Media's 7 Lies Controlling You—Escape the Chaos Now

Why does the news prioritize chaos over clarity? A look at how media incentives, funding, and logical fallacies shape our perception of civil unrest.

In this episode, we examine the shifting dynamics of civil unrest, drawing parallels between the Minnesota George Floyd riots and current events. We explore the logistical evolution of activism, specifically how organized funding and "flying in" protesters can transform a peaceful gathering into urban chaos. By analyzing the media incentives that favor fear-mongering and polarization over objective truth, we discuss how business owners and leaders can navigate a landscape of misaligned incentives and "brain rot" content.

The conversation shifts toward practical solutions for reclaiming intellectual independence. We break down the grassroots level impact of critical thinking skills and the importance of recognizing logical fallacies like the straw man or slippery slope in political discourse. Whether you are a parent looking into the homeschool movement or a professional striving for entrepreneurial freedom, this episode provides a roadmap for filtering out the noise, avoiding confirmation bias, and focusing on what you can actually control.

Chapters:
0:00 Comparing the Minnesota Riots to Current Unrest
2:15 How Activist Groups Fund and Mobilize Protests
4:42 Media Incentives: Why News Outlets Prioritize Polarization
7:10 The Dangers of Headline Culture and Misinformation
10:05 Statistics vs. Sentiment: Is the World Actually Getting Safer?
13:22 Balancing Global Awareness with Local Responsibility
16:45 Grassroots Solutions: Cultivating Critical Thinking Skills
19:15 Breaking Down Common Logical Fallacies in Politics
22:30 Parenting and Teaching Debate at a Younger Age
25:50 Leadership Lessons: Avoiding the "Borrowing Authority" Trap
29:10 Taking Control: Building Personal Freedom in a Chaotic World

Transcript

 Ready. Cool. So Tanner, you lived in Minnesota during the George Floyd riots. Lemme flip back here, Tanner, you lived in Minnesota during the George Floyd riots. There's riots going on right now. What feels different about what happened when you lived in Minnesota during George Floyd and all the unrest there and what's going on now?

Yeah, when, when I lived there, it was very racially di, you know, divided. And with the protest was the protest. Yeah. And with, with the death of George Floyd, it was activists fighting for, um, black rights. And, and now it's, there's been multiple instances of problems. And I think that the George Floyd riots was the first go around of.

Of, um, the active protests in, in an area where this time they're a little more experienced. There's been many protests since then. And so what the activists groups have gotten very good at is flying people in from Chicago, from Detroit, from Denver, from you know, California. They, they are funding people to go in there.

Now there's tens of thousands of people rioting in the, or protesting in the streets, and. The protesting very quickly turns into rioting, and it's not that you could have 10,000 people in a crowd, and they're all peacefully protesting with signs expressing their first Amendment right. And you've got five people that decide to start breaking things.

And then five more people join in, and then 10 more people join in, and then it compounds. And by the time midnight comes around, there's fires, there's cars being flipped. It's just chaos. And the, the crowds move like molasses. So when, when we were living there, I didn't sleep for a week. It was, it was awful.

We just saw. How the crowds would start kind of more downtown St. Paul area, and then they would just migrate and you'd see them very slowly migrating up, walking all the way through the neighborhoods. And we were maybe 10, 15 minutes north of downtown and they came through our streets just slow it. It wasn't like they're running around, you know, running through neighborhoods.

It's just they're slow and everything in their path. There's broken mailboxes and cars getting smashed windows. You know, I, I just don't understand how that is peaceful protesting. And so it's, it's tough because I, I do understand where they're coming from and their right to protest, but the rotten apples ruin the bunch.

I completely agree. Like I'm all about a protest, but how do you do that? That people aren't losing their lives? And that's where the. The great divide just comes into play, whether you're on the left or right, whatever. Like, and from my perspective, it's almost like the people funding it want this, want people to, you lose their lives and it, it is.

So as a Christian, like seeing this go on and people. I was watching something and I don't know this guy, I'd never heard of him before, but some American, I think he's American billionaire that lives in China or Japan or something now, nowadays, and supposedly he's one of the people flying people in like paying fund it.

I've heard George Soros, no one's ever confirmed it, confirmed or, you know, anything like that. Like that could just be a, a right-leaning talking point. I, I, I don't know that, but. Someone's doing something somewhere, and that's what drives me nuts the most. It's not the the issues being left, right, or center for me.

It's the people purposely manipulating other people and gaslighting people to do their dirty work. Realistically, they're doing it so they can make more money. And that's, that's really the worst part for me. I, I think that's, that's a very possible scenario, but I think it's also possible that the, the people that are funding it realize that their highest and best use to, to move a cause forward is to fund it.

They're, they're not gonna be the ones sitting there marching in the streets when they have a, you know, $10 billion net worth, but they can fund tons of other people. And so I, I think that. Those people, you know, realize that, that the movement has a better chance of succeeding with them funding it. So, I, I mean, and not that I, so you think it's, you, you think I'm wrong in that they have a, uh, a monetary, uh, it's enough to do it.

I, I'd say that could definitely be the exception, but not the rule. I think that the majority of the people that are funding it. In their heart of hearts, believe in this cause and know that they can have an impact of hundreds of thousands by funding it rather than just one voice by being there and holding up a sign.

See, and I guess I, I think of it more of a globalistic societal draw that maybe they don't have direct, um. Monetary motivation for it, but it's a more globalistic societal draw that. I think stems from, uh, monetary. I, I think that's absolutely true. And, and their where do their political beliefs come from other than what lines their pockets the most and, yeah.

I mean, I'd agree with that, but what I don't think is that by the immediate funding of these events, that they believe there's a direct return. It, it's influencing the society to vote a certain way to put the people they want in office so that that makes them more money. I mean, that's, that's the way I see it going, but.

Ultimately I think that, I mean, you look at celebrities and you know, they go and post on their social media and all that stuff. They have a lot of, they, they have way too much influence over this and they can motivate hundreds of thousands or millions of people to act a certain way based on the things that they say.

So I, I think that those people, even though they're not opening their wallets and funding people, they are just as responsible. The news stations are just as responsible. And I, that's where I wanted to go, and that's. People's political motivation. You whatever you, you know, like I said, left, right center.

If it's an individual and that's their true heart of hearts and they have the means to do whatever, I'm fine with that. My biggest issue is the news and their um, com. Complicitness in in this realistically, and one of my favorite quotes is from Denzel Washington, and I don't remember exactly what he was talking about, but he said, if you watch the news, you're misinformed.

If you don't watch the news, you're uninformed. So what do you do? Like either way you go, you're screwed. Like I find myself, uh, I'll go to Sky News, uh, um, Australia or BBC, uh, you know, Bri, the British stuff, just to get a separate opinion. That's not American viewpoint. Mm-hmm. Um, a lot of independent journalists and stuff like that, but it's really sad that you have to go through 10 different news outlets.

To get, I don't wanna say an accurate story, a somewhat accurate, like you, you can do some kinda reasoning for yourself, uh, and, and kind of tell where, where things fall. Well, and I think that it comes from misaligned incentives, and we've talked about this in business before that I, I think that incentives need to align with what benefits the owners or the, you know, the beneficiaries of the actions.

So. When the incentive for news anchors is fear mongering and pissing people off and, and stirring up the hornet's nest 'cause that's what gets them more views. Then classical conditioning says that they're gonna continue to do those things that give them the right actions. The same with social media influencers.

They, they could go and post. A hundred times, you know, this year about their faith and about positivity and being kind to others and they get five views and then they post something bashing someone else or talking down and they get millions of views. And so now what are they incentivized to do to become a type of person that bashes people and, and spreads more fear?

We can use this podcast that we're recording right now, like what's gonna get clicks for someone to look at it is. It's not like, oh, you know, all the things that are right in Minnesota. It's gonna be some negative thing. You know, I'm just picturing a thumbnail as we're talking about this, but a picture of Minnesota on fire or you know, something like that.

And. Some kind of polarizing why the liberals are crazy, why they're, why the, uh, conservatives are ruining the country. Like something polarizing like that is the only, or not the only thing, but the main thing that drives. So, yes, I think you're a hundred percent correct and that's where the news, you know, you said classical conditioning.

Mm-hmm. Um, yeah, it's, it's very interesting. I, I just don't know the answer. Yeah. No, and it's, it's unfortunate that that's how society operates, but the. I think that what you said about looking at outside sources and forming your own opinion, everyone should be doing that. And unfortunately the confirmation bias is, I only watch my channel and whatever they say has to be true because they're the, they're the truth tellers and the other guys are liars.

So that brings up another point. I don't even know how to ask this without sounding heartless, but should you even care? And what I mean by that is. If I'm worried about every political thing, if I'm worried about every other state, if I'm worried about what's happening in Iran, if I'm worried about Mexico and uh, Canada and Greenland and uh, Panama, like, holy cow.

Like I can't change any of that, but I can affect my family and how my kids grow up. So should we only be worried about. What we can truly control and tell the news media to stick it. I, I think we should be generally aware of what's going on in the world. So I guess my argument to that though, just to is how much time does it take to be genuinely aware from an actual intellectual standpoint?

Mm-hmm. Yeah, I'm, I don't have a hard and fast rule of how long I allow myself to consume news. I mean, I'll definitely go down rabbit holes and, you know, try and research a topic and form my own opinions about things. But I, I think that if, if someone came up to me and told me about something going on in Iran, I'm not gonna waste time sitting there arguing with them about it.

Like, I'll, I'll consume and absorb a lot more than I'll. Spew out because I, I just, I don't know, I don't know how all these things affect each other, but I, I, I know enough to where if someone's talking about it, I can receive that information and at least know what they're talking about. Yeah. I don't know.

I, obviously, this is a struggle of mine, like, how much do you, like, I try to watch the news, especially from a business standpoint and what's going on and how are terrorists affecting this, that, and the other. Is there a, you know. Issue with the supply, like from a plumbing standpoint, from a trucking standpoint, how, how does all that affect us, you know, some kind of shipping issue at a port or, you know, uh, all those things matter when, when it comes to your business, but how do you, how do you balance those?

Well, and, and I think that the, the opposite is just as dangerous, spending too much time in the news. Is just as dangerous to spending the least amount of time in the news. 'cause not not just about what you said about being misinformed or uninformed, but even the in inner workings of it, if. You take the time to read through every news story, news article that you see, then you, you've got so much conflicting information that's going in.

It's chaos. You can't keep things straight, but if you try and spend the least amount of time, what you're gonna do is read through headlines and all you're ever gonna see is the headlines. You're never gonna know the context of the story. And there has been many, many YouTube videos that just go over how the headlines completely.

Tell a different story. The, the same event, going back to this Minnesota thing, like I was just something the other day, and I don't remember the, you know, New York Times CNN, I don't remember who it was, Fox News, whatever it was. But they had a headline that was like polarizing and then like the first paragraph was like basically tied to the headline.

And then once you get all the way down to the bottom, it's like what you really needed to know. Mm-hmm. And like. It almost contradicted what the headline was. So if you just read the headline in the first paragraph, you were thinking A happened, but it really, it was z. Do you remember the, the news, uh, headlines when that marine on the subway took out someone who was threatening others?

Do you remember that? And, and, uh, tried to disable him and wound. Choking him out until he, he died. The, the headlines were like, should this murderer walk free? And, you know, all this, all this stuff. And then you read through it and, and it's just completely different from the headline. So I, I think that it's very dangerous.

And, but journalists know that that's what gets clicked is the, the divisive stuff. And just like you said with our thumbnail, we could start this video with a very bold statement that's divisive and it'll get far more views than us. Talking about peace and how we believe that both sides, you know, should have a voice and that you know, right to protest.

Protest is good and all these things doesn't matter. Doesn't get as many clicks as us being divisive and almost having hateful words. So we look at things unlike, oh my goodness, this is the worst thing in the world, or whatever. Statistically speaking though, right now is the safest. Time to ever live. You know, as far as life expectancy is up, your, uh, chances of getting murdered or robbed and suffer all time light, think we just hit a lowest race since 1900 for murders in America.

You see all this negative news, but is it really that bad? And, and that's my, my biggest issue is like you watch all this stuff and you don't hear the good things. I think, I think at a certain point it becomes the boy who cried wolf is like, the news headlines are so bad all the time and everything's chaos, and the world's ending that when something happens where the world truly is ending, we're all just like, oh gosh.

Like I, I made this, that argument during COVID. Mm. Like

I, this will sound horrible, but. We had all this fear and anxiety about COVID and it realistically turned into nothing. Burger, you know, and what happens next time? How many people when it's actually bad? Next time. And the statistics are what they said initially for COVID is actually true. That no one listens.

But even, I mean, after the 2016 election, like I, I stopped really talking, focusing on politics. I just saw how much anxiety it gave me and how I was obsessing over it and how that's not healthy. When COVID did come around, I'm just thinking back through the way that I reacted to the news headlines and like we were on a plane, so.

At that time we were flying to Hawaii and we left Travis Air Force Base. The first plane of COVID patients coming out of China landed in Travis Air Force Base as we were taking off. And so looking at the headlines and seeing all that stuff like, oh, wow, like a plane full of sick people just landed at Travis, like, didn't really think much of it.

And then looking back at the news, it's like I, I would love to see a, a montage of just my reactions to these news stories. Just being like, oh, people are dying. This is getting kind of bad and. Like going through it and like, oh gosh, they're shutting down the country now. And like didn't really realize how bad it was until I was stuck at home and, and I say stuck at home, meaning like, you're not allowed to go grocery shopping.

'cause I lived in Minnesota and it was, we, we talked previously about how bad California was. Minnesota was just as bad. But you, you would've thought that the plague, you know, bub bubonic plague came out. And I mean, it, it was awful. And this is during all the George Floyd riots. So. It, it was a terrible time to be in a blue state.

But my point in saying that was the, the how, reading all the news headlines is just unfazed. Like, you just start to become so callous to it that it's like, like, oh, just, just another murder today. You know? Like they don't, everything is so chaotic all the time that it's hard to really appreciate when something is bad.

So. Loaded question. How do you fix that? What can be done? What, from a grassroots standpoint? 'cause realistically that's what we're talking about. Like we're not some national, you talk about celebrities and stuff like that. We're not a national, you know, have all this pool or anything like that. We're talking grassroots.

How do you at the grassroots level affect that? I, I think. Like you said about in independent journalists and us doing our part to form our own opinions and not just going with what, you know, the, and like you said about the wealthy people that have a motivation to get people to think a certain way and they manipulate and all that stuff.

Like I, I agree with that on both sides. I think that they are manipulating people and there's a lot of stuff that we don't see or don't understand or this subliminal impact of some of the things that we're consuming, but I think that. You know, consuming positive content instead of brain rot. You know, that's, that's probably the first place to go.

And formulating your own opinions, um, surrounding yourself with free thinkers that aren't just gonna condemn you for disagreeing with them. Like, I mean, I feel like you and I have more conversations about what we disagree on than what we agree on, and you're one of my closest friends, so, so I, I wanna talk two parts to that.

You said free thinking, I would say critical thinking. Mm. And free flow of speech. So I personally feel like those are two things that have been taken outta school. Hmm. So we have individual clubs that people belong to, and you, you sit in your individual club and you, you get around your same circle of people and there's no critical thinking taught in school.

Go down the rabbit hole, whether we think that's. Neglect or complicitness or whatever. Uh, but I think that's part of the homeschool movement that's going on in, in the country is like, we want people to be able to think for themselves. We want free thinkers, we want creative, uh, thinking and thinking outside the box.

And, uh, it, it just, it doesn't happen and it just, how, how do we bring that into. I don't know. My frustration's coming out on my questions, but how, how do we do that? How do we make people to think for themselves instead of just reading a news headline and say, this person's wrong and they need to burn in hell for it?

Hmm. No, I think we, we've had, I feel like the same type of conversation. Half a dozen times since we started this podcast and every time the conclusion that we come to is be the change that you want to see in the world is con you can only control your own two feet. And so, you know, I, I would choose to not engage in conversations of, you know, hatred of, you know, bashing heads with someone who disagrees with me.

I'm just not gonna engage with it. I, I don't have time for that. So should you engage with it? I, I don't, I don't think so. Like, if I have a completely varying degree. Um, than you do. I think I said that wrong, but anyhow, uh, we're completely different. Should we be able to have those conversations civilly?

Mm. And I, I, I think that's the only way that your, the aperture of your life opens up is by having those conversations, like, we'll take finance and finance as a example, having a job. Where you just work at W2 and you're at the mercy of your employer to give you a pay raise every year. Versus branching out and being an entrepreneur where you control your own destiny.

I guess two vastly different viewpoints, but unless you have a conversation with somebody or pick up a book or Rich dad, poor dad, you know, something like that, that opens up your, the aperture to what you see, you'll never change. So that, I don't think we're treating it to our own. I, I agree. But what you, what you just said is civilly.

And if, if I can have a civil conversation with someone that disagrees with me, I think that's the most productive time that can be spent. But if I talk to someone that works at W2 and looks at entrepreneurs like idiots, like, what are you doing? You know, I, I can look at someone that works at W2 and I don't think that I'm better than them at all.

Like, 'cause they will have something that I will never have, and that's the ability to clock out at five o'clock. I, for the rest of my life, I will never be able to clock out at five o'clock. There's always something more to do. And so that, that's something that I admire. They can be comfortable and have that, but if they're talking to me like I'm an idiot and I'm talking to them like they're an idiot, that's not a productive conversation.

But if we can civilly talk about the differences in opinion, then absolutely. That's productive. So does that go back to school and teach and debate and being able to have civil discord in school, do you think? I think, I think debate should be taught sooner. I think that. I didn't learn about argumentative fallacies until college.

And I think that that should be taught earlier, like middle school. Is it taught at all though? My, I mean, so my daughter's in debate and they're, they're teaching it there, so, so it was very cool to talk to her about argumentative fallacies. But granted, like when we're talking to, to our kids, you know, at home in parenting, there's argumentative fallacies all the time.

And even even from the parenting side, I was gonna say like sometimes as parents, we're the worst at it because. Hey, can I have this gain? No. Why? Because I'm the dad. And I said, so, like, you're shutting 'em down and you're shutting down any debate in that? I mean, the same thing could be argued like kids are climbing a tree and you're worried about them falling out.

'cause they might break their arm. Like you're, you're teaching them by saying, Hey, get out the tree. You might fall, you're teaching them to let their fear or what's possibly might happen. Take over and, and stunt your growth. So I think parenting has a lot to do with it. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And, and Mike Owen, you know, in, in his book, one of the things about borrowing authority, right?

I feel like we constantly are borrowing authority and the kids start to, I'm, I'm playing that a little bit. So, so borrowing authority is, um, let, let's say that, that my kids are, you know, trying to have ice cream before dinner. And I say, well, no, your mom said you have to wait till dinner. That's borrowing authority.

Even, even though I have, you know, parental authority as well, I'm deflecting it to someone else that they're the bad guy and you can't do it because they said no. That's, that's an example of borrowing authority. The funny thing is I tell a lot of my employees. I say, if you need to do exactly that, be like, Hey, like we do it all the time.

My partner just did it the other day. He was like, oh, I need to talk to my other, uh, business partner. Or you go buy a car and you're like, oh, I, I can't make a decision. I gotta talk to my wife. Yeah. So, but I think that there's one thing when you're an employee and you need to borrow that authority to deflect and be able to work.

Like when you're working with a customer and they're like, gosh, like that price is ridiculous. Like, I'm, I'm sorry, the boss said, you know, inflation's taken a, so that's one example. As a leader, we cannot borrow authority because everything lies on us. So like if you are talking to your employee and they say, you know, I put in this PTO, why did it get denied?

And you say, oh, um, business partner. He said, no. Like, that's a terrible example and you just discredited yourself. So I think that there, there's a time and a place for it, but from a leadership perspective, I, I think that there. Learning these things as a kid, as a middle schooler into high school, understanding how to formulate, you know, discussions and learning about red herrings and you know, the straw, was it straw hat man or straw man?

Straw man. Fallacy. Yeah, straw man, fallacy, stuff like that. Those are the most common things I see that my kids, when, especially you ever listen to your kids argue. Like, sometimes you just listen to it and you're like, you guys are all ridiculous. Like, none of that makes any sense. And especially, you know, we have such a range with the oldest that is still at home is 15 and the youngest is five.

There's a 10 year gap of just chaos and most arguments don't follow any one line of thinking. It's, they are all over the place. So I think learning that at a younger age would lead to more productive conversations as they get older. Yeah, I, I just go back to like, I don't feel like I was like, I never did debate.

I never did. Straw man fell like I never learned any of that. And by me not learning it, then I don't teach it to my kids. They don't teach it. And then we, we come, we've become so disjointed in our ability to have a conversation and to be able to constructively disagree with somebody and, and get to something.

What's the, um. Uh, the FBI negotiator, uh oh. Never split the difference. You never split the difference. Mm-hmm. Like, he talks a lot about that in there and like staying grounded, staying his late night DJ voice. Yeah. Just brings some calm to the conversation, calmness to it, and, and how do you want me to do that?

Oh, you know, like just those little things like that. Those psychological cues that might help us overcome things. You're looking up something. So, so I, I just wanted to share the top argumentative fallacies because this is, this is the most fascinating I, I thing I learned in my pre-law class. And I think that I wish I'd learned this at a young age.

And these are, there are tons of different, um. Logical fallacies, but these are the, the most common argumentative fallacies. Um, and it says that, uh, the most common argumentative ones that crop up in debates, legal studies, and everyday rhetoric, um. So add addium, which is against the person. Instead of addressing the actual argument, the speaker attacks the character or personal traits of the opponent.

The goal is to discredit the argument by insulting the person making it AKA political news. Right now, every, every political news, they that discredit what the, like you could agree that Trump says killing is bad. He says, well, Trump cheated on his taxes in 2016. Therefore he is, he's false. Like that, that is the perfect example.

The straw man. Uh, this occurs when someone takes an opponent's argument and distorts or exaggerates it to an extreme version than attacks the straw man version instead of the, the real point. That's abortion. So the example is, we should put more money into public education. And then the response is, so you want to leave our country defenseless by cutting the entire military budget.

So it's just being overly dramatic, but yes. Yeah, when, whenever you say that, that's what I think of for abortion. 'cause they, they take the 1%, the transgender is another topic. Like we take the extreme, whichever way. And, and we use that as an extreme anchor. Same thing you do with pricing and stuff like that.

Mm-hmm. It's very similar. Like you just, they dropped this extreme anchor and like, well, what if somebody was raped and incest? Okay, let's talk about the other 99% of, of things and then deal with the 1%. Yeah. And so they argue the, the, it's a straw man. Yep. Yep. Um, the next is slippery slope. A claim that a re relatively small first step will inevitably lead to a chain of related and usually negative events.

Without providing evidence that such a chain will actually happen. Gun control. So that's when, when you say that, I think a gun control, I'm just picking up political things they say, they use the term, we just want common sense gun laws without defining what common sense gun laws is. So you enact a common sense gun law.

And it doesn't work. The slippery slope fallacy says Eventually you're gonna lead all the way down to taking my guns. You don't have any evidence of that, but mm-hmm. Well, and, and things like, you know, if we don't enact gun laws, then eventually, you know, guns are gonna wind up in preschools, and preschoolers gonna start killing each other.

Wow. Like, that's the slippery slope. And this one uses even less, you know, violent ones. If we let students use AI for one essay, they'll stop learning how to write entirely and eventually nobody will be able to communicate at all. Like that's a slippery slope fallacy. So false. The next one's false dilemma either or.

This fallacy presents only two options as the only possibilities when in fact more options exist. It's a way of forcing choice in a complex situation, and that's used in sales a lot too. Yeah, so one thing I've talked to people on my team about. Is I want three options on everything. You can always do it in an A and B, but when you have to look for options, C, you have to think outside the box.

A lot of times, like a lot of things are A or B, like black or white. You know, we, but what is the gray or how, how do we find something that's outside the box? Yeah. Well, and and the false dilemma also, usually one of the answers is so completely. False that it, that it falls into that straw man, you know, or slippery slope that they're manipulating you to.

Or you can only answer that. Right. And, and in the pol in politics, you hear it all the time. Like, if you don't agree with this, then you must agree with that and that is terrible. So when I worked at headquarters in the Air Force, we always had to do decision briefs, like they call 'em COAs. So, uh, course of action.

Hmm. So I'd brief in general and like. The general was just the decision maker at that time. Like I would be the person getting all the information, bringing it to the general, be at whatever level, and we'd have to give a COA briefing, and you always had one throwaway in there. Mm-hmm. So it was like, there's just ridiculous multiple choice questions too.

Yeah. And so it's just this one throwaway where you're always like. What will never happen. Mm-hmm. But you always had to have at least three COAs and a lot of times you had one throwaway coa. Yeah. And, and if you look at test taking. Most of the time one, maybe two of the answers are throwaways. So yeah. Uh, the next is hasty generalization.

This happens when someone draws a broad conclusion based on sample size that's too small or unrepresentative. So the example is I met two people from Chicago who are rude. Therefore, everyone in Chicago is unfriendly. That is a favorite one of the politics. I'm trying to think of it from a political standpoint.

I, I don't what? Look at gun control. Unpack it. What do you mean? Well, this, this white male shot up at a school, so anyone that owns a weapon is capable of violence. That's a hasty generalization. Right? And, and again, like you said, the, the small subset of the population does not represent the whole, and the the same is true with, um, go, go to the riots going on right now.

There's been, I think you were talking before, I knew there was two shootings of people. You said there was three. Uh,

I have no idea. It wasn't there. Not the cops. You know, a video, a 32nd video or three second video doesn't tell me enough detail for me to make a decision. So I, I wanna lead the decision making out of it, but I will make the argument that of those three shootings, there's a. Complete possibility that one of those cops was pissed off in a bad mood, made a terrible choice, and killed somebody, uh, by being a bad cop, you know, just mm-hmm.

I, I don't know that to be true, but I'm just saying hypothetically, but then the argument's gonna be all ice is bad, all, all, and we need to abolish ice. Well, the problem with this is there's two separate. Issues going on and they're just intermingled into one protest. But it's the anti-police brutality.

You know, police have too much power argument. And also we don't like that ICE is out here deporting people. Well, I, I think going back to your very early on initial thing that people are bringing people in, I think they're bringing them in for political reasons to detract from the initial. Thing that was happening there.

Mm-hmm. Because ICE did show up on the scenes as soon as, uh, Nick Shirley put on that video. Mm-hmm. It was happening before that. And this was just a same argument they make about the, uh. Trump covering up with the, uh, Jeffrey Epstein stuff like mm-hmm. Oh, Trump just invade Venezuela to detract from Jeff, Jeffrey Epstein.

Well, and, and, uh, for the record, I, I love life and, you know, so if I don't show up to, to the next podcast, just know that. We're onto something here, but, um, someone just got subpoenaed into Congress and didn't show up for it, and all this political unrest happens, you know. Um, are you talking about a Clinton?

Uh, yeah. Both of them actually. They both were subpoenaed and they didn't show up. And, uh, what were they subpoenaed for? I, I, I don't, I think it was to talk on the Epstein case. And so for their involvement or whatever. And, and, um, and they said that they're not going, they're not showing up. And so then I, I, the next steps, I don't know what, where it's at right now, I haven't checked on it recently, but the next steps, if you disobey a, a legal subpoena, is there's a warrant out for your arrest.

So, dunno where that's going, but we haven't heard anything about it because there's so much other stuff distracting the, the news headlines. So I'm, I'm just saying if you look back at all the, the school shootings there, there's videos and this is me putting my tenfold hat on. School shootings align very close within a month of major political events and primarily ones that attacked the left.

So yeah, I'm uh. I'm gonna say that's a pretty big tinfoil hatch. Yeah. But so, so the next, I'll just pick on you for that one. The next argumentative fallacy is appeal to authority. Uh, when citing, while citing experts is good. This becomes a fallacy when someone claims something is true, simply because an unrelated and unqualified authority figure set it.

Ex exact example. This diet must be healthy because my favorite pro athlete uses it. So it's funny, the first thing that came to mind whenever you said that is actually a marketing campaign from when we were kids. It's like nine out 10 Olympians drink milk or something like that. I don't remember the exact thing, but it's.

Because Olympian drinks milk doesn't mean they're in Olympics 'cause they drink milk, but they tried to tie the two together. Yeah, absolutely. And, and that one's used for marketing quite a bit. I mean, I've seen, I've seen a lot of memes lately about, you know, when you're the, the 10th dentist. Mm. And, and, uh, that it was, it was like all my colleagues said that this was good, like.

No it's not. But yeah, that's nine outta 10 dentists. Choose Colgate or I don't. I'm just making, I don't know what it is, but yeah, that's. Is, is, is that true? Is it just, you know, is it that the 10 that you chose to pick like you Yeah, you interviewed a hundred of 'em and then nine of 'em said that, so you, you chose that nine and then stop the, stop, stop it after that.

Like, yeah, well they, they can't say 10 outta 10 dentists. 'cause that means every dentist, but they say nine out 10 of that subset, you know, maybe is true. But anyways, but that's another one that's not representative of the full populous dentist. Right. Um, the last one is red herring. So it's a diversionary tactic where someone introduces an irrelevant topic into the discussion to divert attention away from the original issue.

So, question, how do you plan to address the rising cost of fuel for your trucks? The answer. We really need to talk about the importance of family values in the workplace. That, that, if you look at any political debates, the best debate, um, they're the best people are able to completely divert the question and the best speakers.

Can take a question and go, you know what, that's a great question. And then they distract over here. I would argue you do that on the podcast. Like that's your, we, we've joked a hundred times about calling this the tangent podcast because you bring all hundred red herrings into the, into it. And I mean, it's the same difference, but I'm just making a joke.

And I, and I think the, the, the difference between a red herring and going on a tangent is the tangent. Just, I'm, I'm following the train tracks and then they go this way. Whereas a red herring is falling this way, and then I'm gonna reintroduce something over here. It's an intentional diversion to, to not answer a question.

And, and we've had people on the podcast who are very good at that. I find, I can't speak to every, every situation like this, but arguing with my wife, like, I'll start making a. Or she'll start making a point that the other one doesn't like. And then you bring up like, well, you did this 17 months ago. And I'm like, what does that have anything to do with what we're talking about right here, right now?

So, yeah, I mean, it's it, but it's a red herring because they're getting frustrated and they, they want to throw, throw off the trail of, uh, what's going on. True. But I, but I also think that, that it's a, um, what was the one about an attack on your character? Uh, against the person ad adin. So it's attacking per, yeah, it's attacking personal traits rather than addressing the problem.

And I think that's a natural human reaction is most people do that. That's probably the easiest one. That's why it's the first one that we did. Yeah. So, well, this was a interesting topic and like I said, it's, I, I dunno, I struggle with this one. Personally a a lot, like how much time do I wanna spend on the news?

How much time do I wanna argue with somebody or just try to have a conversation? And at what point do you just realize like, it's not gonna make a difference, it's not gonna move the needle. Like they're, they're dug in or whatever. And should we do more critical, excuse me, critical thinking and school, should we go over some of these fallacies and stuff like that and like, yeah.

We, I had come back to, I think we teach the wrong thing in school, but that's my, my personal beliefs there. Yeah, I, I agree a hundred percent. I think that you asked how do we fix this? And I think, again, through education is if people are more educated on these fallacies, they will be less objective to the effects of them.

And when you see two political candidates debating about topics, they. The, the reason most people watch the debates is for the zingers is for those one attacks, the, you know, the clip worthy stuff, and both candidates are trying to get those clips, which is why they steal more of the show. And you see, they started putting time limits and you, they're trying to talk more because it's, it's more about the screen time than it is about what they're actually saying.

So I think if people were more aware of what was being said and not just how it's being said, then. I think that they can be less influenced by it. And as a society, we become, we, we take back the control of the, of the country. Well, I think what you just said is taking control back of the country for, at the end of the day, how do we build our freedom back?

How do we take back freedom to freedom of press? How do, how do we. Independent journalist, how do, how do we own all this stuff as a society? And I think that's what it comes back to, is like educating yourself, being a free thinker, being a, uh, being able to think critically, talking to your kids for me, like I try to go back to.

What did, what would Jesus say if he was looking at the situation? You know, that's just personal, but I, I, I think what you said is the perfect way to kind of end this and just own what you can own and do the best you can with that. Hmm. On that tenner, we'll end this one. It's been a pleasure doing this podcast with you from, if I don't come back Yeah.