Protests, Morality, and Change
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In this episode, I'm joined by Jordan Criss and Joe Jackowski. With both of them here, we dive into making sense of the events over the last few weeks.
I opened it with thinking about how the decisions we make will affect not only my life. But the life of my friends and my future children and the children of my friends. And that's where I'm at with all of this, regardless of where, what side you fall on, with all of these arguments going around or anything like that.
It falls on what kind of society do we want to live in?
From my perspective, I see many of these problems as challenging to look at systematically or to solve them on a large scale. I mostly turn to the individual and if people aimed to be as good as they could be with themselves and those around them. Then that informs the society we live in.
What we need to do is understand where other people are coming from. We mentioned a couple of podcasts here and other ideas such as Daryl Davis on Joe Rogan, which I will have a link in the description. And it would help if you watched that podcast. I think him as an example to understand people who are not like you or at least give people the benefit of the doubt. And for him, it always stemmed from the question: How can you hate me if you don't even know me? And I think that's powerful because that's the essence of many of these ideas that have been brought to the surface.
And if you sit down with someone and try to understand them, you realize they're more like you then you would have thought otherwise. They have the same problems that you do, the same worries you do, and the same hopes in the same dreams that you do. Period.
We also cover some ground, understanding morality, and ethics on what it means to be a police officer. And not only just the police officer but in general. I offer a look at What happened through the eyes of a surgeon's code of ethics provided by Peter Attia and normative error. If you want to look it up, I will provide a link in the description. And also offer a link to that podcast that Peter did with his daughter that I mentioned.
But beyond this. We're trying to tackle human nature and human psychology. Many of the problems we're facing are having trouble with how our society is structured. Our society's size is so big that we're not capable of understanding or connecting with all of the people around us. And what we mentioned there has Dunbar's number. We need to do work on trying to create a better framework for understanding other people in our society who may not be experiencing it as we do. Because there's such a kaleidoscope of ways of living in this country That it's, it's challenging for any one person to understand what it's like to live another person's life. And I guess that should go without saying, but we oversimplify these things, and we'd need to be more compassionate.
And to wrap up this intro, I thought COVID would be a wake-up call for our society. And. Honestly, it seems like that's still to be the case. And I mentioned it toward the end of this podcast, thinking about 2025 and how we work through this because I think we do need to start thinking about that.
Because it's not about getting through one day and keeping the foot on the gas now, it's about how do we think about setting. The right step forward for the next decade or further, right. And if we, if we put our honest effort. Now we have a shot of putting a solid step forward to creating a better society.
And so with that, everyone, please enjoy this podcast with Joe Jackowski and Jordan Criss.
Show Notes:
[00:06:45] Opening to the conversation
[00:08:19] The Chaos of the last few weeks
[00:09:06] Jordan's Account of the Chicago Protest
[00:16:01] Aftermath of the protests
[00:19:58] Hierarchical Systems
[00:23:58] Extreme End of Brutality
[00:27:13] Awareness and escaping the moment
[00:34:56] Everyday people and trained professionals
[00:36:52] Normative Error and Peter Attia
#113: Normative errors — a conversation with my daughter about current events | Peter Attia
Ethical Issues of Adverse Events | Krizek TJ. Surgical Error: Ethical Issues of Adverse Events. Arch Surg. 2000;135(11):1359–1366. doi:10.1001/archsurg.135.11.1359
[00:40:50] The Moral Element
[00:43:19] Daryl Davis
#1419 - Daryl Davis (YouTube) | Joe Rogan Experience
The Audacity of Talking About Race With the Ku Klux Kla | The Atlantic
[00:48:10] How can someone hate me if they don't even know me?
[00:52:35] Dunbar's Number
[00:56:22] Dave Chappelle
[00:59:26] The rawness of this time period
[01:06:35] The Streets are speaking for themselves
[01:10:01] An openness to having the difficult conversation
[01:14:51] Converging morally
[01:25:02] Emotional Awareness
[01:26:39] Wrapping up
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Protests, Morality and Change
[00:06:45] Opening to the conversation
[00:06:45] Erich Wenzel: Well, honestly, I'm really excited to bring both obvious to say names, Joe and Jordan, back on the podcast. And in an odd way it's we spent probably the last two weeks, just trying to make sense of the crazy world that we're in.
[00:06:57]it would've been crazy enough just making heads or tails of coronavirus, and now it's starting to release its grip on the United States. And then all of a sudden on top of that, we had the, the murder of George Floyd and then the riots and protests after that, which wound up being more protests than in riot and in the aftermath, which is good.
[00:07:18]But it's just good to have both of you here to kind of make sense of the craziness because that's honestly what it feels like we've been lacking in all of this is there's not really anyone you can turn to. That just feels like a sense-maker right now. and it's not no fault of ours government system as much as I'd like them to try and make sense of it.
[00:07:39] Cause they're doing whatever they can to kind of do what they can and with so many unknowns in this situation. But I also think having our perspective here as people who are going to be who, whatever decisions we make going forward, we are going to be affected by this the most.
[00:07:59] And not only to say us personally, but our children. And those of our closest friends and, the important thing that I go back to is that our friend is going to have a child in like a month at this point. And so going through all of this, I kind of had that really sitting in the back of my head. So with that, I pass it off to you guys.
[00:08:19] The Chaos of the last few weeks
[00:08:19] Joe Jackowski: I mean, just the, you talk about our friend having a kid.
[00:08:23] And I just think about that even now as being an effect, like, I don't know the relationship between. Cortisol in pregnancy on the kids' development, but if she's stressed now, right.
[00:08:37] Jordan Criss: Already implications. that we can't see.
[00:08:40] Joe Jackowski: It's so chaotic right now.
[00:08:45] Everything that has been going on for the last couple of weeks, besides just giving me a headache because of how complicated this is has made it, so that one, one more thing wrong could just be the straw in the camel's back. Yeah, it could just be too much.
[00:09:06] Jordan's Account of the Chicago Protest
[00:09:06] Erich Wenzel: So I think honestly, the best place to start.
[00:09:10] Here before we kind of get into the weeds of the, the aftermath of what has happened. I think Jordan is probably best for you to explain your experience at the protests before they escalated further in Chicago. Yeah. Cause you were the only one that actually went to one of the bigger probably protests when it first happened.
[00:09:28] Jordan Criss: so I guess I'll start by saying, I'm glad I went, It was one of those, it's something that I'll never see them forget. You know what I mean? Like just the feeling like, I don't want to say apprehension, but it was like, I dunno, like you just have people saying like, Hey, I'm going to the protest, like telling my dad that time, Alex, that, and, one of my friend's parents had every, like a lot of people were like, Oh really?
[00:09:47] And kind of like. It might get crazy. Then I'm like my thinking before it was like, why would it get crazy? No, it's not like, this is a message that needs to be said. And you know, these voices need to be heard and it's coming from a good place. Why would it go wrong? so it was like all of that at the same time.
[00:10:05] And, I remember being a little nervous, but still like, no, this is. There's no way this will be twisted because that's just, and everyone sees this. And I know you guys watched the video correctly. Like that, that was one of the most uncomfortable things. Like, I don't know, that was so hard to watch.
[00:10:23] Like I paused it several times and I was like, I want to turn it off. But then what brought me to it was like, no one lived through this or, I mean, ended up losing their life from it, but I was like, they experienced this. Like I should watch it. You know what I mean? That got me through it. So. all of that going around and then finally, you know, I'm downtown Chicago and I get dropped off however many blocks away and I'm walking towards where I forget what the streets were.
[00:10:50] but whatever it was, I was walking towards where the mass congregation was at the protest at the time, I was like, right when it started, like, like two 30 ish, So I'm walking there and it's like empowering. And I hear people like they're wearing their, you know, black lives matter shirts. And like everyone has their fists up and there's people like all through the streets, you know, like outside of their cars, like honking and like they have signs up and just this feeling and like people walking past me, like, you know, putting their hands on my shoulder, like, yeah, we were together, man.
[00:11:17] And I'm like, tearing up like legit. Like now I'm like, I can still feel that emotion. I'm like, okay. This is what it's about. You know what I mean? you know, I don't,
[00:11:26] Erich Wenzel: I also thought too that you, you showed me the picture afterwards that you were showing the cops, but you were on your notes on your phone.
[00:11:34]Jordan Criss: so that was way after, after that. but. I'll get, I guess I'll get through this, but like, you know, at, at a certain point, like it was that it was empowering and then I can kind of feel the shift happening and it was like, we started making our way towards Trump tower. And there were a lot of different crowds.
[00:11:53] So I don't know which ones were going where, but the crowd I was in made us work towards Trump tower and likewise got over the bridge. And we're like the stair steps of Trump tower. And there was like police all around it. And they were like, you're not obviously that would be where a lot of people are.
[00:12:08] Like, you're not getting up here. Cause this is obviously where you guys would want to go. If people were going to flux it up, like just making sense of it. Right. So during that time I could, that's when I started feeling this shit that I was like, no, this is changing from necessarily being empowering, which it still was, but there was like ulterior motives there.
[00:12:27] And I think some people were there that didn't, that weren't part of the empowering message that really just wanted to watch the world burn, not to make a joke or reference, but like, that's kind of the, the idea that I felt, and I was like, this isn't the same thing. So at that point, I had a, wrote a note in my phone and it said, I'm trying to remember what it says specifically.
[00:12:48] I said like, we don't hate you. And like, thank you for all you do or something like that and not verbatim, but basically that's what it said. and I was like, I'm just going to go up to, you know, cops in their cars and show them that. Cause it's not the point of this isn't to say fuck every cop.
[00:13:06] That's not right. That's not the point now to get. Now, if you think about how people are. Yeah. If you want to get a point across, you kind of have to be rash and you have to make headlines and make a message somehow.
[00:13:18] Yeah. So you've kind of have to say, well, fuck all cops. Cause if you just say, well, well, no, it's no fuck I'll cops, but like to swap these few and then like eat, he knows when people are like, okay, whatever, like grab it.
[00:13:30] It's not attention grabbing, you know what I mean? So that's just, yeah. I mean, if you think that's, it's really wrong to say this, but it's kind of just how entertainment works and you kind of have to be entertaining, whether it's negative or positive or somewhere weirdly in between to get people to be like, Oh yeah, that's something I should be paying attention to.
[00:13:47] Yeah. to do that. So I was going up to these cops saying like, yeah, we don't hate you personally yourself. Like, that's not what this is about. And there is, at one point like, cops in there, you know, almost trapped in a way in their cars, you know what I mean? And like, I know people around him and I walked up to him and this was like, you know, I had my hands up to make sure they didn't think I was about to.
[00:14:08] Yeah, I'm sure. but like I had my hands up with the phone out and I like pointed to the phone. And at first the cop looked and kind of waved me off. Like probably thought I was telling him like, fuck you. Like he was going to look at it and it was going to be something, but I was like, no, like, look, and then he looked at like, looked away and then like, looked back.
[00:14:24] And there was like, like he did like a thumbs up and I was like, like mouth, thank you. Yeah. And I was like, yeah, like, this is the energy that needs to be here. It needs to be, we're making a stand. And we're letting you know, we're going to be heard, but at the same time, it's not a personal attack against any one person.
[00:14:41] It's, again, it's way bigger than that. and to the point where like, you know, moving forward, I was actually speaking with the cop, like they had a barricade set up and there are people, you know, trying to, you know, there's some people defending, like they had a line in there, you know, locking arms in front of these cops.
[00:14:58]like, cause there were people trying to throw shit and like get through and just like. Yeah, like whatever it is they wanted to do. And, I stopped and was talking to this cop, you know, I don't remember what I was saying, but I was just like, yeah, like, I don't know. It's crazy. Like I hate the environment that we have to be in that it has to be this way, but.
[00:15:15] It is what it is. And this is the reality that we live in and you can't look past it. Like, it's kind of what I was saying. And he was like, yeah, I understand. Like, you know, we don't condone the actions of our lesser, colleagues or whatever. And, at this point, like I see something in the corner of my eye and I turn, I get hit in the face with a water bottle and then the water bottles open and sprays all over the cop.
[00:15:34] And he's like, get that, get her, get her. And I look at him and I'm like, yeah, honestly, dude, I just have to say, I'm sorry, like. That's not what this is supposed to come to. Right. We're supposed to come to an understanding and he was like, no, thank you. Like I hear you. And I understand, and we shook hands. so yeah.
[00:15:52] And then after that I was like, yeah, it's time for me to get out of here. Whereas like, it was just turning
[00:15:56] Erich Wenzel: something to keep escalating into more and more dangerous territory.
[00:15:59] Jordan Criss: And then you see what happened afterwards.
[00:16:01] Aftermath of the protests
[00:16:01] Erich Wenzel: I mean, just the aftermath was crazy. Know, I, I went to bed that night, just thinking about the protest and then woke up the next morning and just saw it, you know,
[00:16:12] Joe Jackowski: did just the damage
[00:16:14] Erich Wenzel: all up and down downtown Chicago. And I was like, what happened? No, you know, this is so crazy to just see, I mean, just, just for me, like, I understand that this may be insensitive to other people, but it's like just to cause more pain after RD. So much pain has been caused is not. It's just the wrong way to keep going about it. It's like we just can't keep the cycle of continuing because it just builds more resentment for both sides.
[00:16:42] Not even just in respect to what was caused because of George Floyd, but just in terms of this, the animosity between protesters and police. Because if, if the presumption is made on both sides, that it's going to be a confrontation, then the chance of descalating that. Go lower and lower just as a prerequisite.
[00:17:05] Jordan Criss: Yeah. And you enter the situation differently. Yes. If you, if you're going to a club, let's just say like, Hey, we're going out tonight. And they're like, Hey, by the way, there's someone here who has been saying, they're going to, they wanted to fight you for years. They're going to be there. You're going to approach going there.
[00:17:23] Differently. You might avoid going all together
[00:17:26] Erich Wenzel: If your might be smart.
[00:17:27] Jordan Criss: Right. Which would be probably the wisest or you might go there and be like, all right, there's a good chance. I'm like, shit's gonna go down. Yeah. You know what I mean? You are posted definitely. Versus like, yeah. We're just going to go and have a good time.
[00:17:39] You know what I mean? It's a whole different scenario and I think that's, I think that's a good point. Yeah. That's a really good point. There's I mean, this has been going on for years and like, I, I don't even know how to word this. Right. But it's like, What happened with George Floyd opened a lot of eyes, but there've been hundreds of thousands of George Floyd's.
[00:17:59] You know what I mean? Like this has been going on forever, literally since the Dawn of America. You know what I mean? Like it's been like these unrighteous things, so it's like, yes, it's good that this. Not good. You wish it was under different circumstances, but for the sake of conversation, it's good that it was able to open people's eyes.
[00:18:20] But now when you get these protesters, you know, and these things that are happening and like people are rising up coming together against it. You're coming to it as if you're going to a club where someone's ready to fight you. And these cops are like, well, these people don't like us. And at the same time, we're like, well, we're out here, peacefully protesting, but. We might be doing that and then got, might get pepper sprayed or tased,
[00:18:41] Erich Wenzel: like you're twisting the message for your own purposes at this point.
[00:18:44] Jordan Criss: Right. So it's, it's, it sucks. It really does suck, but, and it's so convoluted. Yeah. But that's just where we're at. And it's almost a necessary, like a necessary evil, not that I'm condoning anything, but it's like, What do you think is going to happen?
[00:19:08] You know what I mean? Like that's almost, that's how you have to look at it.
[00:19:10] Erich Wenzel: The reason too, I bring this up and they, I say this on purpose, but it's like a lot of these people on both sides, sides of this that want to overly simplify either side. They're like, Oh well that person just an anarchist, or that person's just an authoritarian or a fascist or whatever, choose your flavor of word.
[00:19:32]that people wound up saying, and. You know, both of you guys serve in the military, obviously in different branches, but you guys know what it's like to serve in an authoritarian system or very hierarchical system that's very rigid on or chains of command. And does that make that system flawed at its core?
[00:19:58] Hierarchical Systems
[00:19:58] Joe Jackowski: Hmm. I'd say there's consequences to that. I don't know. I don't know if it makes a flood per se, because there's at least in the military and probably even in the, in the police, I'd let know less about that. It's necessary that it's a hierarchical ordered system. And in part it's a, there's a historical precedent for that.
[00:20:20] The, this that goes back to Rome, which is that they're kind of thinking was that. War is total chaos, that it is so chaotic that it is almost impossible not to be swept in the chaos. And so you create a culture of hyper order so that it can survive the chaos. It's like building a statue up against the water.
[00:20:47] It better be durable or an in no time flat is going to be totally withered away and needs to be able to withstand the pressure. Right. And so military culture is that hyper order. It is. Everyone has a rank. You go by last names. You're not an individual, in some sense, you all need to be on the same page.
[00:21:07] There's all the debate about who's who and what one, what do you want needs to be out the window when the shit hits the fan? Yeah. And one consequence of that is positive. Which is that, which is that a lot of the things that don't really matter do get just thrown off to the decide. Like I saw people who buy all me and should've totally should've didn't get along all come together because there's just more important things to do.
[00:21:41] And that's encouraging and acts like conflict resolution, like in psychology. One of the ways they deal with conflict resolution is they literally. Take two groups or people who are opposing each other. And then they put them in a situation where they have to work towards a common goal, and that helps them come together.
[00:22:01] Because now they're on the same page, they're doing the same thing. They get that they can work with each other because they're moving in the same direction. Right. So that same thing happens in the military and that's really positive. And I've seen a ton of really cool things. I've seen that reverberate into the veteran community at the university I'm at, but the negative thing.
[00:22:20] Is that there's a price to pay to get that amount of order. Yeah. And it can be rough. I mean, nobody thinks bootcamp is like, you know, picking roses, man. You're not hanging out. And like, you know, with your boys sucks.
[00:22:37] So there's prices to pay. And sometimes that what it requires to become that kind of person is. A rigid, hard, callous type of personality that believes into a time beyond just training and so I'll see on the more authoritarian end of either the police or in the military, that coercive personality manifesting again. And so it's, and I think that personally exists to create order.
[00:23:18] When it's necessary, but when it's not necessary, it's just empty coercion. Yeah. Then that's where it looks like brutality. Right? Well then it's worse. It's worse, right? Because you can be coercive and still be justified, but then it becomes like if somebody's totally misbehaving or, or imagine a guy at the bar who's super drunk and is harassing a chick.
[00:23:38] Well, when you go up to him and you like to push him or get him away, Right. That's coercive, but it's absolutely justified. Right? Right. So there's coercion that's necessary at times, but if the situation doesn't demand for it and that coercion remains present, then that's a real problem. Right. I think.
[00:23:58] Extreme End of Brutality
[00:23:58] Yeah. And so the police brutality is like the extreme end of that. Right? It's we need to instill order and you're seeing clips like this all over the internet right now, protest. It really isn't even in the riots, it's
[00:24:10] Erich Wenzel: like the history now of whatever really captured that never saw the light of day.
[00:24:15] Joe Jackowski: Yeah. Oh yeah. I'm sure there's plenty of it. And people have, I'm sure it is burned into people's memory at certain points, but these moments where it's like the situation we're in is more disorderly than we need. Is chaotic and even dangerous. And so that Courser personality emerges to contend with the disorder and then it almost swallows up.
[00:24:41] Some people like maybe it's necessary for cops to, in a dangerous environment and disorderly environment to be. Like puffed up and assertive and moving forward. Right. So that they're sending the message, like your time to leave when it is. But that doesn't mean that when, when S when somebody approaches or isn't easily, acquiescing to the requests that.
[00:25:20] Their immediate response should be a level 10 when the, when the, the disagreement is like a level three.
[00:25:27] Jordan Criss: Right. Right. And I think that's one of the biggest things. And I mean, all three of us are speaking from the outside and none of us are cops here. Yeah. But I went to school to be a cop, so I know plenty.
[00:25:41] And I have friends with CPD, you know what I mean? They were texting me when I was at the protest. And they're like, Hey, Be careful, blah, blah, blah. And like we had our discussions and stuff, but I just, there's a, there's a line where that, you know, that coercion or it might be necessary, but to do that profession, I feel like you need someone who can fall in line, but at the same time, understand when I need to pull back.
[00:26:04] Yeah. And there's not enough of that, you know, there's, it's, to be honest, it's way too easy to be a cop it's. Way too easy. That would be one of the hardest professions to get into. Yeah, I think it shouldn't be something
[00:26:18] Joe Jackowski: to become a cop. Not necessarily easy to be a cop
[00:26:21] Jordan Criss: become one. Sorry. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And you need people who can be in these super high stress situations where you might need to puff up and be like, okay, everyone, we have it's time to disperse.
[00:26:33] Get out. Right.
[00:26:35] Erich Wenzel: Now this has turned it into something different. Right. And now, instead of protests, now it's
[00:26:38] Jordan Criss: right. And so you need those people that can do that. But at the same time, if it, you know, like that, I don't remember what to sit here with them, but you have a 70 plus year old man coming up to you and you push them over where he now has brain damage.
[00:26:51] Is you really enforcing anything at that point? No. Yeah. You know, who knows that there's ulterior motives there. It's hard to say. and in a lot of these situations, it might be hard to say, But at the same time, you need to be able to look at a situation. And I feel like that's what breeds the best soul soldiers I can say, or even
[00:27:10] Erich Wenzel: basically call like situational awareness.
[00:27:13] Awareness and escaping the moment
[00:27:13] Joe Jackowski: Yeah. And it's, and it's really, it's what it really looks like to me is it's just forgetting situational awareness as like, as it's self contained now that we use to define some military specific thing, but it really is. Awareness. Yeah. Just, just being able to not get caught in it and to go, okay, I'll react to this in one way.
[00:27:36] I can react to this. And it's like a certain level of wisdom that's necessary, which is part of why I'm wanting to make the differentiation between becoming a cop and being a cop. Is that to be a cop? You, it is so hard in part because just having that awareness. I'm really cynical about it. I think it's nearly impossible.
[00:28:00] Then most people like 99.9% of people are not going to be there. Right. And it's not even their fault. This isn't me putting blame on whoever. I mean, and this goes both ways, right. Yet, maybe it sound like I'm defending the cops, but I, the same thing could be applied to defending riders is that when the current shifts, right.
[00:28:19] And you are so deep in it, it's hard to do anything at all that I think about. As an analogy. When I was in California, we were at one of the few beaches in California that he could drink on and was at camp Pendleton where I was stationed. So we were drinking, hanging out with it's girl time and we went out into the ocean and it's a particularly wavy day.
[00:28:41] Right. They're huge. I mean, they might have been like eight, 10 feet waves. Wow. And we were stupid. So it was really, let's call it as far as we can.
[00:28:49] So we get out pretty far. And then as we're trying to come back in, it gets to the point where you can't really swim in because it would where the waves would get pulled out. So he came to a shallower.
[00:28:59] Yeah. And the current pulling out was so damn strong. I couldn't even walk against it. I can do anything. I'd be stuck in one place. And then these 10 foot waves would come over. Bang and just crushed me and I just tumbled tumble, tumble, tumble, and then get back out. And then it was like, try to get short, try to get short.
[00:29:15] And I can't move. And it was literally, I couldn't move. I didn't go anywhere. It was just like pure exertion and just really just catching my breath right before getting demolished again, just bang, bang, bang. And it was getting to a point where I was like, I don't have any more energy. I was like, I'm going to drown.
[00:29:32] Like, I'm probably gonna fucking drown here. Now. I got really lucky. I got really lucky. Because basically I just ended up drifting sideways and moving in and got out of where that pole was so strong and got into shore. And there was like a lifeguard out there yelling at all of us. She's like, you can't go on that.
[00:29:51] You asked that to say, and I'm sitting there. I'm like, . Yeah, I like, I was totally when I made sure I was totally at ease. I was like, don't care.
[00:30:00] Joe Jackowski: Like I'm just not dead. I was like, I walked that. It was the most relaxing moment I can think of in my entire life. I literally got back to this little lawn chair.
[00:30:08] They had set up with this little cabana thing overhead. I cracked open a beer and I sat there and just looked out at the ocean and I was like, nothing's wrong now? But it was like,
[00:30:20] that's what it's like to be in those situations. Yeah, you're even willfully charging in one direction, fighting with everything that you have.
[00:30:29] And you're probably still going to drown to be a cop is to risk drowning, to put yourself free, to put yourself in a situation to be a cop is to risk worth Johnny or to risk drowning, to put yourself in a situation where there's riot is to risk drowning. The current beats the social current, it's like the environment demands that of you, the ocean is pulling you out.
[00:30:50] It's made its decision and you can't do Jack shit. As far as it's concerned,
[00:30:56] Erich Wenzel: like you're individuality in this situation means nothing.
[00:30:59] Joe Jackowski: Yeah, you are just being ripped apart by the current. And most people don't have the awareness to swim sideways. I didn't. You got lucky. I got fucking lucky. I just kinda ended up doing it. It wasn't intentional,
[00:31:11] Erich Wenzel: but I think that's a good point too. And kind of going back to what Jordan was saying with the old man that got pushed over and was bleeding out of his ear. I've seen lots of people make comments on that video and share that video again. But the one thing they didn't mention we didn't say it because we were already past it in our previous conversation was that one of the cops that was close to the old man, right after he got knocked over, went to go check on him.
[00:31:36] And the other cop pulls him violently by the shoulder and keeps him walking in formation. Right. And that right there, that's a, that's the moment of that awareness where that, that one SWAT officer knew better. He knew what just happened. And went against every way to be part of that tribe. Right. Cause that's what serving in the military is he went against the instinct of his tribe to care about another human who just unluckily enough, got in the way no, you know, right, right from wrong age difference here, no matter who you were in that situation, you would get bulldozed.
[00:32:12] Joe Jackowski: Right. And you can even steel, man. It is for the cop. I'm not saying this is the case, but you could divorce it from that situation. So I'm just thinking of it as a hypothetical. Yes. Like that cop could have just been like, I didn't think I was going to knock them over. Like Jesus, like a 70 year old man, they got right eye.
[00:32:28] He could slip in the bathtub. You know what I mean? Like it's not an excuse for the thing. No, but it's like, it shows that even decent people. You could imagine yourself being in that cop's shoes and that same thing happening to you. Right? Right. And it's like, when things get chaotic, they get chaotic down to the thing down to the second.
[00:32:55] It's not just, you can't predict what's going to happen over the next month. I mean, we talk about. How you should have a five year plan for your life, right? What do you, what are your new things in five years? And welcome to this interview. Let me ask you this question that you were supposed to, everyone's supposed to just have a two minute speech about, but when things get chaotic, you can't even predict the next second.
[00:33:17] And so being that cop or being a protester or in us, when things start to turn, you. We'll do something and then watch something you didn't expect or predict will happen the next second. And I can imagine being that cop and pushing that guy and going, Oh shit right now. That's a totally separate thing to just Derek Chovan guy.
[00:33:42] Yeah. Yeah.
[00:33:43] Erich Wenzel: That's totally different.
[00:33:46] Joe Jackowski: I would, I would love to pick him part like. I'm here, but I think we should get to that.
[00:33:51] Erich Wenzel: Yeah. We'll definitely probably get there. I will say, I think there's two sides. You can look at that at one side is where's the remorse.
[00:33:58] Jordan Criss: Normal even. I mean, I don't know. I haven't been in many chaotic situations, so I'm speaking speculatively, but I feel like if you did something and we're all, you know, well, minded people here, right. Do something and you know, you fucked up, there's a level of remorse that you have when you realize it. And you're like, Yeah, shit.
[00:34:19] Erich Wenzel: Yeah. You're not going to sleep well at the very simplest level. Yeah.
[00:34:22] Jordan Criss: Like, you know, you know, you did wrong. Yeah. So that's one side and a lot of these things there's too much. No remorse. It's too much like, well, you know, I did it because of this and like excusing it. And I'm like people that come into defense.
[00:34:35] Jordan Criss: Like you're trying to absolve yourself of your mistake when it would be better and serve. Probably more to the submit. I probably made a mistake.
[00:34:45] Joe Jackowski: He defensive self protection.
[00:34:47] Jordan Criss: It's like a mechanism that is just a part of their culture. That's like, no, I'm always in the right, because my job is hard. No, that's not how you should look at it.
[00:34:56] Everyday people and trained professionals
[00:34:56] The other side that I'm thinking of going back to your, the tides analogy. You know, or, you know, everyday, everyday Joe's not everyday people, you know, like us might be in that situation, like Holy shit. And, you know, just get swept aside and get lucky. Yeah. But maybe in those situations we need a microphone. Yeah, you can look at it, you know, to be a cop, you might need someone who's. I know, I know how to get out of this situation.
[00:35:22] Mean that's why I think there needs to be a need to be harder to become a cop. You need Michael Phelps in that situation to say, I know how to get out of the situation. I know what the right and wrong thing to do here is, and I can easily differentiate the two. And not push over this old man and then pull someone who's trying to help them come back and say fall in line.
[00:35:44] Erich Wenzel: Exactly. You know what I mean?
[00:35:46] Jordan Criss: That is where I was a terrible soldier. Cause that would have been like, you let go of me. That's
[00:35:50] Erich Wenzel: right. Old man bleeding out of his ears.
[00:35:52] Joe Jackowski: I mean, it doesn't matter who it is. Right.
[00:35:55] Erich Wenzel: It just makes it worse because it puts it in a more stark contrast that it is an old man.
[00:35:58] Jordan Criss: Right.And I don't know their culture, but I know there is a real code of silence and, One of my past coworkers, we shared this, I don't want to say his name, but we shared the same coworker. but he told me he's like, there is a real, that's real. And that's part of the reason why he left, where he worked is because he tried to bring something up.
[00:36:19] So when his superiors and they just sweep it under the rug and he was like, I don't want to be a part of that if I can't call out someone for doing something wrong, because now I'm. Now you have to buy into it. You either buy into it or you're going to hate yourself. You know what I mean? And I'm like that to beat you.
[00:36:33] That's a job where you should want to hold people accountable. You know what I mean? It'd be like, like that was, can't push people over like that dude, like, don't do that. You know what I mean? Like people look to us to help them. We can't be the, we can't have this image of the opposite. You know what I mean?
[00:36:52] Normative Error and Peter Attia
[00:36:52] Erich Wenzel: Yeah. to me. One of the best examples I heard to kind of help steer this discussion of like, how do you, you know, help people make better decisions or at least, weed out people who are not going to adhere, adhere to a higher standard of operation was within the surgeon code of ethics. you guys both know that I listened to a former surgeon, Peter Attia.
[00:37:16] And he had a 20 minute discussion with his, I believe 11 year old daughter. And I don't even know how to comprehend having a kind of conversation around racism and the aftermath to an 11 year old. And just to get her raw take on, like, how could someone do something like that because of the color of their skin.
[00:37:37]she just didn't comprehend it. And I think that's part of, to me, it's hopeful for the future because. That non comprehension from a child is what we should strive for. Yeah. Cause it shouldn't matter. Like it shouldn't even be part of their dictionary too, to have to even consider these things. and Peter shared a story of his, of him being pulled off his bike while on campus one time.
[00:38:00] Cause he's Egyptian, he's slightly darker, like an olive tone, like Mediterranean. And so he was kind of a little profiled and even in Southern California, by a cop.
[00:38:11] Jordan Criss: And that was probably in like the eighties or something like that. That's really bad, but right.
[00:38:15] Erich Wenzel: Yeah, exactly. So it's, it's kind of like, but still even like, even him, like you wouldn't consider him to be dark skinned. but then he went on to describe, at least in his view, how surgeons are trained and there's like three types of errors you can make technically. I can't remember the other one, but the one that he really highlighted was normative errors. Which are these errors that you create or that you make that are kind of like little white lies where you fresher away a consequence of a procedure.
[00:38:44] Like you take a risk of your procedure because you think it'll solve something and then it goes wrong and then you don't hold yourself accountable for it going wrong. Or you prescribe a drug that has complications, but you do it anyways because it gives you a bigger kickback, right? Things like that. And so what he was saying is though, is that these normative errors, no matter how small they are at beginning, will only ever escalate.
[00:39:15] They never deescalate. So these are just character flaws in who you are as a human being. I'm sorry to say that, but there's just some things that you just can't like, you just won't be able to learn. Unfortunately. And so these kinds of people, the reason that's why med school takes a long time is when you're in clinicals and you're doing these things.
[00:39:35] If you, any three of these, any of these errors that you make, and if you're not learning from yourself, you're out, you're just, you're just out because you just don't have what it takes to be a surgeon period. And I think if we can figure out a way to implement these types of error and ethical models, To a police officer and say, you've done this too many times.
[00:39:59] I'm sorry, but you're out or just improved the on-boarding process to, you know, have them being shadowed by a cop with, you know, 10 years of experience and your partner with him for three years. And he's, I don't know how you do this, but I'm just throwing it out there. But something like that, where it's like, he's already passed this standard and then you have to, he's not analyzing your model, but.
[00:40:24] Like keeping you in line and saying, Hey, maybe you shouldn't have done that. You know, Hey, that was a little too forced for whatever it is. I don't, you know, it's never good for other people, especially in the same field to be checking each other like that. It doesn't feel good to be put under a microscope, but like, we just need to have just accountability and an ethical slash moral model with these people who have given power.
[00:40:46] I mean, you're holding a firearm when the majority of people don't, that's.
[00:40:50] The Moral Element
[00:40:50] Joe Jackowski: I think that's really, I think right now the moral element is what has our culture in flux, because we are not sure how broad right and wrong go it's as if. For the bad cop, that's silent on these issues. That what's good is what's good for my end group.
[00:41:23] Right? My fellow policemen. No, and what's moral, morally good is what is good for them. And so when the outsider confronts them about misgivings or deeds, We raise our shields form of phalanx, protect them because that is good morally. And then you see the same thing happening from the police response.
[00:41:56] Joe Jackowski: Well, I would say that's within the police and then like, it's it's opposite. Right? Cause I like to try to balance things because I see this as psychological. Good and evil are products of humanity and that in so far as they are, that means that wherever humanity is present, there is both good and evil.
[00:42:17] And so the idea that just one side of an issue. Is going to be all good or evil. It makes no sense to me. I'm like, do you have people present on both sides? And both of those are present and people, so this, this whole thing, it seemed, it seems silly. So it's like, so where's, where's the equivalent on the other side.
[00:42:36] So we have protesters or writers and I can see some writers. I don't know if I see this in protestors because there's a, it's not to say that these are mutually exclusive categories. Fine. Yeah. We'll hold these categories. You have the writers who it's almost like for some, there's an even worse group amongst the writers, but for some, it's almost like what is good for black people in this case is what is good.
[00:43:11] And so there's almost no conception. Of what will be good for everyone? Like the broader
[00:43:17] Erich Wenzel: populace, basically,
[00:43:19] Daryl Davis
[00:43:19] Joe Jackowski: like I saw a conversation with Daryl Davis, who's the man who, converted isn't
[00:43:25] Erich Wenzel: the best one I saw was ended 200 over, or at least 200,
[00:43:29] Joe Jackowski: KKK memberships. Right. So he had a bunch of people, he kept meeting up with people in the KKK and essentially just by hanging out with them and like getting to know them.
[00:43:39] Erich Wenzel: And like showing them the guy's a Saint he's like a human being, the guy's a Saint he's amazing.
[00:43:45] Jordan Criss: He's indescribable. Keep going, finish your point. But Jesus,
[00:43:51] Erich Wenzel: Jordan your face was amazing
[00:43:52] Jordan Criss: because I it's something that even I can think about it for days and I will never comprehend that, but just
[00:44:02] Joe Jackowski: being able to do that. Oh my God. The patients. Fuck, dude.
[00:44:07] Jordan Criss: How the Fuck what dude
[00:44:10] Erich Wenzel: I mean. It's so easy to write someone off who just doesn't like it, it's just, just from national human response, right? Like that person D is not going to like you because you're a certain color and it's so easy to be like, well, if you're not going to like me, because of that, fuck you.
[00:44:24] Then like natural human reaction, totally warranted and that situation, but instead he's like, you know what I think when we actually just talked to him for really long
[00:44:32] Jordan Criss: periods of time, he just wants to understand.
[00:44:35] Erich Wenzel: It's so amazing.
[00:44:36] Jordan Criss: What I like about his story? Sorry to cut you off. is that music. Is what bridge?
[00:44:43] That was the initial connection point. That is awesome. Like music bridges, so many things. That's why he
[00:44:49] Erich Wenzel: called them and said, Hey, come watch me.
[00:44:51] Jordan Criss: Come watch me play. Hey, you should come see this guy, play it. This guy is really good. I know we don't like him typically, but he can play the piano, like whatever the guy's name was that they were referring to.
[00:45:02] But what the fuck? it's it's really incomprehensible for me. Like, I can never. Imagine what it would be like to be like, yeah. These like, God, I can't put into words. It's just, nuts it's really just
[00:45:20] Joe Jackowski: it's so it's so crazy.
[00:45:22] Erich Wenzel: It's like how, I mean, the crazy thing too, is that the fact that those people, that he's helped in their thinking for them gave away, he's like, well, I don't believe in this, so you can have my hood. And it's like, it's like his token for them. Seeing the error in their ways. They hand it off to him as a Relic, like shedding that identity. And I'm like, damn, that is, I don't even know. I like getting goosebumps thinking about that. Just, just to be able to
[00:45:50] Joe Jackowski: it's real. It's so encouraging. I get really, like, when I think about it, I kind of get a little emotional I'm like, if I can't do this, like
[00:45:58] Jordan Criss: I honestly thought he was like, when I heard this story, I was like, he must be like a Candice Owens who is, he's like, just like, no, like this is completely like arching down your throat reality.
[00:46:07] That's out there. And just being like, you know what? No, like, you know, we're just playing victim, like shut up. Like that's not what it is, you know what I mean? Like, just so that's what I thought pandering to their beliefs. Yeah. It's I'm like, well, no reason, like, duh, they liked him because he, I thought he was like feeding into it, you know?
[00:46:24] And I'm like, well, yeah, So I never cared. I was just like, I don't want to hear the story. Cause I mean, I guess I was doing the same thing that he was blaming himself for doing when the sound happened. He said that it was like the ice shifted when he was,
[00:46:38] Erich Wenzel: everyone was on edge.
[00:46:39] Jordan Criss: Everyone was on edge. And I guess to a little backstory he's meeting with one of them.
[00:46:43] Erich Wenzel: Leaders, I think dragon
[00:46:46] Jordan Criss: or something like that.
[00:46:47] Joe Jackowski: Yeah. Whatever
[00:46:48] Jordan Criss: their titles are. So yeah. Everyone wants to go. That's listening. Go watch that. Watch go. Listen. You can watch it too. It's out. It's on YouTube to watch slash listen to a podcast with Joe Rogan with Daryl
[00:47:01] Joe Jackowski: Daryl
[00:47:02] Jordan Criss: Davis.
[00:47:03] Erich Wenzel: We'll have a link in the show notes for sure.
[00:47:04] Jordan Criss: Yeah, that was awesome. But, at that point of it, he's. Telling the story of how he met with one of the leaders of a specific KKK group. Yeah. and you know, obviously there's high, he's a black male and there's a, you know, obviously high tension and this guy he's speaking to, as party guard with a gun next to him.
[00:47:20] And like, just obviously you can imagine tensions are high. And as they're speaking, like ice in the ice machines, shifts cans, and there's a noise and everyone's like tensed up, like what. What was that like, everyone was freaking out and then there's a lady there and she's like, Oh, Nope. That's what it wasn't like, explained to me.
[00:47:36] And they're like, Oh, okay. That's all it was. But he made the note to say, like, I made a judgment to say, like he was going to. Do whatever, do something to him, you know what I mean? And that's, I realized that's what Daryl Davis was assuming that since he was meeting with these people, he must've been buying into their ideologies for them to even sit with him.
[00:47:57] And so I wrote them off before I even listened to it. And then I was like, okay, let me just listen to this. And I was like, no, this is just a genuine dude. Yeah. Who just feels like transcending.
[00:48:06] Joe Jackowski: Did he just balls of steel?
[00:48:10] How can someone hate me if they don't even know me?
[00:48:10] Erich Wenzel: I mean, my God, when he, when he said like this, the question he'd formed was like how can someone hate me if they don't even know me?
[00:48:19] And I just think, I honestly think that just kind of cuts through all of the things that we're dealing with right now. Right. Because that question has nothing it's yes. It's rooted in race for him, but it's rooted in an, all of our experiences. There's people all throughout our lives that assume something about you.
[00:48:37] When in reality, they never took the time to get to know you.
[00:48:40] Joe Jackowski: And this, so this is it all.
[00:48:42] Erich Wenzel: Yeah, go ahead.
[00:48:44] Joe Jackowski: What that, I think that question is so important because that question transcends. Race itself, right? Because the person is so much more than the color of their skin. And this used to be obvious.
[00:49:00] Erich Wenzel: Well, that was like the Martin Luther King part of this, right. At least in part of the,
[00:49:04] Joe Jackowski: I have a dream speech. Right. But it's like, and I've thought about this and I'm not, I don't know if I'm there yet. Exactly. But the thought came to mind. At least it was like, I noticed that when people really pissed me off.
[00:49:20] What, the only thing that could really, that I could really be relaxed with where, when I met with them again, I could be clear how to it, that I could kind of have it under the bridge, not forget it, but like really kind of forgive it and some personal sense, not to say that I wouldn't advocate for justice as somebody who was acting a boringly.
[00:49:46] But to not have a personal stake in it that that state could only be achieved for me when I really understood the person. And so the way I think about it is, or try to aspire to, is that okay if I hate somebody it's because I don't know them well enough. Okay. And that very often the thing that's driving me crazy about what they're doing, here's the result of, of some understandable pain.
[00:50:25] Hmm. And that very often
[00:50:27] Erich Wenzel: it's something that you hate in yourself.
[00:50:30] Joe Jackowski: Yeah. Sometimes
[00:50:31] Erich Wenzel: some degree
[00:50:31] Joe Jackowski: or at least yes. And so far I can like, imagine that they're being. Did they just hurt? Yeah. And then they're reacting out and I can see in myself that when I'm hurt, I react. Maybe I react in a very much less insane way or less and more volatile way.
[00:50:51] Yeah. Fine. It exists. Right. We're all human beings. It's not a stretch to say that we all have a certain amount of behaviors that we all act out. So I saw this Daryl Davis video of him talking with. Some of the organizers of a black lives matter movement in Baltimore, a handful of years ago, reformed this.
[00:51:18] Jordan Criss: Yeah.
[00:51:20] Joe Jackowski: And it went so bad.
[00:51:23] Jordan Criss: Really?
[00:51:23] Joe Jackowski: I was like, Holy fuck. Because, and to pull back the original point I was trying to make there was that. You can see that the same kind of good for this community is what defines what's a morally good period. And the people he was talking to, there's three men that went the fuck after him.
[00:51:48]and one of which at least said, ``Who gives a shit about you collecting these people's hoods. He's like you weren't out there saving our race. Like you weren't out there doing, helping us. You were helping them
[00:52:07] in one guy, the oldest of them almost from his generation even told him, it's like, if you ever come back to Baltimore again, he's like, don't do it. Don't come back to Baltimore ever again. And I was like, Whoa, that went so you can have that same kind of closed in group thinking. Wherever people are. It's a psychological problem.
[00:52:35] Dunbar's Number
[00:52:35] Not actually, it's a, it's a neurological problem. Your brain actually can't track more than like 150 people. It's called Dunbar's number. Yeah. And then after that things get weird to connect it to something even deeper than that. Chimps do the same thing, David Dunbar's number. It's less than ours because their neocortex is smaller, which is correlated with the number, but it's just the number of social interactions you can track.
[00:53:01] And when chimps do it, chimps will form tribe troops, right? Just like we have, but they'll get to the point where they can't process everyone in the tribe. It splits off into two and that two different separate tribes and even chimps that used to like groom, be friends with each other. We'll fucking rip each other to shreds.
[00:53:21] Oh, my God unbearably violently. They will literally skin each other. And it's like, it's like how I can't keep track of you. You're the other, you're a danger. It's over.
[00:53:30] Erich Wenzel: You're coming after my resources. Same territory, that kind of stuff.
[00:53:34] Joe Jackowski: Yeah. And then what humanity's been able to do because we became conscious and could create culture, is created in groups based on ideals instead of just.
[00:53:48] The number that I can track neurologically. Yeah. So long as we all agree on some basic principles and we're all moving the same direction, we're all on the same team. Like we might be like, think of those Viking shifts with the boom, boom, boom. Everybody's rowing together. And guy in seat, fucking one up in the front of the top.
[00:54:04] Right. And a seat. And like 10 on the left side can hate each other's guts. But as long as they're all rowing in the same direction, fine. Screw it. Good enough.
[00:54:13] Erich Wenzel: You're cooperating. Well enough. It's always, they're not killing each other.
[00:54:17] Joe Jackowski: Right. And it's the same thing in the military again. Yeah. You have this common objective.
[00:54:20] Screw it. Good enough. I don't have to, I don't even have to like you as a person, but if we were going in the same direction, we're good. Yeah. Right. But what I see happening, a danger of what's happening is that we are too, without a. Rod moral structure that we all agree on. A common ideal that we all agree on is in fact, as a civilization, as a Western civilization,
[00:54:44] Erich Wenzel: North star to point us in the right direction.
[00:54:46] Joe Jackowski: So we can be coming at that North star from everywhere. But as long as we're heading towards it, we can literally take all of the West under a common banner. Yeah. If we don't have that it fractures and then you just have people redefining. What's good? All over the place.
[00:55:05] Jordan Criss: So to that point, I feel like, I don't know when I, when I hear like, what happened with the Daryl Davis thing, which is nuts, but I almost, I just feel like I experienced that same thing now.
[00:55:20] I was, you know, so many areas removed from him. So like I never spoke to him, but I can, I can understand those. People's reluctance to accept what he was saying, because they view it as like, just like, as you said, they said like you are helping them, not helping us. You know what I mean? So you're making them feel good about their choices, but what are you doing for us?
[00:55:46] Is that right or wrong? Not really the point that I'm making, but I can see why they're put off against it.
[00:55:54] Joe Jackowski: I should say, as, as quantifiable. That one of those three guys ended up reconciling with him in a separate video. So you find it, I can send you both links of this stuff, but it's like in the later one, him and one of the really adamant, adamant protesters spent some time together.
[00:56:12] And they basically came to terms. He was like, you know what, there's a certain amount of like misunderstanding here. I don't know what the other two guys I don't know about them.
[00:56:22] Dave Chappelle
[00:56:22] Jordan Criss: Right. But, and I think, I think that's normal because. If, I mean, like how I perceived it, that's, might've been what they thought, who knows what they actually thought, but I perceived that he was buying into them and that's how they were like, well, not all black people are bad.
[00:56:37] He thinks the way we do. You know what I mean? Almost like that Dave Chappelle cliff, what is it? Clifton
[00:56:43] Joe Jackowski: Clayton Bigsby, black, white supremacist.
[00:56:45] Jordan Criss: And so just for some reflection on that, when I tell people that I. Use to not like, not that I didn't like Dave Chappelle, but I didn't like the Chappelle show.
[00:56:55] That was a skid that I said, I don't like this. I didn't find that funny.
[00:57:00] Erich Wenzel: It's funny. Gerald Davis says the same
[00:57:01] Jordan Criss: thing. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I thought. I like Oh, cool. So I wasn't the only one who thought that I was just like, I get the humor in it
[00:57:07] Erich Wenzel: when you're too close to it.
[00:57:08] Jordan Criss: Yeah. I'll just see it as like this isn't something that I feel like we should be laughing at, but obviously there's humor in it, but I mean, so, that was just my own thing.
[00:57:18] And I was like, I don't like the Chappelle show for that reason. Just didn't like it. I was like, I'm not okay with that. but that was what it was. And then, you know, now they're Chappelle is amazing that 8:46, he came out with, we're going to have,
[00:57:30] Erich Wenzel: please unpack this as much as we want to, because I think, I think that's like if you had like a time capsule of 2020, that should be in seriously.
[00:57:39] Yeah. It really captures it. Things go out of the essence.
[00:57:43] Jordan Criss: Yeah, I wasn't ready for the emotion, the emotion that he was letting out, I was just like, Oh, this is a side of him I'd never seen before. You know what I mean,
[00:57:55] Erich Wenzel: less comedy, more of him kind of having almost like a town hall meeting of him, just kind of coming on stage and saying like, alright. Bitches. Here's how I see it in his voice.
[00:58:09] Joe Jackowski: And it's really what it is to me that it shows Dave and why I think he's one of the best comedians alive is if not, actually I think he's the dub to comedian alive is that he. Well, I think that that is the beginning of what becomes a comedy special for him.
[00:58:29] Oh yeah. I don't think he's trying to make jokes. No, I think that he's naturally funny in some sense. Yeah. But he has things he's trying to understand that he then distills into comedy. Yeah. He makes it accessible for the people. Right. And so what you see is like the raw material. Yeah. Like the resource itself, it's a slab of marble uncarved and this is what it is.
[00:58:58] And eventually that can be carved down into something gorgeous and beautiful and in his case, hilarious, but it takes time. And I think that makes him a philosopher. I think good comedians are philosophers. They're phenomenologists trying to figure out what it is to be human. And even more so sociologists.
[00:59:20] Erich Wenzel: Well they're the experts in many different domains,
[00:59:23] Joe Jackowski: right. They're trying to figure out the truth. Right.
[00:59:26] The rawness of this time period
[00:59:26] Erich Wenzel: I mean, it's interesting to me because watching that, I was looking at his body language a lot of times and it was like, he was all at once kind of at a loss for words and yeah. And like his, his take on it where he had his notebook, like he had some ideas. Onstage and he wasn't sure how to start for sure. Yeah. And my thought there was that he, he hadn't been writing at all, really. Like maybe he was like jotting down notes, but he was just kind of like letting the shit unfold of COVID and then just throwing this, this George Floyd murder on top of it and just totally.
[01:00:04] Turns it up to, I don't even know what the fuck number you want to turn it up to at this point, but it's just insane. it's just insane. Like no one could ever write this story. and so for him, I think he was just kind of just saying all the emotions and he obviously did some research to make a cohesive story around what he was seeing. but it was, it was so raw to me to just see. People like him, to be honest about the situation. And I, I mean, I wouldn't expect anything less from Dave Chappelle because he's been nothing but honest, but I think in this world, the reason someone like Chappelle and even Rogan, like Rogan has said this on his podcast that he's not writing right now either.
[01:00:51]he just let it take its course. And then once things open back up, then he'll start writing again. but I think it goes to show that in these times where. On one end of the spectrum, our politicians and our people in the institutions are rushing to get information out to people and make sure they're well informed and make sure they know what to do and how to do things.
[01:01:15] And then you get memes like the, I don't know shit about fuck in regards to CDC and who, but maybe it's time for thoughtful experience and maybe just saying, instead of pretending, like, you know, the right next course, but just say, here's how we see it. We're going to keep monitoring the situation. And once we know more, then we'll give you the right guidance, but we don't want to, you know, jump the gun and give you a false direction, you know, like, or just be honest and say, okay, I think right now we have to just cut our losses and closing the country seems like the safest option.
[01:01:52] For the long term, because if we don't take this seriously, then what happens in six months from now and we're overrun and this is, you know, the economic impact is 10 times worse than it could have been, you know? Cause you only get one shot at this. I'm sorry we don't get to roll back the clock and say, let's run that experiment again.
[01:02:11] Yeah. Let's not do that please. And so that's kind of why I think. A person like Chappelle is a sense-maker like Joe was saying a philosopher because we need more voices that just tell it like it is and don't sugar coat it.
[01:02:26] And Pat us on the head is what it feels like from our institutions that say, Oh, you're too, you're not going to be able to get the truth because yeah, we're, we're all in this together.
[01:02:37] Joe Jackowski: And for me, it's really, there's a certain, there's a certain thing that I think is happening with. People like Chappelle and why I actually find it really interesting. Fascinating. Almost empowering even for myself who I, you almost assume that I'm outside of the people to whom he is trying to empower, but at the same time, when I watched that, it was, it was, so now it was so honest, but it was.
[01:03:12] Emotions are really bad ways of finding out the truth. No, because they're so broad, they're such a lower system. So unspecialized that all they can do is kind of say something is wrong in this corner of the map. It just says somewhere between North and East, anywhere in that 90 degree angle, there's a problem.
[01:03:39] It doesn't tell you where it says this, this quarter of the map something's fucked up.
[01:03:44] It's like, if you went to the doctor and they were like, so what hurts the lower half? Like the whole thing? No, but you know, can you point me now? It's like this doesn't help. So I mean, It helps generally it moves you in the right direction, but it's not a specialized system. But what I think we've been doing as a society is that we're expressing the emotions performatively. Oh, we're angry on Facebook about all these things.
[01:04:20] Oh my God. And then it's not, it's not an honest emotion. Because it's emotion stirred up to provide force behind our thoughts. And we have these where you can rationalize anything in the world. I can come up with a rational argument for literally anything, anything. No. I mean, I can be like, there's a giant pro ball fit in the room right now.
[01:04:47] I can say that. And you guys can be like, you're full of shit and be like, listen, all reality is subjective. what I see as true is subjectively true. And so when you argue against me, you're supposing your, your views on me and how am I to know at all in the first place that a, what you say is any more true than when I say, and so there's a purple elephant.
[01:05:03] See how bullshit that was. I can literally come up with anything in the fucking world to rationalize what I'm doing. So what I think we've been doing is we have these insane rationalizations for everything that's happening, spewed everywhere, and the emotions that we've had. Our emotions manufactured to provide the motive force behind our bullshit rationalizations.
[01:05:34] And the reason I'm refreshed by Dave Chappelle is because. He goes, I don't know what to rationally say. Think about this. I haven't gotten to that point yet. I'll get to that point when I make a comedy special, but you know what, right now I'm going to be honest in my emotion. And so he said something real.
[01:05:50] Yeah. And it might not be true. It might not be factually correct in every instance, but the reaction is sincere. Yes. And when you take people into therapy, if you have a couple of couples, therapy people, if they're just rationalizing the whole time, you'll never get anywhere. You need them to be honestly emotional, sincerely emotional.
[01:06:12] This hurts me. And I know it doesn't make any sense that this hurts me, but I'm going to tell you that hurts me. I'm going to tell you why maybe I think that it does, and then we'll get to the problem. But the fact that we haven't been willing to speak, honestly, emotionally, I think is fucking insane.
[01:06:29] And that the reason I love that Dave Chappelle piece is because it was sincere, honest, emotional.
[01:06:35] The Streets are speaking for themselves
[01:06:35] Erich Wenzel: Yeah. Like one of the things that really hit me in that video was when he, when he kind of called out all of the people, making videos that are like famous people and, or writers asking, like, where are the celebrities now?
[01:06:48] Where are they now? When all this was going down. And, and he gave his honest opinion, which some people were not going to like, but he said, I don't need to talk because right now the streets are talking for themselves.
[01:07:01] Jordan Criss: I think he was a hundred percent spot on.
[01:07:02] Erich Wenzel: I agree. I can see where people don't like it, but I think, I think he's right.
[01:07:07] I think he's really right about that because that's what a protest is for. That's everybody coming together and saying, this is fucked up. It needs to be better. You know, it's calling to attention. It's like having a wound of some sort and saying, there's something wrong here. And I need treatment.
[01:07:27] Jordan Criss: Yeah. I think it's, I think this is why I value art and all, any in any medium, so highly, because it can be why I have such a high standard and why I'm like, don't put out bullshit because it's not about that.
[01:07:42] Now you can have your fun. That's fun. You know what I
[01:07:44] Erich Wenzel: mean? It's different than bullshit,
[01:07:46] Jordan Criss: right? Exactly. But you're, you're speaking for the unspoken, you know what I mean? And a lot of these mediums, so. I think what he was saying is like, I can say these things, but as of right now, people are already saying them, people are saying the same things that I'd be saying now he obviously is a comedian.
[01:08:03] So he'd be saying it differently. But he's saying that the streets are talking, how do I add to that? I don't need to be the voice for them, you know? And so that's why I'm like,
[01:08:16] I a hundred percent agree and you know, people are coming. Whoever, like, you know, people have been saying stuff about Kendrick Lamar and stuff.
[01:08:24] Cause he hasn't tweeted or stuff like that. And I'm like, what is he? He made an album about the shit. You know what I mean?
[01:08:31] Erich Wenzel: That was the one they did them dissect
[01:08:32] Jordan Criss: right. To pimp a butterfly. Yeah, it was, I don't know if that damn man to pimp a butterfly, but I know they did one, one of them, but. And like he made a whole like 16 or so song album about the situation.
[01:08:47] And you were saying, Hey, why are you not talking? He did already, you know what I mean? But what does he need to say right now? Like, is that the point is that who's who we should be focusing on and I get it because you look at these people and they're like, might be your heroes or your icons and stuff.
[01:09:00] And you're looking for guidance maybe in like, well, what did they have to say about this? So I understand it. But at the same time, it's like, maybe this is time for you to speak up for yourself. You know what I mean, to be honest, to be emotionally honest about the situation and say like, this is how I feel now let's get somewhere.
[01:09:16] Yeah. yeah. Which is good because I feel like with that, what you were saying, I feel like a lot of people have been emotionally honest, but a lot of people and most of the people who can, who, you know, these people were calling out to listen were choosing not to. And they were saying, well, I don't want to listen to you being emotionally honest, because that goes against whatever it is that I think.
[01:09:43] So I'm not going to listen to that. You're being irrational or that's not what it is. Here's my facts to debunk whatever it is you're saying I'm not listening to that. That's bullshit. well, no, I was just going to say, now you have more people saying, let me hear you.
[01:10:01] An openness to having the difficult conversation
[01:10:01] Joe Jackowski: And I think that's, yeah, I think that's happening.
[01:10:04] And I think that part of why. What you're describing was previously happening. It's almost like everybody in this house was like constantly making these rationalizations
[01:10:19] Erich Wenzel: about the other side.
[01:10:20] Joe Jackowski: Right. And so now when, when the quiet one in the corner says something emotionally honest, sincere everybody is so on guard that they go, well, here's my, no, they immediately start rationalizing.
[01:10:35] And they're just assuming that the other one is, but it's almost like everything came to such a standstill right before this, everything kind of went quiet if you will kind of shut up. And they were just like, I don't know, this pandemic is crazy. Like everything ended. Yeah. And so what I see is happening is that because everything came to a halt.
[01:11:02] People could process the things that were getting in the way of having an honest conversation, all that information that was cluttering, their minds, all that white noise was filtered out slowly, like just drained from the system until we had calm water and then this kicked off and there was still enough time and space and openness that.
[01:11:29] People went. Oh shit. And so when the person who was being sincere emotionally spoke now all the clutter that was forming the defensive wall for these people who otherwise would not have heard them was gone, they ended them. And now for the first time, I think, I literally think this, this might be a decade in the making, at least since I got out of the Marine Corps.
[01:11:57] I think really this moment for the first time in a long time, everyone is kind of on the same page and really going wow here.
[01:12:11] Jordan Criss: Yeah. But that's what that anything,
[01:12:13] Joe Jackowski: yeah, there's still the assholes.
[01:12:15] Jordan Criss: There's always going to be those people,
[01:12:17] Joe Jackowski: but it's like all the people who were, I would say this, all the people who are well intentioned, but totally unable to hear each other. Or at the point where they can hear each other now?
[01:12:27] Jordan Criss: No, I think, I think I've said that I think we were texting one time and I mentioned a similar thing and I was like, there's so like, people don't have their escapes. They can't be like, yeah. Wow. Yeah. I don't want to talk about that. I'm going to go to the bar.
[01:12:40] You can't, you're stuck at home. You have to listen, you know what? I don't have an option right now. And then they say, Holy shit is that I get it. And it's like
[01:12:50] a light switch and maybe, you know, thanks. God for COVID. That sounds so weird, but in a way, in a way, like you have to, cause I feel like, like you were saying, it forced people to listen.
[01:13:00]and I don't know. It is a weird thought I've had, but I feel like I've been saying this since, since black lives matter jumped off, like I've been saying that and I feel like a long time ago it was a lot of things where people were like, like, so just like, Nope. Nope. It doesn't make sense. And I'm like it does if he just really strips it down and realizes what is really trying to be said, like take emotion out of it.
[01:13:23] You know what I mean? And just view it for what it is. And it makes sense and people are just, Nope, Nope, Nope. Whatever it is, what it is, you know,
[01:13:33] Erich Wenzel: it's easy to hand wave things away.
[01:13:34] Jordan Criss: Exactly. And I don't think those people are necessarily coming from a bad place. Not some, yes. Most probably not. It was just like a.
[01:13:43] It was like, you're talking past each other. It's like, you're saying the same thing, but they didn't like how you were saying it. Like, if it's a star and someone's coming from Eastern, you were coming from Western. You're like, well, fuck the West. We're coming from this way. And they were like, well, we're going in the same place, dude, like Jesus.
[01:13:57] But yeah, I think that's what most of those conversations were, but where we're at now and why I think this is going to be one of those moments that we'll look back on. Decades from now, let's say there was a monumental change because now there's people joining the conversation that are coming from the West or East or whatever.
[01:14:18] And I think that's what's important. And I mean, I think just the blunt part of that is that you have no, you have Caucasian Americans now saying like, can look at people and they might've been someone who. Was an opposition, but now they're looking at it in a sense of being like, Oh no, I get it. And now they're speaking to people who someone like myself may not have been able to reach.
[01:14:41] And so I feel like that conversation is spreading and it may not get there the same way. Right. But again, we're still going to the North star. Yeah. You know what I mean?
[01:14:50] Erich Wenzel: Absolutely.
[01:14:51] Converging morally
[01:14:51] Joe Jackowski: And it's, it's cool because it's like we've converged on something. Right. And I don't think that converging was political.
[01:15:00] I think that it was moral. Yep. No, it absolutely is moral. Then what happened was because again, we made all this space for people who may otherwise have been, like, I'm not watching the video. I'll just comment on the show without him. You see it. But then when you watch it, when you really watch it, I think it's not even a question of good or bad it's w it's evil.
[01:15:21] No. And our culture has been trying to figure out what the hell evil even is. Like what's good or bad. I don't know anymore.
[01:15:28] Erich Wenzel: Yeah. We were so removed from the atrocities of our times that
[01:15:31] Jordan Criss: it's talk about Hitler, but like,
[01:15:33] Erich Wenzel: yeah, but you could call other people they're like Hitler,
[01:15:36] Joe Jackowski: right. And Hitler just became like a slur.
[01:15:38] It didn't even, it wasn't even like a real thing anymore. And people who were making, and this is the thing, the people that are using it as a slur had no real conception of what violence was. No of what to witness, something like that really was. And, but you go, I think about, so there in 2018 there was a, there's two or a handful.
[01:16:03] I think it was a couple, cyclists who wanted to go from Europe and bicycle down through the middle East and make their way back into Europe or something. And they did this and they were warned not to go in the Middle East during this time they did not do it. It is dangerous. And they publicly said that evil is just a conception that we have made to paint to other people that we don't understand. And on their trip, they got into Tajikistan and a handful of dudes who had pledged allegiance to ISIS, saw them ran them down and stabbed them to death.
[01:16:39] Jordan Criss: What the hell?
[01:16:42] Joe Jackowski: Our culture has been so confused. So it's like, there's the question? Where are they?
[01:16:46] Right. Where they just stabbed to death because. Somebody else has a different opinion or is there really evil, is it really evil or is it all just a difference of opinions? But I think that when we watch Derek Chovan murder, George Floyd, that's evil. And I think that we kind of all felt it. And that the reason that I think that is because he had every opportunity, every fucking.
[01:17:18] Opportunity. Every option in the world was afforded to him. He had every call if humanity spoke out for George and literally other humans standing around telling him what he's doing and what is happening and why you shouldn't do this. Every option, every single possible day, every single barrier that you could imagine erecting as a rationalization for his behavior.
[01:17:44] Was knocked down in that moment. And all that was left was the murder of George Floyd. Y what was Derek Chovan aiming at death, because if he's trying to submit a person who was, maybe not behaving perfectly or whatever in front of a cop, maybe even, maybe even this guy could have been rough about it, whatever.
[01:18:10] But he had the option not to do that. He had the option to, he already had subdued him that had already been done. If you didn't know if he was ignorant, he had multiple people telling what he was doing. He was filmed
[01:18:23] Erich Wenzel: from multiple angles by people on the street
[01:18:26] Joe Jackowski: who were telling him throughout the whole video.
[01:18:29] There was one guy. If I remember this correctly, who was like, I went to the Academy, what you're doing. Isn't okay.
[01:18:35] Erich Wenzel: Holy crap.
[01:18:37] Joe Jackowski: This training did that. It wasn't he was falling on training that doesn't wash every single possible rationalization you ever could have come up with doesn't wash. And what you have is the murder of someone I'd say that indicates that the murder was the point.
[01:18:59] Jordan Criss: It has to be.
[01:18:59] Erich Wenzel: There's no other, there's no other way you can rationalize this, this and that.
[01:19:03] Joe Jackowski: I think that. That's what evil is. Evil is aiming at death. The antithesis of life, aiming at death. That's evil. Derek Chovan is evil. And I think that everyone and all of our well rationalizations I don't mean evil really exist.
[01:19:25] What does this, can we convene on any moral truth? Is anything really? Is anything true in all? I don't understand anymore. We all had a moment that was so self-evidently evil. We went,
[01:19:34] Jordan Criss: Oh fuck. Yeah. And the thing about it, and I guess it's kind of me being devil's advocate kind of, not really, but since this wasn't a situation in a vacuum like this, wasn't the first time something like this has happened where I can say, well, is this evil because of a difference of opinions or ignorance or whatever you want to put it, at words, you have this.
[01:20:03] Hate for, you know, people who are different from you, and you can look at it in the sense of like, well, my evil is justified, you know what I mean? Where he can do something like that. And I think there's so many layers to this, but I feel like he and his had why, Derek Chovan and, Many other cops use excessive force where it's like, what are you doing?
[01:20:28] And people are telling them, what are you doing? You know what I mean? Or there's a guy who says, Hey, I have a gun. I'm going to reach you for my license. And he gets shot. And it's like, what are you doing? You have this because there's a mentality there that says I'll probably get away with it. I'd probably be okay.
[01:20:46] And I don't think it's a conscious thing. I don't know. Maybe it is, but I don't think it's necessarily something that's like, I will kneel on your neck for eight, almost nine minutes and you will die and I'll be fine. I think it's just like a regurgitated idea. And if you read about the history of where law enforcement even came from, then it kind of makes it make a lot more sense.
[01:21:06]and I don't sound like a conspiracy theorist, but I'm not, that's look it up. It's fucked up. I didn't know this until recently. And someone sent me this article and I was like that. Fucked up. but you have this kind of subconscious thing where it's like this badge right here. absolves me of any wrongs that I can ever do because I'm a cop and my job is hard.
[01:21:28] So chances are I'll be okay. So I'm going to kneel on your neck and it'll be fine.
[01:21:36] Joe Jackowski: And I think that. That we're asking for really good agreement here, because I think that the evil and Derrick Chovan was all loud.
[01:21:53] Erich Wenzel: Yeah. It was facilitated because of the badge.
[01:21:55] Joe Jackowski: Like I've said multiple times, that what I think that
[01:21:58] Erich Wenzel: it's apt, that you wrote the article recently,
[01:22:00] Joe Jackowski: people are only as good as their environment facilitates that. He could have been,
[01:22:10] Jordan Criss: you've been saying that for years. A long time ago.
[01:22:13] Joe Jackowski: And now it's playing out. It's almost like I was right, but it's, you've given him a person like that whose aim is death, the freedom to express, to express that aim by insulating and protecting him. And so that indicates two things to me.
[01:22:43] One is in the system you need to, and I don't like the, I don't actually like the word the system because too vague people just say, Oh, the system did it, man. It's like, right. But it's like within the specific regulations of these precincts or the laws in these States, There needs to be a change. So those cops can be held accountable so that most of the good cops are just going to continue to obey the rules.
[01:23:13] And they'll even, maybe even go out of the way, be decent for the rules, like be more than the rules demand, but you need to put obstacles in the way of people who are aiming at evil shit. And one of the ways you do that is don't give them the protections because when they think they can do it, they will.
[01:23:30] Because that's the point, that's the point? Yeah.
[01:23:34] Erich Wenzel: It's like, it's what do you do when nobody's looking? That's the ultimate litmus. That's
[01:23:37] Joe Jackowski: how, you know,
[01:23:38] Erich Wenzel: That's where, you know how some, how good or bad someone will be. It's when no one else is around. Did you fudge the numbers or don't, you know, I mean, it's just, it's as simple as that, we've dealt at my work.
[01:23:51] We've heard horror stories of labs that run tests and they run the same tests all the time. They find out after the fact that years' worth of data has been fabricated. Is it the problem with the lab? No, it's a problem of the people that were given that test. That shit is boring and repetitive, so they get bored and they're like, well, I'm just gonna fill out this paperwork.
[01:24:14] They're not gonna check me anyways. But then it shoots the entire credibility of that institution down the drain. Yeah.
[01:24:21] Joe Jackowski: One person could do so much damage. It's unbelievable. It's unbelievable. But it's like, well, that's part two. Right? Part two part one was. That you need to fix. The regulation says systems that confine the misbehavior of those within the system.
[01:24:39] Erich Wenzel: Yeah, that's true. That's what I was trying to get with the normative errors is like, how do you control these people so that they are not allowed to overstep the bounds in which they're given
[01:24:47] Joe Jackowski: and part two is that every person needs to recognize that same fact about themselves. It's psychological. It's Oh, If I have this anger, right?
[01:25:02] Emotional Awareness
[01:25:02] If you recognize yourself as being angry, if ever, if you have the courage to let yourself recognize that you're angry about something so long as that emotion persists, if the environment gives you the opportunity to express that ever present anger, you should assume it's going to happen and it might happen.
[01:25:26] When it's really, really inappropriate, like not good. Yeah. I thought that another kind of truism that I've held onto is just that if somebody's reaction is disproportionate to the situation, it's not about the situation, right? Like if I have a family member who's really angry about us being late to dinner, right.
[01:25:53] Like really angry. It's not about dinner, not about being late to dinner, man. Something else is being held there. And that will just keep playing out time and time and time again. So us, all of us, everyone, every person who's literally breathing needs to have enough awareness to note where they are emotionally in any given situation.
[01:26:22] And have the courage to do what they need to do to deal with it before the environment shifts to allow them to express it in a context that it's not going to be good.
[01:26:39] Wrapping up
[01:26:39] Erich Wenzel: I think that's probably one of the best places to start wrapping this up on quite literally. Because I, I went into this COVID-19, environment thinking about it as almost like Aristotle's the cave
[01:26:55] Joe Jackowski: or is that Plato? Plato.
[01:26:57] Erich Wenzel: Plato was the cave where, or this was a time for me personally, to go into my cave almost literally and, and think about what the next five, 10 years might look like. Myself and a broader scope of humanity. and then, cause I really feel like this is a moment in history that will never be repeated or hopefully never be repeated. or at least just with COVID
[01:27:24] Joe Jackowski: hopefully the conditions under which something like this can happen. Don't happen again. Yes.
[01:27:30] Erich Wenzel: And, and one of the mantras that I kept thinking about was like the year is 2025. And what has changed, how did we make a better society than it was in the proceeding decade or in the five years since COVID has, you know, restructured our entire society. And what did we do, you know, to usher in that new thing.
[01:27:59] And I think in this case with the murder of George Floyd, it's another one of those things that's going to add on top of it. The post COVID era to ask ourselves really, and truly, what does it mean to be a part of a good society? And what is my part in that? Because it's easy to absolve yourself of impact on the system, as large as the United States and then the world, but a society is as good as its people.
[01:28:31] And we're all a part of it, whether we realize it or not. And so how you show up impacts the rest of us. And at the very least how you show up impacts your friends and family, the people you should be caring about the most and how well you show up.
[01:28:51] Joe Jackowski: So every step, every step we make does matter.
[01:28:58] Erich Wenzel: It always hasn't. Now it just shows how much power we can have. I mean, Jordan, you went to the protest, you started this with saying how powerful it was. Yeah. And we all have a voice and the internet allows us to have a voice and it's our job to have the awareness to articulate our voice well enough.
[01:29:17] Jordan Criss: And, and what I love, sorry, is that now we are broadcasting our own news. We're not relying on these stations that you know, are entertainment really at the end of the day,
[01:29:31] Joe Jackowski: continuing to rationalize.
[01:29:32] Jordan Criss: Yeah. We're saying, no, we are going to tell you what's going on. You know? So that's why I'm like, I've always, you know, I've had this like, love, hate thing with Facebook.
[01:29:42] Cause I'm like, it's like, it's like when you talk to people, like, I feel like we've had this, like Joe and I have had this where we talk past each other, we talk and then we're like, Oh, okay.
[01:29:51] Joe Jackowski: This happens every time, every time me and you have some dumb disagreement on Facebook. This will even come to mind while it's happening, like, we're just going to talk to the person we're just going to literally be on the same page. Like right now
[01:30:07] Jordan Criss: it's like, Oh, okay. So for that reason I hate Facebook. It's annoying. But then on the other hand, I'm like, it's necessary because if you, if you take away all the social media, Twitter, or Facebook, whatever, and all of this stuff, that's been documented, one, most of us would have never even seen it. Right. Well, that's that's I think
[01:30:28] Erich Wenzel: that's the, the power of what this is, right?
[01:30:31] It's it's not, Oh, it was, it was George Floyd. This happened this is the one that got filmed. Yep. Right? So it's like, if this is one time, that means it's able to happen 10,000 times or more. And how long has it been being perpetuated? Right. That's that's where I think why it's so like, Heinous and just makes people angry, furious, because it's just,
[01:31:05] Jordan Criss: this would make everyone furious. That's what I don't get. When people look at it and can say. Whatever they say, right. I want to get too far into that. Right. But
[01:31:13] Erich Wenzel: it's missing the point
[01:31:15] Jordan Criss: and I'm like, how does that not piss you off? If you just think like, that was my father or my brother or whoever it is relative to you.
[01:31:22] Right. How does that make you, like, how did I, when I watched that video, like, I've just feel like there was like,
[01:31:29] Joe Jackowski: okay, fucking
[01:31:30] Jordan Criss: like a fire that's just built. And I was like, Oh, That's evil. Like it's just pure evil for this. For what? For what?
[01:31:39] Erich Wenzel: It doesn't solve anything.
[01:31:40] Joe Jackowski: Right. Why? And I, and I think the answer to like, we all watch it, everyone with a conscience or decency watches and goes.
[01:31:48] Why?I think the answer is that the point was to kill that's the point and that's, that is what evil is. That's what evil is. Yeah. Is it just jokes? It's just like, I don't care about your, why this isn't mine.
[01:32:10] Erich Wenzel: It's just, he has control
[01:32:12] Joe Jackowski: it's you can.
[01:32:13] Erich Wenzel: it's gross. Well, I think this was a great conversation to have, and I think to try and make sense of this chaos,
[01:32:24] I'm not probably the only one here, especially with you guys here, that I definitely lost sleep last week, trying to just unpack the situation. Cause like what you said, Jordan is like, this is not something that just happens in a vacuum. you know, and just to kind of unpack the, the shameful legacy that we hold in this country that is his, and was slavery, which is definitely a conversation for another time.
[01:32:48] but I've spent a lot of time just unpacking that and will continue to do so. because it's like what, Brian, Steven had said is in this country, we don't try to reconcile our past. We tried to hide it. Whereas like if you go to Germany and you can find bricks in the street from Jews that lived at those places, during that period of time from world war II, as to pay homage to those people and, I want to do my part to play respects to people that lived in this country before me, you know, and not having to keep those scars open, we need to get past it. We really do.
[01:33:32] I appreciate your brothers.
[01:33:33] Joe Jackowski: Love you guys.