SantaCon: From Burning Man Founders to Federal Fraudsters (w. filmmaker Seth Porges)

00:00:00
Speaker 1: For everyone who only listens to us, please check out our YouTube channel where we interview Hungarian filmmaker Aaron Timar about the Hungarian election and the impact of the documentary had on the outcome.

00:00:11
Speaker 2: We are going to talk about some very serious themes on the show today, So if you are the victim of violence, sexual assault, police, seek out these resources. We're going to list them on the screen. Welcome to Brief Recess.

00:00:28
Speaker 3: I'm Michael Foot, I'm Melissa Malbranch.

00:00:30
Speaker 2: Today we're going to have some birthday reflections. We're going to talk about Melissa's running with the former boss, Justice for Ursula and the Little Mermaid, Three types of Hugs, Pam Bondies no showed for her subpoena. We're going to talk about Bubblegate with Lindsey Gribb's bubble wand an interview with Seth Porges talking about Santacon and.

00:00:50
Speaker 3: My favorite holidays, the CEO.

00:00:51
Speaker 2: Who just got arrested. And I'm going to answer all your freaky, deeky, nasty emails from my dms and a little bit of a confessional in their two this week.

00:01:00
Speaker 3: Oh that's right, Yeah, it was good.

00:01:01
Speaker 2: Stick around, Sit your ass down. Some people that you get like a dirty martini with and yeah, I've never had a martini. Really well, I guess like it'll really knock you on your ass if you start having martinis.

00:01:16
Speaker 1: Although you know what, I'm kind of really into now. So I was like this during the pandemic, I started making like old timey cocktails.

00:01:24
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, because there was.

00:01:26
Speaker 1: Nothing else to do but get drunk. Right, So so I mean, am I wrong?

00:01:31
Speaker 2: Like remember when we facetimed Alyssa. Okay, everyone during the pandemic, we got on a we we had a daily check in with Alyssa and Melissa because Alyssa was one of the first people who got COVID in New York.

00:01:44
Speaker 1: First of all, let me just say this about Alyssa. Who you know, love her.

00:01:50
Speaker 3: Alyssa.

00:01:51
Speaker 4: Alyssa's are most chaotic crit Yes.

00:01:53
Speaker 1: And Alyssa was always sick. Yeah, always always sick. She was always she was always sick. And Alyssa and I shared an office and.

00:02:02
Speaker 4: It's March first, twenty twenty and I used.

00:02:05
Speaker 1: To always say to her, get the hell out.

00:02:07
Speaker 3: Of here, because she'd be like coughing up.

00:02:10
Speaker 1: Along and She's like, no, I'm fine, I'm fine.

00:02:12
Speaker 2: But then you're reading about COVID.

00:02:14
Speaker 3: Right, and oh yeah, and you're.

00:02:16
Speaker 2: Like, huh, this bitch next to me keeps coughing, keeps coughing.

00:02:19
Speaker 1: I wonderful, like anything, got a fever and is still like bleary eyed in the office.

00:02:23
Speaker 2: She's like, well, it's just a dry cough and a fever and that's our throat.

00:02:30
Speaker 3: And oils.

00:02:31
Speaker 4: So weird.

00:02:32
Speaker 2: So when she got COVID, it really was. It was like her and Tom Hanks. Yeah, we didn't know anyone who had COVID personally in our lives, and so we were we set a daily checking with her. And I mean, this is not my my lord to tell, but she went into lockdown with someone, a guy that she was like in the process of breaking up with.

00:02:53
Speaker 1: I feel like a lot of people broke up to her.

00:02:54
Speaker 4: Like two weeks this vicious.

00:02:57
Speaker 3: Poor girl was stuck with it and it was awful.

00:02:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, And so we had a daily like him anyway, though, Yeah, we didn't know he was. We were we were, we were never one whatever his name was. And so but we had this daily checking with her. And during the pandemic, we facetimed her at one point and her air conditioner had exploded. I was shooting out this orange liquid.

00:03:18
Speaker 3: Like this goose.

00:03:19
Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:03:19
Speaker 1: Yes, it was like Ghostbusters, like hellish, yuck, it's weird.

00:03:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was crazy. And we were like, she was like, what are my abichesill have the pictures you could have put up?

00:03:30
Speaker 4: Because she was she based on was like what do I do?

00:03:35
Speaker 1: What do you guys think this is?

00:03:37
Speaker 3: And I showed it to Andre and he was like, that looks really bad. Shot, It looks really bad.

00:03:46
Speaker 2: And it turned out the neighbors air conditioner upstairs was leaking onto hers and rusting.

00:03:52
Speaker 3: That's what it was.

00:03:53
Speaker 4: What it was.

00:03:54
Speaker 3: It looked thicker, it looked like asbestos.

00:03:57
Speaker 2: There's a viscosity to yeah, yeah, yeah, this is a quick cybar. We're going to get into what's going on in our personal lives.

00:04:04
Speaker 3: I'm pregnant with twins, congratulations, Mazzle.

00:04:08
Speaker 4: Okay, so Melissa and I are both wearing our Taurus.

00:04:10
Speaker 2: Sweat because it is the first day of tourist season and also my birthday.

00:04:15
Speaker 3: Happy birthday, Michael.

00:04:17
Speaker 2: Twenty yep, that's right, and your birthday is in two days, right on Wednesday.

00:04:22
Speaker 1: And Michael, tell everybody how old you are?

00:04:24
Speaker 2: Old enough thirty eight, but I'm going to lie and say thirty two. I think why because I want to redo what I did when I was thirty two. It's this is my life. We've only got a couple of years left on Earth, only a couple more years to tell the bunker until Paradise, the bunker under the ballroom at the White House that they're building.

00:04:50
Speaker 1: If you could go back and redo things, would you absolutely?

00:04:54
Speaker 2: And I shame on anyone who says they wouldn't, because y'all know you would.

00:04:58
Speaker 1: For real.

00:04:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, there are so many things. I mean, I think I would slut it up more. I think that's one, now what you would do?

00:05:05
Speaker 4: Absolutely? Yes. Yeah.

00:05:06
Speaker 2: When I was like young, in my early twenties, I was so I was like scared of stuff for anxious or didn't want to.

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Speaker 4: I don't know.

00:05:16
Speaker 2: I was like afraid of anxiety, do you know what I mean? Like I was like, let me not do too much because I don't want to get anxious later. And I think now that I'm on the other side of that, I'm like, I wish I didn't live in fear of anxiety. Okay, you know, like in so many ways. And also I think around the pandemic too because I kept breaking bones and I was like, I'm afraid I'm going to break another bone.

00:05:38
Speaker 3: Let me not.

00:05:40
Speaker 2: But you know, it's just like that, that fear of being anxious or having a breakdown. Later, it's like, looking back, I had a breakdown anyway, I might as well have turned the party. I might as well have been on the pole. I should have gotten out my my pleazers.

00:05:55
Speaker 4: I could have.

00:05:59
Speaker 2: More.

00:06:00
Speaker 1: I wish that I had told more people to stuff it.

00:06:05
Speaker 3: Yeah, do you know what I mean?

00:06:06
Speaker 1: I think when I think about even like stuff that happened to me when I was like sixteen, You know what I mean, Like I wish that I would have yeah, already had my voice, Yeah, to be like I'll never forget one time I was.

00:06:22
Speaker 3: With go ahead.

00:06:23
Speaker 2: No, I was just going to say, but now that you know that, you wish you told more people to go get bent? Do you feel like you tell people more now? Because I do. I'm making up for that lost time.

00:06:35
Speaker 3: Yeah.

00:06:35
Speaker 1: You know, I think I let people know that I don't care what they think.

00:06:39
Speaker 4: I think that's beautiful.

00:06:40
Speaker 1: No, I think that's a beautiful I love that, Like, Okay, well.

00:06:44
Speaker 2: That's Emily Dickinson poem that is so beautiful. That was That was actual poetry.

00:06:49
Speaker 4: Thank you so much.

00:06:50
Speaker 3: No, you're welcome, Thanks everybody.

00:06:55
Speaker 4: That was beautiful.

00:06:57
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that.

00:06:59
Speaker 4: Okay.

00:06:59
Speaker 2: So I have a birthday party this weekend and there was a situation I won't get into, but there was some drama at my birthday party that someone else brought with them. They loaded up their mary Pop and suitcase that you can stuff with all sorts of bullshit, and they said, let me bring it to Michael's party. I know, and so, knowing what I know about myself where I do wish, I told people to take it and shove it somewhere, and trying to make up for lost time, I did say something.

00:07:27
Speaker 3: Did you Yeah? I did, okay, because we were talking about it.

00:07:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, I said something okay, and I said I know what you did, yeah, and you were messy. Yeah, and I need to let you know that that's not okay and I don't like you because of it. And then I blocked them, Okay, I don't want to hear your response.

00:07:44
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:07:44
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah. This is something that I speak to my therapist.

00:07:46
Speaker 1: A lot about of my my sort of unquenching thirst to understand why people do things right and I don't know, and I don't I don't know why I need to know, but I would just want to know what were what were you thinking about? What were you hoping to achieve? What did you hope to learn?

00:08:07
Speaker 2: What were comparist people listening? Basically, someone came to the party and was just kind of messy in a way that was like intentional, yes, and it was. And I was just like, and you're right, it is like what were you thinking?

00:08:19
Speaker 1: But also but also potentially very hurtful? Yes, right, And so that's the thing, like, is the intention to be hurtful?

00:08:28
Speaker 3: Are you just nosy?

00:08:30
Speaker 4: Are you?

00:08:30
Speaker 2: And for me, I don't need to know, but I will project. My projection is you don't have anything else going on. You're so bored or you're so unhappy with yourself or your life and your choices that you've got to actually go out of your way to strum up something interesting. Take this opportunity because you've got nothing else going on. And that's where I say, And this did take a lot of healing and a lot of ketamine therapy and a lot of regular therapy to be able to say I feel bad for that person, huh, but I'm also going to tell them what I think and how I felt, and.

00:09:04
Speaker 4: It feels really good to like let it go and move on.

00:09:08
Speaker 1: Do you legitimate because I hear people saying that a lot about people who have caused harm and their feeling is, you know what, I feel really bad for that person. Do you legitimately feel bad for that person?

00:09:20
Speaker 3: Because I tell you I.

00:09:21
Speaker 2: Don't feel bad for I say I think I pity them. I'm like, god, it it sucks to be that person. But I'm not like, oh my heart breaks for this person. No, because these people that I'm feeling that way about are have so much agency and privilege that I'm like, I'm saving the feeling bad for for my clients who have been in detention centers for four years. Like I'm not feeling bad for like a rich white person from Brooklyn who comes to a party and like start shit, you know like that, I'm not going I'm going to save my pity points for that for other people who really are suffering and have no agency.

00:09:55
Speaker 4: But I will.

00:09:57
Speaker 2: I will look and be like, oh, yeah, it sucks to be that person. Glad I'm not them, and like kind of move on.

00:10:02
Speaker 4: I am a little bit more glib with it, gotcha, But yeah, I don't know, what do you think.

00:10:06
Speaker 1: I don't feel bad for anybody like I mean.

00:10:10
Speaker 3: I feel sorry.

00:10:13
Speaker 1: I mean in the sense of, like, obviously I feel bad for people that have had a tragedy. I feel that for people who are ill or have experienced some trauma in their life, right, But I don't feel bad or have empathy or pity for somebody who's because there's messy just being messy and sort of gossipy and nosy, which is which is okay because we all.

00:10:38
Speaker 3: Have we can all be that way.

00:10:41
Speaker 1: We'll not just that. Just listen. I say this all the time. Magdalie and Joel Malbranch raised a nosy chick for sure, you know. But I don't feel bad for people like that, because again, it's the intent behind the messiness and you're just being message like Kiki the fine, But if you're being messy to be hurtful, then that's that's the mental though. Like, I do not feel bad for you, and may you have the life that you deserve. And the reason why I say things like that is not for them, It's for me.

00:11:18
Speaker 2: You inspire me because you've told me stories about how you've run into like a former boss on the street.

00:11:22
Speaker 1: Yeah, I did.

00:11:23
Speaker 3: That's my favorite.

00:11:24
Speaker 4: And you said, I want you to know.

00:11:26
Speaker 1: I did, and I felt great about it. She was complaining, So this person that I used to work for. She was like, what's that really bad chick from.

00:11:34
Speaker 3: The Little Ursula? She was like Ursula from The Little Mermaid?

00:11:36
Speaker 2: Yeah, really is a complex female character. Okay, fine, you know there was contract low, there was breach of contract. She was the victim of See. I don't feel bad for her death by ship. They like drove a boden to her. I don't know if that fits the crime. She stole her musical theater kids singing voice like, I'm sorry that that's bad. It's death penalty. That's capital punishment. Sure, get the expert on death penalty on the phone. I'm sorry. They steered a boat into her. They skewed her without a trial. You want to call Karina, Yeah, call Kara.

00:12:10
Speaker 4: Get her on the phone.

00:12:11
Speaker 3: I want to talk to you.

00:12:13
Speaker 2: Talked to her about whether or not this is a just death sentence or ursula?

00:12:18
Speaker 1: I mean, anyway, a.

00:12:19
Speaker 2: Size woman of color, she was purple, I'm sorry, constantly persecuted in the realm, well, now you got.

00:12:27
Speaker 3: Me feeling.

00:12:30
Speaker 4: Your old boss. We hate her.

00:12:31
Speaker 1: No, she was really really awful, and that the thing about it is she could not keep a body. And you know how I feel about people like that.

00:12:38
Speaker 3: What do I mean when I say you can't keep people?

00:12:41
Speaker 4: Always quit?

00:12:42
Speaker 1: People are quitting's firing them. You can't keep a body, You cannot keep a body.

00:12:47
Speaker 2: And it's people will always say like, oh, well so and so quit, Oh so and so got fired, oh so and so this at a certain point, if you've said that more than two or three times, do you you're the calls coming from inside the house.

00:13:01
Speaker 1: And she was so hideous of a human being that the temp agency stopped sending people to her.

00:13:08
Speaker 3: Oh that's crazy, really really bad.

00:13:11
Speaker 2: Because temp agencies in New York they take fifty percent of whatever the person is.

00:13:14
Speaker 3: Yeah, so they're willing to take a pay cut.

00:13:17
Speaker 2: So they're like, we're finding these times on the side of the west side of our way, curled up in a ball, tossed out the window.

00:13:26
Speaker 1: We had more than one temp leave at lunch and not come back. I'm not going to even make it to five, act not even make it to five.

00:13:34
Speaker 2: Wow, she said, I'm going to get on the off peak train and head home at lunch.

00:13:39
Speaker 4: Fuck this.

00:13:40
Speaker 2: And so Melissa ran into this old boss after I did.

00:13:44
Speaker 1: A left and I and you know, we were cordial and how are you? And I said, I'm fine, how are you? And she's like, you know, I'm still looking for an assistant. And I said to her, and you know, and the bravery came from a source of I don't give a shit anymore because I don't work for you. You can't do anything to me anyway. And I said to her, have you ever thought that the problem is you? And I wasn't and I wasn't mean. I was just like, I mean, when if you think about it, how many assistants have you had in a year? And I said, you know so, and so the temp agency has stopped sending people to you. I was like, is there any is there any part of you that understands that maybe it's you? And she said to me, looking straight in my eyes, and was just like, well, you know, I am quite exacting, bitch. What what you're like?

00:14:39
Speaker 3: And and so.

00:14:41
Speaker 1: And because I had been her assistant at one point, I also had access to her emails. No no, no no, and I would see the emails that she was getting from her daughter, ripping her like her daughter ripping her a new one.

00:14:54
Speaker 4: Oh my god.

00:14:55
Speaker 1: Her ex husband called one time and was like, where is she?

00:14:59
Speaker 2: Oh, so you think these assistants were her punching bag because she had no control anywhere else in her life.

00:15:04
Speaker 1: I mean I also think I think the reason why, like her daughter was sending her nasty messages and her ex husband was like calling it because there was something wrong with her. And and dan Anne because I'm a nosy bitch. I had looked into her and she had had a very sort of a high power, prominent job and she was sued.

00:15:26
Speaker 2: Right, you really do want to know why you and your therapists are doing that work, because you want to know why about it.

00:15:31
Speaker 3: I do, like, what is why? Like I even have love you? Well, so like what like what do we.

00:15:41
Speaker 1: Think is the matter with the president? What is wrong with him?

00:15:47
Speaker 3: But for someone to.

00:15:50
Speaker 1: Comport himself the way that he does, the way that he speaks to people, and the things that he does, and I get it. Some people are like, oh, I like him because he shoots straight from the hip and there's no bullshit with him.

00:16:00
Speaker 3: He's insane and.

00:16:02
Speaker 2: Shooting period, right, like the these are follow.

00:16:05
Speaker 1: We know that this country loves their guns, so we're we stay shooting.

00:16:09
Speaker 2: I think it's time for a what's going on in the home?

00:16:12
Speaker 4: What is going on in the going on in the home?

00:16:14
Speaker 1: Didn't you know my theory, nothing went on in that home? Well know, like about the hugs.

00:16:19
Speaker 2: Okay, Melissa has a theory that there's two kinds of people in the world.

00:16:22
Speaker 1: There are three kinds of people. Three Yeah, there are three different kinds of hugs.

00:16:26
Speaker 5: Okay.

00:16:30
Speaker 1: So Melissa's theory is that the hug, by the way, the hug is a metaphor.

00:16:35
Speaker 3: Okay, like it's not actually hugs.

00:16:38
Speaker 2: Get in touch now, Melissa is a theory that you're either get too many hugs, you got too many hugs in your childhood, you didn't get enough hugs in your childhood, or what's the third one?

00:16:50
Speaker 3: Just enough inappropriate, inappropriate hugs.

00:16:53
Speaker 4: You've amended it since the last time.

00:16:55
Speaker 3: I have it.

00:16:55
Speaker 1: It has always been it's always been the three and it was only around for no you know, this is no this is the first thing.

00:17:01
Speaker 3: Yeah you did you tuned me out. He tuned me out.

00:17:05
Speaker 1: But yeah, and I mean and I just think that either you were constantly coddled and told that you were special and that you could do anything, and then you've gone out into the world and you think that that's actually true when in reality you're only really special to your parents, as it.

00:17:19
Speaker 3: Should be, right, But in the world you're regular like the rest of us. Special is special.

00:17:24
Speaker 2: You can't be not everyone can be a special snow No, not.

00:17:27
Speaker 3: Everybody is special. That's specially special.

00:17:30
Speaker 1: Yeah, most of us are just regular.

00:17:32
Speaker 3: And that's okay, it's very nice.

00:17:34
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's uneventful. Right. Was the other one? Not enough?

00:17:39
Speaker 1: Not enough hugs is neglect? Right, Like you were not told that you were loved, you were even your parents didn't think that you were special, you were like and ignored. I think that that is not enough hugs, inappropriate hugs. I think is there's either some essay or physical abuse, right, And that's so that's what that is. And I think all of these experience and says you go out into the world and you project.

00:18:02
Speaker 2: That, Yeah, I was definitely too many hugs.

00:18:05
Speaker 3: I knew that right away special.

00:18:07
Speaker 4: I was special. And you know what what they were fucking right?

00:18:10
Speaker 3: Were they?

00:18:11
Speaker 4: Yeah? Thank you?

00:18:12
Speaker 2: I Yeah, special snowflake. You know many times I had to repeat ninth grade math. That's how special three times twelfth grade. I had a ninth grade math tutor, and he would come I woul didn't eat lunch.

00:18:29
Speaker 4: For all of highchool.

00:18:30
Speaker 2: We didn't eat lunch because I had to go to the extra help math tutor.

00:18:35
Speaker 3: Do you know if you have discuculia?

00:18:38
Speaker 2: We didn't have those those words, I know, but.

00:18:40
Speaker 3: Now do you think that's probably?

00:18:41
Speaker 1: Yeah?

00:18:42
Speaker 3: I had discocula because.

00:18:43
Speaker 2: It's like a party trick. Brad will be like, what's twelve times seven?

00:18:46
Speaker 4: And I'm like, I know.

00:18:48
Speaker 2: He'll be like, what's twelve minus seven? And I'm like, get out the abacus, honey, it's not.

00:18:53
Speaker 1: Gonna yeah, yeah, any kind of a math question. Like I just yelled out to Andre.

00:18:59
Speaker 2: Wait really Like that's a beautiful mind.

00:19:03
Speaker 1: You're a little Yeah, That's why I married him.

00:19:05
Speaker 3: He's geeky, smart.

00:19:10
Speaker 2: Let's get into your algorithm is show. Let's talk about all the wicked and wild, freaky tiki things that are happening on our phones. Pam Bondi didn't show up for her subpoena.

00:19:18
Speaker 1: She was out to dinner though she was going to see that where she was out to dinner I don't know, in the DC area. Some some random person recorded her. She was smiling.

00:19:29
Speaker 2: You guys know how much I hate DC. We covered it last week. I've never eaten a meal in DC, where I was like, really, yeah, no interesting, But every place I when I go to d C, it's are you in and out?

00:19:43
Speaker 4: I'm in and out?

00:19:44
Speaker 2: And it's also like I'm only in like the corporate areas, you know, Like I'm not in a cute little Bethesda neighborhood, you know, I'm not Like yeah, and then I'm I went to this one drag show that was at like the Hamburger Mary's, and it was like at the diner and do On Circle and that was that was really fun. I saw someone leap off a table and land in a.

00:20:04
Speaker 1: Split like the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders. Have you seen that? Do you know that? Those women? Sorry, this is sorry, this is us, this is us. Yeah, So I was obsessed with There was a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader documentary.

00:20:19
Speaker 3: It was a few episodes.

00:20:20
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, yeah about this. They all go.

00:20:23
Speaker 1: Into debt because first of all, they hardly pay them anything. All these women have real jobs outside of the cheerleading. Thing right, God, they go to appearances, they don't get paid for them.

00:20:38
Speaker 2: I can't believe. And it's also like it's not like they don't have the money. These sports are owned by billionaires.

00:20:44
Speaker 1: And when they were like, well, why don't you pay them, and they're like, well, it's really about the honor of being a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader.

00:20:51
Speaker 2: And more honorable than a paycheck, as I'm concerned.

00:20:54
Speaker 3: Nothing.

00:20:55
Speaker 4: What's more honorable than healthcare?

00:20:57
Speaker 3: You know? And they practice almost every night.

00:21:00
Speaker 2: They're kicking in boots that planter flat fasci itis, Oh.

00:21:04
Speaker 3: For sure, for sure.

00:21:05
Speaker 4: You know there's going to be a bunion.

00:21:07
Speaker 1: What is it called. It might be called thunder road, I don't know. I can't remember. But there's a routine that they're famous for and they all jump up and they all land directly into a split and then so and after a certain amount of time, there's a lot of wear and tear on the body.

00:21:25
Speaker 3: All these young women.

00:21:27
Speaker 1: Are having hip replacement surgery like when they retire, because you can only be.

00:21:31
Speaker 3: A Dallas Cowpboard chee leader.

00:21:34
Speaker 1: There's a few years, like I think maybe six years or something, and at the end you have to you have to retire tire and usually at the end of that these women are having.

00:21:44
Speaker 2: Hip replacement surgery twenty five.

00:21:45
Speaker 3: Yeah, whoa, and it's on their dime.

00:21:49
Speaker 4: Like it's a grilling I mean, it's a grilling career.

00:21:52
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:21:52
Speaker 2: I think that's why the Rockets I call them the Rickets. They they unionized.

00:21:58
Speaker 1: Yeah, they had to.

00:21:59
Speaker 2: They have to unionized because they do eight shows a day for the month of December. They can only do so many. I met one one. She was telling me she takes an ice bath every night. And because of the union, they have to address them as ladies. Okay, collectively they say ladies.

00:22:15
Speaker 4: And then they all as opposed to girls.

00:22:16
Speaker 2: Yeah, they have to be addressed collectively as ladies per the union contract. Yeah, the Broadway union contracts are actually really freaking weird. But anyway, Pam Bondi didn't show up.

00:22:27
Speaker 4: She was out eating.

00:22:28
Speaker 1: She's out eating in DC and smiling. If there's anybody in this world who does not deserve to smile about shit, and.

00:22:34
Speaker 2: You know that if she's out in DC smiling eating, it was like a setup for a photo op, you know what I mean, Like it wasn't or like, you know what I mean, like if she's out and she's probably inherent makeup. It was, it wasn't an accident. She tipped off the pop Arazza that she was there. But Robert Garcia is going to subpoenat her, so explain tempt proceeding.

00:22:56
Speaker 3: Okay, so explain to us she doesn't show up.

00:22:59
Speaker 2: She doesn't show up and so sorry they subpoenaed her already, Yes, she didn't show.

00:23:04
Speaker 1: Up, so what is the what is their next course of action possible?

00:23:10
Speaker 2: The thing they did immediately was everyone took to the internet to say we are going to hold her in contempt. Those are threats. That's there's no like actual active thing that happens. Yet then the committee votes to start contemp proceedings, so the committee of that subpoenaed her would vote we want to do contempt, and then the House has to vote we're going to hold her in contempt, and then it moves to like a criminal proceeding, so that's when the criminal charges would hit. So we're a couple steps away from, you know, a perp walk, but it's it's like moving forward. There's no reason why Robert Garcia and Jasmine Crockett would stop whilch is like threaten and not and they have the votes.

00:23:55
Speaker 4: In the committee.

00:23:55
Speaker 2: The committee issued the subpoena in the first place. It's not like, but the real battle happened in the house when everyone has to duke it out.

00:24:03
Speaker 1: So for Pam Bondy for her, what's the best case scenario and what's the worst case scenario for her?

00:24:09
Speaker 2: Well, it depends on what she's hiding and how damning her testimony is going to be for herself.

00:24:17
Speaker 4: Right if we're just.

00:24:17
Speaker 2: Talking about Pam, like, what did she neglect to do that is going to come out in this subpoena? Right, because a subpoena, you're under oath you cannot lie or you're subject to perjury if you do. So what is she not saying? What is she sitting on that they're going to ask her about that she's not going to be able to lie about or she'll face I mean, low Kim went to prison for perjury, right, like people do time for perjury. It's like a real thing. So what is she willing to go to prison for if she wants to lie and cover it up? Right, So there's a big it's hard to answer that question is a big unknown. What doesn't she know? Or what do we not know that she knows? So depends on how bad it is. This is kind of what it comes down to, Okay, But I'm interested to see what happens with the House and how they do get out because we're coming up on the midterms. Sure a lot of those folks are going to be up for reelection. So do they want this on their voting record that they voted not to bring criminal charges against Pambondi? Or will look really good? Because right now, I mean, the president's approval rating isn't the toilet?

00:25:32
Speaker 4: Yeah? Yeah, so, and.

00:25:34
Speaker 2: They're losing special the Republican parties losing special elections around the country. Anything come up on your feet this week that you want to cover.

00:25:41
Speaker 1: So you know, I've been trying really hard to avoid the AI vegetable. Oh yeah, yeah yeah, And you know, and so friends, please stop sending me things because I'm trying to really people randomly most did you see this one? Please stop sending me things I don't I don't want anymore.

00:25:59
Speaker 3: It's too much.

00:26:00
Speaker 1: It's too much because now they're getting they're just getting worse. Right, they're running either of things that.

00:26:04
Speaker 2: AI is like breeding with itself. It's like, yeah, self perpetuating.

00:26:08
Speaker 1: So do you this is really depressing, But this is what came up for me. Do you remember this French woman, Giselle Pilico. Yeah, so she's the woman. So she's the woman who they were. They live in France. Her husband for like five or so years was essaying her, drugging her and essaying her and inviting other men to do the same thing, taking photos and.

00:26:36
Speaker 3: Pictures and stuff.

00:26:37
Speaker 1: So in the news a few.

00:26:39
Speaker 3: Weeks ago, there was this.

00:26:43
Speaker 1: Sa Academy that came up and it's basically a website. I went to the website just to see what it did, to see what it was, and it's basically men trading ideas of how to do this to the partners.

00:27:00
Speaker 3: Oh god, really.

00:27:03
Speaker 1: And you know, and the thing is like we all know, once you start with that stuff, you just get more and more of it. Yes, and it just you know, we know obviously not all men, but it just always feels like always a man, right, yeah, it's and it definitely feels like this world hates women.

00:27:24
Speaker 2: Yeah you know what I mean, yes, of course. Yeah, And I think that there is this The internet has been great at info sharing. It's also being really it's created a forum for creeps to connect with each other.

00:27:38
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure, because I wonder how in the before it because because I think that these people have always existed, right, So I wonder in the before times, what were they doing were they putting as in the newspaper?

00:27:50
Speaker 2: Like what were there like code words? Was that like creeps would find each other in their neighborhood and like connect? Yeah, yeah, I mean, and it is one of these things where I don't, like, what do we do about that? I mean, obviously shut down these websites, yeah, but.

00:28:06
Speaker 1: I mean the thing is, it's like you get rid of one and another one pops up in this place, right. And I think that people are getting more and more devious. I think they're getting smarter, unfortunately.

00:28:21
Speaker 2: And I also think that people are getting a lot of dog whistles and signals from literally the Epstein files and how that is not being prosecuted. There is nothing happening there and everything is just getting swept under the rug and everyone's moving on. People are I feel like it's possible that people are learning from that and saying like, oh, well, if no one is really condemning.

00:28:46
Speaker 5: This, who's to say that I like, there's this kind of like signal coming from the White House that this is okay and tolerable.

00:28:59
Speaker 2: There is a really interesting documentary out about a cult that one of the hosts of an exactly right show, trusts Me her Mom, infiltrated a cult, a Mormon cult.

00:29:12
Speaker 4: Yeah. I watched it this weekend. Is it good. It's really good.

00:29:16
Speaker 2: I've gotten like a couple of phone calls from people like you have to watch this documentary.

00:29:20
Speaker 3: What's it called, trust Me the False Prophet?

00:29:23
Speaker 2: Trust Me the False Prophet. Yeah, it's really interesting and I think we should talk about on this show because maybe next episode we can cover some of the women went to prison, and I think we could probably cover that.

00:29:35
Speaker 1: And talk about them.

00:29:36
Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:29:36
Speaker 1: There was another documentary that I had seen kind of similar. It was called Stay Sweet Okay, and it was about LDS and how the leader like his whole thing was, you know, to get the girls to do what he wanted. He was just like, you have to stay sweet. No, so disgusting, it's so creepy.

00:29:54
Speaker 4: How is that legal? Like, well, they're like, oh, but there it's a church.

00:29:59
Speaker 3: It's okay, but it's not legal.

00:30:01
Speaker 1: But they're getting away with it, and especially I think I think in any kind of community where they are so incredibly insulated, it's much harder to figure out what's going on.

00:30:14
Speaker 2: It's very like underground, right, Yeah, it's always in some rural place.

00:30:18
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, they and they do their best to stay away from people, yes, right, So they're very isolated. And it's by design what this.

00:30:25
Speaker 2: Is what we need TMZ to do as well. Because TMZ is photographing politicians out in the streets, we need them to also go after the LDS church. How it's going to be hard to have them go and do you know what I mean, it would just be harder. But did you see the photos of Lindsay Graham at Disney World with a bubble wand no.

00:30:48
Speaker 4: TMZ.

00:30:49
Speaker 2: Someone people are just sending photos of congressmen and senators to TMZ to shame them while they're out on recess, the fact that they not doing anything, they're not passing any bills. They're all like helping cover up the files like every like literally.

00:31:06
Speaker 3: Everything bubble one comes up right away.

00:31:11
Speaker 2: But that's literally what people are sending in photos of senators to TMZ. So TMZ, after twenty years.

00:31:21
Speaker 3: A reporter and.

00:31:22
Speaker 1: The thing about it is like he looks. The only word that I can think of to describe the way that he looks.

00:31:28
Speaker 3: Is deft, right, Like he just looks.

00:31:32
Speaker 1: So he looks. He looks ridiculous.

00:31:35
Speaker 2: Now people are going up to you, and they're like leaving chambers, going back to their office, and people can actually interview them because they're it's that they're allowed to film and record. Someone ran up to him and was like, do you have anything to say about the bubble one?

00:31:48
Speaker 3: Quickly the bubble one.

00:31:50
Speaker 2: And he ran for it and like scattered away, So great, do you have anything to say about the bubble one? Melissa? She's given a dirty look again.

00:32:03
Speaker 1: I'm so tired of these people.

00:32:05
Speaker 2: He literally to not vote on the government shutdown, on the Iran war, on the Epstein files, and then to fuck off to Disney World and play with the bubble wand is like, so it really is District twelve Hunger Games, Like it's feeling very that lately, you know, like Effie is the announcer of the next presidential debate? What speaking to Bautry out in these streets.

00:32:37
Speaker 4: We have a.

00:32:37
Speaker 2: Special guest in the studio, excited, So we have with us today, Friend of the Pod Friend of the Pods at Porges Whew. You may remember him from the Action Class Action Park documentary where we talk.

00:32:50
Speaker 3: Remember how excited I was.

00:32:51
Speaker 2: About your childhood trauma. Yeah, I was talk about not enough hugs.

00:32:56
Speaker 3: Totally.

00:32:57
Speaker 2: She was absolutely battered and bruised at Action Park, Melissa. Anyway, he has a new documentary coming out about Santacon, and we thought it would be cool to bring him on the show today to talk about it. Santacon because it's in the headlines as of last week. Because why ceo head of Santacon, which I didn't realize was an actual organization.

00:33:17
Speaker 3: It was a nonprofit. It's not supposed to raise money to alcohol awareness.

00:33:22
Speaker 1: No, it's opposed to The funds raised are supposed to go towards some kind of a kid's something.

00:33:30
Speaker 2: So these men are busting their bones, barfing in the streets, taking a dump on my stoop to raise money for children.

00:33:40
Speaker 4: I mean, why don't.

00:33:42
Speaker 2: You make your gift on, make your recurring gift online and leave me the buck alone.

00:33:46
Speaker 1: Santa God, it's like a scourge. It looks so disgusting.

00:33:50
Speaker 4: You know.

00:33:51
Speaker 1: It's one of those things where, like you you forget that it's happening until it's happening, and then you're in the middle of it.

00:33:59
Speaker 2: It reminds me of like the like the AI videos of the Bubonic plague, like where people are just sort of like lying in the streets, you know, like slowly dying. It's okay, it was long enough ago. I can make fun of the plague, right, Like, I'm not going to get canceled for plague talk, no, right, but no one's going to be like my great great great great grandmother actually had the black lung. Yeah, okay, and if that's what I go out for, so be it. Really at this point, okay, so I'm excited.

00:34:26
Speaker 4: We'll be back.

00:34:26
Speaker 2: We're going to do an under oath with Seth Porges and we're going to talk about Santacon and the new criminal charges for the CEO. We're going to talk about this documentary which I watched over the weekend.

00:34:36
Speaker 4: It was good. We'll get into it. Okay, we'll be right back.

00:34:42
Speaker 2: Welcome back to Brief Recess. We're going to get into under Oath. We're going to do a deep dive with our good friend of the podcast, Seth Porges. We're going to talk about Santa con and your incredible documentary. So welcome back. It's great to be here.

00:34:55
Speaker 4: Last time you.

00:34:55
Speaker 2: Were here, we were talking about people getting shredded up at action parks.

00:34:59
Speaker 4: Sure we're now.

00:34:59
Speaker 2: We're we're going to talk about people getting shredded up as Santa Cooh.

00:35:02
Speaker 4: Absolutely different kind of shredded.

00:35:03
Speaker 1: Yeah, different kind of shredded.

00:35:04
Speaker 2: I mean, I feel like someone's gotten flayed alive at Santacon, right. I feel like there's been some serious injuries. I feel like I've witnessed that. I feel like I would know about this and the problem with Santacon not to just immediately start complaining. But I'm a New Yorker, Yeah, I'm a total Yenta. The way that it springs up on you like an edible, it hitch in the back of the fucking head when you least expect it. It's right when you're like I'm going to go buy some Christmas ornaments or I'm going to meet up with that friend or colleague for that holiday cocktail, and you just don't happen to pass through the East Village.

00:35:40
Speaker 4: I think there's like a direct correlation between how annoyed you will be by Santacon and the likelihood you would have any idea when it's going to happen.

00:35:47
Speaker 3: Yes, that's the thing, because this is what happened to me.

00:35:50
Speaker 1: Anytime I've encountered Santa Coon, it's it's been completely by accident, and now I'm like, fuck, today is it to day day?

00:35:58
Speaker 3: Yeah?

00:35:59
Speaker 4: And at first, really, okay, it's one Santa it's they're going to work at Macy's, you don't know. And then you see the other and you're like, oh no, no, oh, no, oh no, what day is it? Yeah, and it's always a guy named Brian. Yeah. Yeah.

00:36:11
Speaker 2: So people for who are not from New York who are watching or listening, could you please explain briefly what Santacon is.

00:36:18
Speaker 4: Yeah. So Santa Con, which doesn't just occur in New York, of course, New York's is the largest and most infamous of them. Is this incredible day typically in kind of early December, when up to tens of thousands of folks dress like Saint Nick and invade New York City and just kind of have their way with the town. The reputation, of course, whether earned or not, is that they get a little the botross use the fact that they're all dressed the same and therefore fairly anonymous to kind of be their worst cells. The reputation is it's like, you know, twenty two year olds from Hoboken for the most party, baby's first day drinking like that kind of thing. People who may not necessarily be the best of a hold in your liquor. But that's not what it always was. And that's what's so fascinates to me about the whole story. Yeah, it really has.

00:37:02
Speaker 2: I mean, I watched the documentary this weekend, and so do you want to give a little plug for the documentary sort of tell us about it.

00:37:08
Speaker 4: Yeah, So I just made a movie called Santa Con. You can check out some of it at santacon dot dot com about the secret history of Santa Coon. You know, the most hated holiday in the world, which began is this very, very, very different thing. And it was like this Frankenstein story where these guys create this thing, totally lost control of it, disowned it, and had to watch it mutate into whatever it is today.

00:37:30
Speaker 2: It is one of those things where you know it is a Frankenstein monster, right, And I'm watching the documentary. It starts out as sort of this like riot girl, anti establishment proteste kind of thing where I was like, almost like a public art performance of like a group of twenty friends who are best friends just having a blast dressed like Santa As really as a reaction to capitalism in the nineties, right of the the nineties commercials Everything is getting commodified, Christmas is for Sale. And what really struck me about it when I was watching it was I was like, wow, it kind of became the thing that it was rejecting at its infancy, like they these Santas were just kind of wandering around the Pacific northwest San Francisco, causing trouble, being debatrous, and now it's become a ticketed event sponsored by corporations and brought to you by Yeah.

00:38:31
Speaker 4: I mean, I was sort of joked that everything eventually becomes Santacon. And the reason the story jumped out to me was because I saw it as this, like it's a life cycle of all ideas. Right, Yes, you create something, the masses take hold of it, turn it into something else, and you watch it before your eyes transform. And to me that was like wow, Like Santa Con just feels like it's about like everything in this world that we you know, in shitivocation, like the way sis get corrupted and manipulated, and I just couldn't stop thinking about this. It's like, my goodness, Like Santacon began as this one thing and it turned into something else. And then meeting the people who create Santacon and then their very tortured relationship with what had become was so fascinating to me because if I were them, and what my initial thought about what their response to modern Santacon would be would be absolute, discussed and maybe even anger at it. But that's actually not the case, and I think what their attitude is way more interesting and mature, because you know, we can see the things we love, maybe even the things we created the world around us transform, and what do you do. Do you just get really angry and yearn for days gone by and say f this and burn it all down? Or do you say, all right, this thing isn't for me anymore. That's cool. I'm going to be over here doing something else cool. And that was their attitude. I was so blown away by that because right now, I think a lot of people just experience the world and they're like, I don't get this any more, and the easy response is just to be really angry pissed off and miserable, and instead of that, you can also be like, you know what, I'm just going to continue to try to build new things, and that really I love that. Yeah.

00:40:12
Speaker 1: Let me let me ask you, when you decided that you were going to do this, was there anybody who had been a part of it originally who was just like, you know what, No, I don't want to talk to you about it.

00:40:20
Speaker 4: You know, we had a lot of people in our film, kind of all the early creators, and some of them are more camera shy than others, but I think, you know, these were all a tight knit group of friends. It was a group called the Cacophony Society. Yeah. It was sort of these like Anarco prankster, post Dada folks who would just basically do random stuff and none of it was created with the intent of maybe ever happening again or being a business or any of this sort of stuff. But every once in a while they would create something that for some reason or another just kind of like just took off. So they also created Burning Men. As you guys know and say, a very similar trajectory happening in Burning Man is different types of people start to come to your the identity of the event changes for better or for worse. I'm not going to pass judgment on that over there. And these guys, you know, they they sort of saw their their baby change that people. You know, there's a couple folks who maybe would have liked to go on camera, just did a scheduling or logistics. You can never get everybody, but I mean, but I think we got everybody we really want. Yeah.

00:41:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, as you're making this movie, right, I mean what were some of the challenges, right, I mean you when I was watching it, I was like, wow, he really had to film in a lot of different places. You attended Santa Con in New York.

00:41:36
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, before you were doing this. Had you been ever been a Santacon participant?

00:41:43
Speaker 4: No? I mean like you I had stepped outside and then realized, I guess, like in a way, you know, like street theater, the folks on the street are part of the performance, whether they like it or not. Right, Yeah, and reaction as part of that. Honestly. Yeah, that's like a big thing that really drew me in about the archival footage of the early Santa Cons. Wasn't the Santas themselves were necessarily acting that different. They're always a little old natty. You know. It's the people around them because nobody had ever seen this before, right, and so their faces have this sense of joy and want.

00:42:15
Speaker 3: We are much more amused, yeah.

00:42:16
Speaker 1: And sort of excited about it. And I feel like, if you were to do.

00:42:20
Speaker 4: It now, yeah, I've seen the joke is old.

00:42:24
Speaker 1: Joke is old, but it's not just the joke is old, but also like, oh, this is just going to be disgusting.

00:42:28
Speaker 4: I want to we know what this is and we don't.

00:42:30
Speaker 1: Like what exactly exactly.

00:42:32
Speaker 4: Yeah, and so you know, making this film, what really made the film possible was this archival footage. You know, this This movie started because I ran into my old friend Scott Biale at a bar, like December twenty twenty one maybe, and somehow Santakon comes up and he kind of looked a bummed out. I'm like, what's up and he's like, yeah, Santa Con is coming up. I'm like, I know it's the worst, going to lock myself up that day and he's like, nasath, you don't get it. I was there when my friends and I started this thing, and what it's become. I just I wrapped my heads around it. And I know this guy for like more than a decade. I'm like like, pause, rewind, what are you talking about? Wow? And he started telling me how he and his friends that started Santa Con had also been involved with Burning Man's creation, and how this group Cacofne Society was also the real life inspiration for Fight Club and Project Mayhem, and I was like, wait, this is crazy, all of these cultural touch points the same people. And then he said the thing that really blew my mind, which is that he personally had video recorded several of the early years, and he offered to show me this footage. And it really was like the entirety of the early Santa Kan years, from beginning to end, come to life, and it was so immersive and transportive, and I felt like I was traveling back in time to the nineteen nineties. Nobody's got their cell phones out right.

00:43:42
Speaker 2: It was very cool, really was. If you haven't seen it, and it's going to be premiering.

00:43:50
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean so we've been playing at a film festival, still figuring out wider distribution. Hopefully it'll be out in a place the world can see it this next Christmas.

00:43:57
Speaker 2: I got a chance to watch it thanks to say, but it's the archival footage really makes it right. You get to see you felt like you were there with them. Yeah, you really felt like you were a part of this group of friends. I mean it's it was very well structured, and I could see you absolutely manipulating it from behind the scenes to make it really The interviews with people, yeah, we're just like so, and.

00:44:22
Speaker 1: They were so good, And I loved seeing the reactions of the people who were like trying to explain to us what they had been thinking when they were doing this, and they're just like, well, that's not what it is anymore.

00:44:34
Speaker 4: And also how they don't necessarily all agree. Like to some of them it might have been like this protesting of commercialism and capitalism Christmas, but to others it was just the point was that it had no meaning. It's a piece of absurdism and the reality.

00:44:46
Speaker 2: The one story of the one Santa they went to I think Portland, ye or maybe La and he wore the same Santa outfit for like three days. So after setting it on fire on fire, it melted to a skin and he warred for three or four days and got on the planet and blew home in the Santa suit.

00:45:07
Speaker 4: That's the Great Reverend Al And so he would do this thing where at the end of Portland in nine seventy six, he stood on stage at this event and he just basically says, I'm so filled with Christmas spirit that I just might explode. And then he sets up a bunch of cheap fireworks firecrackers in his Santa suit and the whole thing just like goes ablaze in this indoor venue, all caught on tape. I really need to stay away from cheap Chinese produced suits that are made out of plastics. And it just melted to his skin. And he just flies back to La with this Santa suit melted to his skin, because why not.

00:45:42
Speaker 2: And then there's there's this one other gentleman in it who was a postal worker.

00:45:47
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, he was my favorite.

00:45:51
Speaker 2: Like the dog's barking because I'm laughing so loud. My husband's in the other room confused about what's going on. And there is a postal worker who in the nineties, for those of you who don't know, postal workers.

00:46:04
Speaker 4: Were this series of mass murders, Yes, series of mass.

00:46:07
Speaker 1: Murderers, and that's where the term going postal comes from. I feel like it's a lot. It's so funny to me, Like.

00:46:14
Speaker 2: They were shootings in the nineties. Yeah, and so this guy was a postal worker and he seemed to be.

00:46:19
Speaker 4: He reveled in the reputation.

00:46:21
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, And he.

00:46:22
Speaker 2: Really leaned into it and bos and be like, don't make me go postal. Don't make me shoot you. Yeah, don't make me go I'm going to go post so crazy, and.

00:46:29
Speaker 4: He's just walking through the giant guns. He started a camp at burning Man called the Disgruntled Postal Workers Union, where they all wear their uniforms and walk around guns. And he just kind of leaned into the iconography, which I think he said, like, you know, there's a certain amount of fear that he translated as respect.

00:46:44
Speaker 2: And in the film you have footage of him at like a shooting range like a bunch of other kinds of Santa suits.

00:46:53
Speaker 1: They wouldn't fire him from the goddamn Postal Service because they're afraid.

00:46:55
Speaker 4: He was going to come back and kill everybody.

00:46:58
Speaker 2: Oh my goodness, I was dying during that. But I I cried during your documentary. I literally cried at the Santacon movie because it ended up being like a really heartfelt, touching story about friendship and friends throughout the decades. And I was like bringing booking you to come on this show to talk with me and my best friend for a million years, and it was just like it was just like very touching, like you really brought a full circle around to this group of friends and what they started. And I think it could have quickly become a capitalism as bad and like this is these are the pitfalls of capitalism and how it sort of gobbles up everything and like attacks everything that's pure. But I think that's like a really obvious read, Like I don't think you need to tell us that, And I think it was and ended up being not to like spoil it for people, but there was this really shocking, surprising emotional thread through it that not to do any spoilers, but that was really unexpected for me.

00:47:58
Speaker 4: I appreciate that.

00:47:59
Speaker 1: Yeah, so that's surprising for you as well.

00:48:02
Speaker 4: This Yeah, yeah, I mean, you know, something happened during filming that we didn't expect that sort of played out. And it's a movie it largely takes place in the nineties, wen't really even thinking about like present day developments. Yeah, but something happened to one of our main characters that really recontextualize everything and allowed us to think, really make the movie about something different. Yeah, you know, and it was it was kind of amazing, and we're really glad we're able to capture that.

00:48:26
Speaker 2: But as a documentary filmmaker, you have to be ready for that, right, yes, and being open to it is what's going to make the film great rather than good. And just taking that and using that as a part of the story just like really drove it forward in a new direction. You have to be ready for that kind of stuff.

00:48:41
Speaker 4: And you also have to be you know, cognizant about whatever emotions might be out there and how raw they might be for people involved, you know, because it's always a fun line about wanting to capture things without putting people out there in a way that maybe later won't they won't love or feel comfortable with.

00:48:56
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I mean this is like a more fun version exam bole. But there was someone who was not on camera in this documentary who was talking about sleeping with a guy in a Santa suit. She just wanted to ymous.

00:49:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, she wanted to tell her story, but not sort of be the story.

00:49:13
Speaker 2: I'm willing to go on the record today and say that it was me.

00:49:15
Speaker 4: Yes, so I knew it not even there. It's like we can put the name down and it's not like you know who they are. It's way funnier if you just say anonymous Santa, you know.

00:49:25
Speaker 1: And like, although there were like so many little things that just were like so they just sort of were so funny, super amusing. Like you remember the guy's name who shaved his beard, John Law? Yeah, yeah, and so you were like, it's him shaved.

00:49:38
Speaker 4: Beard like he did. We did more than one interview with him, and in the first interview he looks like Santa has this big beard. And then we interviewed him again and there's no beard, and I'm trying to footge people and people are like, wait, that's the same time. Ye, Like you literally can't tell. And then they get to end the movie. I just realized I was the same guy. He's like one of our main characters. So we had the label like, yeah, it's the same guy he shaved his beard.

00:49:58
Speaker 1: But like it makes it funnier, do you know what I mean.

00:50:02
Speaker 4: Yeah, Yeah, it's a little bit of attitude kind of sprinkling it so we brought you on the show.

00:50:05
Speaker 2: But I was like, we got to get seth because Santa coom was in the headline. Santasine's in the news and it's April. It is it's not Christmas. Christmas is in here, and Santa Coon's in the news because the CEO was just brought up on fraud charges and I wanted to talk to you about it. I wanted to do you are you aware of Stephan Stephan Pildas. He's allegedly misled attendees and businesses marketing Santacon and misused the funds that were supposed to be going towards the nonprofit of Santacon, which is supposed to be helping children kids.

00:50:42
Speaker 4: I think, who knows? I mean, yeah, I'm aware. I mean this is the thing about this, and this is like such a distinction that is really important to make is the original people when they started Santa Coon, it was never a business, It was never a trademark, It was ever piece of IP, it was ever a brand. It was an idea and it came of age kind of when the Internet became the Internet as we know it, and it spread and as it spread, people said, oh I can start my own Santa Con, and they did so Santa Con started popping up all over the world. As the original creators, who would you know, create this open, open thing that anybody could do, you know, by design, they never wanted control of it. But part of seeding controlled the world is accepting that sometimes the world to do weird things with your with your ideas, right, And so the you know, this Santa Con and this organization and this organizer of course have nothing to do with the original folks to do. I just want to make sure it's very very clear here. And so this this is about the New York City Santacon, which is again the biggest, the most infamous, the largest, what most people think of when they when they think of Santa Con. And yeah, the headlines, you know, and the press release coming from the FBI, which I guess this is the biggest thing they have to worry about these days for some reason, you know, is like yeah, he he, you know, this guy allegedly created some like shell companies and was some money. But the thing that like a bunch of I was on some really funny texts with some of the original standas. After this happened, they had some really fun emojis to send me after this, the arms up and the air, like what that kind of kind of emogis going on? And you know, one of them text me something which is like super true, which is like there's a lot of scammy nonprofits out there. Oh yeah, yeah, An, you don't need to create shell companies in funnel money around. Just pay yourself a giant salary like most of them do. Yeah, and that's true. It's like weird. It's like, I don't know what this guy Dare don't do. I'd actually don't know him personally. I'm not going to accuse him of anything, but if these allegations are true, it's like, come on, dude, just do whatever the other scamming nonprofit does and pay yourself a giant salary. You don't need to go through all these machinations exactly.

00:52:44
Speaker 2: Yeah. And I was just I thought the same thing when I saw that. I was like, this is just such a splashy headline. Yeah, this wasn't even Malfi's and some an extraordinary degree a million true right exactly, yeah, yeah, which I mean, honestly, the person power that it took to investigate this at the FBI must have been extraordinary.

00:53:05
Speaker 4: It's like we're making no judgments about the FBI's priorities, right none.

00:53:10
Speaker 3: Everything is great.

00:53:12
Speaker 2: Hotel is like rolled up on a float.

00:53:15
Speaker 4: Did he? I don't want to end up on a list by even talking about him, but I'm already on it. So you tell me what you want me to say. What's over under and him having gone to Santa God, oh my god in the past three years.

00:53:24
Speaker 3: Oh honey, no cash? Oh honey.

00:53:30
Speaker 4: Yeah, he was organized.

00:53:32
Speaker 1: I feel like, I mean, I'll say what I want, but I feel like that there's any debauchery going on. He's probably there, right, I mean right now.

00:53:39
Speaker 2: I mean they literally he's He just sued fifty million dollars because of an article about him being wasted and missing all these meetings.

00:53:49
Speaker 4: And they needed like.

00:53:50
Speaker 2: A battery, a battery ram to get through a hotel door where he passed out.

00:53:56
Speaker 4: Most Santa con coded FBI director since I mean only more than than Muler, probably more than Comy, Like I think this guy's if we're gonna get ranking, FBI director is by likelihood of going to Santa con CJ put a scale up on.

00:54:09
Speaker 2: The there's the sexuality spectrum, but there's also the spectrum is a spectrum. Yeah, it's beautiful. And you know what the thing about spectrums, you're on it no matter what, even if you're all the way one end of zero, you're still part of them.

00:54:29
Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:54:30
Speaker 2: So, and that's what's beautiful about really. Yeah, it's the fabric of society and it's.

00:54:35
Speaker 4: A beautiful red side of the Santa rainbow, you know.

00:54:37
Speaker 2: And that fabric is sometimes synthetic red.

00:54:41
Speaker 1: And we'll go up in flames to just melt on your body and someone.

00:54:46
Speaker 2: Who has been there with that level of alcohol intoxication myself, it's okay, it's fine, it's fine, it's okay. I've never been to Xanacon. I have partied like that in my life.

00:55:00
Speaker 4: It's great. Why I have? I had a blessed fawn, really fun memory. Yeah, Saint Patrick's Day, Yeah, come on, come on?

00:55:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, where do you see Santa Kun going? As are a resident expert Santa Kon? Like what's next for Santa Kon?

00:55:16
Speaker 4: Right? Every year?

00:55:17
Speaker 2: It's because I do feel like, at least as someone deep in his thirties, it is becoming forty, it is becoming a little song of ice and fire where we have like the two worlds colliding of the twenty year old olds from Hoboken determined to piss themselves and get in a fight. And then we have like the thirty something year olds who have kids who are trying to just like get through December alive. Where is there going to be a civil war? Like what do you see on the season four?

00:55:50
Speaker 4: Is it a race riot?

00:55:51
Speaker 2: Like?

00:55:51
Speaker 4: What is a it's a question? So so Santa Coon, you know, I mean, of course the thing like somebody ask me like this the end of Sanak Like no, of course, it's it's yeah, like, first of all, is anybody you ask a thousand Santa as a Santacon who's the head of this? I don't know.

00:56:07
Speaker 2: You don't even know that they don't have to pay to a nonprofit teche.

00:56:10
Speaker 4: Yeah, they don't even know. They're just like it's a wristband, it's a party who cares. If anything, it probably makes it like a little more transgressive, like we're going to the scammy thing. We're going to the con like we're all watching the documentaries about cons. We love this stuff. It's like your your front row seat at the con at the scam right there. Absolutely, you know, And if you're a kid coming in from Hoboken and you're like, oh, what, like five dollars from my wristband isn't going to this thing that I was told was you never heard the fine prints?

00:56:34
Speaker 3: Yeah exactly, Yeah.

00:56:36
Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:56:36
Speaker 1: Has Santacon been trademarked?

00:56:38
Speaker 4: Well, that's you know, when when the original creators created it was designed to be this big open thing. Now I think there's you know, don't quote me on this, but I think there are certain like organizations and groups and local perhaps in New York one who have their own trademarks associated with this, and I am sure that some of them have attempted to own various aspects of this. But when these guys create it, the whole point.

00:57:00
Speaker 3: To make it open, yeah, everybody.

00:57:03
Speaker 4: Or Also, it was never something I was supposed to repeat itself. It was like a coffee society would create these like one off things and then all right, the next year they decided to do it again, and the next year they decided to do it again, and next thing you know, it kind of goes viral and like other people are are doing it, and it was sort of like this proto flash mob. When I started, like the term flash mob didn't even exist but that's basically what it was. I want to ask you about Coachella. Sure, have you been following what's happening with Coachella at all? I'm happy to do it quick, brill and friend.

00:57:30
Speaker 2: Yeah. So, similar to Burning Man, similar to Santacon, Coachella was once this pure thing that then got corrupted by the wrong one of the wrong type of person goes, and then it becomes that type of group of people go and a lot of influencers go, and it's now become a little bit of like oversaturated, late stage capitalistic healthscape. Right, We're like putting branding on branding on branding, and it's.

00:57:56
Speaker 4: Branding brought to you by this brandy exactly, and it's and it was supposed to just be like this fun concert out in the desert, and now it's become just like ridiculous, and brands are flying influencers out, and so this past year and it's still kind of ongoing, these influencers that were flown out were getting really ragged on for like taking the free seat from Starbucks to go.

00:58:20
Speaker 2: And do the Coachella thing. And I do feel like the coolness and the exclusivity of Coachella.

00:58:28
Speaker 1: It's gone is gone.

00:58:29
Speaker 4: No one wants to go.

00:58:31
Speaker 2: It was probably ten years ago, but now it's like I don't even think the influencers are going to want to go because so many people got shipped for it this year.

00:58:39
Speaker 4: Well that when these things the problem is like like the modicum of cool that people are taking to capitalize on. You've got to keep that spark alive somehow. When you totally you put that blanket on the on the fire, which is what happens with all of these things. You know, eventually brands don't even want to be a part of it, right.

00:58:57
Speaker 2: You know, it's just becomes it becomes so oversaturated and to be too available. There's no exclusivity anything.

00:59:03
Speaker 1: It's just so watered down at this point that it's there. It's it's just not cool anymore. I mean, I can't tell you how many times like this, just randomly scrolling on social media to see like and it's always like the same kind of come with me, and you know, while I do, you know, this is my clothing hall for Coachella, and you know, and.

00:59:21
Speaker 4: It's but what is like New York magaz I think where it's like the backlash the white girl voice is so good come with me. New York Magazine does the thing where it's like like the backlash and the backlash of the backlash. I think we're in like the backlash era of Coachella, and maybe in a couple of years it will be the backlash of the backlash and it goes so it becomes so uncool it becomes cool again.

00:59:44
Speaker 2: But I also think the reason why Santacon has been been impervious to that uncool cancelation is because to go is kind of cringe, Like to do this is kind of cringe your your The the concept of it is you're already going in without any self consciousness. People are going to Coachello because they want to look cool, yea. They want to be like, oh my god. And same with burning them where they're like painting their faces. They kind of want to appear like a bad ass.

01:00:12
Speaker 4: It also costs a lot of money to go to Coachello, ass and Santacon. You can get a Santa suit for like fifteen bucks on Amazon and a path train ride the Hobok and you're.

01:00:20
Speaker 3: Say, you know, exactly exactly.

01:00:22
Speaker 2: Like it is still and it does kind of hold that thread of the original concept, which is like we are. There is this anarchistic there is element.

01:00:33
Speaker 4: And you know, I will say, like the folks involved with the modern Sanacon who I did deal with, we're all awesome and like super nice, and a lot of them were kind of people who've been there for a long time, and you know, we're just like kind of resilient in their desire to have fun, understanding that the world is endlessly shitting on what they do, you know, And I got to get off some people who are like, We're going to do this thing no matter what the late night comics say, no matter what we can update says about us, no matter what, you know, they know everybody hates Santa Con, right, and to still do it. It's like, it's kind of kind of cool that we do that.

01:01:11
Speaker 2: Always said that about my podcasting career, and I really and it is something that makes me feel a strong affinity for Santa Con. Could you tell us maybe some of the most horrific debatras things that you uncovered about Santakan stories, maybe from the past, present, future Santa Klan's.

01:01:29
Speaker 4: I mean, the real joy of making this film was going through all this archival footage from the early Santa CON's in the nineties, and the bulk of the film takes place in these four years ninety five through ninety eight and four different cities, as the original creators start Santa Coon and San Francisco and then bring it to other cities one year at a time in each city, like the Johnny Appleseeds of Mayhem, spreading it across the land. City go from San Francisco to Portland to La end up in New York in ninety eight, and that's kind of the last year a lot of the original creators went was ninety eight New York by then was the first year was in New York, and then by then it just sort of was spreading, had a life of its own. But some of the stuff we caught on camera, which you saw in the film, I like, pot, I'm like watching the footge I'm like wait, wait, what was that? Like they're just walking on Fifth Avenue and they run into Michael Moore for some reason, and Michael Moore thinks they're protesting consumerism and Christmas and starts leading them in these like anti capitalist Christmas carols that he's like improvising on the spot, and it's hilarious and yes, kind of cringe and kind of beautiful and amazing. Yeah, it's like white. Just the Michael Moore just manifests for some reason. It's like you say his name four times and yeah that was what he was like, yeah, and it's like that's Michael Moore. And then the nineteen ninety eight New York sequence, the very first year it was in New York. It kind of culminates with several of the Santas, including our main character John, climbing the Brooklyn Bridge as Santa like with the shadow of the World Trade Center behind them in this deathifying stunt that it's like, I don't know what the statute of limitations is then climbing to Brooklyn Bridge, but he had no problem talking about it. So yeah, it's over as a legal expert. It's definitely not thirty years no, no, yeah, so it's good. It's pre nine eleven. You could do whatever you want back then. Yeah.

01:03:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, Well, thank you for coming on the show and talking about Santacon any other groups that you're really going to. You've already done Action park Justed santakn.

01:03:24
Speaker 4: I mean you can yeah, you can still see class Action parking mine on hox. How to drop a Bank. Another movie I Made's on Netflix, Santacon hopefully coming soon. You can check out infoence Santacon dot dot com. And you know, honestly, if you've always got leads about cool stuff and when I'm into reach out to me, Yeah, you people have gotten a sense a bit. Yeah, you get sort of focused on.

01:03:42
Speaker 3: Yeah, what's the best way?

01:03:44
Speaker 4: Uh, you can find me on social you too gorgeous?

01:03:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, next one, just like a request for a documentary if you could do. Pablo Escobar's zoo always had hippos, the hippos, the hippos. I think that could be really cool if you want to go global. I think that could be an interesting angled because the hippos are now destroying the ecosystem. But there's all this tourism.

01:04:04
Speaker 1: And I love this story so much. Yes, the people in the area are now using the hippos as a way to make money. Hey, do you want to come see Pablo's hippos.

01:04:15
Speaker 3: Here they go. But the hippos are making havoc.

01:04:18
Speaker 1: They're killing people, and like apparently their scot is super toxic to the area.

01:04:23
Speaker 3: I would love to know.

01:04:24
Speaker 4: In terms of like animals to mess with. Hippo is at the bottom of the list. Do not mess with they.

01:04:29
Speaker 1: Know they will, but I kind of love them, Yeah I do. I'm obsessed with them. Yeah they're they're not carnivores. They'll just kill you because they want to. Oh yeah, yeah, which I kind of love.

01:04:40
Speaker 2: So beautiful. It's such a great trait to have them.

01:04:44
Speaker 1: I feel like my next tattoo is going to be a hippo with the open mouth.

01:04:48
Speaker 3: I love them.

01:04:48
Speaker 2: We're going to take a break. Thank you for coming on the show.

01:04:51
Speaker 4: Thank you, Seth's good to see you. Great to be there. Thank you.

01:04:53
Speaker 2: So we'll be right back. Welcome back to Brief Recess. This is tells from the DMS. These are all the weird, freaky, nast things y'all send me in my DMS.

01:05:02
Speaker 3: Everybody, remember what I always say.

01:05:04
Speaker 1: While Michael is a lawyer, he's not your lawyer, so you should probably get your own.

01:05:10
Speaker 3: Okay, so sorry.

01:05:12
Speaker 1: This is a review from I Need More Sleep same. This pod is like a brunch hangover. You really can't speak, but you enjoy sitting there with your fives listening to them talk ish as they keep you updated on the latest. Melisten and Michael are hilarious and definitely worth a listen. Thanks, I need more sleep so much.

01:05:34
Speaker 2: I had a brunch hangover. It's about ten years ago.

01:05:38
Speaker 3: Okay, you still remember it? Somethingover bad? Okay.

01:05:41
Speaker 2: So it was when I was dating the coach of my swim team, where I was then asked to leave the swim team and stayed over. It was the first time I stayed over at his house and we had just been hooking up. I stayed over at his house and I didn't sleep at all because I just wasn't used to sleeping in like a stranger's. And okay, I think it was like and it was very I forget the neighborhood. I want to say it was like flat Iron or something. Anyway, we go to brunch the next day. He tells me that he's struggling with religion. What's the struggle, proceeds to break up with me at Friedman's on thirtieth Street in the Flower District.

01:06:20
Speaker 1: How many drinks in.

01:06:21
Speaker 2: A couple mimosas in. He decides to tell me he has a Catholic relapse and is feeling guilty about all the gay sex, all the gay stuff. I was like, we are like deep in our twenties. This isn't like high school anymore. And now, and let me tell you, I haven't been back to Friedman since.

01:06:41
Speaker 3: Well he ruined it for you.

01:06:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, his name was Neil. I'm willing to go on the record. I'm not scared. I'm not scared of someone who can swim at.

01:06:51
Speaker 3: L which Neil and el Oh yeah, interesting, he spelled.

01:06:56
Speaker 2: It weird and he was fucking freaking yeah.

01:06:58
Speaker 1: There you go, Ben, here's another email. I think it's funny. I tried real hard to listen to the Peda episode. I tried fast forwarding through some of it and finally had to give up. I can't handle the catholic guilt. The description of what is done to animals gives me I am no longer Catholic, but the guilt never leaves.

01:07:19
Speaker 2: The guilt of what she's done to animals.

01:07:21
Speaker 1: The guilt's there's a lot of Catholic guilt anything, everything, oh everything.

01:07:27
Speaker 2: Okay, I should know better because swim coach.

01:07:31
Speaker 3: Well, there you got.

01:07:32
Speaker 4: I was the victim of a dumping because of it.

01:07:35
Speaker 1: So they go on to say I did start donating to PETA. I'm sure they really appreciate it. The episode made me realize they aren't the crazy organization. I thought they were, but any communication from them goes straight in the trash in real life or virtual.

01:07:51
Speaker 2: Oh that's okay, Yeah, I spam people. I do the spam all.

01:07:54
Speaker 4: Yeah.

01:07:54
Speaker 3: Yeah.

01:07:55
Speaker 1: So the question is my question is for Melissa, do you still wear your vent first after that episode? So the answer is going to be yes. I don't think I have warned them since.

01:08:06
Speaker 4: Then, but it's been warm.

01:08:07
Speaker 1: But it's been warm, which is why I'm still gonna wear them. But but I know that I'm not going to buy any new ones, vintage or new. I the reason why I'm keeping the ones that I have. One of them especially belonged to a relative of mine who passed away, and it has got.

01:08:28
Speaker 3: A lot of sentimental value.

01:08:29
Speaker 1: No, I think it's fine too. And I also know that I remember when she bought it, and she was so proud and so happy that I I don't think that I could give it away.

01:08:42
Speaker 2: It's like Karma points right, It's like you're going to do that, but you're going to eat the coconut yogurt, you know. It's like it's it can be a little bit of a swap sea It's it's up to you and your own personal sort of values, right, I gonna continue wearing like leather boots.

01:08:59
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm sorry. I didn't realized that.

01:09:00
Speaker 1: She went on, I have one that was gifted to me, and I don't know how I feel about it. After listening to a little bit of the episode that I could stomach, I've learned so much from listening to Brief Recess. Thank you so much for keeping us informed and entertained. Thanks Karen so Yeah, as I say, Karen, yea, do what feels right for you if you don't feel right wearing it.

01:09:18
Speaker 2: Gifted it to Karen, right, and let us know, was it your swim coach?

01:09:22
Speaker 4: Was it?

01:09:23
Speaker 1: Like?

01:09:23
Speaker 2: And it depends who gifted it to you. And that's gonna yeah, because if it's got negative sentimental value, or maybe it was beloved, right, was it maybe your boyfriend who was out of content because he was a religious studies student and then right when he got out he broke up with you? Was it your swim coach?

01:09:43
Speaker 4: Right after? Like?

01:09:46
Speaker 2: Who?

01:09:46
Speaker 4: Was it? Just curious?

01:09:48
Speaker 1: Do you think, now you're a married man, do you think it is in poor form to keep an item that an ex gave you.

01:09:59
Speaker 2: It depends how valuable it is. If it was like a Rolex keeping that right.

01:10:04
Speaker 1: Well, what I mean, what if it's just something that you happen to like and forget about the person who gave it to you.

01:10:11
Speaker 4: I think it's fine.

01:10:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, me too, because when it comes to XES, there's already, especially with me, there's so much beef. There is so much bad with X that if there's just one little shrapnel piece that is has something positive to it, hang on to it, hold it close because there's.

01:10:33
Speaker 3: Going to be Do you have beef with most of your exes?

01:10:36
Speaker 2: Not that we have like live beef where I'm like, oh, I got to take this. There's so much you. Nothing has ever ended on good terms for me. There's none of this conscious uncoupling in my life. No, I'm Mediterranean stock. Like it is. It gets vicious. Yeah right, so it's scorched earth. Got So if there is some something positive, like a nicemental value thing, do you have anything sentimental from excess that you've kept?

01:11:04
Speaker 4: I don't.

01:11:05
Speaker 2: I can't think of anything because most of them were deadbeats who never gave me anything.

01:11:08
Speaker 1: There you go, thank you so much, thank you. They were riding my cotaels exactly. Remember what I said the other day, hobo sexual friends.

01:11:17
Speaker 3: That is that is that is what that is. That is what that is.

01:11:22
Speaker 1: It's the guy who's driving you to work in your car and then going home to watch Sports Center all day.

01:11:28
Speaker 3: That guy, Yes, that guy.

01:11:30
Speaker 2: I had to just explain to Brad what sports Center was because I was like, we didn't know what it was either.

01:11:35
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, it sounds like.

01:11:37
Speaker 2: A hockey rank. I'm going to sports Center.

01:11:39
Speaker 3: Sports Center, No sounds take the place with.

01:11:40
Speaker 4: The crane game. You know what I mean? He never went win?

01:11:44
Speaker 3: Do you really?

01:11:45
Speaker 4: I am very good at that game.

01:11:47
Speaker 1: One flex the kids who get stuck in that how is that happening? Am I wrong?

01:11:54
Speaker 3: Yes?

01:11:54
Speaker 4: You were climbing in.

01:11:56
Speaker 3: I'm not the only person. To me, are the only person who see that.

01:12:02
Speaker 4: I thought you met like stuck, like trying over and over.

01:12:04
Speaker 2: Like when you get your hands stuck in the vending machine.

01:12:06
Speaker 3: OHO as a kid.

01:12:10
Speaker 4: I square to good.

01:12:13
Speaker 2: Thank you for watching. This is brief recess. I'm Michael Foot, I'm Melissa Albrandt. We'll see you in court, not me. This has been an exactly right production recorded at iHeart Studios, hosted by me Michael.

01:12:26
Speaker 1: Foot and me Melissa Malbranch Our producer is CJ. Ferroni.

01:12:30
Speaker 4: This episode was edited by Nicholas Galucci.

01:12:32
Speaker 1: Our associate producer is Christina Chamberlain, and our guest booker is Patria Kuttner.

01:12:36
Speaker 2: Our theme song was composed by Tom Bryfogel with artwork from Charlotte Delarue and Manessa Lilac, with photography by Brad Obono.

01:12:43
Speaker 1: Brief Recess is executive produced by Karen Kilgareff, Georgia hart Stark, and Danielle Kramer.

01:12:48
Speaker 2: You can find me on Instagram at Department of Redundancy Department or on TikTok at Michael foot and.

01:12:53
Speaker 1: I'm on both Instagram and TikTok as Melissa Albranch.

01:12:56
Speaker 2: Got legal questions, reach out at brief Recess at exact actiwrightmedia dot com. Listen to Brief Recess on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts, and of course we're a podcasts with video. Search for Brief Recess on YouTube