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Episodes
Wednesday Aug 09, 2023
#123 - Inappropriate Honesty, Truth Riders, That Which Must Remain Unsaid
Wednesday Aug 09, 2023
Wednesday Aug 09, 2023
In the continuation of the last episode, Todd re-explores his oft-ignored Path to Empathy, the DIKW pyramid, and data Overload before exploring religion's real purpose and offering our pompous atheist friends the back of his rhetorical hand. From that joyful and uplifting summit, he moves on to question how woke parents can sacrifice their own children to a foreign ideological god.
Also:
Introducing The Desert of the Why!
We know what legislative riders are. What about "truth" riders?
The one thing in news, information, and tech that must remain unspoken.
Why climate change hysterics are misguided and a waste of time.
How the stupid cliques we form as kids flare up like herpes for the rest of our lives.
Todd's new Gatekeeper disconnect.
Chasing Che.
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Monday Aug 07, 2023
#122 - Intellectual Tribalism & Gladiators in the Virtual Coliseum
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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Wednesday Aug 02, 2023
#121 - The Authoritarian Mind #2: Puritanism vs The Right Not to Believe
Wednesday Aug 02, 2023
Wednesday Aug 02, 2023
Mr. Sunshine delivers another cheerful monologue on our deep and persistent strain of authoritarian thought! Book those children's parties now!
Subtopics:
America's puritanical tradition began on the Mayflower. Why totalitarian cultural eugenics might do more harm than "good." Agitprop and authoritarianism are conjoined twins. Can a true Democracy even defend itself? The generational tyranny of tradition; each new generation has the right to rule itself free from the yoke of their dead ancestors. Is authoritarianism, like deceit and self-deception, an inherent trait rather than a character flaw? Is it democracy's self-destruct button? A brief introduction to Harold Lasswell. And finally, if you suddenly find you lack the freedom to NOT believe, you're living in a theocracy. Stand up. Push back.
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Now on Discord.
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
#119 - Inherent Deceit & Self-Deception: Our Wonderful World of Make Believe
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.
Friday Mar 17, 2023
#118 - Propaganda: Inseminating Zealots & The Religious Mind
Friday Mar 17, 2023
Friday Mar 17, 2023
Taken from two episodes released in 2019, I begin laying the 2023 foundation for a return to my unfinished series focussing on Jacques Ellul's book, Propaganda. This episode focused on how propaganda severs the individual from themselves, robs them of their intellectual autonomy, and "crystallizes" inseminated thoughts, opinions, and agendas, inside the propagandee host. It then uses slogans, symbols, stereotypes, agitprop, and the warm glow of tribal fellowship, to turn them into malleable proselytes and militants always awaiting their righteous marching orders. More of what’s covered: a preview of what’s to come and having the real Courage to be Disliked as opposed to surrendering to fear and social momentum to avoid the pain, and punishment, of leaving a group.
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Jacques Ellul's "Propaganda": https://www.amazon.com/Propaganda-Formation-Attitudes-Jacques-Ellul/dp/0394718747
Sunday Mar 12, 2023
#117 - Propaganda, Trust, Coronavirus, and You: 3-Years Later
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
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Thursday Feb 16, 2023
#116 - Guns, Balloons, Trains, Unworthy Victims
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
#115 - It’s Still The People
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).
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Sunday Jan 22, 2023
#114 - B for Boomerang
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?
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Tuesday Nov 22, 2022
Tuesday Nov 22, 2022
[Micropod] Social Media’s Ministry of Truth
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)
Thursday Nov 17, 2022
#113 - Our November Surprise, TikTok, and Rocks From Uranus
Thursday Nov 17, 2022
Thursday Nov 17, 2022
Reflecting on the rather shocking midterms and Trump's uninspired announcement. Was he pouting after being robbed of his triumphant return? Or worried about investigations?
Segment 2 (16:02): The changing social media landscape and TikTok posing an obvious data-driven election threat from China.
Segment 3 (22:12): Mankind at its best: Artemis finally lifted off sending Orion to the moon!
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Tuesday Nov 08, 2022
#112 - Storytellers, Truth, and The Great War of the 21st Century
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.
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Tuesday Aug 23, 2022
[Reload] Iceberg Ahoy! Validation Junkies & The Chosen Ones (9/10/19)
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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Friday Aug 19, 2022
[Reload] Story: The Propaganda Paradox (5-9-20)
Friday Aug 19, 2022
Friday Aug 19, 2022
From #79, this episode dove in to storytelling, a central theme in the quest to not only understand but hopefully fight propaganda's mind hack. Also, the relationship between stories, hope, and both kinds of religion: theological & ideological. What's the major distinction and why I believe traditional religion deserves its pass...on ONE ironclad condition.
Watch YouTube for new video from July's scrapped episode! A flood of fresh audio is coming!
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Tuesday Aug 16, 2022
[Reload] All You Need Is Doubt (1/4/21)
Tuesday Aug 16, 2022
Tuesday Aug 16, 2022
- This is the first of what will be weekly reloads highlighting ETC segments from the first 111-shows.
From #97, this episode featured uplifting topics such as: why it's not necessary to conquer a democracy when a just little doubt'll do ya. Also, how can a nation avoid inevitable conflict when each half of the country functions according to different rules of factual physics? Is there a relationship between likability, deplorability, & disinformation?
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SocMed: ToddzillaX
Tuesday Aug 09, 2022
#111 - Tribal By Nature & The Invasive Species
Tuesday Aug 09, 2022
Tuesday Aug 09, 2022
The one where Todd finally plants his flag! We're tribal critters who are bound by self-serving fictions; these stories are called cohesive narratives; national myths. And, in this country at least, the collectivist fairy tale of socialism is the antithesis of individualism; the "prepare the road for the child" mentality is mutually exclusive with our established American principle: meritocracy. Collectivist socialism and its "equity" cult is, therefore, an invasive species. Wokeism is an ideological insurgency. But from where?
#111 also features the details of a lengthy and dramatic tribalism re-think, how data overload & its existential chaos push people toward idiocratic political cults, and foreshadowing hints about finding propaganda's Rosetta Stone! Answers are finally coming! But are they the ones you think you want?
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Tuesday May 03, 2022
[Micropod] Murrow to FOX & CNN: From News to Monetized Propaganda
Tuesday May 03, 2022
Tuesday May 03, 2022
Selling blind confirmation bias back to us.
A whole new podcast made of old episodes!
Find it wherever you found this or here: https://toddzillax.substack.com/
Tuesday Dec 28, 2021
#110 - The Cost of Courage & The Limits of Anti-Vax Empathy
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.
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Tuesday Dec 07, 2021
#109 - Backdoor Reparations & Unity Via Division
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.
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Saturday Dec 04, 2021
#108 - My Team Bullsh*t: Private Lives & Public Health
Saturday Dec 04, 2021
Saturday Dec 04, 2021
After nine months Todd finally births another episode! In the return, he discusses his new video focus on YouTube, the year that's been, his wedding & vaccine-related informational anarchy costing him his mother, and how one is both free to exercise their vaccine choice and subject to the decisions others make in response. Also, "My Team" Bullsh*t has effectively neutralized the government's ability to respond to another public health crisis.
Music: Ryan Miera & Yellow Pills: https://open.spotify.com/artist/7rDvBzvGcNPV3BYZ1n5VdZ
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More Shows: https://www.escapingthecave.com
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Monday Mar 01, 2021
#107 - Social Media Avatars: Crazy, Stupid, or Full of Sh*t?
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
#106 - Political Cults & Mobs 101
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
#105 - Exploration, Evolution, Death of a Propagandist
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
#104 - Leaders, Puppets, Boils, and Show Trials
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
#103 - From Moralist to Tyrant or The Fanatic's Imperative
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
#102 - The Other Insurgency & Where's Our Hashtag?
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
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Monday Jan 25, 2021
#101 - Post-Trump Stress Disorder & Tech's Theocracy
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
#100 - American Zapatistas, Saboteur in Chief, The Lone Boogaloo
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)