- 'Sup, you beautiful bastards.
Welcome back to the Philip DeFranco Show.
My name, oddly enough, what a twist, Philip DeFranco,
and before we jump into the news of the day,
yes, hit that like button, subscribe,
but also, as we enter the first story,
text someone you know that you love 'em,
that you care for 'em,
'cause you don't know what's gonna happen tomorrow.
One day, you're gonna die and cease to be
but until that day,
I'll be your resident bringer of sadness
and talk about the news of the day,
and so, let's just jump into it on that happy note.
The first thing that we're gonna talk about today,
not to just immediately bias you,
but I think it's incredibly stupid.
And I say that because reports have come out saying that
at least 20 students of LJ Alleman Middle School
have been expelled for participating
in a TikTok trend on school grounds.
And for me personally, I hear, okay,
kids at school, TikTok trend.
Is it one of those things where they're destroying property?
Looking into this, it wasn't that.
According to reports, the students filmed two TikToks
back in December as part of a trend
using Nardo Wick's song, "Who Want Smoke?"
With that video featuring some students making finger guns,
others using their phones to imitate firearms.
Right, and these aren't the exact videos
that we're talking about today.
Those have actually been taken down,
and even some parents say
they haven't seen the posts themselves.
But I did wanna kinda give you an idea
of what we're talking about here.
When the school caught wind of this, they acted immediately,
suspending the students
and citing them under Discipline Code 70
for Crime of Violence: Assault and Battery,
which states there was an aggressive action
directed at students,
which may involve threats or unwanted physical contact
while on school grounds,
with or without the use of a weapon.
So because that's what the school threw at these kids,
we saw one parent telling reporters that the school was
quote, "trying to make an example of these kids
and make it look like they handled a threat
that didn't even exist."
Another mother saying, "It was not assault.
It was not battery.
It was not violent, and the code that's being used
and the level of infraction associated with that code
is completely unwarranted, unfair, and horrible."
And so reportedly,
as the school system considered expulsion,
it then changed the offense of what these kids did
to a code 21 violation,
which basically covers anything else.
And I mean anything else.
Here's the definition:
any other serious offense not covered by any other
of these codes resulting in or not resulting in
the need for law enforcement intervention.
What an insane catchall.
Like, the definition or the reason
included might as well just say, 'cause I said so.
Which is also why we saw Pat Magee,
a lawyer representing some of the families saying,
"They're making the rules up as they go along.
They made some mistakes, as any organization would
because this is all new, but the problem is now they
don't wanna say that this was wrong.
We're handling these children wrongly,
and let's step back, take a breath,
and figure out how to fix this
for the good of all the kids."
And possibly saying that
because this situation doesn't necessarily just exist
in a bubble.
The disciplinary action reportedly already having a
ripple effect.
With the news coming out that one student was allegedly
denied acceptance to a high school over this issue.
With Magee adding,
"We're not saying there needs to be an absence
of punishment.
No, but the punishment needs to fit the behavior.
That's why you have a rubric,
and when you misuse the rubrics
by saying it's any other serious offense,
then you know they don't really have
a cause of action to justify what they're doing."
Now as far as the other side of things,
a spokesperson for the Lafayette Parish School System
told reporters that it does not comment on information
regarding disciplinary action against students and staff.
Now be that as it may, heat against the system
has continued to grow over the last few days.
In fact, and this doesn't surprise me 'cause the internet,
people reportedly dug up a photo
showing some of the schools teachers
making gun gestures while wearing cowboy attire
for a contest.
With parents saying that this was done to prove a point
to see if the teachers would be held to the same standard
and adding, "If it's not okay for a child to do it,
it's not okay for an adult to do it."
But ultimately with this story,
I kinda wanna end on two things:
one, of course I'd love to know your thoughts on this story,
like what do you think in general,
do you think the students should be punished?
Yes or no.
If you're on the side of yes,
do you think expulsion is a road too far
or do you think that's right?
And two, I would say at the very least,
we just have to look at rule 21.
How do you make "because I said so after the fact" a rule?
That's insane.
That sounds like a rule from a king
or a dictator or an incredibly bad parent.
And personally, I don't know if I can support anything
other than maybe a warning
because everything that I've heard about this
doesn't seem like they were threatening anybody.
Like if the caption to the video was like,
"Hey Greg in third period this is for you,"
okay sure.
But I don't know,
the whole thing just reeks of stupid to me
and that's why I'd love to know your thoughts.
And then, is YouTube doing enough to combat misinformation?
That is the question at hand for a lot of people right now.
And according to a group
of more than 80 fact-checking organizations
from around the world, they say the answer is no.
Which is why we saw that group publish an open letter
to YouTube CEO, Susan Wojcicki, today,
calling on the platform to make improvements.
Now I understand,
concerns about misinformation have existed for years now,
especially in regards to election and health claims.
Now, in the pursuit of this,
we've seen platforms like YouTube
taking steps to try to limit the spread of such content
while also trying to provide links to credible resources,
suspending figures for violating COVID-19
misinformation policies.
But now, we're seeing fact-checkers
calling on YouTube to do four things;
One, commit to meaningful transparency
about disinformation on the platform.
Saying that it should support independent research
into misinformation campaigns as well as, quote,
"publish its full moderation policy
regarding disinformation and misinformation,
including the use of artificial intelligence
and which data powers it."
Two, go beyond removing content
and focus on providing context
and offering debunks clearly superimposed on videos
or as additional video content,
which the group says would have to come from investing
in independent fact-checking among other meaningful actions.
Three, take stronger actions against repeat offenders,
which includes doing more to stop promoting their content.
And finally four, extend its current
and future efforts to languages other than English.
With the group noting that YouTube shortcomings in
moderating non-English language content
are incredibly notable in the global south.
Now in response to this letter,
a YouTube spokesperson stressed
that it was heavily invested in policies
and products that connect people to authoritative content
and reduce the spread of misinformation.
And adding that it has seen important progress
but is always looking for meaningful ways to improve
and will continue to strengthen our work
with the fact-checking community.
And, you know, personally when it comes to this topic,
I feel somewhat defeated
when it comes to misinformation on social media.
I also am a bit torn to a lesser extent on some things.
I mean just think about when you've seen
the biggest pushers of misinformation.
Like, they wear those, like, you putting resources
underneath their video or their tweet as a badge of honor.
And then if a platform removes that content,
it essentially turns into this Barbra Streisand effect,
where then it's just uploaded to another place,
it turns into this big promotional event to go,
"Hey, this is what they don't want you to see."
But then, in what feels like 99 out of 100 cases,
they allow those bad actors
to then still continue using their platform.
So, those bad actors get to treat these videos,
get to treat these moments as promotional events,
whether to push to content off-platform
or usually, to paid subscriptions or donations.
But also, and this is where I get torn,
I don't wanna call for YouTube to remove more content,
suppress more content, because they already do that
on a lot of content that shouldn't.
For example, while I was out on vacation,
a YouTuber by the name of MamaMax,
put out a video called, YouTube pick a side.
Personally, I found that he had a lot of really important
and, I think, very on-the-point critiques of YouTube.
Or the fact that YouTube suppresses,
and at times, removes content they deem as controversial,
which inadvertently protects the worst of society.
Right, how can we talk about
and expose horrible people doing horrible things
to, at times, the people that need to be
most protected in this world
when you're not gonna allow us to have a voice?
And that is actually a point that creators like
Charlie White, aka MoistCr1TiKaL,
had when responding to MamaMax's video,
with him saying things like,
- For a lot of people, they feel like YouTube just
prefers to bury this kind of information
instead of trying to help the people
that are affected by the bad actors that get investigated.
YouTube instead just punishes the people
for investigating it.
Clearly a pretty (beep) solution
because if the content's getting taken down,
less people know about it, which means more victims.
- Also, a little inside baseball,
you know how sometimes I upload morning videos
in addition to the PDS on this channel?
I do that because I genuinely don't believe that YouTube's
gonna make the situation better or easier
and I don't want those stories
that I still wanna get out there to tank my show.
And it also troubles me the number of times
I've come across a creator that I know,
talking about a bad actor and they feature the video
and somehow they're video gets removed
but the original post stays up.
And so their batting record there doesn't make me feel great
about where their batting record would be
if they imposed even harsher restrictions.
And I just sometimes look at that content
and I'm like, YouTube make it make sense.
Which is why my final point on this story is
I don't think that we should remove videos,
I think we should remove the internet.
We tried y'all, it didn't work.
I don't know what I'm gonna do with the 10 hours a day
that I'm plugged into the Matrix but, you know.
Whatever the alternative is probably better at this point.
I'll take the pay cut,
I'll take the hit on the bank account,
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And then, while it is a new year,
we got some of the same shit in the news
like the situation with YouTuber, Ethan Klein,
and Triller co-founder, Ryan Kavanaugh.
Right where we left things last year,
we talked about Ryan filing a defamation suit against Ethan,
arguing that Ethan was causing constant harm
to his reputation.
Writing in an essay that Ethan, quote,
"has posted video after video attacking
and slandering me personally."
With this also notably coming after Triller
had filed a lawsuit against Ethan and H3 Productions
over alleged copyright infringement.
With that, you had Ethan shooting back
at all of these lawsuits, including the defamation suit,
and saying that while he has referenced negative information
while talking about Ryan,
he is, quote, not creating any of these claims,
but merely reading what has already been published
by well respected news sources.
And arguing that it's not defamation
if he's citing information that has already been published.
But, we also have an update to this story,
thanks to this morning.
Ethan Klein posting a video claiming that Ryan has now filed
a fourth lawsuit against him.
And I'll link to it down below but the case in question here
involves a website that Ethan made called,
"Does Ryan Kavanaugh Look Like Harvey Weinstein?"
With the website having compare and contrast images
of Ryan and Harvey's faces.
Additionally, it includes photos of them together
as well as a timeline laying out, quote,
"Ryan Kavanaugh's terrible record."
And with this and the defamation essay that Ryan wrote,
he said that the creation of this site has resulted, quote,
"In further false articles and sites to be be published
and directed traffic to these false articles and sites."
Adding, "He has sent paid traffic
to the site to push it the page one
of Google search results for my name.
He has encouraged people on Reddit, YouTube, Twitter,
Instagram, and elsewhere to click on this site,
upvote comments, and engage to keep pushing it
higher in my search results."
With Ethan also claiming here
that Ryan is trying to get that website removed,
sharing a link at one point saying.
- Ryan Kavanaugh files a cybersquatting case
against YouTuber.
That's right.
Ryan Kavanaugh filed a UDRP to try to take down the website.
- With the website that Ethan shared explaining a UDRP is a
Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy
with Ethan saying that he thinks that Ryan
was hoping that he just wouldn't respond,
resulting in a default judgment.
So yeah, this dispute, expectedly, has now bled into 2022.
It continues to grow and who knows where this is gonna end.
That said, I do have to kind of wonder,
with how much we've actually talked about
Ethan Klein over the years,
if we're looking at amounts of time, which would be longer?
The amount of time that extends while H3 is being sued
or the times where he's not?
I've never seen a YouTuber have to deal with
this amount of litigation.
And then, let's talk about Dr. Fauci
speaking at a hearing of the Senate Committee
on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions yesterday.
If you were online, you saw it got very heated,
even leading to a point where Fauci
called a Republican senator a moron.
But before we get to that specific moment,
let's start with Rand Paul
and Fauci having this back and forth.
- You keep coming back to personal attacks on me
that have absolutely no relevance to reality.
- Do you think anybody has had
more influence over our response to this
than you have? - [Fauci] Let me finish.
I have life threats upon my life,
harassments of my family, and my children,
with obscene phone calls because people are lying about me.
Why would senator wanna do this?
So go to Rand Paul website and you see "fire Dr. Fauci"
with a little box that says, "contribute here."
You can do $5, $10, $20, $100.
So you were making a catastrophic epidemic
for your political gain.
- You have politically attacked your colleagues
and in a politically reprehensible way.
- Now notably, this is by no means
the first time Dr. Fauci has said
directly to senator Rand Paul's face
that Paul is spreading totally inaccurate,
baseless claims that are making the pandemic worse.
But it was a key point for Fauci
to directly point to how Rand Paul
and others like him are trying to monetize
and fundraise off of the villainization of Fauci.
And also, if you're wondering what even led to all of that,
as Fauci explained yesterday,
- Senator, we are here at a committee
to look at a virus now,
that has killed almost 900,000 people
and the purpose of the committee
was to try and get things out
how we can help to get the American public.
The last time we had a committee or the time before,
he was accusing me of being responsible
for the death of four to five million people,
which is really irresponsible
and I say why is he doing that?
It distracts from what we're all trying to do here today
is get our arms around the epidemic
and the pandemic that we're dealing with,
not something imaginary.
- So you have all of that
and then you have this other heated exchange
with Republican, Roger Marshall, with Marshall asking Fauci
a totally unrelated question about his personal finances,
which are actually already public knowledge,
and asking Fauci if he would file a financial disclosure,
which if you even took a second to look at this,
he already has.
But still, despite Fauci explaining that,
we saw Marshall saying,
- Big tech giants are doing an incredible job
of keeping it from being public.
We'll continue to look for it. Where would we find it?
- All you have to do is ask for it.
(chuckles)
You're so misinformed, it's extraordinary.
- And that exchange finally devolving into this.
- You are totally incorrect.
- [Marshall] Well we look forward to reviewing it.
- [Woman] Senator Marshall, Dr. Fauci has answered you,
it is public information
and he's happy to give it to you if you would ask.
Senator Moran-
- [Fauci] What a moron. Jesus Christ.
- And ultimately, that is where that story
and today's show ends.
I love your faces and I'll see you tomorrow.