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Sunday, September 11
· Recap of the Week – Chilean presidential speech, Queen Elizabeth II’s death, Liz Truss becomes prime minister
o That clip of Chile’s president trying to give an important speech while being circled by a world-class distraction was everything – “Quick tip to any world leaders: if you want people to focus on what you’re saying, do try not to say it next to a bicycle-riding fun-sized Superman having the time of his fucking life.”
o John referred to Liz Truss as “Dollar Store British Leslie Knope.”
· And Now This – Sean Hannity references Walmart
o This was montage was described as “the opposite of a Walmart ad.”
o In it, Hannity repeatedly referred to conservatives as “the smelly Walmart shoppers,” a send-up of an apparent liberal pejorative(?) – He occasionally mixed it up by calling them “smelly Walmart people.”
· Main Story – Law & Order
o A running gag throughout this story was including pearls of wisdom from Ice-T’s wild Twitter account – As John put it, “The man is a truth-teller. If you can’t handle the Ice, stay out of the freezer.”
o It’s not usual for the show to devote its entire main story to a scripted television series, but John had plenty to say about issues with Law & Order – The overarching problem was that people’s perception of police characters trickle down to their position of real cops, because “the line between cop shows and actual cops has always been deliberately blurry.”
o Good Avatar joke – “Dick Wolf is the most enthusiastic chronicler of blue lives since James Cameron.”
o John pointed out that, despite the franchise’s penchant for gray “think again” endings and infrequent episodes about isolated “bad apples,” the show has always clearly been on the side of the police – As one writer explained, “There was also always the sense that if we told stories that reflected too badly on the police, the NYPD could make it very difficult for us to shoot in New York.”
o Another major point was that the lawyers on the “law” side of the show are prosecutors, not defense attorneys – A quote from Dick Wolf himself outright stated, “I believed the heroes weren’t the defense attorneys who were getting these scumbags off. The heroes were the prosecutors.”
o This was a great line – “Defense attorneys are a vital part of the justice system, so it’s a bit weird that Law & Order can sometimes go out of its way to present them like the Babadook.”
o We looked at many ways the franchise doesn’t reflect reality, such as the fact that most of the perpetrators on the show are middle- and upper-class white men – “You can see why [Wolf] might not want to make a show in which his good-guy cops are disproportionately targeting communities of color. He wants people to like them. But the result of these creative decisions is that instead of depicting a flawed system riddled with structural racism, the show presents exceptionally competent cops working within a largely fair framework that mostly convicts white people.”
o Increasingly in recent years, the show has used the characters as mouthpieces to rail against police reform – “Oh no! ‘Scrutinizing arrests’? How awful! You know, it’s pretty telling that even in this fictional universe, basic police accountability is treated as an equivalent to getting your balls cut off.” That’s not exaggeration, by the way, since this observation followed a clip in which Sam Waterston’s character described police oversight as “castrating them.”
o John fully admitted that he knows that, for all its damaging elements on a societal level, Law & Order still makes for entertaining television – On the subject of a viral SVU TikTok, he said, “I think I’ve made my position on police brutality pretty clear, but even I will admit, it is hard to resist the sight of Olivia Benson slamming an asshole’s head on a table to the beat of ‘Hollaback Girl.’ In which case, go off, girlboss! Lean into state-sponsored violence!”
o There were particular problems to look at with SVU, between showing “hero cop” Elliot Stabler routinely brutalizing suspects and the idealized depiction of a police department believes sexual assault victims and treats them with respect – “If, as Hargitay says, the show encourages people to avail themselves of this system, it is worth knowing what that system can look like in practice, because it’s not good.”
o To wit, while Stabler boasts a 97% case-closure rate on the show, New York’s real sex crimes unit closes less than a third of cases at best – One study done over a two-year period found a closure rate of only 6%.
Wednesday, September 14
· Main Story – Queen Elizabeth II’s death
o Trevor was perplexed by the opening blurb that California is going to introduce a ranking system for heat waves – “…Which, isn’t that just temperature? Did they just invent the thermometer?”
o Trevor went full Danaerys Stormborn for the queen’s intro, complete with, “Mother of Corgis and Maker of the Chains.”
o The lavish pomp of the queen lying in state was no surprise – “The British love doing shit all dignified. No, they do. Have you seen the changing of the guard? That’s a 45-minute ceremony just to clock out.”
o Good line – “Officials expect that more than 700,000 mourners will come to see the queen lying in state, with people waiting up to 30 hours in a line stretching five miles long. It’s basically like trying to vote in Georgia. That’s how dedicated you have to be to see the queen.”
o Due to the queen’s appearance in a sketch with Paddington Bear, people have been inundating Buckingham Palace with gifts of stuffed bears – “By the way, I’m not sure leaving a trail of teddy bears outside the palace is a good idea. I mean, that’s already how Prince Andrew finds his girlfriends.”
o Trevor thought the Crown was being too sensitive in punishing people for expressing anti-imperialist views along the motorcade – “You realize that, back in the day, a crowd that didn’t like you, their opinion would be that your body should be separated from your head. Now they’re just holding up a sign. You could just turn the other way. Yeah, you still got a neck, use it.”
o Meanwhile, people in many former colonies, including South Africa, aren’t in the mood to mourn – “You can’t expect the oppressed to mourn the oppressor. It’s never going to happen.”
o A few laughs over how the start of Charles’s reign has been plagued by troublesome pens – “You’re literally the king of England, dude. If you don’t like the pens, get different pens. I’m not an expert in the monarchy, but I’m pretty sure the hierarchy doesn’t go Prince William, King Charles, and then the guy who buys the pens. I don’t think that’s how it goes.”
o Wild stories from a (former?) palace staff member about the royals’ learned helplessness due to their immense privilege. One involved being called into Charles’s room to pick up a letter that had fallen in the wastebasket… right beside Charles – “When I was a kid, I thought kings had to pull swords out of stones. This dude can barely pull his dick out of his own pants?”
o Trevor had a few takeaways from these stories – “One, the royals have been really spoilt. Right? And two, I can tell you that nobody who works in that palace is African. ‘Cause I’ll tell you now, if there was one African mom who worked in that palace, you try and pull that.” The resulting scenario culminated in the African mom telling Charles, “There is only one king, and that is Jesus, right?”
o We wrapped up with an amusing David Attenborough send-up with Planet What on Earth, observing the royals in their native habitat.”
· Interview – Author Jennette McCurdy
o McCurdy discussed her memoir I’m Glad My Mom Died, about her experiences growing up as a child star with an abusive mother – Writing all this for the book wasn’t easy. She explained, “It feels like a thing that you can’t say because society doesn’t accept it. You have to keep moms on a pedestal and we all have to have the same experience. And that just wasn’t mine, so it felt even more important to express it in the book.”
o When Trevor asked whether he thought her story was rare or normal for child stars, she admitted, “I think it’s way more common than anyone would care to admit.”
o In talking about how she could bring so much humor to a book about child abuse, she said, “I think finding humor in those really intense moments and those tragedies can bring levity where it’s necessary. I hope I’ve done that.”
o Trevor recognized the difficulty McCurdy has had processing all these experiences in therapy and understood her feeling like she wasn’t yet in a place where she could forgive her mom – He noted, “It is a very complicated topic. How do you address the lack of love or the lack of parenting that you were supposed to get from that figure?”
Thursday, September 15
· Ain’t Nobody Got Time for That – Patagonia founder gives away company, Gov. Ron DeSantis flies migrants to Martha’s Vineyard, racist backlash against the live-action Little Mermaid, Phoenix Suns owner suspended, speculation about cheating in grandmaster chess tournament
o I liked Trevor’s take on Patagonia being sold to support fighting climate change – “When you think about it, who’s more baller: the person who has a billion dollars or the person who literally uses their billion dollars to make it rain?”
o Great summation of DeSantis, using Florida’s taxpayer money to fly asylum seekers in Texas to Martha’s Vineyard – “You know, there’s assholes, and then there’s this guy.”
o Excellent – “Here’s what gets me. If you told Ron DeSantis to spend the same amount of money to help these asylum seekers, he’d be like, ‘Oh, we don’t have the funding for that,’ but to troll the Democrats, suddenly he’s like, ‘Put it on my card, yeah.’”
o This was great – “Of course the Little Mermaid is Black. All right? Everyone whose name starts with Lil is Black. Lil Wayne, Lil Nas X, Lil’ Kim. Honestly, if you heard that there was a woman named Little Mermaid, you’d just assume that she’s on a track with Cardi B., you know?”
o Trevor was amazed at the sheer volume of HR violations from the now-suspended Phoenix Suns owner – “How do you justify sending porn to your employees? What are you doing, huh? What’s the rationale? Just be like, ‘Did you see that gang bang video that I emailed you? Well, that’s the kind of teamwork I want to see on the court tonight, people! Come on, get out there!’”
o Another reason the owner was suspended was due to his repeated use of the N-word (in a “you guys get to say it, so why can’t I?” capacity) – “Here’s what I don’t get. If you’re someone who wants to walk around saying the N-word, then pretty much the worst place in the world for you is the NBA. He’s like, ‘I love saying the N-word and I hate the sound of squeaky shoes.’ Well, my man, you chose the wrong field.”
· Correspondent Piece (Michael) – Fill Me In
o :shrug: These bits are meh – The one part that made me laugh was when a guy made a wrong guess and Michael turned to the guy’s wife and asked, “Why does your dumb husband say things like this?”
· Interview – News host George Stephanopoulos
o Like many people, Stephanopoulos felt the upcoming midterms will be one of America’s most important elections – “The very way we debate and decide elections is under assault.”
o This was interesting, discussing the change he’s seen in politics over his career – “When I first worked in campaigns, we used to footnote our commercials ‘cause we were so concerned about being called out for not telling the truth. But what has changed over time is that, as each side basically just tries to get out their own voters rather than trying to persuade others, they care less about whether they’re called out by the media on telling the truth or not.”
o I appreciated this statement – “I think there is a risk when you’re talking to certain politicians, if you’re willing to say, ‘What you’re saying is not true.’ And sometimes you have to risk looking partisan by doing that. But I think we can’t bow to that threat.”
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