it and, uh, start over just to make sure, because this is a very deep topic and, uh, there's a lot we wanna say about it. So we wanted to make sure that we were concise and to the point. So today's episode is over Censor censorship, and specifically in regard regards to, uh, roll Doll. And so here, go ahead and Shannon and, uh, and give us a quick intro to the controversy
Shannon (00:01:19): <laugh>. Yeah. So first of all, I grew up reading Rule Doll, so when I heard this was a controversy, I was immediately, um, I was just immediately swept away with it because I, I was like, his, his works are very important to me. And so when I heard they were being changed, it was a very, I don't know, not emotional, but I definitely,
Dexter (00:01:40): Well, it was like a child, it was like a, uh, an attack on your childhood.
Shannon (00:01:43): Yeah. So that's why this has kind of been like a big topic. It's trying to figure out what I think about it and what to do with it. So yes, roll Doll. Um, he is a British author. He was born in 1916. He ended up fighting in the Second World War, then went on to become one of the top selling children's authors of all time. Uh, Forbes even mentioned it, I think it was, yeah, in 2021 that he is the top earning dead celebrity
Dexter (00:02:10): <laugh>. Wow.
Shannon (00:02:11): His books are like The Witches, the B f g, Matilda Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Fantastic. Mr. Fox. Ooh, forgot James in The Giant Beach. I don't know if I already said that one. I mean, amongst many others,
Dexter (00:02:24): Which is crazy because I guess I never really read any of his books growing up, but I watched all of those movies, you know? Yeah. Like Tims and Giant Peach was, uh, was one of my favorite movies whenever I was a little kid, you know?
Shannon (00:02:41): Yeah. Well, and it's funny cuz even Tim Burton had, uh, recognized Roll Dohl as being like a huge influence in his work. Mm-hmm. Because Roll Dohl is known as being a little bit of, um, a little bit darker, very witty, very imaginative. So there's a reason that like his works are being censored to kind of lead into that topic because he is known for being edgy. Mm. And so I do think there's a reason that this is such a controversial topic now is specifically because of who like rule Dohl as an author is, and like how his books are, you know what I mean? Like, his books do kind of walk the line of being offensive and they always have, like, that's what they're meant to
Dexter (00:03:27): Be. It's almost, it's almost more of a traditional fairytale approach where you, you give the kids a little bit more of a raw version of whatever it is, whatever the story is. Yeah. So instead of, um, a witch that, I mean, I can't even think of a good example, but like Hansel and Gretel, they get, like, the whole goal is she was gonna try to get them into an oven to cook them so she could eat
Shannon (00:03:56): Them, which is, I mean, and then his book, the Witches, the Witches do try to eat the kids, right? So yeah, they're kind of, um, a little dark, but they're also, like I said, one of the top selling, or he is one of the top selling kid authors of all times. So that's who Rule Doll is in a very, very tight shell. Now, moving on to the, to the conversation of the day, his works are undergoing tons of revisions. So he is, his works are now owned by Puffin, which was then bought out by, or at least bought by Netflix in 2023
Dexter (00:04:37): In, and no, it was Netflix bought it in 2021. Oh.
Shannon (00:04:40): And they started making the changes in 2023.
Dexter (00:04:42): Yeah. They bought it for $1 billion. Dang. They bought, uh, access and rights to all of his work for 1 billion, which
Shannon (00:04:50): Is, that's
Dexter (00:04:51): Insane. Which is so crazy to think that that might have been why he was, why he's like the top. Yeah.
Shannon (00:04:55): I'm like, yeah, that right
Dexter (00:04:56): There, you know, dead artists just cuz of that one purchase. But
Shannon (00:04:59): So what they did is they hired Sensitivity readers to read through all of his books and suggest changes. This resulted in there being hundreds of tiny revisions throughout all of his works. So this happens frequently, like this in, in and of itself isn't necessarily anything new. This does happen with authors, even dead authors like this, this does happen. People do update their works to become, you know, to at least fit with the Times a little bit better with Roll Doll. However, it became such a controversy for several reasons. One, because there were so many changes, having hundreds of revisions is still pretty significant. So that kind of caught people's attentions that it's such, it wasn't just changing one or two words. They changed a lot of words. But also it's kind of controversial because as I said, rule Dohl is, is an edgy dark author. And how exactly do you censor that? Now what they did for the censorship is basically they took out what they said, anything, any language concerning weight, mental health, violence, gender, and race. So these were either cut completely or rewritten. So just to give some examples, I guess before we move further, um, in James and the Giant Peach there were the cloud men. Those now became the cloud people. Um, there were several references to Ru Rud Kipling and Joseph Conrad. Those were changed to Jane Austin
Dexter (00:06:38): And
Shannon (00:06:39): Oh, and John Steinbeck. Yeah. Yeah. Um, the witches, they were originally supposed to be like everyday women. They worked as cashiers or secretaries. They became scientists or CEOs. And James and the giant peach, Ms. Sponge was described as the fat one. And now she is no longer described as that. It took her, it just took that out. Ms. Spider, um, was described as being black. And she, that again, is taken out. They just don't describe her color at all. The earthworm had lovely pink skin that was changed to lovely smooth skin. So he took out the description of pink in the twits. Mrs. Twit is no longer described as ugly and Beasley, now she's just Beasley. Um, in Charlie, in the Chocolate Factory, they changed Oh, which boy was
Dexter (00:07:30): It? It was a, a Augustus.
Shannon (00:07:31): Yeah, a Augustus. They changed him from being enormously fat to just enormous. So there was just a few examples. They, they, this has happened. These are just a few of the a hundred examples. Like I said, what's interesting it throughout all of the books,
Dexter (00:07:45): Like all of that is description, it's description words. Right. So, for instance, if I, uh, one of the ways that this is, I can maybe make this a little bit relevant, is like being a paramedic. Whenever we're assessing a person, we have to look at that person and assess what they look like, right? So for instance, if somebody is, you know, grossly obese, one of the questions that I'm probably gonna ask pretty quickly is, are you diabetic? Because a lot of the times, if you're grossly Abe obese, that means, and like, grossly not meaning like, Ooh, that's nasty. It's like size. Like that's a reference, right? Um, there's a chance that they have diabetes because that's typically coincides with it, right? So you actually have to look at the person and see the person for, for what they reality are, you know? So it is interesting to me that a lot of that stuff was just descriptions. And then one that I struck me instantly was the cashiers, the women's roles, right? The cashiers and housekeepers, is that what it was? Yeah.
Shannon (00:09:08): And
Dexter (00:09:08): Secretaries Cap. Yeah. Cashiers and secretaries being swapped out for scientists and ceo. You know, uh, it's just kind of an interesting, almost, it's like almost like a backhanded slap in the face, you know?
Shannon (00:09:22): Yeah. And that's where I think the big controversy lies. I, I don't think people necessarily care if you make some changes. So another one that I had seen was Agatha Christie and her bestselling novel, and then there were none. That book was originally titled with the N-Word in it. And that was published in 1939. I think it was just even a year later, everyone realized that was an offensive title and they changed it. And I think they even changed it to like 10 little soldiers, 10 Little Indians. And then they just realized just we are gonna do away with that complet and completely changed the title.
Dexter (00:09:57): What is the context of that book? Do
Shannon (00:09:59): You know? I've never read it and I actually didn't wanna read too much into it while I was looking this up cause I wanna save it and read it <laugh>. Oh, right, right. Because it is, it's actually the bestselling crime novel of all time. Oh. So I, uh, but I guess what's interesting about that one too is that it was, it has been regarded as having racist undertones or being like othering, you know, like, it, it talks about the other and trying to other people. Now I haven't read it myself, so I don't know, but I thought that was an interesting one where, hey, a change has been made and I'm perfectly okay with that. Right. Well
Dexter (00:10:39): See. And, and like
Shannon (00:10:40): It needed to happen in order for that book to not cause offense. And I think like Agatha Christie did not mean to be offensive, offensive. She changed it as she learned what was offensive.
Dexter (00:10:50): Right. Well, and the, one of the other questions too would be, does that actually change the book at all? You know, most authors when they're writing a book, they don't have a title in their mind, or the title that is in their mind ends up getting cut by the publisher. I like, for instance, a very good example of this is, um, the Great Gatsby. Do you remember what the original title was?
Shannon (00:11:17): No. As soon as you said that, it just blanked. Yeah, I, I know what you're talking about now. I can't remember.
Dexter (00:11:22): So originally Fitzgerald had some sort of, it was a pretty complex title. It was like, you know, the,
Shannon (00:11:30): I thought it was like the marvelous life of
Dexter (00:11:32): No, it was, it was, it was, no, I don't think it had Gatsby in the title.
Shannon (00:11:36): Okay. I don't remember then,
Dexter (00:11:37): Uh, you know, but it, to him, it, it needed to be there for, well then the publisher after reading the book just scrapped the title and was like, no, that's not the title. We're gonna call it The Great Gaby and Perfect title. Right. Yeah. And so, um, you know, I think the title of the book to me is a little bit less of a sticking point than whenever you're going in and like, that changed to James and the giant peach and the Ants, you know, the contrast was one of the ants was short and fat, and one of the ants was skinny and tall. And so, you know, part of it that was kind of part of the literary technique that he was using to, to build these characters. So it actually does change the character.
Shannon (00:12:26): Yeah. I think that is the big difference. And I really, I don't think most people wouldn't mind, like in the Agatha Christie case, Hey, this term is offensive, we're gonna change it. I I really think most people will be okay with that. Yeah. And I mean, again, that happens in other books. I know like RL Stein has gone back through some of his works and changed some words because, hey, as time goes on we realize that these words are offensive, go in and change a couple of words. Right. But what they're doing here isn't just changing a couple of words. It really is trying to completely craft a new story in a way like with the witches, because again, for the witches, they're supposed to be these women who are in the lives of children. That's supposed to be the scary part is that children are around these witches, whether they're at the supermarket. Yeah. They're ubiquitous, or at the library or just wherever they are. The witches could be there. So if they're a scientist or a ceo, to me that impedes with the story. Well,
Dexter (00:13:25): And I, this is a slight side note, uh, but to, to talk on the class aspect of this, there are vastly more individuals in the United States that are cashiers than scientists.
Shannon (00:13:41): Yeah. Well, I, there
Dexter (00:13:42): Are vastly more people, just people in the, in the United States that are secretaries over CEOs. Right. And so I think that what he was, maybe unintentionally, maybe it was intentional or unintentional, what he was doing was he was selecting these positions that are numerous and then the edit makes it almo. It's classist. Right. So like right there, you, you instantly like realize like, oh, well, oh, a woman isn't, um, important unless she's a scientist or a CEO or one of these things
Shannon (00:14:21): That Yeah. By making the change, they almost seem to be being more sexist in a way. Like Exactly. Hey, well these cashiers and secretaries aren't good representation
Dexter (00:14:29): Of women. Well, I think, I think the interesting part of it to me is there is an element of it that is, that is sexist, but there's also an element of it that's classist. Yeah. And I think that, you know, one of the things that, like Harry Potter did really well, and I feel like the witches, even though I haven't read it, uh, maybe did a decent job of, was they were trying to assimilate this magical world into everyday life. It's, it's like, it's not this separate existence. There are normal witches and there are normal wizards, not just these, you know, ultra aristocratic elites, you know?
Shannon (00:15:07): Yeah. That the witches would try. Like, that was the whole point, is that they would fit in. And that brings me to another change that I, it just to me, I'm sorry. It's stupid. So again, the witches don't look like normal humans originally, but they change themselves to look like normal women. Mm-hmm. So, for example, they're bald and they wear wigs. They have square feet and not normal feet. Ooh. And I, I forgot what it was. Or something with their hands. So they always have to wear gloves. So again, they put on certain shoes, they wear gloves and they wear wigs to make themselves look normal. Right. Well, one of the changes, it originally in the book, it talks about the wigs and how the kids want to go, like pull their wigs off because, you know, they wear wigs and that's how you can tell if it's a witch. Right. Because if you go pull on their hair, you can snatch their wig off. Mm. Well that was replaced by saying, well, the witches wear wigs and that's perfectly okay cuz there's nothing wrong with wearing a wig.
Dexter (00:16:02): Right.
Shannon (00:16:03): And that's it. They don't talk about the children snatching the wigs off. And so to me it's just bad riding it. I mean, you're trying to not be offensive and I understand that, but in doing so, you completely lose the story.
Dexter (00:16:17): Right.
Shannon (00:16:19): And so to me, I guess if like you're really concerned with someone being offended by being bald or wearing a wig, don't buy the book. Like, I mean, I don't know how you can turn that into Nice.
Dexter (00:16:34): It's one of the questions,
Shannon (00:16:35): The witches aren't supposed to be nice. It's not supposed to be a good representation for women who wear wigs. Like, it, it's,
Dexter (00:16:41): To me, a portion of it is like, and now this is something that's been around since really cinema and pop culture, this broadcasting aspect of, uh, pop culture that I think really started in the, I guess in the 20th century really, uh, of trying to smooth the edges for general consumption. So, so Disney took all of these old stories and modernized them. So you take Cinderella and kind of modernize it. Well, they softened a lot of the edges around the original story. You take, uh, sleeping Beauty or you know, all of these different stories. Well, they like soften the edges, kinda repackage it and then they hand it to you. And at least whenever I was a kid, there's always this like, mythology like around, um, you know, you know, you know what books in the library have like naked women in them. Right? It's like a science book or something.
(00:17:47): And it's like, oh, well all the, you, there's the one kid in class that's like, Hey, do you ever look at that book, page 180? And it's literally just like an anatomy of a human body and it's like, oh, there's, there's boobs. It's a naked woman. Right. There's always that kid. And so there's, anytime you make these changes or like soften the edges, there's gonna be the kid who wants to find the sharp edges and like that's kind of their deal. Right? Maybe they're not good at school and so they wanna find the sharp edges and that makes 'em relevant.
Shannon (00:18:18): Well, and I think to some extent it's also just child curiosity. Right? I mean, I remember that like in school, the kids a knew which pages certain things were on.
Dexter (00:18:30): Right. You knew the dirty words and, and which books.
Shannon (00:18:33): Yeah. And I don't, I mean, it's, it's hard. I'm not trying to make like, blanket statements, but I don't always think that's wrong. Cause I think that's children just trying to explore things. This is new and exciting to them. Maybe sex is new and exciting to them and they're just trying to explore it. And the only way they know how
Dexter (00:18:50): Well, and I, the, you know, think thinking about it and kinda like processing through it. Um, we live in a society now that is the result of softening edges over a lot of years. Right. And so now for instance, somebody might flinch when they hear, or I, I just, I, I can't see a cow processed or I don't want to shoot a deer. Right? Because death, like I, I can't deal with death. Whereas a hundred years ago, you go to any farm in the United States and there's probably a six year old who could process chickens or, you know, like they, they were comfortable with death because it was more around them. Right. And I do, I'm not saying that the edges aren't sharp, you know, but I think society artificially, you, it almost creates this, I don't know if the term's like a microculture or something. It, it, uh, it's fake. It creates this like almost simulation world.
Shannon (00:19:55): Well, and I, I think it's interesting because again, like with Aga Agatha Christie, I can understand the n word being offensive. Right. Like
Dexter (00:20:03): Nobody, let's let's back up real quick. Let's finish on, let's finish on Rule Doll real quick. Cuz there's a couple of important things that we need to make sure that we say he was racist.
Shannon (00:20:13): Well, yeah. And his main thing was being anti-Semitic
Dexter (00:20:15): And he was anti-Semitic. And so even he, while he was still alive, he made changes to some of his books, like the Oompa Lupas in Charlie and Chocolate Factory. Uh, I read that originally they were like African pys that were like, whenever the British Empire fell. Um, and like, so basically Colonialization was ending. Part of the narrative around Colonialization was that Britain was in these places to protect the natives. Right. And so, whenever that, you know, with within that narrative part of the story was that Willy Wonka snatched up these African pygmies and brought 'em to his factory to work to keep them safe. Well, at least the movie, by the time I saw it, they were now Oompa Lupas. And they were a mythical creature. And what Willy Wonka was protecting them from was another mythical creature that ate them. Right. And so, to me, like Ruled Dahl made that change. Yeah. He, he was cognizant and so
Shannon (00:21:19): Someone made it aware, like made him aware that this could be offensive. Right. And so he said, okay, I understand. And changed it.
Dexter (00:21:26): And so, you know, he, it's, it's really difficult because given a long enough timeframe, um, you're, you're going to evolve and change your thoughts. And, and not only are you gonna evolve and change your thoughts, but also the sentiment of the culture around you is gonna evolve and change their thoughts. Whereas, uh, I, I'm trying to think of a, of a good example of, um, oh, like Pepe, right? Whenever I was a kid watching Peple pu uh, on Looney Tunes, I was like, this dude's a creep <laugh>. You know, like he was a rapist. Like that's, that's like what his persona was. It was like, man, he's just gonna keep hitting these, he's gonna keep on this woman even though she's telling him no and no, and no, and no until he do, he figures out some way of tricking her to be in love with him so that he can kiss her.
(00:22:20): You know? Yeah. Um, and he was a creepy, creepy character. Right? So you look at a character like that and it's kind of like, do we need, like, part of it, I think is, uh, capitalism, right? Where you, it's cheaper to recycle an idea than to generate a new idea for the system. Right? It's, it's cheaper to, uh, whitewash Pepe at Pew and keep him as a character. Cuz you already on the rights to him. You already own the copyright to him. You already, you already owned that character. So it's easier just to say, well, how about we make him not erase it or, uh, not, not a rapist. Right? And, and then we'll use him. Well then there's other characters like er, er Elmer fud where he was like hunting, um, bugs Bunny and he had a shotgun. Well, they're like taking out the shotgun, right? He's not, none of the Looney Tunes characters are allowed to have shotguns or, so it's like him and, um, what was it? Uh, Yosemite Sam. Oh yeah. You know, he's, he's got those guns. Yeah. And so it's, it is interesting what they choose to edit and what they choose not to edit. And one or sensor. And one of the, in one of the interesting things is most of the time when they're making that decision, it's for marketability. It's so that they can become more relevant to a broader audience so they
Shannon (00:23:49): Can make more money. That's, that's what I was gonna say, even with Rule Doll is, okay, are they doing this to be good people and to try to really promote social change? Or are they doing this for profit? And as always, they're doing it for profit, right? I mean, maybe there are people involved who really think this is a great change and needs to happen to help protect children. I'm sure there are people out there working that believe that. Do I believe that Netflix and Puffin as companies are doing it to help people? No, they're doing it to sell books. So then we hadn't touched on this yet because of the backlash with the Rule Doll changes Puffin and Netflix came out and said, okay, we hear you. We will also be re-releasing all of the original rolled doll books Yeah. In a classic, classic series. Yeah.
Dexter (00:24:35):Classic
Shannon (00:24:35):Version alongside the newly edited version. Right. So again, because they realize that, hey, maybe this new version isn't gonna sell, we better keep the old one. So then what kind of change is this about if you're just gonna go whatever is making money, whatever
Dexter (00:24:51): Money that can almost, I can almost hear the, um, corporate meeting and they're like, well, I've got an idea. How about now we released two versions Yeah. Of the same book and now we can hit all a aspects of the market. Right? Like, I almost like it, it, to me it seems very corporate in a sense. Like they,
Shannon (00:25:15): Oh, it drives me
Dexter (00:25:15): Crazy. They're not doing, they're not doing anything for the preservation of the work or because they actually care about what the kids are thinking. The whole thing is like, how can we trick the parents into never buying this book? Because one of the things that I was kind of wanting to bring up in regards to like, children's books, because most of the examples I have for like later in the, in the show are more adult books. But another good children's book is Dr. Seuss mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And when he got edited for being racist. And what's really interesting about that is like, uh, with Dr. Seuss, a lot of people just canceled Dr. Seuss.
Shannon (00:25:58): Yeah.
Dexter (00:25:58): It wasn't like, okay, well let's make a couple of changes to the work and like, let's make this work. You know? It was just like, they just, like, most people were just like, we're done with, with Dr. Seuss. And, and, and wrote him out. You know, and I should have done a little bit more research on like, what it was that Dr. Seuss was racist about. Do you remember
Shannon (00:26:18): Off the top of head? I think it was just him as a person was supposed to be a racist
Dexter (00:26:21): Person, but I thought that there was like something in his books that made it, that made it more racist or, or whatever. Um, and Shannon's gonna look it up real quick. And so that, that's one of the things that really kind of took me aback by this, is they have the option. Everybody has the option of just saying, okay, okay, look, look, we're just gonna, that was a great move and that was a great, he was a great rider, but you know what, we're just gonna drop it and we're just not gonna use any of his art or any of his depictions anymore. Instead they decided like, well, hey, how about we go through and basically clean the entirety of the text and then we can re-release it to the, to the masses? And, you know, and, and it is difficult. Uh, I know we got, oh, go ahead. And do you find
Shannon (00:27:12): No, I mean, it just kind of said that he was a racist person, but then as he got older, he did kind of change his thinking and tried to shift that and like tried to write new books that weren't racist. But everything that I've read, I hadn't, I haven't seen like one definitive example. It's just saying that there are maybe like racist symbolism in his books.
Dexter (00:27:33): Right. Which that's difficult too, because, you know, there's a lot of times as an author when you're riding, you're, you're not necessarily intentional about every little thing that's in there. Some of it's just a result of the time, you know, it's almost like a little time capsule in itself. Yeah. Um, but go ahead.
Shannon (00:27:57): Oh, nothing. I was just gonna say there's, they kinda give a few little examples that in one of his books, there's a character named Mike who sits in the back. And so they're saying that's like sitting in the back of the bus. Oh. And so that's racist. Um, I don't remember who they're talking like, who Mike is, so I can't tell you necessarily what I think about it. Well, but yeah, so I apparently there's some racist symbolism.
Dexter (00:28:21): Yeah. There's some racist symbolism. And, and so I just really wanted to make sure that we hit that point, that it's not that rolled all was like this completely innocent individual that, that it's completely unfounded, that these people are, are attacking him or like going after some of his words. Well,
Shannon (00:28:40): And I think that's what's interesting is I would much rather prefer the Dr. Seuss approach. Like, Hey, if you don't like him, don't buy it and don't produce it. Right. Like, I, that actually doesn't offend me because I as a consumer can decide whether I want my kid to read that or not. Right. Right. So if Netflix were truly upset with Roll Dolls, a person stop producing his stuff.
Dexter (00:29:01): Right. It's almost like boycott.
Shannon (00:29:03): Yeah. And I, this may be for later in the conversation, but it always makes me think about JK Rolling because, you know, she's been labeled transphobic amongst other things, and so she's been canceled, but Harry Potter's not been canceled,
Dexter (00:29:17): Which it's that, that's an interesting one to me because she initially seemed like she was gonna be on the woke side of it because like when she started, like she changed Gand or, uh, Dumble Door was now gay. Yeah. And, uh, Hermione wasn't a white girl. It was originally she was supposed to be black, and so she kind of, she originally with the Potter franchise was, and I, not that I have any problems with either of those changes, right. If for my name was Black, I don't think that that would've changed the book, the book or the movie. You know,
Shannon (00:29:52): It, just do it in the book if you're gonna do
Dexter (00:29:53): It. Yeah. Just do it and, and use your descriptive words. Right? Like Yeah. That's what I think is is difficult about it, is if you start going in and attacking somebody for describing a character, they, one of the goals of the, uh, like quote unquote woke agenda is to make everything more inclusive, right. By like, including people. Right. If you're going to include different types of people, then you're gonna have to use descriptive words to describe a different type of person.
Shannon (00:30:25): Okay. So this is my question, and it's a genuine question. I don't have the answer to it. Let's take the witches for example. Right? There are people who say that the witches as a book is sexist because it's positioning women as witches. Right? Okay. Then the is being bald makes bald women villains. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, then you have in other books, um, like the, the Twits where Mrs. Twit is ugly, which means ugly people are bad. That's bad. Augustus, what's fat? And that's bad. So you cannot have any of these things as bad people because then you're positioning someone as being bad. Right. What do you do? You know what I mean? Like, if
Dexter (00:31:04): You, we make 'em all white adult males.
Shannon (00:31:06): Well, I mean, that's what I'm saying. Like, okay, so how do you, what, where's the line between reality and literature or art? Or this isn't real life like, so no, this book is not saying that bald women are villains. In reality, it's saying that in this world, these witches are bald and they are bad.
Dexter (00:31:25): Right.
Shannon (00:31:27): Can we separate the two and can, can that be okay for in one world, bald witches or bald women are bad. And in one world, bald women are just fine and nobody cares. So how do you create a villain, or even not just a villain, but any kind of interesting character development? Because I would say that if you write any good character, they're flawed, right? Yeah. Like in any book, a good character has flaws. And in any good book there's multiple characters that have different flaws. Some may be good, some may be bad. You're just having to position different characters in different light lights. So what, how do you do that if you cannot speak anything about any person? Well, right, yeah. You can't make a woman be bad. So can you make a man be bad? And if you can't make a person of any race be bad, is it only white people or is that bad too? So like, what do you even do in that position?
Dexter (00:32:21): Part part of, one of the things I was really wanting to touch on, this seems like good, as good a place as any is the fact that there is this acknowledgement that we are constructing a narrative. Right? And so we know that brainwashing does exist. That that is, you know, yeah. The reason that, uh, we as a country are rampant consumers is because they market it to us as little children. They say, you want this new thing? You want this new thing. Hey, ask your parents for this new thing. Right? You're not happy with what you have. You need a new thing. Right. And it's programmed into us. Right. And that's one of the things, this is a little slightly aside, but that's one of the things that's interesting to me is we are fine with censoring words in a book right? Now. There are certain, uh, one, the kid has to either be read it by the parent, right?
(00:33:19): Or the kid has to be capable of reading, right? Yeah. Oh yeah. It's not, it's not like a, like a two-year-old is just stumbling into these things. Yeah. But what does a two-year-old stumble into for real consumerism commercials? Like, there's all of this stuff that is subjected to our, to our young children that they don't talk about censoring any of that stuff, right? Like it's, uh, it's kind of the same deal as like, okay, hey, stop throwing plastic bottles into the ocean. Y'all are bad people for not recycling these plastic bottles. Meanwhile, Coke gets a complete haul pass on making the bottles. Yeah. Right? And so it's, it's almost like the responsibility for the trash gets put onto the consumer whenever in reality it's like Coca-Cola can just stop making the bottles.
Shannon (00:34:13): So what you're saying is, hold on. Sorry, I had just this train of thought and then I just kind of blanked. Okay. So we're concerned with Roll Dobbing, an anti-Semitic, and Dr. SHUs being a racist, but we're not concerned with Coca-Cola being, um, just a terrible company who's destroying the environment.
Dexter (00:34:31): Or like McDonald's. Yeah. Putting hat, putting toys in poison boxes. Right? You, it's like, here, I'm gonna put a little plastic toy in with, um, all these like poisons, right? This shit food. Um, and I'm gonna try to convince a kid that they want this shit food and I'm gonna try to incentivize the parents to buy this shit food. Right. And nobody gives a, nobody cares about that. No one's gonna say anything about that. No one's attacking Nestle or all these like, super evil corporations that are literally murdering people
Shannon (00:35:04): Except Dr. Seuss. He talked about it.
Dexter (00:35:07): Did he?
Shannon (00:35:08): Well, he did touch on it in the Lorax. Oh,
Dexter (00:35:11): Yeah.
Shannon (00:35:11): Yeah. That companies were quite literally killing the trees and killing the planet. Right. And this was a change for the movies that I did not like, like with the, and I don't, I never saw the original Lorax, so I don't know about it, but the newer Lorax, Uhhuh <affirmative>, it became like that the, what's his name? The main character who made the Sneed?
Dexter (00:35:32): Yeah. Yeah.
Shannon (00:35:32): I can't think of his name, that he's the bad one that got carried away. But in the book, it's, it's everybody, right? It's everybody's fault. It's the consumer's fault. It's the company's fault, it's the creator's fault. We all participated in this ugly, horrendous system, right? It's not one person's fault.
Dexter (00:35:49): And see, and I think to me that's, you know, whenever I really started to dig into this thing, it's like, who, the question is who controls the narrative and what narrative is Okay. Verse not okay. Right? Like, what narrative, um, what narrative are we allowing our kids to participate in? And what narratives are we saying, oh, well, we can't, we can't go in that direction. We can't let that world. And part of the reason that I think that these classics become classics is because they, they hit some aspect of humanity that really goes across the board and almost, um, engages with evil. Right? It's like this question of there is this force in the world that is not benevolent, that that is engaging, that is trying to eat our children, that is trying to, uh, burn down the forest that is trying to sell us junk that is gonna just be junk for a thousand years. Right? Stuff that we don't need to begin with. There is this machine that is churning and instead of attacking the machine, the machine's like, no, no. Pay attention to this over here. Pay attention to this over here. Pay
Shannon (00:37:06): Attention. It's hard. It's, that's an interesting one because I personally do care. Like I, you know, I, I try to be very judicious about where I spend my money because of that, right? I don't sport companies that blatantly are doing horrible things, but there's only so much of that you can avoid. At the same time, there's the question of individual people, right? Like, do I feel comfortable supporting Roll Doll because of who he was? And so it's an interesting question of can you separate the artist from the work?
Dexter (00:37:36): Well, and now to circle back a little bit to the Roll Doll, so his family owns, and they're the ones that made the billion dollars or whatever, right? Yeah. They and his family came out and apologized for a lot of stuff, like, oh no, grandpa, he, um, he was kind of an asshole, right? Yeah. Meanwhile, I guarantee you that they're all living in mansions paid for by the grandpa. Yeah. They're all, they're still selling the brand Yeah. That the grandpa made while they're like demeaning him and saying, well, you know, like he,
Shannon (00:38:11): But I, this is a hard one and there's no definitive answer for it. I think that's okay. He rolled Doll, had some very terrible, terrible opinions. He was also an incredible author. Now the family is benefiting from him being an incredible author. I kind of, and again, this is a personal thing. I am going to read my, read my kids, his books. I don't have a problem with buying his books because I think they're great pieces of work. I loved them and I hope my kids love them. Well, and at the same time, I, I will also teach my kids that he was not a good person. Right? Right. Like, I am okay with separating the two. There are some people who don't like that. And that is perfectly fine if you don't wanna support Rule Doll. I, if someone comes to me and says, look, I'm not gonna read these to my kids. Cool. I respect that. I think that's okay. And I, I support you in that decision, and it's also okay for me to do so, and that's kind of the beauty of it, right? That we are each making our own decision based off of how we see the situation. Right?
(00:39:19): So it's kind of a hard one cuz um, this, the another example that I had was Chris Brown, because I actually get really angry with Chris Brown that people still support him because he beat up Brianna. Right? And so, like, I'm not going to listen to his music. I don't actually care for his music anyways, so I'm not ever gonna listen to his music now. Right. I used to really like him, but I don't care for his stuff now. But that was one that always pops up in my head where it's like, well, am I okay with supporting Roll Doll? I'm not okay with supporting Chris Brown. How do we make sense of this?
Dexter (00:39:50): Well, and um, so I, I watched Chris Rocks, uh, well, not all of it, but a portion of his new special, and it's called Selective Outrage. And that's what his point was, is he was talking about r Kelly and Michael Jackson, and he was like, okay, all these people are canceling r Kelly and saying, oh, R Kelly, he's this evil man, this and that. We can't listen to him. We can't support him. He's, he's gone, he's canceled. But Michael Jackson is like, his music's still around, right? And his music is still celebrated, and he's still the king of pop.
Shannon (00:40:28): And there's a large difference in the type of work you're producing. Like if you were good at what you were doing,
Dexter (00:40:32): That's, that's what his joke was. His joke was like, if you make good art, then, you know, a lot of people are th they're willing to excuse the bad behavior if, if you are of a certain, like, um, that, and so this is one of the things I've written down, like, if you are good enough, you are excused. And, uh, I think specifically of, uh, von Braun in nasa, um, a lot of, I don't know if people know this or not, but, um, at the end of World War II Operation Paperclip, they actually snatched up Nazi scientists and brought them to the United States and gave them prominent roles like in nasa. Right? So this Von Braun guy who literally would, would kill the slowest Jew in his factory every day and hang them out front at the end of the war, since he's amazing with rockets, they brought him over here and they gave him beach in the ha uh, beach house in the Hamptons and gave him director position at nasa. And now he's this NASA great, you know, scientist. Right? So if you are good enough, you are excused, right? If, if you, I
Shannon (00:41:49): Think that's just the way of the world. I know. And I, and I'm, I'm not saying that I 100% am okay with it, but I also don't know how that's ever gonna change. Like Michael Jackson, there's no denying that he was amazing at what he did. Right? Like, there's a reason he is the king of pop, right? Because he put out incredible music. What do you do with that? Do you, do you just completely do away with all of his music now because well, bad people can't produce good stuff.
Dexter (00:42:15): Well, and I, uh, I was laughing. Uh, Dave Smith, he's a podcaster. He is also probably gonna be the libertarian, uh, candidate for presidency. Uh, but he's a comedian and this and that. And I was listening to an episode a while back when Kanye was really blowing up with all of his stuff. And, um, one of the things that, uh, you know, and, uh, Dave Smith is Jewish, you know, and so it was kind of an interesting, you know, overlap. But one of the things that Dave Smith said is he was like, Kanye is is one banger away from getting UNC cancelled in my book? You know, he was like, if Kanye puts out another amazing, uh, song, I'm gonna listen to it. Yeah. It doesn't matter. Like if he's this wacko off the chain, you know, like crazy essential because it's like, if you look at that class of individuals, they are all assholes.
Shannon (00:43:13): Well, that's what's so hard. I actually do, like, I do try to find good individuals and support them, right? I do try that. Like Andy Gramer is one who I love because I love him as a person. I think he's a good person. I think he promotes positivity. Therefore, take my money. I want to support you so that you can have success in what you're doing. At the same time, can I, can I truly do that with everything? You know? Like, am I not gonna read my kids Harry Potter and am I not gonna let them see certain movies? Am I not gonna let them read, you know, the witches? Am I not gonna let them just go into Walmart? And so like, at what point can you really cut out everything? Because at the end of the day, there's a lot of bad people <laugh>. Oh, yeah. And there's just a lot of people with viewpoints. Even if they're not bad, I may not agree with them.
Dexter (00:44:01): Well, one of, one
Shannon (00:44:02): Of, can I truly cut out everything?
Dexter (00:44:04): One of the things I was wanting to talk about in this vein of who controls the narrative is think about all the propaganda bullshit that has been created in order to sell people a certain story. And I think specifically of, uh, did you ever watch the show? Hell On Wheels?
Shannon (00:44:23): Mm.
Dexter (00:44:24): It was on AMC a bunch of years ago.
Shannon (00:44:26): The, the Western?
Dexter (00:44:27): Well, it was like about the expansion of the
Shannon (00:44:29): Yeah, I did. I actually really liked it. Yeah, yeah,
Dexter (00:44:31): I did too. <laugh>. And so a lot of it was like kind of written in this revisionist way. Yeah.
Shannon (00:44:36): Like, why I'm gonna watch it. So I don't remember it like detailed.
Dexter (00:44:38): It was like wanting to show like the real side of the Western expansion. Well, one of the characters in this, um, gene Hackman, his character is this railroad tycoon who is like racing with other railroad tycoons to have the first transcontinental, um, you know, yeah. Transcontinental Railroad. Well, of course, like most of the corporate elite in our country, they are on welfare. They're literally on the tit of the government. And the way that they're able to, you know, do a lot of these amazing things is with government subsidies. So his whole thing was, he was like, we've gotta get more government subsidies, and we've gotta get more government troops to protect our railroad and protect our, um, you know, surveyors. And just because they were literally going through the Native Americans, um, native lands, right? And they, and like they're cutting off the buffalo, and I mean, it, they're murdering the buffalo.
(00:45:36): These people are their way of life. The Native Americans, their way of life was being directly attacked. Right. And so what do you expect, uh, prideful, uh, happy or not happy? You know, that's probably not a good term, but you know, like the Indians, right? You have this invading force into your land that's threatening your way of life. You're probably gonna fight back. And so in the TV show, there's this scene where they pull up and there's a couple of settlers that have been killed in a fight with the Indians. And, uh, you know, I don't, I I can't even remember if they had an arrow sticking out of him. Well, he had a photographer with him. And so he set, he set the scene, he went and got arrows stuck, more arrows in the bodies. He was like making it look more savage. He wanted it to look like this brutal attack from these savage indi, you know, he's trying to create this narrative that he can then take back and get funding for what he's doing. So it is this who controls the narrative aspect. And we have all this stuff. You know, you look back at, uh, I know you, when you were going through that Western class, um, Larry McMurtry, it was actually writing an anti-western. Yeah. And so, like, a lot of they lonesome dove. Yeah. A lot of the guys I worked with in Amarillo, they loved Lonesome Dove. They didn't realize that it was an anti-western. They loved westerns. Right. And that, so I love Lonesome Dove because I love
Shannon (00:47:08): Oh yeah. Sorry, I was just gonna follow this up after you finish that. But Larry Mc Mercury has even set himself like I set out to write like the antithesis to a Western and came out with the greatest Western ever. Right. Like, I didn't mean to do that. Right. Well, but all he did is he included a woman, right. He included a black person. He included the Irish men. Yeah. He included like realistic thing. I mean, those were real parts of the West that often get completely excluded.
Dexter (00:47:34): One of my favorite parts of Lonesome Dove, and I'm, I'm sure it's in the movie too, but I read it. And so in the book, one of my favorite parts is when, uh, Gus and Call are leaving that bar after being disrespected by this like, young, you know, bartender. And, uh, Gus is, um, like kind of lamenting and he's saying like, damn, did
Shannon (00:47:58): We fight for the wrong side?
Dexter (00:47:59): Did we fight for the wrong side? Like, here we were thinking that we were,
Shannon (00:48:04): But you don't say that in a Western.
Dexter (00:48:06): You don't, you know, don't say that in a Western. And I, and I thought, so to me that is a beautiful way of, um, creating a sort of relevance. Um, so like, one of the things I always wanting to talk about is how do you embrace like cult classics, um, while still cr like while still introducing the critique, right? Like, everybody loves a good Western. I mean, in reality, I mean, I think it's probably one of the most popular forms of cinema even all around the world. I mean, yeah. It's, it's this, it's this picture of time. It's almost like the Samurai, right? Everybody loves Samurai Stories because it was this iconic, um, character that was real, that truly existed and was in it was such a radical, radically unique thing. And so The Cowboy is one of 'em. It's one of those where we want more westerns with cowboys. And so then you start getting, the first batch of Westerns you get is like My Darling Clementine and High Noon and all these that are overtly, they do have some racist aspects to 'em. They do have some sexist aspects to 'em. Classist, uh, good guy, bad guy. It's, it's a who, you know, the good guy is
Shannon (00:49:28): Rugged man, saving a girl.
Dexter (00:49:29): Yeah. It's the state verse, the outlaw and all this different stuff. You have all these things. Well then, um, the way that they like modernize that classical, uh, genre is like Lonesome Dove and, um, dances with Wolves. And even like, uh, what is the one, it's my favorite Western with Clint Eastwood.
Shannon (00:49:52): I know which one I'm talking about. And I dunno the name of it.
Dexter (00:49:54): I just went, I just went blank on the name with
Shannon (00:49:56): The prostitutes.
Dexter (00:49:57): Yeah, yeah, yeah. Look it up real quick. Um, just
Shannon (00:50:00): Clint Eastwood prostitutes.
Dexter (00:50:02): <laugh>. Yeah. Yeah. That might, you never know what's gonna pop up with that, but, um, yeah, you know, it it, it play, it takes the genre and kind of melds it. And so one of the things that I think is really relevant whenever we're talking about, um, you know, shit,
Shannon (00:50:18): Unforgiven
Dexter (00:50:19): Unforgiven. Yes. That's it. Yeah. Um, whenever you're talking about like, shit authors, or like, people who were like probably fairly shitty in their time compared to Modern Sentiments is like HP Lovecraft who was a racist and who, uh, also like, liked Hitler and was, you know, said some positive things. Just so happens that he was a cult classic, right? He created this whole genre of like fantasy melded with sci-fi in a very unique way that nobody else had ever done. And he did it so well that like, Lovecraftian became a thing. Like, it was, it was, it was its own world. It was its own world. It was its own genre. And I think one of the ways that the classic was honored while still being critiqued was in Lovecraft country, even though I feel like they lost it, like the first, it
Shannon (00:51:11): Started out so good, and then I didn't Yeah. The first,
Dexter (00:51:12): The ending. Yeah. The first couple episodes were kind of cool, and then it just, in my opinion, got real shit. Um, <laugh>. But, but one of the things that I really enjoyed about, about that was how they, they flipped the narrative and they started telling it from the black people's point of view, uh, black people in like fifties, I think it was the fifties, um, and how they juxtaposed it to this like, fantastical world with these, with these, uh, monsters. And then the reality of the world where you had these sundown downtowns and white people were literally monsters.
Shannon (00:51:49): Yeah. So white people have made up fantasy monsters to be scared of, but like black people had very, very real fears of just even going outside and being in the wrong town.
Dexter (00:51:59): Right? And so, um, in, in the Lovecraft country, there is a scene where the white, uh, woman who's like this witch soer or whatever she is, she wanted to feel, feel what Emmett Till went through, because that was like going contemporaneously in the, in the narrative. And so there's this scene where, what happened to Emmett Till they did it to this woman, right? So like, beat her up and drown her and, and all, it's a real brutal scene, like a truly brutal scene. And what I thought that was reminiscent of is, I think the movie was called A Time to Kill with, with
Shannon (00:52:38): Matthew
Dexter (00:52:39): McConaughey and Samuel L. Jackson, where at the very end of it, he's, he's telling the narrative. Yeah. And then he says, it's in the court. Yeah. And he's in the court and everybody's in there. And he, he ga basically goes through the entire narrative of what happened to this little girl. And then he says, now imagine she's white. And everybody was like, holy shit. You know, it like completely flipped their, their opinion on the evil, right. That was happening. And so that's one of the things I think is, um, is available to true critique. Right? It, and, and you can reframe it in this new artwork, right? So instead of bottling, bottling all this artwork and like, Hey, we have to take this book and change over half of it in order to make it modern. It's like, honor that book, um, by, by continuing the narrative.
Shannon (00:53:31): You don't have to honor it, call it out and write a new book. Right. Right. I'm fine with that. Yeah. You can do that. I think. Yeah. It's, are you exerting your effort into just critiquing and banning books of the past? Or are you exerting this effort into creating this dialogue and putting new works out there that you're proud of, that you think represent what needs to be represented?
Dexter (00:53:48): Right. And so, like part of part of the question is, so you were talking about the Agatha Christie book where they, where they changed the title of it. Yeah. Um, and that book, you know, let's say it had the original title, it would've been a band book. Right? Well, now look at verse a book that is a band book a lot of the time, which is To Kill a Mockingbird. Right? And if you, if you read the book The To Kill a Mockingbird book, in my opinion, um, it's it cause it calls into, it's a critique. It's
Shannon (00:54:24): A critique on racist,
Dexter (00:54:25): It's a critique on
Shannon (00:54:26): Racist, and it shows it for what it
Dexter (00:54:28): Is. And as you, and now granted, I originally watched the movie, uh, and then I read the book, which the book is way better. But that was what I learned from the movie, right? What I learned from the movie is there is this race divide and a certain group of people are treated unfairly. They're not, they're not given the same rights. But now you have this guy who is a genuinely good dude. Not saying that he didn't have his own problems, but when he saw an injustice, he stood up for the injustice. He stood up against in, I think he loses in the book, right? Doesn't he lose the court case? I think so. I'm pretty sure he loses the court case. Um, but anyway, it, and it's all told through this little white girl's eyes and she is just developing her opinions on race and, um, and contextualizing like what is going on. And so to me, the fact that that's a band book shows more that, um, this censorship state or this censorship culture is, is less about, um, making a better world and more about brainwashing and controlling the narrative. Um,
Shannon (00:55:43):
Well, yeah, cuz that is one, like, that is a good discussion. If you're banning it, you're not having that discussion about racism and what it looks like and how do we discuss it to kids and what are they learning? I mean, there are so many good things that come out of dialogue that if you are just gonna ban anything that's bad or that, that promotes or not promotes, that discusses bad ideas like racism, then you're missing out on so many opportunities to actually discuss it with children.
Dexter (00:56:10): And, and so like for instance, honesty in literature, um, when they, when you're talking about crafting a narrative and, and creating this, this imaginary world, there is an aspect of it. Like, hey, let's be honest in the literature, right? Let's, let's not write, um, a Columbus pilgrims novel right. Where Columbus lands and, and it's beautiful and he's this hero and he, you know, rides off into the, the distance being this conquering hero. And like, let's also show the Catholic church burning all the books and murdering the indigenous people and all of the atrocities and the genocides that come along with it. Right? Let's not just sugarcoat or whitewash the history. And, and that's, I think one of the things that bothers me the most about this, uh, this censorship is they're not censoring the bullshit history that they're teaching our kids. They're not censoring that, they're still teaching, uh, teaching our kids the bullshit history Right.
(00:57:16): Of um, you know, a western centric, uh, worldview. Yeah. Um, where, you know, there's this, this, uh, advance, there's this, you know, this, uh, improvement of life from Greek, uh, Greek culture all the way through. Right. It just continually got better for everybody all along the, and now we're in this modern world where we're living in the best world that could have possibly existed. And, and you wouldn't want to have lived in any of those other worlds, right? It's this narrative that's like constructed. And so one of the things I was thinking was funny is the, the real enemy is artificial narratives. The real enemy is like, so for instance, I was wondering, you know, uh, it seems like a lot of the artwork that's coming out today makes everybody gay. Like all, like, there's a bunch of characters that are just, does it add anything to the story necessarily that they're gay? It comes
Shannon (00:58:15): Back to the prophet thing that we talked about at the
Dexter (00:58:17): Beginning. Right? Right. You know, you're trying to make it more relevant or whatever. And, and like, I think of the, uh, the commercials today that you see where there's, um, you know, it'll be a family and it's like a white, uh, guy is married to a black woman and they have a Mexican kid and an Asian kid, and they're all are sitting around the table and it's like, whoa. You know, we can re And I agree with the fact, don't put a constraint on what a family is because you can have mixed race families and you can have adopted, you know, kids into families. But it seems like every commercial they have to have, uh, two guys that are together, two women that are together a normal, uh, family, but they don't have any that are the same races. Right. It's like you, you gotta, and to me it's, I'm not, I'm not against any of those things, but they are artificial narratives and they're being projected in an artificial way, in my opinion. And it's propaganda. And it, um, these decisions are being intentionally made in order to try to control the narrative.
Shannon (00:59:30): Well, I think to tie this together back with Rule Doll, so like what we were saying at the very beginning, part of what the change is taking out any mention of the word fat, taking out any mention of the word white or black in any circumstance. So even describing a black widow, you can't call her black, right? And so it's just completely erasing these ideas and just, I guess presenting a new narrative where these things just don't exist, which is weird.
Dexter (01:00:01): It is weird.
Shannon (01:00:02): And I, I don't know, I don't know what to make of that, where it's like, okay, if a kid grows up and never reads the word fat, is that gonna solve fat shaping?
Dexter (01:00:11): Well, and part of that too is, and, uh, this might be a little controversial, but it's, uh, child abuse, in my opinion. What? Like if your kid is obese by the age of eight?
Shannon (01:00:25): Well, yeah, I think, um, take
Dexter (01:00:27): Like new, new onset diabetes or type two diabetes has shot through the roof Oh, yes. In recent years. Yes. You know, and, and that's not something that these kids can just, Hey, you know, whenever they get a little bit older, they make, you know, they're, there's
Shannon (01:00:41): This, you are setting them up for health problems for the rest of
Dexter (01:00:43): Their lives. Yes. Yes.
Shannon (01:00:44): Outside of any disease or, um, things that just can't be helped. Right. If a kid is just that, because they're just eating McDonald's every day, that is child abuse.
Dexter (01:00:53): Yes. And normalizing, normalizing, uh, that state of being unhealthy is to me not the direction that I think is the best thing for our society and those kids themselves. Not to say that they should develop a complex or be, it's
Shannon (01:01:11): Just, I don't think should they should ever be ridiculed or bullied. No. But I also think there's good dialogue to be had. I wish I could think of a very concrete example, but I can't off the top of my head. I just know there's so many times where I read a book or Emmett watches a movie, and he comes away and he asks me, so why did this happen? Why, why was the Grinch upset that there's so much that he wanted to take away Christmas? Why were they mean to the Grinch? Was it okay that the Grinch was mad? Was it okay that they didn't invite him for Christmas? Who was right, who was wrong? I mean, all these questions. And he'll ask me because he's watching the movie, he's thinking about it. And then I, as the parent get the opportunity to sit down with him and say, well, let's, let's discuss this. Right.
Dexter (01:01:53): You see? And that's how, like, that's what reic uh, you know, rabbis like at the turn of this century, Jesus uses all these parables. And a lot of the time we want to, we want to flatten those parables today and make 'em like, oh, it means this. Yeah, it means this one thing. But really the, the Rabbi, um, tradition was not that parables were these, uh, quandaries, right? There were these things where you have to work through 'em and say, well, this guy was kind of right here, but this person, obviously, you know, it was incorrect the way it was interacting. You, you, uh, you, it helped to develop your, I don't want to say the word moral compass. Yeah.
Shannon (01:02:37): But I, I, that's what I was thinking too, because let's just take the Grinch again for an example. That's what I've told Emmett. Like, the Grinch turned bad because people bullied him so that he was a product of what happened to him at the same time he had agency and it still tried to ruin Christmas, and that was also bad. Nothing is black and white here. Right? Like the Grinch did bad things and people were mean to him, which then caused him to be bad. Right? Right. There's so much
Dexter (01:03:05): Going on. And then it caused the people to hate him because he was mean. Because he was mean. They produced it. Yeah. Even though, yeah. And then now he hates them even more because everybody hates him, but everybody hates him because he's being mean.
Shannon (01:03:17): And so I tell Emmett, this is why we're not mean to people. This is why you don't bully kids in class. You are shaping them when they get older.
Dexter (01:03:22): Or also you can even if, if they have the emotional intelligence, you can even take it a step further to say, if a person is being mean all the time, or if a person is lashing out, they
Shannon (01:03:36): Usually need someone to pay attention to them and love
Dexter (01:03:38): Them. It might just be that they want attention and that nobody's giving them that attention.
Shannon (01:03:42): Yeah. So I think there's good conversations. I think even with, Hey, there's a fat kid in a book. You can have a conversation with your kid saying, Hey, in the book, the fat person is treated this way, but I want you to know that in real life, this is not how we treat fat people. Right. Like, I do think there's opportunity there. That's what I think is so funny with taking out every mention of it, is it's just taking away any chance to have this dialogue. And, and it's kind of taking away agency from parents and kids alike. Oh yeah. Right. Hundred percent. Let's work through these ideas. Let's talk about them and let's, let's figure out what we think about 'em instead. It's like, well, let's just take it out. Nobody even has to talk about
Dexter (01:04:17): This. Well, one of, one of the interviews that I watched, uh, to, to uh, kind of kind of start wrapping it up. Yeah. Um, whenever I was doing a lot of research on the roll doll editing or censorship, uh, I watched a bunch of different videos. The vast majority of the videos were made, um, opposing the censorships, the vast majority. And, and one of the videos I watched, it was a debate between two individuals. One person was against the censorship, the other person was for the censorship, and the person who was for the censorship, their argument that they were proposing was they were saying, look, there's a lot of kids who were at home who don't have parents, um, engaged with them to help, um, give them context and show them what's right and what's wrong. So we, we being the, the moral compass of the society need to edit this stuff out because those kids are just wayward boats.
(01:05:21):Right. There's nothing guiding them. And so if we, as the, uh, overlords of the society don't make these edits, then these kids are gonna become, you know, terrorists or, you know, not that extreme, but you know what I'm saying? Like, they're, they're gonna get these, uh, they're gonna get, uh, infected with these, these dangerous thoughts. And, and one of the things that, um, I would attack this woman back with or like would propose to this woman is you think the, these kids who were completely you, you think that the number one thing that we need to worry about those kids is them reading a book.
Shannon (01:06:00): Yeah. If anything, we read all the books, read
Dexter (01:06:02): Every book.
Shannon (01:06:02): Yeah. Read every book. But I guess again, it's just funny because again, I read their witches as a kid, as a very young kid, I never once thought like, women were witches were bad. You know what I mean? Right. And so I do understand subliminal messaging and I do understand that like representation matters. I do get all that. And I actually do think it is important. At the same time, there's gotta be a line there. Right. Because I mean, like, I, I've mentioned this before, but I read Harry Potter also at a very young age, and my mom sat me down and said, you know, this isn't real. Right? And I said, yes. Okay, cool. Like, as long as you know that you're not going to Hogwarts and that I don't have to worry about you running away and going to England, whatever, and like trying to cast bells on people, then you can read these books.
Dexter (01:06:45): Yeah. Meanwhile that meanwhile they're like showing Jurassic Park. Yeah. You know, with these dinosaurs running around and it's like, oh, they're, you know, you're not gonna, you know, one of the things I thought was funny, I was, uh, talking with one of my coworkers about this the other day a little bit, and we were talking about the Little Mermaid, and it's like everybody's throwing a fit because they're using a black little mermaid in the new live action. Yeah. And they're just throwing this fit. And I'm like, it's funny that nobody's throwing a fit about her being like sexy whenever she's supposed to be like a young, you know, a young person. And she's in this like, you know, little
Shannon (01:07:21): Bra, little little
Dexter (01:07:22): Shell bra. Yeah. A little shell bra. And and what is it she's obsessing over a man? And like, there's all always these other aspects of the story.
Shannon (01:07:30): She's willing to give up her voice literally for a man.
Dexter (01:07:32): Yes. Yeah, exactly. And she's willing to make a deal with the devil in order to get this prize possession of
Shannon (01:07:39): Yeah. I mean, the story's actually very, very
Dexter (01:07:41): Dark. <laugh>. I know. And what, what's interesting is, um, of all of the, of all, now I'm not saying give a shit or don't give a shit or let your kid watch it or not let your kid watch it, whatever you decide to do. But that, that is the aspect of the story that you
Shannon (01:07:57): Yeah. I want to take issue with.
Dexter (01:07:58): Yeah. It's like of all of these other aspects. But the story that you could take issue with, the one thing that that is controversial is it's a race. Whenever it's a mythical creature. <laugh>, you
Shannon (01:08:11): Know who and mermaids were white <laugh>.
Dexter (01:08:13): Yeah. Whoever said like, I am pretty sure that if there were a mermaid it would be a really weird color, like blue probably. Or you know, like,
Shannon (01:08:23): Well, wasn't Ursula Purple? I mean,
Dexter (01:08:25): Ursula Yeah, Ursula, yeah.
Shannon (01:08:27): Yeah. Purple, right? She's purple. No, it's
Dexter (01:08:28): Believable. Yeah. <laugh>. Well, cuz she's a squid or she's, I mean it's just like, it's so ridiculous, you know? Um, just the whole topic of it. And so it's, it's funny to, to me what they choose to censor and what they choose to not censor and like what it's like when it's like, okay, we are, we, this is, this is a line in the sand that we will not cross. Yeah. And it's like talking about a person being enormously fat in a book whenever the character is supposed to be glutinous. Like, uh, what?
Shannon (01:09:00): Yeah. Well and it's, it's interesting and I know that we are probably starting to wrap up. I'm just gonna mention one more thing cause I kind of feel like we just need to mention it cuz this idea of completely doing with any of the words is very reminiscent of 1984. Right. And I do think it's interesting, like, okay, as I kind of mentioned, so let's just say we take away the word fat completely. No young kid is exposed to it. We're just gonna remove it from our language. I mean, that's very much 1984 and new speak, which is that actually gonna work? I mean, no <laugh>. Yeah. And like, is that actually going to make people view fat people differently? Like that's not going to solve a fat shaming problem solving. Fat shaming is parents being around their kids speaking to them and discussing with them how you treat people. Right. Doing away with the word fat is not gonna solve
Dexter (01:09:50): Indian kid. Well, and also I think also that's very interesting that you, when you bring that up is fat shaming and all of these things are a result of having an idealized body. Right? So for instance, you go to the supermarket and you look at all of the, the tabloids, well, number one, it's the most beautiful people in the world. Yeah. Right? Those are the people who are, are movie stars, the most people, beautiful people in the world, almost all of them have plastic surgery. And then on top of that, the pictures are edited.
Shannon (01:10:24): Yeah.
Dexter (01:10:24): So we're, we're mad. We're mad that a kid might feel bad about themselves because they're fat. And then the flip side of that is that our society literally promotes Kardashians. The
Shannon (01:10:37): Avengers. The Avengers, literal superheroes, literally this scarlet of Hansen, Chris
Dexter (01:10:41): Hemsworth, the most beautiful people in our society on steroids, literally. Yeah. Right. They're all on steroids, they're all jacked to the f fricking gills. They have professional chefs and then on top of that, they're CGI i'd on top of that, they're edited. Yeah. And you're gonna say that a little, little, uh, rule doll saying enormously fat is gonna, uh, negatively impact this individual's view of the world. Whenever, whenever the other aspect, the other things that they're being, uh, exposed to are hyper idealistically beautiful.
Shannon (01:11:20): Yeah. It, you know, they always say it's to protect the children. Is it really to protect the children if you're just doing away with these words as a whole? I don't know. It's just odd. It's just very weird.
Dexter (01:11:31): It is odd. I mean, it is, I I I do think like wrapping up on the idea of 1984 is very important and is because the whole point of 1984 is newspeak and it's redefining language artificially because language as we've spoken on previous episodes, naturally evolves. Yeah. Language words change, meaning words get colloquially used in different ways, and that is a natural process. But then you have, whenever you, uh, have in, I want to use the term colonists, right. You have these individuals who see themselves as the dominant culture and now they're going to artificially construct how we're gonna speak about each other, how we're gonna view each other. Well, and
Shannon (01:12:18): I'd be really interested, I don't wanna speak on it because I'm white. I would be very interested to hear what a black person has to say about doing away with the word black. Do you know what I mean? Like Yeah. Would a black person say, sure. Let's you race blackness Completely <laugh>. I want to say no. That sounds crazy. Right? Like, I don't think a black person wants blackness to be erased. Well, and I, I think, but I, I mean I can't speak on that. I don't know. So that's kind of an interesting topic
Dexter (01:12:43): To refer to our last episode over cult over, um, cultural residues. Right. Whenever I was looking into that, it got into a little bit of cultural appropriation and there were, there was a video I watched and it was this black woman, I think it was a Ted Talk or something, and she was talking about it and it was like, that is the exact opposite of what she wants. Yeah. She wants her blackness to be on full display. She's very proud. Legitimized.
Shannon (01:13:11): Yeah. She's
Dexter (01:13:12): Validated, she's very proud. She was very proud of her hair and the styles in the ways that she can wear her hair. She was very proud of her body. She was very proud of her culture. She was very proud of
Shannon (01:13:22): Um, I don't think she wants to be erased
Dexter (01:13:24): How she speaks. Right? Yeah. Like I know that with linguistics, we've kind of touched on that before where you have these individuals who speak a certain, the different dialect at certain dialect Yeah. And they are proud of that dialect. Right. And, and you can't, I, as a standard English speaker, can't go to them and say, you should be ashamed of your dialect.
Shannon (01:13:45): We're just gonna erase
Dexter (01:13:45): That. We're just gonna Yeah. We're just gonna work around and we're, we're gonna do is we're just gonna, we're just gonna that, that and that is racist. Yeah.
Shannon (01:13:54): It's like what's, like anything that does parallel with 1984 can't be
Dexter (01:13:57): Good. No. You know,
Shannon (01:13:58): That's the whole point in the book. That's the whole point of the
Dexter (01:14:00): Book. Yeah. No, it, it is just, it is a really interesting, uh, concept and you're right. Uh, it would be interesting to get, you know, a little bit more context, um, on it from, you know, somebody who is black. Right? Because I know, I know I've seen this and I, this is probably something people are probably, well this is something or a racist white person would say, but I have seen videos of black people saying, I would rather be called black. Like, that is not offensive to me. That is not demeaning to me. Right. Just as, as it's not demeaning for me to say that you are a white person. It is not demeaning for me to say that I am a black person. Right. And so I would be interested, I've, you know, I've seen that, I've seen people say that and people talk about that and um, you know, it's, it's kind of that, that would be an interesting thing to, you know, follow up for this episode, uh, possibly in the future.
(01:14:55): So, uh, anyway, we gotta wrap this thing up. We're at an hour and 14 minutes of straight talk <laugh>. Um, so I'm gonna start, I wanted to start doing, uh, kind of intro announcements type things at the end of the episode. That way people, if they're listening, they can just jump right in. Um, if you've been engaged all the way to this point, hey, maybe you want to hear some announcements. So I'm gonna start throwing 'em at the end. But, uh, we are in the process of really working on the branding of the podcast and the purpose of the podcast. Um, you know what, I've always kind of been in the model of like, you know, run first stumble later, you know, and so I think we're kind of in the process of stumbling a little bit and we're, we're gonna rebrand the podcast. We're probably gonna be calling the podcast the Curly Cultivation, just to try to get our branding or across like Instagram, website, everything.
Shannon (01:15:54): Yeah. We kind of have a lot of things going on. They're not very cohesive and we're trying to figure out what to do with that. If anyone has any thoughts or suggestions, we're open to them. We'd love to hear them.
Dexter (01:16:05):Yeah. We're probably eventually, um, going to try to like work with some people because the, the thing is we're not necessarily, like, neither of us really want to be Instagram people.
Shannon (01:16:20): Like Yeah. I don't care to be a social media guru. Yeah. That's not, I'm not
Dexter (01:16:23): Here for that. That's not my, that's not what we are, what we're wanting. We enjoy doing this podcast cuz we like getting our our thoughts out. And, uh, eventually, hopefully we can start getting thoughts back and it can kind of be this A dialogue. A dialogue, yeah. Uh, a place where we can grow mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, our thoughts, you know, and, uh, where, you know, we can like ruled all right. You know, you put your ideas out there and then the society, uh, choose 'em up and spit 'em back in your face. So that's kind of what the goal is. Um, so yeah, we're gonna kind of be in this process of rebranding and, and doing some stuff, hopefully that the website's gonna get kicking. We're gonna get some blogs and stuff going, trying to create more content, uh, and more context for the projects that we're working on.
(01:17:11): So hopefully you'll, uh, you'll come along with us on that. Um, if, if you are listening to this, uh, on whatever streaming service you're listening, if you'll give us a rating on it and make sure that you follow on that streaming service. We're kind of in the process of trying to figure out how many people, how many listeners we have. And, um, it's actually, it's a very interesting thing and how prominent and like large scale podcasts are, but they really don't have a great way of gauging listenership on it. Like downloads and I guess there's a lot of podcasters, uh, in order to get their ad revenue up, they actually go and like hire Click Farms to just click on their links so that they can get, you know, artificial numbers and artificial,
Shannon (01:17:59): I think that's crossing any social media.
Dexter (01:18:00): It's across any social media and we're not really into that. Like, we're not, I don't want to be artificially big. No. I want to have, even if I just had a hundred listeners, but they were engaged listeners, that's what my goal is, right? Is we wanna affect cultural, I wouldn't say change, um, evolution maybe.
Shannon (01:18:23): I don't know. I just wanna promote thinking, thinking. Yeah. So like, even this episode, like what are your thoughts on Rule Doll? What are your thoughts on separating books from their authors? What are your thoughts on censorship? They don't have to be definitive answers. I don't have answers on how I think, but let's be talking about it,
Dexter (01:18:38): Right? Yeah. Let's, yeah. Just creating a, a space for dialogue. Yeah. And a space for nuance really. So, um, like I said, uh, also if, if you are so inclined and you are on social media, if you'll share onto social media, you know, that'd be kind of cool if, uh, you can go to the website and click one of the little buttons, you know, share it, you know. Um, and, uh, beyond that, just keep tuning in. We're gonna, we're gonna attempt this, uh, once a month until, you know, really I think if we had a good studio set up and there's a lot of stuff that we're gonna work on. We're really trying to, uh, make this more of a professional, more
Shannon (01:19:27): Cohesive. We're trying to get together,
Dexter (01:19:28): We're trying to get it together. And, uh, and you're a big part of that, you know, if, if y'all aren't listening, then literally we're just speaking into microphones and
Shannon (01:19:36): It's, which we might be. Yeah.
Dexter (01:19:38): We're not getting hurt by no
Shannon (01:19:40): One. The way I like to think about it is, you know, maybe a hundred years in the future, some archeologists finds us somehow and
Dexter (01:19:48): Digital archeologist.
Shannon (01:19:49): Yes. A digital archeologist finds us and listens to us, and then, you know, maybe we'll mean something then. Well,
Dexter (01:19:55): That's the whole, you never know. That's the whole goal of the, uh, panal Primate was I was wanting to be a digital strata.
Shannon (01:20:02): Oh, okay.
Dexter (01:20:02): You know, so that like, you know, if, well, I was thinking of more of a geologist, less of a archeologist, and they're just looking at the, at the stratifications of internet culture and hopefully we'll be one of the strata.
Speaker 4 (01:20:15): Yeah.
Dexter (01:20:16): Cool. So anyway, thank y yeah. Thank y'all for listening and tuning in and, uh, until next time, peace. Bye.