Will We Ever Learn To Listen To Women?
Mary Shelley, 1840
Today I’ve found myself coaxed into watching a YouTube recommended episode of the Lex Fridman podcast.
Yes, yes. He has platformed bad people, so he is a bad person, and his listeners are bad people, and everyone who refers to him is also bad. Happy? If I were to choose from the pantheon of podcast bros, I personally find him to be the least “problematic.”
Darn it. One sentence in and I’ve already capitulated to the angry mob in my head.
There are countless sources from which to obtain information and thus inform your perspectives, and while some media outlets are notoriously biased, many of them are not.
You just don’t like what some of them have to say.
Hope that helps.
The only other Lex Fridman episode I’ve ever tuned into was his interview with Bassem Youssef and I thought it was great. This is hardly enough evidence to absolve me of the suspicion that I’m one of ‘the bad ones,’ but I also know that such an endeavor is about as fruitful as cutting a tree down with a nail file.
I see well-meaning lantzmen attempt this everyday, with some having more success than others if they’re only repentant enough and say or post the right things. But try as you might, the roots will always be there – etz chaim.
If I have learned anything over these last nine months, it’s that there are no amount of truths we can prove, advancements to humanity we can contribute, or goodness we could embody, that will undo 3,000 years of well baked libel.
As for everyone else, I don’t know whether to be terrified or embarrassed watching an entire population tap dance as they shoot at each other’s feet. Meanwhile, the dancehall is burning. You all have fun with that.
Lastly, for the love of god, read some Hannah Arendt.
Hannah Arendt, 1963
Where was I? Right. Lex Fridman.
His guest is investigative journalist, author, and veritable catnip to conspiracy theorists, Annie Jacobsen. Previous publications of hers include books about the CIA, DARPA, Operation Paperclip, Area 51, and the US governments investigations into extrasensory perception and psychokinesis. Fun stuff if you ask me! But also decidedly male preoccupations, so it’s no wonder she’s found herself here to promote her latest book, Nuclear War: A Scenario.
Granted, everyone loves a post apocalypse story when it’s interwoven with fantasy; with series like The Last of Us, Station 11, Fallout, etc., imagining what one might do to survive under such dire conditions is a cathartic mental exercise. Yet it’s entirely different to hear someone talk about it so matter-of-factly. Jacobsen’s descriptions of what would happen aren’t theoretical. They’ve been corroborated by the fortunate (or unfortunate), few who have lived through it.
The bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki killed hundreds of thousands of people, but they also left behind thousands who survived. People who would live the rest of their lives carrying a knowledge that cannot be conveyed by making films, sharing stories, writing books, or giving interviews.
Nevertheless, it’s important to listen and take heed. (I would recommend watching White Light/Black Rain: The Destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki).
Shigeko Sasamori, Hiroshima bombing survivor
While words can’t suffice to explain what is beyond comprehension, Jacobsen does a commendable job, all while speaking in the most calming honeyed voice I have ever heard.
I pause it for a minute.
What the hell am I doing? I’m in no state to be watching this. I should switch to the Dodo. I want to see a rambunctious kitten become best friends with a barn animal.
But watching Fridman squirm with anxiety as this woman walks him through increasingly horrifying hypotheticals is prime entertainment. How does she make it so provocative?
Just recently I was reminded of the fact that Mary Shelley was only 16 years old when she wrote one of the most highly acclaimed and long lasting science fiction/horror stories of all time. It’s been suggested that Shelley was inspired by the legend of the Golem, a creature originating in European Jewish folklore with the most famous story being the Golem of Prague. The below is pasted directly from Wikipedia, feel free to skip it if it doesn’t interest you.
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Rabbi Judah Loew ben Bezalel, the late 16th-century rabbi of Prague, also known as the Maharal, reportedly “created a golem out of clay from the banks of the Vltava River and brought it to life through rituals and Hebrew incantations to defend the Prague ghetto from antisemitic attacks and pogroms.” Depending on the version of the legend, the Jews in Prague were to be either expelled or killed under the rule of Rudolf II, the Holy Roman Emperor. The Golem was called Josef and was known as Yossele. He was said to be able to make himself invisible and summon spirits from the dead. Rabbi Loew deactivated the Golem on Friday evenings by removing the shem (soul) before the Sabbath began, so as to let it rest. One Friday evening, Rabbi Loew forgot to remove the shem, and feared that the Golem would desecrate the Sabbath. A different story tells of a golem that fell in love, and when rejected, became the violent monster seen in most accounts. Some versions have the golem eventually going on a murderous rampage. The rabbi then managed to pull the shem from his mouth and immobilize him in front of the synagogue, whereupon the golem fell in pieces.
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My crudest understanding of the predominant interpretations of Frankenstein is that it warns about the hubris of man when he tries to play god, or remove women from the process of creation. It’s said that Shelley drew inspiration from the Industrial Revolution that was taking place at the time and warned against the reckless pursuit of scientific advances.
But what speaks to me most profoundly, is its portrayal of the cruelty that erupts from the hive-mind, when humans are faced with something (or someone) they don’t understand. People are malleable. Tell them a story about this “other,” make it convincing enough to not only engender hatred but to justify it, and an army you’ve created. Tada!
Is this just a natural outcome of being human? Collective fear getting left to fester and destroy.
These thoughts of Shelley and Jacobsen distill in my mind until I arrive at the notion that while men may commit the atrocities, no one can tell them back to us the way a woman can.
In the wake of all of this destruction, we’re left trying to create allegory from the aceldama.
Ok, I need to shake this. No YouTube. No doom scrolling. At least for a moment.
Maybe the safe space in my mind right now could just be in memory (lol, what memory?). I generally steer clear of millennial nostalgia content seeing as it serves no purpose other than to make us idealize the past while deepening our resentment for the present. It’s not helping anyone. Alas, I need to try. I can do this. Just meditate on it. Find something simple to think about. And then it comes to me.
FroYo.
I want to go back to the feeling I had in the days when Red Mango and Pinkberries were everywhere. Now the dernier cri is: COOKIE.
Big fat cookies the size of your face, churned out by places like Crumbl. With it’s sleek packaging, constantly rotating menu, and celebrity ‘collaborations,’ I suppose it’s earned its position as top dog of sweet treat franchises.
But even with all of the algorithmic force feeding to which I’ve admittedly succumbed, watching TikToks of people spitting sprinkle crumbs onto their steering wheels, not once have I ever thought, “wow, that looks good.”
Britney Spears
I want a gosh darn frozen yogurt! *shakes fists at the sky*
And I want Britney to have her frontal lobe back.
And I want to rent a movie from Blockbuster.
And I want to hug my mother.
That’s all.
Suddenly I have Maria Callas’s rendition of “La Mamma Morta” playing in my head. This happens sometimes. Like a haunted radio that turns on spontaneously and plays music I didn’t ask to hear. Right now, combined with Jacobsen’s ASMR-like description of a 100 mile wide fireball consuming an entire city in seconds, I have to give my brain some credit – it’s an inspired choice.
While I have little faith that the general public will come to its senses about most things, as the summers continue to grow hotter and we finally concede that frosting fomented root canals are simply not worth the trouble, I believe that we will bring back my beloved FroYo.
Ok now it’s time for the Dodo.
