https://toddzillax.substack.com
*An anti-woke podcast focusing on the invasive collectivist species and the widespread confluence of money, boutique ”news” propaganda, psychology, and hyper-connective tech: The Social Media Disease. Toddzilla X @ YouTube.
Episodes
Monday Aug 21, 2023
Monday Aug 21, 2023
In this short episode, Todd discusses the near complete loss of trust in American institutions, particularly the media, and the result: informational anarchy. What filth is left free to slither into the trust vacuum?
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Tuesday Aug 15, 2023
Tuesday Aug 15, 2023
Starting with a discussion about painfully reaching rock bottom and its role in addiction and recovery, Todd applies it to the dopamine drip of technology-driven tribal politics and how he and others wrongly assumed Donald was the tribal floor. (13:52) The Left's application of Newton's Third Law of Extremism: the Green Tea Party and how, with the media's deification of The Holy Counterfeiter, it mutated into an invasive Ideological Insurgency using scapegoats to aggressively attack American history, institutions, and core values. To colonize anywhere, you must first exterminate foundational myths and cohesive narratives, the established religion, in order to replace it with your own. There’s a reason Latin America is Catholic, after all.
Also:
- The Sopranos as social anthropology
- What if there is no floor and rock bottom instead hits like Chicxulub?
- In the failing era of Unity Via Division, selling unity knockoffs is a good dollar
- Can we just dispense with the infanitile "Let's Come Together" stuff?
- No? Show your work!
- The "need to believe" is the death of reason
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https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjdLR140l--HufeRSAnj91A
Monday Aug 07, 2023
Monday Aug 07, 2023
After a brief introduction to metacognition, Todd delves back into how people are born as storytellers, not rational truth seekers, and how the storytelling ape probably evolved out of a need for simple explanation and meaning. Also, why are experts in detecting the "enemy's" bullish*t but so bad at sniffing out our own team's? After reflecting on the Facebook Wars, have we become organic pieces of agitation propaganda ourselves? Worse, can innate tribalism be exploited by agitprop-fueled hatred? Last question: gee, ya think?
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Monday Jul 31, 2023
Monday Jul 31, 2023
Your feral host is suddenly prolific? In the first of at least two episodes, Todd talks about how the Facebook document dump confirmed what most people already knew yet will only play to the messenger's choir. Trust: it matters. Also, what will happen when AI begins churning out endless supplies of effective algorithm-targeted agitprop? (hint: nothing good) Then comes a surprising, albeit half-hearted, defense of The Gatekeepers seasoned with a not as surprising dash of I-told-you-so.
Part two drops in a day or two.
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Now on Discord.
Sunday Jul 30, 2023
Sunday Jul 30, 2023
After another extended hiatus, Todd's back with another sparkling hour of uplifting inspiration!
(8:40) How does a person enthusiastically produce a podcast when the subject matter and outcome is completely devoid of basic hope?
(9:41) "Fix" the for-profit media complex? Good luck. "It's the people." Tiptoeing into how pre-programmed deceit and self-deception are major parts of the how and why.
(30:45) Deceit and Self-Deception. The opening salvo.
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Now on Discord.
Sunday Mar 12, 2023
Sunday Mar 12, 2023
After revisiting the March 2, 2020 episode recorded at the dawn of the pandemic, Todd uses 3-years of hindsight to explore ( 60:00 ) how much further trust in government and media institutions has eroded and the effects. Data overload, trust apathy, and monetized tribal agitprop leads nowhere good. Also, is a liberal democracy capable of defending itself against an illiberal insurgency without destroying itself in the process?
Rachel Botsman's Book: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1541762703/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Your Undivided Attention: https://www.humanetech.com/podcast
"ToddzillaX" on most social media. LIKE, SHARE & SUBSCRIBE!
Thursday Feb 16, 2023
Thursday Feb 16, 2023
After spontaneously eulogizing his friend, Todd tries euthanizing our cliche-and disingenuous-gun "debate" addiction. Again (10:00)
(18:00) Isn't it funny how the balloon and the ensuing UFO "mystery" distracted everyone from Biden's classified documents scandal? How about some MORE healthy rabid skepticism?
(30:00) Your host got the inside poop on Ohio's train derailment. While the cause seems obvious, who's to blame? Is it corporate greed, the ongoing labor shortage, or worse, DOT incompetence?
(45:00) East Palestine, Ohio: in the culture wars, poor whites have become what Chomsky called unworthy victims. How would the response have been different in Ann Arbor, Portland, or Gary?
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Friday Jan 27, 2023
Friday Jan 27, 2023
As the podcast approaches the 5-years mark since its return, Todd revisits his Media 101 episode and further explores why the for-profit media sucks. (Hint: see the title!) Also, how personal attachments corrupt an already frail sense of basic reason, why emotionally compromised victims (and others) should never be consulted, and how a supposedly idealistic cultist "morality" eventually seeks out and crucifies its traitorous blasphemers & heretics, like Elon Musk and Joe Rogan.
Segment 2 starts (27:30) with an overdue return to Joan Didion's essay (and handy extremist test!) On Morality, transitions toward the Woke Book of Shouldism, Haidt's elephant, and steers into Toddzilla's plea for Sausage Party Hope in segment 3 (1:02:40).
"ToddzillaX" on most social media. LIKE, SHARE & SUBSCRIBE!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjdLR140l--HufeRSAnj91A
https://toddzillax.substack.com
https://www.twitch.tv/toddzillax
https://www.escapingthecave.com/
Music by Yellow Pills! https://open.spotify.com/artist/7rDvBzvGcNPV3BYZ1n5VdZ
Sunday Jan 22, 2023
Sunday Jan 22, 2023
Studio 4 opens with a new episode and a new live stream on Twitch! This week at Davos, an official of the EU Taliban's Morality Police wants everyone to know that European hate speech laws "are coming to the United States." Do liberals realize that they've become exactly what they used to hate? Grab Chief Wahoo gear while you can! Also, Biden destroys whatever credible self-righteousness Democrats had left, and thanks to BLM, performative reparations legislation, and far left bigoted preaching about the inherent evils of "whiteness," the cultural boomerang has begun its return journey. Finally, where tech and agitprop converge, the Great War of the 21st Century will be fought during Propaganda's Golden Age. An oblivious species with no self-awareness has no chance of surviving that as free men. Everyone supposedly demands "accountability" these days, so whose fault will it really be?
"ToddzillaX" on most social media. LIKE, SHARE & SUBSCRIBE!
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjdLR140l--HufeRSAnj91A
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https://www.twitch.tv/toddzillax
https://www.escapingthecave.com
Music by Yellow Pills! https://open.spotify.com/artist/7rDvBzvGcNPV3BYZ1n5VdZ
![[Micropod] Our Great War](https://deow9bq0xqvbj.cloudfront.net/ep-logo/pbblog2484714/Micropod_SMALL_uuxfj2_300x300.png){kind=logo}
Tuesday Nov 22, 2022
Tuesday Nov 22, 2022
Over information & reality itself.
Tuesday Nov 22, 2022
Tuesday Nov 22, 2022
In an exploding state of informational anarchy, who gets to decide what's "true?" Who can you believe?
From #112 - Storytellers, Truth, and The Great War of the 21st Century (11/8/22)
Tuesday Nov 08, 2022
Tuesday Nov 08, 2022
Todd's back for the midterms and starts off by blasting the populist Poor Media Victim attitude, exploring whether propaganda and media literacy even matter, discussing informational warfare, and the finer points of navigating ideological drift and its extremists.
Segment 2 (23:00): the Democrats' abortion debacle, The Sham-Wow Guy vs. Fettergump, and how the '22 midterms are a sure sign Idiocracy is here.
Segment 3 (39:00): There were no blacks on the World Series rosters. So?
Segment 4 (58:20): Elon's Twitter drama, his inevitable choice between free speech absolutism and truth ministers, euphemism warnings, then returns to The 21st Century Informational War and how human self-deception is converging with technology to trigger a battle over reality itself.
"ToddzillaX" on most social media. LIKE, SHARE & SUBSCRIBE!
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Music by Yellow Pills! https://open.spotify.com/artist/7rDvBzvGcNPV3BYZ1n5VdZ
![[Reload] Iceberg Ahoy! Validation Junkies & The Chosen Ones (9/10/19)](https://deow9bq0xqvbj.cloudfront.net/ep-logo/pbblog2484714/My_project-1_6__8gtgsr_300x300.png){kind=logo}
Tuesday Aug 23, 2022
Tuesday Aug 23, 2022
From 2019:
Social validation, dopamine, and social media's Walter White; more on how people are more willing and eager than deceived when it comes to swallowing fiction and disinformation; choking on data leading to confused gullibility; honestly in a crisis; Sausage Party Hope: children demanding their happy ending. Where's the spring of genuine hope?
ALSO:
- The Battle of the 21st Century
- The iceberg bobbing off our bow
- Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube: Walter White cutting his meth supply?
- Pinker's Utopian vs. Tragic Vision
- Evolution and self-awareness
- The bi-weekly apocalypse and their "chosen ones"
- Progress's Myth and becoming organic
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Tuesday Dec 28, 2021
Tuesday Dec 28, 2021
Todd's back from sinus purgatory and joined in the studio by Cory! He's un-vaxxed and endured pre-omicron covid, so the show hits its crescendo with a frank, honest, and nuanced chat about responsibility, personal choice, and the ethical limits of anti-vax empathy.
Before that, they explore why no one believes politicians, what it would take to regain any trust (it's authenticity, stupid), whether there's anyone worth believing in and, if so, would they have the courage to speak truth to the mob? In a society increasingly based on the philosophy of Unity Via Division, is it such a shock when whites vote for their advocates, too? Also lawyers: practitioners of the Dark Arts of Rhetorical Bullshit, and Anger+Activism: Self-Righteous Erotica.
"ToddzillaX" on most social media. LIKE, SHARE & SUBSCRIBE!
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Music by Yellow Pills: https://open.spotify.com/artist/7rDvBzvGcNPV3BYZ1n5VdZ
Tuesday Dec 07, 2021
Tuesday Dec 07, 2021
The podship begins slowly changing course as Todd discusses his new Rumble channel, propaganda-by-omission, my-team blind spots, and how his favorite podcast exposed itself as woke. The signs were always there! Also: the special interest boomerang, avoiding exposure to re-articulated ideological scripture, D.I.E. = r.e.p.a.r.a.t.i.o.n.s., the stupidity of scapegoating majorities, and the naive No Tribe Follies. Storytellers, not truth seekers. Memorize that.
"ToddzillaX" on most social media.
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Music by Yellow Pills: https://open.spotify.com/artist/7rDvBzvGcNPV3BYZ1n5VdZ
Monday Mar 01, 2021
Monday Mar 01, 2021
Trump's CPAC appearance marks the start of the 2024 campaign, barely a month into Biden's term. Will we survive this? After other contemporary messages of heartwarming fellowship and hope, Todd continues phoning his shows in, this time "reimagining" episode #64 which discussed performance-based validation addiction. Recorded at the beginning of the pandemic, other topics include how collective critical thought is impossible. You're not the Elephant Whisperer and their switch is internal. You can't "save" anyone! A timely reminder in the Age of Q. Also, leaving the vanquished a path home to save your own casualties.
MORE: https://www.escapingthecave.com
https://toddzillax.substack.com
Monday Feb 22, 2021
Monday Feb 22, 2021
After a 2021 open, your friendly virtual Toddzilla mines early episodes, from 2014 & 2018, as a foreshadowing refresher on ideological religions and the Holy War being fueled by their proselytizing zombie hordes. Remember kids, mobs: they're f***ing stupid! Ask your doctor if intellectual autonomy is right for you! (RE27)
More: https://toddzillax.substack.com
https://www.escapingthecave.com
Thursday Feb 18, 2021
Thursday Feb 18, 2021
People are storytellers not truth seekers. And we're explorers to the core. If you're looking for something positive, exploration brings out the best in us. Good luck today, JPL! How do we become more sophisticated informational consumers? Loved him? Hated him? Either way, Rush Limbaugh was probably the best and most influential for-profit propagandist ever. Also, finding the line between honesty and aggression, how the pandemic complicates a digital detox, and the relationship between money and exploration.
More: https://www.escapingthecave.com
https://toddzillax.substack.com
Monday Feb 15, 2021
Monday Feb 15, 2021
Why aren't impeachments argued before the Supreme Court instead of pre-decided partisans? What better time to revisit the ridiculous idea of Mob Wisdom and the Plague of Democratized Opinion? Are the intentionally misinformed qualified to sit on a We The People's Court Jury? And, if "the people" are going to metaphorically kidnap and blackmail their representatives, should "news" outlets be subject to perjury laws? Also, the weird thing that happens when abstractions come alive!
More: https://toddzillax.substack.com
https://www.escapingthecave.com
Monday Feb 08, 2021
Monday Feb 08, 2021
What about the inevitable Iron Fist of the Collective and the short path between one's idealistic morality and political fanaticism? The batsh*t political poles have shifted apart again! Since no quarter is found between the cults' compounds, Todd asks once again: where's a legit centrist supposed to go? Also, a refresher on narratives, a quick introduction to Sowell's "constrained" and "unconstrained" visions, a very human NEED for propaganda, understanding why many Trump voters just hate Democrats, and our great crime against humanity: self-advocacy!
More: https://www.escapingthecave.com
Monday Feb 01, 2021
Monday Feb 01, 2021
In this sprawling and questionably improvised episode, your slightly medicated and possibly menstruating host discusses everything from subject-matter-futility to contemporary colonizers attacking native temples. How is life in the jungle different from the zoo? What happens when propaganda is simply met with boring ol' truth? Social media is propaganda's plutonium. What's the relationship between moral imperatives and political violence? Enjoy the silence, Trump: The Second Season starts soon. And what about that search for lost or missing significance and meaning? Is there something more to it that we shouldn't ignore?
More: https://toddzillax.substack.com
https://www.escapingthecave.com
Monday Jan 25, 2021
Monday Jan 25, 2021
Joffrey's banished from Twitter and exiled to Florida while a traumatized and twitchy nation begins adjusting to something "normal." How has The Mad King's term eroded government legitimacy within our own borders? No inauguration day riots? What are those brave revolutionaries up to? A: trying to get each other banned from Twitter! President Biden's a reality. How long will Trump continue to set the standard and serve as the excuse? Also, last week's Woke State Media display was the fusion of big tech, pop culture, corporate media, and Green Tea Politics. It introduced us to our freshly exposed left flank and the future of Ideological Theocracy: technological totalitarianism. Where's the centrist supposed to pitch his tent? (RE27)
More: https://www.escapingthecave.com
Monday Jan 18, 2021
Monday Jan 18, 2021
With troops flooding DC, Trump's term ends in two days time. Why doesn't it feel certain that it will? Was a nation of "patriots" suddenly afflicted with insurrectile dysfunction on Sunday? Is Donald Trump a foreign agent? Who cares? He performed like one. What lies at the confluence of technology & idiocracy? Also, letting escaped cultists find their way home, When Stories Attack: factional storytelling is propaganda, and Toddzilla stalks Telegram! How did this thing make it to 100? (SM7B)
Friday Jan 15, 2021
Friday Jan 15, 2021
Waiting for 2021's Inauguration Day storm to arrive, I intended this to be a quick repost of a segment from 2019's "Iceberg Ahoy!" episode but it took on a life of its own. It covers everything from QAnon and the Religious Mind's need to believe to the responsibility coming with our contemporary tech capability to our eventual (and deserved) loss of free-range free speech. But the core of the episode is this: it's the people. It's always been the people.
More: https://www.escapingthecave.com
For Future Reference: https://toddzillax.substack.com
Monday Jan 11, 2021
Monday Jan 11, 2021
Trump's insurrection and the religious mind: why are so many Americans committed to faith before facts? Were they rioters? Protesters? Activists? Terrorists? That's decided by propaganda's very peculiar perspective effect. Is this the end of Trumpism or the beginning of something even worse? When it comes to free speech, where's the line between "liberty and license? If people ignore free speech's responsibilities, should social media accounts be licensed? Should Silicon Valley be in the gatekeeping business? Also, what's the relationship between likability and demonization? (RE20)
More: https://www.escapingthecave.com
For Future Reference: https://toddzillax.substack.com
Sunday Nov 22, 2020
Sunday Nov 22, 2020
Todd & Brian begin with some obligatory "analysis" of Trumptown's post-election conspiracy orgy including more conversation about why both Trump and down ticket Democrats had their electoral posteriors handed to them: has the Moderate Majority finally reclaimed its place at the wheel? Or, will it again be shouted down by loudmouth extremists? Also, what's Trump's post-term role with his increasingly unstable base and how will that affect the new Resistance™ party? Is something even more dangerous than Trump coming? Around 34:00, the conversation pivots wider to "institutional terra incognito", the point at which history stops rhyming, comfortably habitual thinking, and Marshall McLuhan's classic phrase: "The medium is the message." Is the important issue our new technology or how we use it? The answer isn't simplistic; the simple act of writing provides an instructional example why!
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More: https://www.escapingthecave.com
Sunday Nov 15, 2020
Sunday Nov 15, 2020
The afterglow is now the aftermath. Essentially two episodes in one, Brian and Todd begin by reflecting on how the vibe has changed since Biden's victory speech then touch on fundamental social psychology. What happens when cognitive cliches begin breaking down and we're forced to explore unfamiliar ground? Is too many choices as bad in the political and informational marketplaces as it is on Netflix? What's the relationship between age and wisdom? Around 53:00, the conversation pivots. Why do Democrats seem to always lose even when they win? Bill Maher offered a very familiar answer! Is the Moderate Majority in danger of being surrounded and marginalized by the loudmouth extremist minority? What happens if they're forced to choose between competing demagogues in 4-year's time? Will an increasingly fragmented boutique news help social media make that possible? Book your Toddzilla Children's Party before it's too late!
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More: https://www.escapingthecave.com/
Monday Nov 09, 2020
Monday Nov 09, 2020
The Moderate Majority spoke! Todd, Brian, and millions around the globe are relieved and indulging in the afterglow of relieved liberation and overdue hope. Enjoy it while it lasts! We discuss how the podcast's overarching topic, the Social Media Disease, is going mainstream, how both extremes were repudiated in the same election, the art of changing one's own mind, and erecting bridges: everyone's individual responsibility if we're collectively serious about The Great Coming Together. Also, this "stop the steal" silliness and how does someone as personally vile as Donald Trump still get over 70-million votes? Oh yeah! We begin with a late eulogy for Eddie VanHalen.
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More: https://www.escapingthecave.com
Monday Nov 02, 2020
Monday Nov 02, 2020
Todd & Brian reflect both on where we've come from and where we're going as this electoral reality show finally ends. We explore the side effects of direct democracy's mob rule and why the Electoral College is absolutely essential. Also, how do we "rehumanize" ourselves and each other? What's the best case scenario to avoid post-election chaos and violence? Is it inevitable? How will our various factions perceive President Harris if Biden wins only to resign? What are the wider effects of our burgeoning "no compromise!" culture? Pre-election anxiety and fatigue: is it universal outside the fanatic's camp? What's the relationship between one-issue voters and Haidt's Elephant? Our media celebrities and influencers: are they simply clever fiction writers and talented performance artists? Winter: is it finally here? We'll know in a week.
The "Safeguard" documentary: https://www.amazon.com/Safeguard-Electoral-College-Trent-England/dp/B08H6KH9QV
More: https://www.escapingthecave.com/
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Monday Oct 26, 2020
Monday Oct 26, 2020
Todd & Brian return discussing the direct parallels between ideological and theological religion and what Dan Carlin calls The Heat: trivial outrage manufactured to manipulate media consumers for advertising profits, and how it affects us as a society. And, does it matter if our outrage triggers are fake? Is social media contributing to a literal devolution and destroying eons of self-domestication? How do we reclaim our human empathy? Are we returning to naked barbarism as we become slaves to emotional impulses that just "must" be expressed/inflicted? Also, fertile revolutionary soil and how it's the suffering who are susceptible to Snake Oil Demagoguery, Manchurian propagandists, the Electoral College, and Mencken's disturbing concept of irredeemably. What if there is no solution?
Dan Carlin's "A Recipe For Caesar": https://www.dancarlin.com/product/common-sense-319-a-recipe-for-caesar/
MORE ETC: https://www.escapingthecave.com/