“Tech Terrors, Calling Out Fascism in Small Talk, and Progressive Political Strategy” with Ilana Glazer

On this week’s solo episode of It’s Open, Ilana reviews some recent headlines on advancing technologies against the people’s will for all types of surveillance 🤮 She calls for the It’s Open community to kick off neighborly discussions by naming authoritarianism in order to de-normalize it, and to underline the risks around, as well as great promise of, our 2026 midterm elections in November. This is democracy strategy toward a United States truly for the people, by the people. And forreal: it is within reach.

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Host: Ilana Glazer
Producers: David Rooklin, Annika Carlson, Madeline Kim, Kelsie Kiley, Glennis Meagher
Video Producers: Lexa Krebs, Louise Nessralla
Audio Producers: Nicole Maupin, Rachel Suffian
Lighting Director: Kevin Deming
Editor: Tovah Leibowitz
Graphics: Raymo Ventura
Outro Music: Don Hur

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Transcript

0:00

Hello, hello. Hi. Welcome to It's Open with Ilana Glazer. I'm your host, Ilana Glazer. This world that we are in is, it is just fucking wildly insane. It's so insane. This is like the day-to-day battle is to stay in your life and live your life moment to moment and not feel like you are living the headlines you read. Oh my God, I am 38 years old. I was born in 1987, so I was like a little kid in the nineties, and this country has always been a fascist one for black people and native people. The rule of law is on a spectrum from fascism to democracy, and the dials have been turned such that we're all living under fascism now, and white people are really understanding The fascist framework that this country can and has operated under the country has been on a spectrum from fascism to democracy since its inception as the country we know today. And now for a while when ai, when everybody started realizing how dangerous this is, the internet was saying AI is gentrification for white people, which is true, but now it's clear that it's actually colonization for all people and we're in this moment, the power structures that we live under create binaries to own us, man or woman. Well then we're going to fuck women over rich or poor. We're going to fuck poor people over black or white. We're going to fuck black people over. They made the binary. So now we're all seeing in binaries, we are now in this moment of pro-human or anti-human, just pro-human, pro-human rights. People want to parse out. I believe that although I am a Jewish American, I don't have some loyalty to the idea of Israel because I've always lived in the United States. I have loyalty to New York City, that's my Israel. Okay, you want to parse out my speaking up for the dignity, safety, and basic human rights that Palestinian people, families, and children deserve or anti-human right now, what are we even parsing out here in the United States? Data centers are springing up and by the way, being fought back on and not being implemented in many places because the people, no matter what fucking party they check off on their little ballot, are working together to fight big tech and keep data centers out of their towns because these creeps, these big tech techno fascist creeps are anti-human and they want to give our water to their AI data centers that are bloating, leading up to fucking nothing. They want to poison our land. They want to take our land, they want to take the fucking soil off, and literally they're creating new dust bowls for their ai, AI data centers, and it's just anti-human. It is anti fucking human. They are so violent and it really feels like they want to enslave all humans and then just create some world where they're, it really feels like actually that these big tech tech, no fascists, and of course the Republicans who are in my opinion, sucking their dicks want to create AI and prop it up because it is their only ability to create and what they think is comparable to creating human life, which only women can do. It is misogynist. It is woman hating and it's humanity hating as is all misogyny, as is all racism. They think this is their little baby and it's like not AI just steals human data and becomes the most average version of fucking everything. It really is white male mediocrity as software. It's not anything new. It's completely uncreative and it totally and literally appropriates all human magic creativity, our faces, our eyeballs, the way we speak, the way we write, just to average it and makes something that can sort of sound like or look like humanity, but just doesn't have that sparkle and them getting even realer. The best they can do is copy better. They can't even create anything and they're violent. Man. I don't know if you saw these horrific headlines right before the US bombed Iran for, I guess to distract us from the Epstein files, there was this headline that said that Anthropic AI wouldn't let the US government use clawed their chat bot for lethal purposes, wouldn't let them use clawed, the chatbot for murder. Andro said, no thanks Anthropic. So guess who stepped in to say they would let the government use their AI for murder? Sam Altman. They somehow found the deal with Sam Altman and made a deal with open ai, and then I saw the New York Times writing an article about this as though it's fucking normal as though this is a normal article and a normal headline. All this shit is scary, right? I've been thinking also about leadership and the voice of a leader. It's scary, but we have to be brave. And honestly that LOL, literally that animated movie Brave, I think they have this line about if it weren't scary, you wouldn't be being brave, dark, chuckle, which is what I call Mark Zuckerberg dark chuckle just until six years ago was these people were including him. Tech had a bent toward at least culturally representing progress, and there was this moment in time in Facebook and Meta and Instagram's trajectory where Mark Zuckerberg, I had a friend who worked at Facebook for a long time, and then other people I know, this very smart woman who had worked at Facebook also, they moved to the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, CZI, and it was like an initiative for progressive policy and they had forward us fwd, US Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, mark Zuckerberg had forward us, and this was a tool, a really effective tool to get people registered to vote. They were trying to do voter empowerment work that was just a few years ago, and the tides have turned and they've just grabbed onto the coattails of whoever's in power and they're fully, they appear to be fully in the government surveillance business now. So this other piece of horrific news that I saw on Instagram while it was extracting my biggest emotions was that meta, their glasses are, they're trying to not release their meta glasses until they're in the clear for not being regulated, and these are facial recognition tools that are going to take pictures without people knowing you're wearing glasses and it takes pictures of people non consensually. This is like a badly written version of a 1980s movie of an evil nerd in high school who can't get laid making these ugly, stupid fucking glasses that can record presumably upskill shots, down shirt shots. What else could these be used for other than abusing people and specifically women and girls also, they are so ugly, they look so stupid, and when I see dark chuckle, I don't know why I'm coding his name, mark Zuckerberg Ashkenazi Jewish man, millennial from Westchester, New York. When I see him wearing these glasses, it softens it because it looks like just like a nerdy dude wearing these glasses. This is like a piece of evil technology, evil. The last horrible piece of news was that Apple bought a company for $2 billion that allows them to listen to silent speech, which means whispers and I can only imagine mouthing things so our phones can listen to us even more. So this made me lose my mind. I was like, this is so, so fucking scary, and I really feel like these billionaires want to enslave humanity, kill whoever doesn't want to go along with their stupid, stupid and bad plans, and I also get the sense that they want us to kill each other. They want us to certainly hate each other. They have all these hateful comments. Whenever I post something about human rights, specifically within the conflict of Jews and Arabs and Israel and Palestine, the hateful comments I get, I'm like, I get that there's anti-Arab, certainly anti-Arab sentiment, there's anti-Semitic sentiment, but I do not spend much time on it, but all this to say shit is bots. There are so many bots. These billionaires invented bots to make us think we're fighting each other even when we're not. When I take myself away from social media and from short form scrolling and it's burning my fucking brain and making me so upset, I really find that the moment I start talking to people and I love people, I love talking to people, and I love talking to people about sharing reality, they want to fracture our reality. I think it is so important that we weave a sense of shared reality at the top of all of our conversations because it lets us all remember and know that we mostly more agree with each other than disagree. James Erika won the primary in Texas. He is the Democratic senator candidate for Texas. This year, James has been saying that the fight in this country, the people in charge want us looking left to right, but the real fight is top to bottom and the bottom, which by the way is 99% of us. The bottom is becoming more united in my opinion, and not just in my opinion, actually in my lived experience, I really don't care how much money they have. I don't care. All these horrific policies, they are literally killing us. The Republicans or the people in power, federal agents, ice have killed Americans and had no trials. They're going on. They're out there living free. The government has killed people in plain sight. I'm holding that while I'm saying they are not as powerful as the people. The people still have the power and the more united we are, the more efficiently that power can be executed. This administration has the lowest approval ratings They know, they absolutely know that if and when in this country we have safe and fair US midterm elections in November, they will lose and there will be an historic sweep among candidates running on platforms for basic human rights for Americans. So they are in the meantime coming up with all the different ways they can cancel the elections. In my opinion and in the opinion of many people I know and respect, that's why they bombed Iran so that they can say, we're at war with Iran, guys. They are coming for our elections. That is why they had ice terrorized and also murder US citizens actually execute US citizens. They are doing that to show the rest of the country, you better watch out on the midterms in November. Ice is going to be there. We're going to be disrupting these elections. Well, here's what I want to say about that. I said this before, I'm going to say it again. I'm organizing with some really smart women, a campaign called Moms and Neighbors for Safe and Fair, US Midterm Elections 2026. This is a pointedly, non-controversial deescalating campaign to center moms in the narrative in order to soften the fight for safe and fair elections in the midterms. This originally started in my mind as moms and neighbors for a global standard for basic human rights because you know what? Fascism is on the rise globally and people around the world, most people around the world want most people around the world to have basic human rights. Now, listen, listen, LOL, you are, the world follows. The United States' lead. Culturally, the world follows. Black Americans lead because black Americans are the leaders of American culture and civil rights is, well, I'll say this, freedom. People who settled this country and colonized this country and enslaved people to build this country they couldn't have otherwise. They had ideas about liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and then the people who were enslaved to build this country actually somewhat ironically created the path to true freedom, and that's the civil rights movement. We have the blueprint, we have our historic heroes and their blueprint. We have their books. We know how to achieve freedom. Right now, we are in a shift, late stage capitalism, the empire of the United States as it's been pretending that it is a place for freedom for all is falling, but what can and is emerging is a true civilization, not just a society, not a capitalist structure, a civilization where people are working together in their communities to stay safe and to see Zoran Momani pass universal childcare and 2K like preschool for two year olds, which helps working parents work and know their kids are taken care of for free. That is a civilization that is civilized us working to the fucking death just to pay our bills and accrue no wealth is not civilized. That is something else that is dying, and the administration right now is so unpopular it is actually dying. That's why they are so violent and ratcheting up and we're in a messy moment. It's hard to say. There's no really winners or losers right now. We're all kind of losing because living in this fucking painful time together and just to see the suffering, to know this suffering is happening, to know that this girl's school was bombed in Iran, I can't know it so bad, so it's such a fucking travesty of human life, but we can vary economically and more efficiently than you think, unite and work together to get to those safe and fair midterm elections in November, and when we do, it will be an historic sweep and that can be what we make. America's 250th anniversary mean that we finally have our sights set on a democracy for the people by the people. We can do this. You should talk to everyone you know about the midterms. If you're like, where do I start in working towards safe and fair elections this November? When you talk to anyone in your community, talk about authoritarianism or fascism, whatever word choice you like, just weave it in. How are you doing? This country is so divided, it's really terrible. Name fascism, de-normalized what's happening. It's not normal and just point it to the midterms and say, what I'm concerned about is the safety and fairness of the midterm elections in November. Start there. Let's start there. That to me is the call to action for this Moms and Neighbors project is going to be volunteering to work at the polls, but while I work with moms first and Brittany Pak, Nick Cunningham and Glennys and Ranya, Patrice, we're like, how are we really going to make this happen leading up talk to your communities about fascism right now and how it's going to connect to the US midterm elections. We're getting breaking where Trump just fired? Christie Nome. Okay, one monster. It's a monster. Swap the monster mash. You've heard of the monster Mash, right? It's a fucking monster swap. What fucking monster is he going to put in this monstrous place? She's going to leave shitty sludge behind her and then new shitty sludge is going to take her place. Great. Let's bleep these words, all of them, but evil, white supremacist, you know the Democratic Party. I'm also like, Ew, you guys are nothing, but the party is splitting into true progressives who fight for human rights and corporate centrist nothings. I saw Jennifer Welch on, I've had it. It was a great phrase. She said, Gavin Newsom's death March to the center. I was like, woo. And it's exactly true. It's just nothing. What does it even mean the center? It's justs. Just absolutely nothing. May God bless us soon with centrist Democrats being the Republicans and progressives being our mainstream left and they're waiting for the proper as though this is business as usual, waiting to waiting for the primaries for presidential candidates in 2028. We are not in normal times can we nominate a OC to be the presidential candidate? Now, does that sound right to you? I'm curious what you think a OC had some of the highest percentage of Democrats who also voted for Trump in her district. I hate this argument that younger women of color, it just couldn't happen yet. People say usually white people who are like think that they're being safe and protective, but I'm like, what are we talking about? We are in unprecedented times now. We need the person. We need the narrative. We need the hero. Okay, this has been so intense. I want to just wrap it up. I announced that I'm going on tour. I am so fortunate, my God, it is so much fun. I'm having so much fun with standup, but it has been a long journey for me to go from anxious and self-loathing to enjoying it and loving it. I don't think I'm unique in that, but I'm just fucking loving it, and the feeling of the act of getting together to laugh is so magical and is so spiritual for me. It truly feels in line with my Judaism, my spirituality. I'm really looking forward to this and I feel so fortunate that I have this to look forward to buy tickets if I'm in your city and let's hang out and have fun and laugh and allow me to perform for you, but also if it's not this, I guess I just want to evoke the feeling of knowing the organization that it takes to get people together. Whatever it is that is your tour, or even going to see a music show or something or a standup show or whatever, just getting together with people. That is reality. That is also reality. These headlines, there's an element of reality, but you are lived in the limits of your body's reality. Let's get together and whether it's on my tour or something else, just remember to get out there and get your body among other bodies, even just going to a coffee shop, even going to the mall, walking around, seeing people, whatever. Just a reminder that our lives are really actually majority not the scrolling that we're doing, and it is the lived experience we're having within the limitations of our sweet little bodies, and I hope you can find a good feeling in person IRL experience soon and maybe create in your mind a series of those things to count on. Because in my experience of planning this tour and knowing I'm going to see my peeps all around the country and in Europe actually this time, my first time touring in Europe, it feels so damn good. So yeah, just a reminder that you can put your phone away, you can turn it off. You can have time limits around it. My brother has an alarm set for when he hits 15 minutes on Instagram. So smart and good. Yeah, get out there in person and talk to your people and share reality. They're systematically fracturing our reality. Let's share our reality and create our reality. And I think that's all I got you guys. God bless you. I love you. This has been, it's open with Ilana Glazer and it has also been a star pick production. I want to thank my creative producers, Annika Carlson, David Rooklin, Madeline Kim, Kelsie Kiley, and Glennis Meagher. I want to thank the good, smart, creative, good taste, people with good taste, who set up the look and the feel and the sound and the visuals for this show, which are Kevin Deming, Nicole Maupin, and Lexa Krebs. I want to thank Raymo Ventura for the graphics and the opening musical sting. I want to thank Tovah Lebowitz for his awesome editing and just create a partnership on this show, and I want to thank Don Hur the band for their outro music, and I believe that is all. Take care of yourselves and see you next time.