Starship Troopers: Adolescent Development & Propaganda

<v Speaker 1>Welcome to Popcorn Psychology, the podcast where we watch blockbuster
<v Speaker 1>movies and psychoanalyze them. My name is Brittany Brownfield and
<v Speaker 1>I'm a child therapist and I'm joined by.
<v Speaker 2>Ben Stover, individual therapist.
<v Speaker 1>Hannah Espinoza, marriage and family therapists. We're all licensed clinical
<v Speaker 1>professional counselors also known as therapists, who practice out of Chicago.
<v Speaker 1>Even though we are licensed mental health professionals, this podcast
<v Speaker 1>is purely for entertainment purposes and to fulfill our love
<v Speaker 1>of dissecting pop culture and all forms.
<v Speaker 2>Please remember that, even though we are all licensed therapists,
<v Speaker 2>we aren't your therapist.
<v Speaker 1>If you are struggling with mental health symptoms, please find
<v Speaker 1>a local mental health provider.
<v Speaker 2>Welcome to Popcorn Psychology. In this season eight episode, we
<v Speaker 2>are going to be covering a fan request one we
<v Speaker 2>have gotten many many times. I think I counted eighteen
<v Speaker 2>requests for this film over the time we've been doing
<v Speaker 2>this podcast, and took us a little while to get here.
<v Speaker 2>But we'll be covering the nineteen ninety seven classic cult
<v Speaker 2>film Starship Troopers. The reason we've been asked to do
<v Speaker 2>this film is because it is a satire. It is
<v Speaker 2>a strong satire of a militaristic fascist culture that controls
<v Speaker 2>the narrative its public sees the messaging people get and
<v Speaker 2>the identity formation that they have, and how that propels
<v Speaker 2>them into their own demise, sometimes without yet having the
<v Speaker 2>opportunity to be aware of what they are signing up for.
<v Speaker 2>In the plot of this film, we meet a group
<v Speaker 2>of kids in Buenos Aires for just the whitest of
<v Speaker 2>the white kids.
<v Speaker 1>When that was a plot twist to me, Oh I
<v Speaker 1>found out there from Bartos earras, I went sh what
<v Speaker 1>it's in my notes actually with exclamation point dire from Bernos.
<v Speaker 2>Eras, Yeah, they don't look remotely South American.
<v Speaker 1>No, I also don't look remotely like teenagers. So we
<v Speaker 1>just have a lot of a lot of things, a
<v Speaker 1>lot of a few things slide.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, like most nineties movies, you know, teenagers being twenty
<v Speaker 2>five to thirty two, somewhere in that range seemed consistent,
<v Speaker 2>but it's definitely present in this movie. One character looks
<v Speaker 2>feasibly nineteen. Another couple teenagers look feasibly thirty five.
<v Speaker 1>I mean, Dizzy looks like she's pulling like a Josie Rosie,
<v Speaker 1>like she's trying to go undercover as an adult reporter
<v Speaker 1>into a high school situation.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, and Sander looks like he's an undercover recruiter. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>and maybe he was because he's a flight instructor. And
<v Speaker 2>they left for the academy at the same time Carmen
<v Speaker 2>and Xanders.
<v Speaker 1>We start getting into the timeline of this movie. Oh
<v Speaker 1>things take all night.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, we will be, which is part of why I
<v Speaker 2>think people ask us to it. There is more to
<v Speaker 2>it than meets the eye. But also they was this
<v Speaker 2>the best delivery of this style movie ever done? No?
<v Speaker 1>Absolutely not.
<v Speaker 2>So. In Starship Troopers, as I established, we start off,
<v Speaker 2>I actually start off with the flashback, right. This movie
<v Speaker 2>is shot with a lot of propaganda scenes that show
<v Speaker 2>us a little propaganda film snippets if we're watching through
<v Speaker 2>their hollow net, as they I think they call it.
<v Speaker 2>Oh okay, So there's a lot of things that are
<v Speaker 2>showing us as if we're seeing a newscast on our
<v Speaker 2>little tablets. And it starts with if a year ahead.
<v Speaker 2>Oh where the rest of movie picks up where we
<v Speaker 2>see a war reporter commenting on like, look, we're gonna
<v Speaker 2>come kick these bugs asses and they attacked us, and
<v Speaker 2>now we're gonna go get them, and that is most
<v Speaker 2>certainly not how that goes. And they make that clear
<v Speaker 2>right away, like, oh, it's fine, we're gonna come kick
<v Speaker 2>there as this dude gets literally ripped in half on
<v Speaker 2>live TV.
<v Speaker 1>He gets bugs apped.
<v Speaker 2>So we see a war scene at the beginning through
<v Speaker 2>the Hollnett propaganda arm of the government, and then we
<v Speaker 2>flash back to where our characters started in high school.
<v Speaker 2>We see the characters kind of walked through the last
<v Speaker 2>days of high school, kind of tying in the relevance
<v Speaker 2>of what they've been through and also what they're walking into,
<v Speaker 2>where we see the stark contrast between the world the
<v Speaker 2>adults are presenting them and the world the teenagers have synthesized,
<v Speaker 2>which are starkly different.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, the adolescent perception filter that's on their brain, so
<v Speaker 1>that when they stimuli, it goes through that filter before
<v Speaker 1>it actually hits the messaging of their brain.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, And we see how strong that is is these grizzled,
<v Speaker 2>damaged guard amputee veterans that are teaching them or telling
<v Speaker 2>them how seriously they need to take themselves and their
<v Speaker 2>everything they're getting into, and they just clearly ignore that information. Blake,
<v Speaker 2>Everything's gonna be awesome. By the way, are you going
<v Speaker 2>to the dance tonight before you go to the academy
<v Speaker 2>to join the military forever? Well?
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Like the tone that's set in the very beginning
<v Speaker 1>of this movie is that everything is pretty from their perspective.
<v Speaker 1>From the teenager's mind, everything is pretty low risk, high
<v Speaker 1>reward is how I would put it. Yep, absolutely, which
<v Speaker 1>is very teenagery. As someone who has worked with a
<v Speaker 1>lot of teenagers. I was actually a therapist in an
<v Speaker 1>adalyst in program for a while. Something that can be
<v Speaker 1>very frustrating about teenagers when you're no longer a teenager
<v Speaker 1>is ugh, I don't This is not going to be
<v Speaker 1>a nice way to say, but like the limitations of
<v Speaker 1>their perspective in how they don't think they have any
<v Speaker 1>limitations on their perspective.
<v Speaker 2>Correct.
<v Speaker 1>So those two things conflicting with each other makes the
<v Speaker 1>soup that is some of what we see in this movie.
<v Speaker 2>Correct. So the movie goes to great care to establish
<v Speaker 2>that right off the bat, and it explains the society
<v Speaker 2>a little bit to it that in this world, the
<v Speaker 2>military veterans stopped the quote social scientists and politicians from
<v Speaker 2>running society. Into the ground, and what we have now
<v Speaker 2>is a thousand years later where this militaristic society has
<v Speaker 2>thrived in peace quote unquote through strength, and that they
<v Speaker 2>have created this world that is one earth as one
<v Speaker 2>federation and everybody's a citizen of it. So everyone has
<v Speaker 2>just got to get on board and comply because there's
<v Speaker 2>one way. That's it, the end, one way, and it works,
<v Speaker 2>so deal with it. Is pretty much the introduction we get,
<v Speaker 2>and then we see the kids start to follow that
<v Speaker 2>and they all join up, join the military, go to
<v Speaker 2>boot camp or to officers school for a couple of them.
<v Speaker 2>One's going to be a pilot, one's going to be
<v Speaker 2>military intelligence, one's gonna be boots on the ground infantry.
<v Speaker 2>And we see how all of this goes from this
<v Speaker 2>peacetime idea of I'm gonna see the world for two years,
<v Speaker 2>I'm gonna do cool stuff.
<v Speaker 1>To that oath that they gave in the beginning was
<v Speaker 1>two years to never correct or two forever I did
<v Speaker 1>catch that part, or.
<v Speaker 2>So long as may be required.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, which means that the military owns your ass until
<v Speaker 1>they decide that they're done with you, which is probably
<v Speaker 1>your death. In how this movie goes and or losing
<v Speaker 1>enough limbs that you're no longer able to carry out
<v Speaker 1>the job that they've asked you to do.
<v Speaker 2>The movie lays it right out there for the characters,
<v Speaker 2>but they just can't see it, which isn't done like
<v Speaker 2>real life, and why we're going to do this movie.
<v Speaker 2>But also looking at how this plot develops, we see
<v Speaker 2>them start to find success in this new life because
<v Speaker 2>as they've joined the military and bad things start to happen,
<v Speaker 2>and they start to get exposed to how real and
<v Speaker 2>dangerous real life is outside of high school sports and
<v Speaker 2>talking and studying, that bad things can happen and will
<v Speaker 2>happen to you and you've got to survive them. Our
<v Speaker 2>main character, Johnny Rico, who in the books is a
<v Speaker 2>Filipino man, and this is played by Casper Van Deen,
<v Speaker 2>the whiteous man there's ever been a white man truly,
<v Speaker 2>Johnny Rico and his girlfriend and at this start Carmen
<v Speaker 2>what's her last.
<v Speaker 1>Name Ibanez or something Ibanez, famously ethnic Denise Richards, Yes, yeah.
<v Speaker 2>Yep, from Downers Grove, Illinois, Yes, just in the Chicago suburbs.
<v Speaker 2>Denise Richards, Yes, the most whitewashed cast of main characters
<v Speaker 2>with ethnic names because nineties, they start realizing that these
<v Speaker 2>identities they formed as kids and the things that they
<v Speaker 2>were thinking the world would be is not. Because as
<v Speaker 2>one of Johnny's teammates get killed in a training accident
<v Speaker 2>under his first command, yeah, he's punished, and then he quits,
<v Speaker 2>he's going to leave, He's going to leave the military.
<v Speaker 2>And then he watches on the screen as an asteroid
<v Speaker 2>attack from this bug species that they is, the antagonist
<v Speaker 2>of the film has allegedly sent to Earth kills his parents,
<v Speaker 2>their home and everything and everyone that they know. So
<v Speaker 2>Johnny joins back up and off we go into war,
<v Speaker 2>and whatever identities they were going to have, whatever alternative
<v Speaker 2>paths for them existed, are now closed and they're at
<v Speaker 2>wartimes military citizens now, and we watch as they developed
<v Speaker 2>this and kind of abandon their old identities and then
<v Speaker 2>form the new identities that keep the Federation going. Interspersed
<v Speaker 2>throughout this film are these little videos of propaganda films
<v Speaker 2>that help us understand the world and see that it's
<v Speaker 2>a film that's making fun of itself and of fascism.
<v Speaker 2>But I don't think the reception of this film indicated
<v Speaker 2>that they nailed that point, because this movie unfortunately became
<v Speaker 2>a cult classic because it was a very expensive not
<v Speaker 2>I don't know if it was full flop, but it was.
<v Speaker 2>It was a critical flop. It made some money with
<v Speaker 2>ticket sales because it has a lot of blood and
<v Speaker 2>gore and cgi that would have been cool in ninety
<v Speaker 2>seven now is a little corny, but it really captured
<v Speaker 2>the attention of you know, thirteen to sixteen year olds
<v Speaker 2>who absolutely missed the point, kind of like you know,
<v Speaker 2>Fight Club, for example.
<v Speaker 1>Talked about as well we have.
<v Speaker 2>But it's become a cult classic because of how close
<v Speaker 2>to some things that have started happening in our society
<v Speaker 2>have repeated themselves as they have done throughout history and
<v Speaker 2>any fascist societies where a singular voice starting to control
<v Speaker 2>the narrative starts to change the way humans that live
<v Speaker 2>in a society see themselves see their role in a
<v Speaker 2>society and lose the ability to critically evaluate anything because
<v Speaker 2>they don't have an alternative viewpoint that allows them the
<v Speaker 2>opportunity to form an inner dialogue to challenge anything. So
<v Speaker 2>as we talk about Starship Troopers today, we're going to
<v Speaker 2>talk about adolescent development, the blief formation, and ecocentrism and
<v Speaker 2>how Brittany kind of mentioned already that that creates a
<v Speaker 2>bit of a filter. We're going to talk about propaganda
<v Speaker 2>and how that controlled messaging sort of creates the blank
<v Speaker 2>slates that these teenagers don't even realize that they become
<v Speaker 2>to adopt the messaging that allows them to fit exactly
<v Speaker 2>into where the powers that be want them to rather
<v Speaker 2>than naturally develop identity against their experiences. And then, like usual,
<v Speaker 2>we'll cover treatment and final thoughts. So before we launch
<v Speaker 2>into any of that, we'll take a quick break and
<v Speaker 2>we'll come back before we get started here on adolescent development.
<v Speaker 2>Gonna go ahead and remind you guys please give us
<v Speaker 2>a like and a review and check us out on
<v Speaker 2>Patreon if you haven't already. And let's talk about adolescent development.
<v Speaker 2>What do we see in this film that feels true
<v Speaker 2>Universal Classic Eternal about seventeen year olds graduating high.
<v Speaker 1>School that they're thinking is very black and white. There's
<v Speaker 1>really not any gray, which is really common for teenagers
<v Speaker 1>in terms of where they are developmentally, which almost makes
<v Speaker 1>the characters very too dimensional in some ways. But they
<v Speaker 1>do a good job of showing the lack of awareness
<v Speaker 1>of consequences of real life consequences.
<v Speaker 2>Well they're super good at then, aren't they.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Yeah, that's something that they did a good job
<v Speaker 1>of showing. And also that they are all you know,
<v Speaker 1>they're also something else we know about teenagers is that they're,
<v Speaker 1>you know, in the process of developing their identity and
<v Speaker 1>they have a lot of ways to go. I mean,
<v Speaker 1>our brains aren't completely done until twenty six, twenty seven,
<v Speaker 1>twenty eight of how life is. And also having access
<v Speaker 1>that's what's hard about teenagers. They don't have access to
<v Speaker 1>awareness and consequences in a lot of different ways because
<v Speaker 1>of where they are developmentally. Yeah. And part of that,
<v Speaker 1>right is also the egocentricism of nothing bad can really
<v Speaker 1>happen to me unless you're someone that's gone through trauma
<v Speaker 1>or like lived some intense lifeest off, which I do
<v Speaker 1>think is an interesting jexposition with that gratuitous shower scene later,
<v Speaker 1>is that I think that the teenagers were we meet
<v Speaker 1>in the beginning of the movie Johnny, Dizzy, Carl and Carmen,
<v Speaker 1>that they seem to be like more sheltered, more able
<v Speaker 1>to buy into the shininess, the shiniest version of the
<v Speaker 1>messaging they get which is like, isn't this fancy and
<v Speaker 1>impressive and you have to be really smart to do it,
<v Speaker 1>And they're very caught up in like the hero aspect
<v Speaker 1>of this world and the belief systems around it. Whereas,
<v Speaker 1>did you see in like the shower scene, you hear
<v Speaker 1>a lot more of the reasons why people join the
<v Speaker 1>military in our world, which is to get access to
<v Speaker 1>resources they wouldn't have otherwise. And so I thought that
<v Speaker 1>was a good example of how the kids we meet
<v Speaker 1>in the beginning, they also have the extra layer of
<v Speaker 1>almost like sheltered protectiveness that makes them even less aware,
<v Speaker 1>like you're saying, Hannah, of like the bigger picture of
<v Speaker 1>the bigger world, and like nothing bad will happen to me,
<v Speaker 1>even more than maybe even like the other people that
<v Speaker 1>they joined up with, who have those stories of like
<v Speaker 1>I couldn't go to Harvard unless you're in the military.
<v Speaker 1>I don't know if I could have children unless you're
<v Speaker 1>in the military. I don't know if I can have
<v Speaker 1>the career I want unless you join the military. Whereas
<v Speaker 1>even with like Johnny, it's just more just wanting to
<v Speaker 1>do something that will look cool, make them feel impressive,
<v Speaker 1>and give them an identity, which as much as like
<v Speaker 1>an adolescent would probably like wrestle me to the ground
<v Speaker 1>and like beat me to death about this, which I
<v Speaker 1>would totally understand, is they're also doing that thing teenagers do,
<v Speaker 1>which is like trying on different identities as well.
<v Speaker 2>Absolutely, and we see them all.
<v Speaker 1>I mean they're getting sorted basically.
<v Speaker 2>Of course they're getting sorted. They just don't know it. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>they are all getting sordid and ranked and put into
<v Speaker 2>their skill sets. Like Carmen is clearly very good at math,
<v Speaker 2>and we can just assume that physics engineering generals, you know,
<v Speaker 2>STEM is Carmen's wheelhouse. Would they show us as she
<v Speaker 2>got a ninety seven on her final, she knows she
<v Speaker 2>wants to be a pilot. She wants to fly a
<v Speaker 2>starship that's going to have possibly thousands of lives on
<v Speaker 2>board it, and she wants to be piloting it. But
<v Speaker 2>we also see that she has absolutely no awareness whatsoever
<v Speaker 2>that the first time she's flying that chip, she brings
<v Speaker 2>it within five meters of completely wiping out the space doc,
<v Speaker 2>which you know, last I checked, if you put a
<v Speaker 2>hole in something that has air in it in a
<v Speaker 2>vac we have a big problem but you see, like
<v Speaker 2>the lack of awareness, lack of consequences that if you
<v Speaker 2>crash this ship, billions of dollars and people are going
<v Speaker 2>to die. And she's just like, but I'm awesome and
<v Speaker 2>everybody should see that. Like I don't have to back
<v Speaker 2>the ship out of the dock all the way. If
<v Speaker 2>I get this angle right, I can get it within
<v Speaker 2>five meters and clear the thing because I've already calculated
<v Speaker 2>the perfect angle. And it's a flex. It's a total flex,
<v Speaker 2>which is annoying and why they you know, usually don't
<v Speaker 2>let teenagers fly anything ever, But we see this over
<v Speaker 2>and over again they show us in this film. It's
<v Speaker 2>a great take, a great recognition. How many times are
<v Speaker 2>these characters shown the consequences that they're really dealing with
<v Speaker 2>and they see it zero percent.
<v Speaker 1>Well, there are no beats in which they're staying with
<v Speaker 1>what they're literally seeing and hearing. Like we talked about
<v Speaker 1>like the oath that they take, they're just that goes
<v Speaker 1>right over their heads in terms of like the fact
<v Speaker 1>that they're swearing over the rest of their lives. Like
<v Speaker 1>we already I think mentioned that right after that oath
<v Speaker 1>they meet that guy who is the military who has
<v Speaker 1>like no limbs left, maybe one hand. I don't know
<v Speaker 1>if that was that a prosthetic, I can't remember, but
<v Speaker 1>basically they.
<v Speaker 2>Had one normal hand and one prosthetic okay, no legs okay,
<v Speaker 2>and no legs.
<v Speaker 1>But it's also that thing teenagers do where they're like
<v Speaker 1>that won't happen to me though, Like and which I
<v Speaker 1>think I don't know. When Johnny's parents are trying to
<v Speaker 1>impress upon him to not join the military and try
<v Speaker 1>to bribe him to not join the military, they don't
<v Speaker 1>do a great job of this, but like they're hitting
<v Speaker 1>the same a similar wall, which is that like there
<v Speaker 1>are certain there's if a teenager doesn't want to hear
<v Speaker 1>what you are saying about something that they want to
<v Speaker 1>be true, it's really really hard to get through that shield,
<v Speaker 1>that like wall around their belief because I don't know
<v Speaker 1>if it's because their identity is so fragile that they
<v Speaker 1>will really like grab onto a really strong idea, whether
<v Speaker 1>it is an ideology, whether it is a aspiration, whether
<v Speaker 1>it is even like a esthetic trend, a band, you know,
<v Speaker 1>a fandom of some sort, and they can be very
<v Speaker 1>protective of that, yep, understandably so. And so then as
<v Speaker 1>us as adults trying to like crack into that, they
<v Speaker 1>don't want to hear it, they will just reject it.
<v Speaker 1>And so it makes sense to me why they keep
<v Speaker 1>encountering all this very blatant, contradictory information that should discourage them,
<v Speaker 1>and they're not discouraged. They don't even hear it, just
<v Speaker 1>getting high off their own supply and high off of
<v Speaker 1>the messaging supply obviously, which I mean, how can you
<v Speaker 1>not if you're being raised in a militant fascist government
<v Speaker 1>where the military is so revered that they've created a
<v Speaker 1>class system where people who have served the military get
<v Speaker 1>to be citizens and everybody else is civilians. And the
<v Speaker 1>idea that you can't even vote unless you've served military
<v Speaker 1>time does exactly sound like a government that has come
<v Speaker 1>from a total military takeover, like just the total idolization.
<v Speaker 1>And so how could teenagers not gom onto that? And
<v Speaker 1>I don't want to not vote. I don't want to
<v Speaker 1>not vote. I don't want to be at a disadvantage.
<v Speaker 2>I don't want to be less than I don't want
<v Speaker 2>my dreams to not come true because of my own choice.
<v Speaker 2>Of course, I'm going to choose the thing.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, And That's why the scene with Johnny's parents is
<v Speaker 1>such like weak sauce in terms of their argument, Like
<v Speaker 1>they barely argue with him. I wouldn't say that they
<v Speaker 1>don't even don't really argue with him. They kind of
<v Speaker 1>just like show like a mmmm and then try to
<v Speaker 1>bribe him with vacation. And then they just kind of
<v Speaker 1>like put their hands up. No, they cut him off them. Oh,
<v Speaker 1>they do cut him off. You're right, they cut him off.
<v Speaker 1>That was such a quick thing in the movie, but.
<v Speaker 2>Many movies of this type, twelve more minutes of exposition
<v Speaker 2>would have made a lot of points much clearer.
<v Speaker 1>Or even just a bit more vim and vigor from
<v Speaker 1>their parents. His parents during that scene, that dad was
<v Speaker 1>like mixing a drink.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, and he was just kind of like what I mean,
<v Speaker 2>But this was the satire of it. He thought his
<v Speaker 2>rich status could win his kid over against the powers
<v Speaker 2>of the fascist society. His dad's going like, but you're
<v Speaker 2>going to Harvard and the movies are established, Donnie is
<v Speaker 2>not the smartest kid.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, how to get into Harvard sports? That game place, No,
<v Speaker 1>that's a legacy, probably leg Yeah, you're right, money, legacy,
<v Speaker 1>Brittany money.
<v Speaker 2>Even though he's a money.
<v Speaker 1>Dumbass, which is why when everyone's mad about affirmative action,
<v Speaker 1>you know how many people are legacies that get into
<v Speaker 1>those schools. They didn't learn through merit assholes anyway.
<v Speaker 2>No, but they're the ones that set up the rule
<v Speaker 2>that it's they're creating that to be the illusion that
<v Speaker 2>it's fair, so that when they buy their way in
<v Speaker 2>again and exclude the other people, that they can do
<v Speaker 2>it with their money, then it's fair because they're the
<v Speaker 2>ones telling you it was fair with using their eugenics
<v Speaker 2>test to be the determining factor.
<v Speaker 1>But I think Johnny's parents are, which I think they
<v Speaker 1>do do a lot in these kind of movies, Like
<v Speaker 1>I'm thinking about Heathers even and Christian Slater's dad in
<v Speaker 1>that movie, were this very like indifferent vibe that a
<v Speaker 1>lot of parents can have too, Like parents in these
<v Speaker 1>kind of movies, this whole thing of like we don't
<v Speaker 1>really have to talk to our kids. We're just sort
<v Speaker 1>of trying to like impress upon them our beliefs, and
<v Speaker 1>then we're shocked when they don't feel connected to what
<v Speaker 1>we feel connected to. Yeah, the way that adults will
<v Speaker 1>just like project their viewpoint and their wisdom and their
<v Speaker 1>belief system onto their children, assuming that they're following suit.
<v Speaker 1>When I would bet money that Johnny's parents haven't been
<v Speaker 1>paying that much attention to him and what he's actually
<v Speaker 1>interested in, especially given how surprised they are at the
<v Speaker 1>choice he makes. Yeah, because I feel like if they
<v Speaker 1>were actually paying attention to him and actually talking to him,
<v Speaker 1>that they would have a better sense of what he's
<v Speaker 1>looking at. Yeah, and that I would hope that they
<v Speaker 1>would do a better job of having conversations with him
<v Speaker 1>earlier to make him think more critically about everything, Like
<v Speaker 1>you have to teach your kids how to think critically. Yes,
<v Speaker 1>there are some kids that will just be able to
<v Speaker 1>think critically, the same way that some kids are just
<v Speaker 1>naturally resilient and some kids aren't. But like the idea
<v Speaker 1>that your kid will just be able to think as
<v Speaker 1>critically as you as an adult, especially in this kind
<v Speaker 1>of society where there is no encouragement to think there critically.
<v Speaker 1>That's why I mean, I'm sure we'll talk about this
<v Speaker 1>one of the propaganda, but how there's more and more
<v Speaker 1>discussions about But there's very few spaces that young men
<v Speaker 1>can encounter on the Internet that haven't been infiltrated by
<v Speaker 1>really intense right wing not even right wing really just
<v Speaker 1>like in Selly, toxic patriarchal, misogynistic shit, and that adults
<v Speaker 1>parents aren't doing a good enough job of injecting enough
<v Speaker 1>critical thing and media literacy into their kids as they're
<v Speaker 1>consuming all this information, similar to this movie where these
<v Speaker 1>kids are getting inundated obviously with propaganda because that is
<v Speaker 1>the world they live in.
<v Speaker 2>Correct.
<v Speaker 1>And it's the way that Johnny's parents talk. It's like
<v Speaker 1>they just assumed he would think more critically than he
<v Speaker 1>does a boy who is famously not smart. No offense
<v Speaker 1>to him, I guess.
<v Speaker 2>At least not in math. Johnny has plenty of skills,
<v Speaker 2>but he's not an intellectual. Johnny has charisma, Johnny has
<v Speaker 2>like physical skills. He's clearly good at art. But Johnny
<v Speaker 2>is not a math person. We don't know anything. We
<v Speaker 2>don't have any objective assessment other than his thirty five
<v Speaker 2>percent score in math that Johnny is not.
<v Speaker 1>He doesn't strike me as much of a thinker because
<v Speaker 1>I mean, he also does that thing that teenager. I mean,
<v Speaker 1>he joins the military for a girl. Johnny's a doer,
<v Speaker 1>and I would say probably dizzy kind of joins the
<v Speaker 1>military for him.
<v Speaker 2>She did, There's no question she was. She was about
<v Speaker 2>to be a pro athlete. I hadn't caught that comment.
<v Speaker 2>I know the dialegue, but he had at the end
<v Speaker 2>of the game Johnny or at the dance when she's
<v Speaker 2>so thirsty for Johnny, she's asking or they're having a
<v Speaker 2>little conversations. Johny's like, oh, are you gonna go and
<v Speaker 2>play pro? For BA? She's a quarterback for the team
<v Speaker 2>or whatever.
<v Speaker 1>That sort doesn't make any sense. So she was.
<v Speaker 2>She's the quarterback, and she's clearly good enough to get
<v Speaker 2>a pro contract, and so the expectation was that she
<v Speaker 2>was going to do that. I think it was a
<v Speaker 2>surprise to see her enlisting when she followed him to
<v Speaker 2>the mobile infantry, And even though she's clearly a badass,
<v Speaker 2>that wasn't the expected path for her. And all of
<v Speaker 2>them are making all kinds of decisions for reasons because
<v Speaker 2>they're so up their own worldviews, but that they can't
<v Speaker 2>see the consequences of their actions, Like each one of
<v Speaker 2>them has been given information that what you're about to
<v Speaker 2>do is not what you think it is. And Carl
<v Speaker 2>seems to think he's gonna go into research and development,
<v Speaker 2>even though he's showing signs as being a psychic. And
<v Speaker 2>Carmen is I think she's the only one who thinks like,
<v Speaker 2>I'm just gonna be a pilot and everything's gonna be
<v Speaker 2>great and it's gonna be fine, and I'm not gonna
<v Speaker 2>like be in danger at all. And she's in danger
<v Speaker 2>fucking immediately, absolutely and serious critical danger. And then it
<v Speaker 2>becomes one of the characters that gets into the most danger,
<v Speaker 2>barely survives with her life on the ground, not in
<v Speaker 2>her spaceship. This movie has slapped each one of them
<v Speaker 2>in the face with the realities that could face them,
<v Speaker 2>and they just roundly reject him because they don't fit
<v Speaker 2>their narrative. And that battle we see between the parents
<v Speaker 2>and Johnny, yeah, the parents should have done a better
<v Speaker 2>job of going like, this is the culture of our family,
<v Speaker 2>This is the opportunities that exist to you, This is
<v Speaker 2>what you can do, never mind what you hear elsewhere.
<v Speaker 2>But Johnny is attaching to other things that are more
<v Speaker 2>in that door mindset. He doesn't value things the same
<v Speaker 2>way his parents do. He values what people like ratchact think.
<v Speaker 1>His teacher well, also, you can see that he feels
<v Speaker 1>insecure about the math stuff. That's one of the beats
<v Speaker 1>they do in the beginning. So I could also see
<v Speaker 1>where he would feel insecure about going to Harvard because
<v Speaker 1>it seems like he knows that he's not very smart
<v Speaker 1>in that way, and so why would he in his mindset, like,
<v Speaker 1>why would he embarrass himself, if you will, by going
<v Speaker 1>somewhere like Harvard where he could go to the military
<v Speaker 1>where he can be appreciated in all these ways that
<v Speaker 1>I'm sure he's getting his ass kissed at school by
<v Speaker 1>all these people, so that he wants to enlist. I mean,
<v Speaker 1>that's the.
<v Speaker 2>Point, right, And I said Johnny has Christma. That was
<v Speaker 2>a lot. Johnny does not have chrisma.
<v Speaker 1>I mean, it's just like a good looking kid. It's
<v Speaker 1>a good looking white boy.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, but he's he's pretty introverted. He's not real out
<v Speaker 2>there with his personality. Ace kitten. Those guys have charisma,
<v Speaker 2>they have energy. But Johnny doesn't say much. He just
<v Speaker 2>kind of he's a doer. He wants to do things,
<v Speaker 2>and he thinks, oh, well, infantry, they just do things
<v Speaker 2>and this is what my teacher, they do it, and
<v Speaker 2>I can do things. So when I'm giving the opportunity
<v Speaker 2>to shine and told what to do. I do great,
<v Speaker 2>So this is a good fit for me. But also
<v Speaker 2>he's shown over and over again that oh, you joined
<v Speaker 2>the mobile infantry that made me the man I am
<v Speaker 2>today by a guy who has one functional limb left.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, but that's not gonna be Johnny's life.
<v Speaker 2>And never mind his teacher also has one arm.
<v Speaker 1>And then their other teacher seems like she's blind are blinded,
<v Speaker 1>and she also seemed like she was a little worse
<v Speaker 1>for wear.
<v Speaker 2>She's at least acid burned in the face, she had
<v Speaker 2>dark glasses, eye blind. Maybe they don't specify, but you
<v Speaker 2>can see she's scarred up. Yeah, And she's trying to
<v Speaker 2>counter Carmen's intellectual safety of saying like, but aren't humans
<v Speaker 2>the best because we created art and science and that thing.
<v Speaker 2>I'm really good at math, and because I'm good at it,
<v Speaker 2>like we must be the best. That's very teenagery and
<v Speaker 2>very locked in her own belief system and identity formation.
<v Speaker 2>I'm good at it, so therefore I can use that
<v Speaker 2>to be good and that'll be good enough. Where that
<v Speaker 2>teacher is saying, hey, dumbass, this species doesn't care that
<v Speaker 2>you exist. They multiply at a rate that is vastly
<v Speaker 2>like superior to ours. They have natural armor, they have
<v Speaker 2>ways of killing you that you can't even possibly understand,
<v Speaker 2>and they don't give a shit that you exist. They'll
<v Speaker 2>kill you without thinking about it and reproduce. And they
<v Speaker 2>have things that make them special too, so stop underestimating it.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, but they're doing that thing where they're trying to
<v Speaker 1>like impress upon them the severe to the situation, right,
<v Speaker 1>but also at the same time revering it so much. Yep,
<v Speaker 1>that the reverence is drowning out the cautionary stuff, even
<v Speaker 1>when the teachers are being outright with that. You should
<v Speaker 1>be respecting this and you should be like scared of
<v Speaker 1>it because they are stronger that us in some ways.
<v Speaker 1>I mean, it's like kids with teenagers with fucking cars,
<v Speaker 1>you know, Like adults try to impress upon them like
<v Speaker 1>how danger as cars are and how unsafe the situations
<v Speaker 1>can be with cars, and all teenagers think is, oh,
<v Speaker 1>I got a fucking car, baby, Like I'm gonna go
<v Speaker 1>drive my car around in freedom and looking cool. And one,
<v Speaker 1>I mean the differences is like they're not spaceships and
<v Speaker 1>stuff like in this movie or like bugs. But they
<v Speaker 1>are doing that thing in this movie where they're trying
<v Speaker 1>to I don't know that stupid thing adults to what
<v Speaker 1>it's like they're trying to. Well, this is defically this
<v Speaker 1>movie because the propaganda like trying to impress upon this
<v Speaker 1>message to these kids, but all simultaneously they need them
<v Speaker 1>to sign up, So how much can they actually impress
<v Speaker 1>upon the scary bits? It goes against what they're asking
<v Speaker 1>and needing to, but.
<v Speaker 2>Yet they're still doing it, which is where the satirical
<v Speaker 2>component of it is, Like do you see what happened
<v Speaker 2>to my arm? No, I'm not gonna talk about it,
<v Speaker 2>but you're gonna clearly see that I'm missing an arm.
<v Speaker 2>I'm gonna wag at you, and the whole time I'm
<v Speaker 2>talking about how violence solves everything.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Well, also I think it's aid thing toohere. I'm
<v Speaker 1>sure with these older like these professors, these teachers who
<v Speaker 1>are veterans, is also that thing too where you have
<v Speaker 1>to make meaning of something horrible that's happened to you.
<v Speaker 1>So I'm sure they're also doing their own version of
<v Speaker 1>trying to like create the meaning making within themselves of
<v Speaker 1>like I am in this horrible position now where I
<v Speaker 1>have lost limbs, I am acid burned in the face,
<v Speaker 1>and I have to make myself okay with it. It's
<v Speaker 1>like the pyramid scheme kind of thing, like I have
<v Speaker 1>to really get like double down yeah on this situation,
<v Speaker 1>because I can't live with the fact that like maybe
<v Speaker 1>this was all for nothing or just all for like
<v Speaker 1>this propaganda machine that I let this horrible thing, I
<v Speaker 1>quote unquote let this horrible thing happened to me.
<v Speaker 2>But I'm a citizen now, so therefore I have to
<v Speaker 2>be good enough because everything that I did is already
<v Speaker 2>pre established to be worth it, and it can be
<v Speaker 2>for you too. But they're slapped in the face just
<v Speaker 2>over and over with these consequences. I think the last
<v Speaker 2>even things I'll point out about it with is you're
<v Speaker 2>seeing at boot camp. At the boot camp scenes, ZIM,
<v Speaker 2>the sergeant tells them immediately, several of you will not
<v Speaker 2>survive long enough to be mobile infantry. What are they told? Immediately?
<v Speaker 2>Some of y'all are gonna die here?
<v Speaker 1>But then later that same character wants to be in
<v Speaker 1>the mix of the violence so bad that he wants
<v Speaker 1>to demote himself down to private so that he can
<v Speaker 1>be one of those people that dies. I mean he doesn't.
<v Speaker 1>He succeeds, and he can carried on the shoulders of
<v Speaker 1>his comrades.
<v Speaker 2>But he's an adult, he knows.
<v Speaker 1>But I mean that's where he's also caught yep in
<v Speaker 1>the machine too. I will say, though, just for a
<v Speaker 1>little just to be nice or to the you know,
<v Speaker 1>making fun of how they join the military because their
<v Speaker 1>crushes joined the military. I mean, the amount of times
<v Speaker 1>teenagers will pick what college they go to and or
<v Speaker 1>not go to based on who they're dating in high school,
<v Speaker 1>that is an unfortunate, brutal truth. And that is something
<v Speaker 1>where I could definitely see in this movie kids joining
<v Speaker 1>the military because they're following who they like, the same
<v Speaker 1>way that kids do that now with school or not
<v Speaker 1>going to school, which is horrible because and that's one
<v Speaker 1>of those things that's so maddening also as an adult,
<v Speaker 1>because you're like, oh, you can't. You cannot tell a
<v Speaker 1>teenager that they're not gonna end up with the person
<v Speaker 1>they're dating. They will not hear you, and they will
<v Speaker 1>not believe you.
<v Speaker 2>Because their parents have been telling their love story their
<v Speaker 2>whole life.
<v Speaker 1>I don't even know if that part matters, does well?
<v Speaker 1>I think like it doesn't matter.
<v Speaker 2>They found their person and they were sure and they
<v Speaker 2>were right and they knew and every love story they've
<v Speaker 2>ever seen, every rom com, it does matter because they
<v Speaker 2>can't critically see outside of it.
<v Speaker 1>I guess what I was more saying is I don't
<v Speaker 1>think it matters whether your parents are divorced or not.
<v Speaker 1>I feel like teenagers can get sucked into the trap
<v Speaker 1>of like, my first love is my only love, no
<v Speaker 1>matter what they observed with.
<v Speaker 2>Their parents, because it can happen that someone's first love
<v Speaker 2>is their only love because they've seen someone's story play
<v Speaker 2>that out and they can't see the reasons why that
<v Speaker 2>won't be mine. Dizzy is shown over and over and over,
<v Speaker 2>no matter how badly she is thirsting for Johnny, Johnny
<v Speaker 2>is just not that into her. He tells her, point blank,
<v Speaker 2>over and over again. Were friends.
<v Speaker 1>She dies a quote unquote fulfilled life because she got
<v Speaker 1>to fuck that dude for under twenty minutes. She's my
<v Speaker 1>pick for treatment, y'all. We'll talk about her later.
<v Speaker 2>But I think it's such a powerful way this movie
<v Speaker 2>has of slapping them in the face with their consequences
<v Speaker 2>over and over again, and like Ace going like but sir,
<v Speaker 2>it's a nuke war. How can we possibly need knives
<v Speaker 2>in nuke war? And anybody that's ever encountered a drill
<v Speaker 2>stars and sees this and goes like fuck. Well.
<v Speaker 1>Also that called very teenagery in terms of like I
<v Speaker 1>am gonna move the goalpost because I feel insecure in
<v Speaker 1>this moment. It doesn't even it doesn't. I can't deal
<v Speaker 1>with the fact that I can't throw a knife. Well,
<v Speaker 1>so I'm just gonna make about something else instead of
<v Speaker 1>just sitting in the discomfort of I'm not good at
<v Speaker 1>this thing yet that I've shown that I look stupid
<v Speaker 1>doing in front of my peers, and I'm just going
<v Speaker 1>to move through that and get better at that.
<v Speaker 2>And I also can't see the man with the microphone
<v Speaker 2>rule which you never can beat the person with the microphone.
<v Speaker 2>You can't ever win against the comedian on stage. You
<v Speaker 2>can never beat the drill instructor. They've been trained to
<v Speaker 2>be a drill instructor. They've been doing this for years.
<v Speaker 2>They have canned responses, they understand, they've dealt with you before.
<v Speaker 2>And if you used to come in there with that
<v Speaker 2>energy going look but it doesn't even move, or that
<v Speaker 2>I'm not good at this core thing that I have
<v Speaker 2>to be good at because all these reasons that I
<v Speaker 2>made up that they're true. Put your hand on that wall,
<v Speaker 2>but you can't see that there's these traps in front
<v Speaker 2>of you, and they just walk right into them. And
<v Speaker 2>teenagers will do it over and over because they can't
<v Speaker 2>see because of the egocentric thinking that bad things can
<v Speaker 2>happen to me.
<v Speaker 1>And we should also point out that the reason why
<v Speaker 1>we're so egocentric at that time in our life is
<v Speaker 1>because it helps us take risks.
<v Speaker 2>Yep.
<v Speaker 1>It's the naivete we do need in order to go
<v Speaker 1>out into the world, try stuff, not get embarrassed as
<v Speaker 1>much as we get later on, not be as scared.
<v Speaker 1>I think everyone knows the feeling of trying to do
<v Speaker 1>something later on in life that you do when you
<v Speaker 1>were younger and be like, why am I so much
<v Speaker 1>more scared of like falling down or whatever? And that's
<v Speaker 1>because at that time in our life, we're not supposed
<v Speaker 1>to be aware of those things so that we will
<v Speaker 1>do those things to grow yep.
<v Speaker 2>But later in life we're supposed to recognize and learn, oh,
<v Speaker 2>I am in fact not made of rubber anymore like infants.
<v Speaker 2>If I fall down because I jump a fence, I'm
<v Speaker 2>gonna get hurt. Bodies change, But we're seeing these people.
<v Speaker 2>It's the interesting crossover where they need to stop being
<v Speaker 2>so willing to take risks because real life is starting
<v Speaker 2>now and the protecting environment they used to be a
<v Speaker 2>teenagers in emerging adults struggle mightily with that in this
<v Speaker 2>age range of understanding. Oh, I was told partial truths well,
<v Speaker 2>and that's well, and that's why, as I'm sure we'll
<v Speaker 2>talk about more propaganda.
<v Speaker 1>At this age, you should be going somewhere like college
<v Speaker 1>or a trade where you're in a contained environment where
<v Speaker 1>your risks are only so risky, not going into the
<v Speaker 1>fucking military before you're allowed to rent a car so
<v Speaker 1>that you can do these things like the fucking flight
<v Speaker 1>maneuver where we talked about earlier with Zinnie Richard's character,
<v Speaker 1>where there are like real life consequences for you to
<v Speaker 1>be a dumbass, because like that version is maybe something
<v Speaker 1>she would do in a very very much smaller way,
<v Speaker 1>maybe even like in a car. And then you get
<v Speaker 1>a carcum where hopefully no one gets that hurt is
<v Speaker 1>a very different dynamic than going up in a fucking
<v Speaker 1>gigantic ship where you can hit another gigantic ship.
<v Speaker 2>Do we have anything else we want to say about
<v Speaker 2>kind of how teenagers form their beliefs and why they're
<v Speaker 2>particularly vulnerable to this time period in life where consequences
<v Speaker 2>start to matter, but yet they're ill equipped to deal
<v Speaker 2>with them.
<v Speaker 1>I don't know what do you guys think about this,
<v Speaker 1>because when I think about teenagers, I think a lot
<v Speaker 1>about about how much they want to be trusted. Oh,
<v Speaker 1>that's a great point too, And I feel like a
<v Speaker 1>part of a part of where they are developmentally is
<v Speaker 1>that they want to be They want to be trusted
<v Speaker 1>because they're they're gonna, you know, they're moving towards adulthood.
<v Speaker 1>They want to be respected as adults. They want to
<v Speaker 1>be respected. But then also they're not quite ready for
<v Speaker 1>the potential consequences of some of the things they want
<v Speaker 1>to be trusted for. They want to be trusted because
<v Speaker 1>they know that they're going to have to start making
<v Speaker 1>decisions on their own. Yeah, and so they want to
<v Speaker 1>be trusted by the most important people in their life
<v Speaker 1>so that they can can continue to make good decisions
<v Speaker 1>quote unquote goodness vis.
<v Speaker 2>And be shown to those people that have been teaching
<v Speaker 2>them that they are good enough. Yeah, and they're ready,
<v Speaker 2>But the person teaching them knows, like we're sitting here
<v Speaker 2>thinking about the dumb shit we did. Oh absolutely, the
<v Speaker 2>second we drove far enough away from our parents to
<v Speaker 2>be able to see how fucking loud we just turned
<v Speaker 2>to music up, how fast we were driving, all the
<v Speaker 2>things that we were totally not gonna do. I'm not
<v Speaker 2>gonna have a bunch of friends in the car and
<v Speaker 2>we're going to be distracted making jokes and listening to
<v Speaker 2>music loud and doing dumb shit. What is the first
<v Speaker 2>fucking thing you do when you get your license? All
<v Speaker 2>those things, all of those things together at once one
<v Speaker 2>thousand percent. Are we at all respecting that we're in
<v Speaker 2>a death machine that is responsible for either the first
<v Speaker 2>or second most deaths that are preventable.
<v Speaker 1>Absolutely not, nop. We can take a break here.
<v Speaker 2>So the prop ganda that is the central mcguffin of
<v Speaker 2>this film, right, that the presentation format of this film
<v Speaker 2>is as a propaganda film, which is where the satire
<v Speaker 2>really starts to come in. They tie these little info
<v Speaker 2>videos of showing children joining the military, like I'm doing
<v Speaker 2>my part, I can be a citizen, I can do it,
<v Speaker 2>and then they show a kid and all the time
<v Speaker 2>we're going I'm doing my.
<v Speaker 1>Bar or like the kids wrestling over the future version
<v Speaker 1>of like an ak Oh it's the battle rifle. Yeah yeah, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I want to shoot first.
<v Speaker 2>Just handing out bullets like candy, like yeah.
<v Speaker 1>The propaganda of those parts of the movie were very
<v Speaker 1>like over like over, like super satirical, like really making
<v Speaker 1>a point. Yeah, But like the things like the public execution,
<v Speaker 1>I was like, oh, reality TV.
<v Speaker 2>Well, they're also pointing out that if you don't follow
<v Speaker 2>the rules, will not only punish you and kill you.
<v Speaker 2>We'll do it on TV.
<v Speaker 1>Six pm, right after the news.
<v Speaker 2>All channels, all times, or whatever they said. But basically
<v Speaker 2>making like this is going to be the thing which
<v Speaker 2>is critical for a fascist societies to instill the fear
<v Speaker 2>that you will be punished if you fail.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, well, simultaneously doing a lot of desensitization around violence. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I mean having public executions, attending public executions, being around
<v Speaker 1>so much violence and like even being a round switch weaponry.
<v Speaker 1>It also creates perfect little soldiers because they aren't put
<v Speaker 1>off by this aggression and this violence. No, it's just
<v Speaker 1>something else, like I think, then that's what they do
<v Speaker 1>a lot in this movie, where I'm thinking of the
<v Speaker 1>one specific scene where this happens a few times in
<v Speaker 1>the movie, so I might be getting this confused. But
<v Speaker 1>there's a lot of scenes where they're like fighting the bugs.
<v Speaker 1>There's like a horrible action scene where all people die
<v Speaker 1>and everyone's covered in like different colors, UK, right. I
<v Speaker 1>think Casper van Diem's character Johnny like kills the one
<v Speaker 1>bug and then he gets promoted and then he brings
<v Speaker 1>Desion as his like second and they all hug him,
<v Speaker 1>and I think ace and that was. There's so many
<v Speaker 1>scenes like that where there's like this horrific violence where
<v Speaker 1>people that they care about supposedly have died in front
<v Speaker 1>of them. They're literally covered in viscera and blood and
<v Speaker 1>guts and stuff, and then they very casually jump into
<v Speaker 1>like hey, it's like this scene, the volleyball scene and
<v Speaker 1>top gun. It's like they're just high fiving as if
<v Speaker 1>there isn't like horrible a horrible landscape around them. They
<v Speaker 1>like move really quickly to no big deal energy, which
<v Speaker 1>I assume is because of how to sensitize. To sensitize,
<v Speaker 1>They've been raised around like intense gore and violence and
<v Speaker 1>just like horrificness.
<v Speaker 2>Which I'm sure their world would argue is the reality,
<v Speaker 2>which there is some argument for. But the way that
<v Speaker 2>it's done in societies like this is exactly to your
<v Speaker 2>point to create that desensitization that there is.
<v Speaker 1>No there's a trauma in this world.
<v Speaker 2>Nope. I mean they show the cow getting ripped apart
<v Speaker 2>by the bug of like, look how dangerous the bugs are.
<v Speaker 2>But by the way, come join the military.
<v Speaker 1>Just you know, you could be this cow if you
<v Speaker 1>want it enough. Yeah, that's not what they say, but
<v Speaker 1>that's like but that's like the translation of like how
<v Speaker 1>you could interpret that because cow.
<v Speaker 2>But because of that filter, they can't see that. They
<v Speaker 2>go like, wow, it sucks to be the cow. But
<v Speaker 2>I could never be the cow because I'm going to
<v Speaker 2>be in the mobile infantry doing my.
<v Speaker 1>Part and I'm not life stock.
<v Speaker 2>Right. That's why they asked us to do this movie
<v Speaker 2>because of those little juxtapositions of going like you are, sir,
<v Speaker 2>in fact cattle to the machine and they will throw
<v Speaker 2>you to the meat grinder just like this, and where
<v Speaker 2>it gets super fucked up. You're sort of mixing a
<v Speaker 2>couple points because when Johnny gets promoted to lieutenant is
<v Speaker 2>after Ratshak dies, but Dizzey dies in the same scene.
<v Speaker 1>I'm not thinking about when Dizzy dies. I'm thinking about
<v Speaker 1>when he gets promoted and he brings her on as
<v Speaker 1>his second because she gets really like because she's so
<v Speaker 1>in love with him.
<v Speaker 2>Oh get when he gets promoted to the.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, he's covered, he's covered in like green He's covered
<v Speaker 1>in like green gunk, and she's covered a red gunk
<v Speaker 1>and she's covered in green gunk. They're both covered in gunk.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah. Yeah, Yeah. So there's one attack.
<v Speaker 1>Right where there's a few scenes like that.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, that's the one where he got his leg leg.
<v Speaker 2>That's the first scene, the first battle, and we start
<v Speaker 2>with where they take down that one big tanker bug.
<v Speaker 2>He gets promoted to corporal after taking down on and
<v Speaker 2>brings Dizzy on, right, and then they kind of squat
<v Speaker 2>up her and Ace and uh Kitten, all four of them,
<v Speaker 2>the four they went to boot camp together, have formed
<v Speaker 2>their new bond, their new family, right Ace Kitten or
<v Speaker 2>is he dead already? But Ace, Dizzy and h Johnny
<v Speaker 2>Kitten dies in the first battle.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, And that's what I mean, Like they just like,
<v Speaker 1>move right past it.
<v Speaker 2>Yep, they do. But then later Johnny gets promoted after
<v Speaker 2>Ratchak dies and then Dizzy dies in the same scene.
<v Speaker 2>But who promotes Johnny to Ratchak spot is Carl. Oh
<v Speaker 2>it's when they go to that that Mormon out post,
<v Speaker 2>which I thought was fucking hillar.
<v Speaker 1>Oh, you need to watch it if you watched the Expanse. No,
<v Speaker 1>the Expanse also has a Mormon at hearts to it
<v Speaker 1>where they're also trying to it's.
<v Speaker 2>Right, well, this is this is one where it went poorly.
<v Speaker 2>But what happened was after they just watched their teacher
<v Speaker 2>and they have to execute him because he got hurt again,
<v Speaker 2>and they're like, you know what to do?
<v Speaker 1>Oh yeah he shot him in the face. Yeah that's
<v Speaker 1>hard or whatever.
<v Speaker 2>And then so that would be huge trauma for Johnny
<v Speaker 2>and Dizzy, and then Dizzy dies and does the whole
<v Speaker 2>thing you're talking about. But Carl their other childhood friend
<v Speaker 2>at that moment, in full on Nazi looking SS regalia.
<v Speaker 2>I mean, it was not an accident. They chose with
<v Speaker 2>those military uniforms. None of this is an accident. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>but when they land, it's their childhood friend telling them
<v Speaker 2>after they know he's military intelligence or games and theory.
<v Speaker 2>But as they land, he's the one telling them. We
<v Speaker 2>knew this was a trap. We knew you landing here
<v Speaker 2>was gonna go bad. We knew this officer that sent
<v Speaker 2>that distress call was compromised, but we needed to prove
<v Speaker 2>the existence of the big special brain bug that's to
<v Speaker 2>our interests. And you guys were disposable. And Carl, who
<v Speaker 2>had been seen as kind of a sensitive, emotionally competent kid,
<v Speaker 2>is now here clearly being shown to have to disregard
<v Speaker 2>his identity to take on his new one. And Johnny
<v Speaker 2>has to let go of his attachment to his idol
<v Speaker 2>like Lieutenant Ratjagg and now become him. But it's his
<v Speaker 2>friend that has to go. I knew you guys were
<v Speaker 2>probably going to die. That sucks to be you, But
<v Speaker 2>this is for the greater good. That's fucked.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I mean it's part of the whole bigger thing,
<v Speaker 1>right of just like dehumanizing, desensitizing, like someone in Carl's position,
<v Speaker 1>I'm sure is encouraged to think of people in Johnny's
<v Speaker 1>position as like little game pieces on a board, like
<v Speaker 1>he's playing risk, and that he can't see them all
<v Speaker 1>as like unique individuals with full lives and full minds
<v Speaker 1>and full family systems, that he knows he was shit
<v Speaker 1>about them, that he knows.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, but we see over and over how like you
<v Speaker 2>said earlier, these they're being kind of sordid, right, And
<v Speaker 2>they make it clear like, hey, you know what, Johnny
<v Speaker 2>is special so long as Johnny can do, But once
<v Speaker 2>Johnny can't do, he's not that special. Carmen is much
<v Speaker 2>more special as long as she can fly. But Carl,
<v Speaker 2>if you think you're psychic, maybe you are. They made
<v Speaker 2>it quite clear that through those propaganda films, and Carl's
<v Speaker 2>trying those same experiments on Johnny and telling his ferret
<v Speaker 2>to go bug mom, I can't control humans yet. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>it was creepy, but you could see it in him,
<v Speaker 2>and that that propaganda machine is reinforcing that in him,
<v Speaker 2>that hey, you might be more special than everybody else.
<v Speaker 2>And if you're that special, you fit into the specialist
<v Speaker 2>kids club where you get to be better than everybody else.
<v Speaker 2>And if you're that special, other people aren't really like
<v Speaker 2>you anyway, so they don't really matter. And what does
<v Speaker 2>Karl do with that identity? What does he become a Nazi?
<v Speaker 2>He becomes detached.
<v Speaker 1>M Oh yeah, absolutely, he definitely shows he definitely has
<v Speaker 1>a different way about him in that outfit. I feel
<v Speaker 1>like he jumped into that identity.
<v Speaker 2>He sure did. And now that home's gone on, Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>where's home?
<v Speaker 1>Well, it's your unit, it's your department, that is your home.
<v Speaker 2>And even we saw this foreshadowed when Carmen asks him
<v Speaker 2>they're shipping off to their respective military training bases that
<v Speaker 2>oh did you talk to Carl? Yeah, I did this morning,
<v Speaker 2>but he couldn't tell me where he was going. He
<v Speaker 2>didn't leave when everybody else left. But we see this
<v Speaker 2>identity building being built into the messaging, and it's just
<v Speaker 2>implied through the way we're seeing it that everyone is
<v Speaker 2>being shown these things in the same way. Why is
<v Speaker 2>that dangerous? Why does that become such a problem? Why
<v Speaker 2>does that red pill people?
<v Speaker 1>What part of what you're asking.
<v Speaker 2>That singular viewpoint of bandwagoning information as if it's the
<v Speaker 2>only correct way to see things. Why is that so dangerous?
<v Speaker 1>I mean, it's just it's dangerous because it creates a
<v Speaker 1>rigidity in thinking that is not healthy, because you get
<v Speaker 1>stuck in that identity as well. And then if that
<v Speaker 1>identity is stripped from you, is jeopardized in some way.
<v Speaker 1>You feel panicked. You're like a rat in a corner,
<v Speaker 1>like you don't know how to be anyone else. You
<v Speaker 1>don't think you can be anyone else in really extreme situations.
<v Speaker 1>Like I would say, like in more in cell version
<v Speaker 1>of this is that this is a This is an
<v Speaker 1>avenue in which I can be accepted and I can
<v Speaker 1>maybe feel love in a way that I don't think
<v Speaker 1>I can or deserve to feel love and these other
<v Speaker 1>parts of my life. So I need this. And so
<v Speaker 1>this is the double downing that happens as well, because
<v Speaker 1>you don't know that you can think differently and then
<v Speaker 1>experience things differently, so you just get really wrapped up
<v Speaker 1>in the ideology that you are buying into. And also
<v Speaker 1>because a lot of like the red pill shit too,
<v Speaker 1>and I'm sure the military and especially in this movie,
<v Speaker 1>I mean, cults do this. They will continue to reinforce
<v Speaker 1>what's bad about you quote unquote while also giving you
<v Speaker 1>a lot of praise and accolades, so like you're really
<v Speaker 1>really smart. No one else will appreciate you, but me, see,
<v Speaker 1>we are your friends here. It's the way that like
<v Speaker 1>in the insull community, if a guy will actually find
<v Speaker 1>success with a woman, instead of the other men in
<v Speaker 1>that group being like, oh man, you finally crack the code,
<v Speaker 1>Like help us, brother, how do you get that thing
<v Speaker 1>that we also desperately want and that literally defines us
<v Speaker 1>as Instead, they will usually ostracize and reject the member
<v Speaker 1>of the in cell community that is finding the success
<v Speaker 1>that they quote unquote all want.
<v Speaker 2>And telling them they should be mean to himen and
<v Speaker 2>whoever was nice to whoever chose to have a second.
<v Speaker 2>Let's say it's a woman in this case, Well, he
<v Speaker 2>he was nice to women, so he's bending the knees
<v Speaker 2>a little bitch, and we shouldn't follow him, and like,
<v Speaker 2>you should be mean to women. So they like, you
<v Speaker 2>don't be like him, he's whipped now.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, Or they'll even like viewd as a betrayal. Well
<v Speaker 1>will like you've you've turned your back on our community,
<v Speaker 1>where now we are over identifying with our celibacy, with
<v Speaker 1>our rejection from women, and so it becomes this thing
<v Speaker 1>where then you keep perpetuating that identity because it's all
<v Speaker 1>that you have, or it's all you think you have
<v Speaker 1>because of that rigidity. And like in this situation where
<v Speaker 1>even though they barely touch upon it. All their families
<v Speaker 1>and loved ones were born to fucking bits, so they
<v Speaker 1>don't have anyone besides what they're currently doing. So like
<v Speaker 1>where it's different than like a lot. I mean some
<v Speaker 1>people that are been like quote unquote red pilled, they're
<v Speaker 1>very isolated, and that similar to this movie in that way.
<v Speaker 1>And I think where a lot of people get confused
<v Speaker 1>about the red Pill in cul situation is that because
<v Speaker 1>a lot of those people actually do have a world
<v Speaker 1>around them that they are not necessarily choosing not to
<v Speaker 1>engage in, but thinking that they can't. They don't have
<v Speaker 1>the in choice to engage in, right, And this movie
<v Speaker 1>is more literal in this way we're talking about, it's more.
<v Speaker 2>Metaphorical, correct, And what I thought would have been a
<v Speaker 2>better choice is at that moment where they start showing
<v Speaker 2>the hollownot thing that just goes like war, right, They're
<v Speaker 2>mobilizing everyone now of like, oh well see now all
<v Speaker 2>that thing we told you would happen would happen, so
<v Speaker 2>you have to do the violence thing now. So we
<v Speaker 2>need everybody to be on board. But here's the singular viewpoint.
<v Speaker 2>So look at it and understand that this is totally
<v Speaker 2>what happened. Never mind it is feasibly an accident that
<v Speaker 2>are one of our ships knocked that asteroid off course
<v Speaker 2>or even.
<v Speaker 1>Just yeah, just jumping to that conclusion period. Like I
<v Speaker 1>really thought, as I was telling you guys before I
<v Speaker 1>started recording, I really thought there was gonna be a
<v Speaker 1>twist in this movie where they figure out that, like
<v Speaker 1>the military government is actually the one doing all this
<v Speaker 1>stuff and that the bugs are just uh patsy like
<v Speaker 1>maybe even constructed by the government. Like I really thought
<v Speaker 1>Neil Patrick Carson was gonna like have a twist where
<v Speaker 1>he was like, actually, now that I know I'm in
<v Speaker 1>games and theory, we've been making the bugs and they're
<v Speaker 1>all robots.
<v Speaker 2>Well, that may have been a better movie.
<v Speaker 1>Do you think would played into the satire in the
<v Speaker 1>propaganda of at all?
<v Speaker 2>No, and it wouldn't have held to the book where
<v Speaker 2>bugs were definitely the bad guy like period. But book
<v Speaker 2>is a different thing. We'll talk about that later. But
<v Speaker 2>looking at that scene with war, did you guys catch
<v Speaker 2>what they worked in there in that particularly since they
<v Speaker 2>showed other places that got attacked by the bugs, did
<v Speaker 2>you guys catch where one of them was that were
<v Speaker 2>all destroyed. Remind me where was it that Johnny's parents
<v Speaker 2>are trying to take him on vacation? Oh, the beach
<v Speaker 2>to Segama Beach on Saturn, Right, what was destroyed? Segama Beach.
<v Speaker 2>Had Johnny been there, no matter what he did, he
<v Speaker 2>would have been dead. Whether he is in Buenos Aires
<v Speaker 2>or Zegama Beach. Any choice he made other than the
<v Speaker 2>mobile infantry would have been dead. Johnny, what do you
<v Speaker 2>think that does to his identity formation? With this his
<v Speaker 2>lock in to that viewpoint? Is he coming back?
<v Speaker 1>I mean yeah. What comes to mind for me is
<v Speaker 1>just like hopelessness, which I also think can be very
<v Speaker 1>similar in the red pill community and cell community. Is
<v Speaker 1>like a hopelessness about the future, kind of like an
<v Speaker 1>acceptance that things will never get better, and the kind
<v Speaker 1>of you're dead already.
<v Speaker 2>There it is, that's the last thing Johnny says. That's
<v Speaker 2>the last line of dialogue he has, which is it's
<v Speaker 2>what Ratchek was echoing. That was actually a real military
<v Speaker 2>commander that said that. But that's the last thing Johnny says.
<v Speaker 2>Come on, you apes, you want to live forever? Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>And then we cut to the propaganda and they'll fight
<v Speaker 2>and they'll win.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, And there's no discussion within both of this metaphorical
<v Speaker 1>community we're talking about, well, this fictional community we're talking
<v Speaker 1>about in the real community we're talking about that there
<v Speaker 1>isn't enough space talking about like how also trauma and
<v Speaker 1>other mental health stuff also leads to that hopeful hopelessness
<v Speaker 1>and just encourages this idea that like the future is
<v Speaker 1>not real or a positive future is not real. But
<v Speaker 1>that part obviously is not touched upon in the movie.
<v Speaker 1>Nor is it something I think I don't know. I
<v Speaker 1>don't know if it's something that's becoming more of a conversation.
<v Speaker 1>I think people are trying to have this conversation about
<v Speaker 1>the in cell community, but they have to want to
<v Speaker 1>hear it.
<v Speaker 2>And what movie was it that starkly issued that exact
<v Speaker 2>warning about that community and how dangerous they can become
<v Speaker 2>when they rally around a particular leader or cause, because
<v Speaker 2>it was the critical turning point plot in a movie
<v Speaker 2>we did an episode on in The Batman, who was
<v Speaker 2>Riddler rallying on the internet in cels sure was mm hmmm,
<v Speaker 2>and exactly the ways you're talking about. They created a community,
<v Speaker 2>a singular messaging extracted from their supports, isolated from their
<v Speaker 2>supports and given support only from the singular viewpoint of
<v Speaker 2>their community, because that's the only one that tells the
<v Speaker 2>truth reflective of their experience. Now, this movie doesn't white
<v Speaker 2>cover that angle. This covers two thousand years down the
<v Speaker 2>road when that viewpoint has conquered, and it's bigger than that.
<v Speaker 2>It's the rush limbaws, it's the abolition of the fairness doctrine.
<v Speaker 2>And what happens, that's why people are partially asked us
<v Speaker 2>to do this is looking at how does this parallel
<v Speaker 2>our world? As a warning that if we allow this
<v Speaker 2>to continue to exist, people's choices will start being taken
<v Speaker 2>from them as they're thrust into a machine that operates
<v Speaker 2>at levels they can't possibly understand until it's too late.
<v Speaker 2>That's the social site of the propaganda of looking at
<v Speaker 2>like the dangers of single side of meshing. How many
<v Speaker 2>people grow up in the eighties believing Russians or the
<v Speaker 2>bad guys everybody? How many people would have questioned that.
<v Speaker 1>Nobody, nobody, why because this was the only story you
<v Speaker 1>were given.
<v Speaker 2>How many Russians would have been given the opposite story
<v Speaker 2>that the Americans are the.
<v Speaker 1>All of them? I mean, I think we're I think
<v Speaker 1>in some ways we are gaining more awareness of that is,
<v Speaker 1>you know, trying to have more awareness of how these
<v Speaker 1>rigid messaging then perpetuates the problem, like what we would
<v Speaker 1>consider the problem, which is that if you identify a
<v Speaker 1>group of people as evil, then obviously they're going to
<v Speaker 1>have a matching response, and then they will maybe potentially
<v Speaker 1>become the version of that kind of person or that
<v Speaker 1>kind of culture or that kind of community that then
<v Speaker 1>matches the propaganda that we're selling. It's like we go
<v Speaker 1>into the Middle East, for example, right, and we bomb
<v Speaker 1>the shit out of them, and we decimate their communities
<v Speaker 1>in a lot of way out of quote unquote, bringing
<v Speaker 1>them democracy lull, and then they grow up, like kid
<v Speaker 1>in that community grow up to see us as the villain,
<v Speaker 1>understandably so because it was our bomb that blew up
<v Speaker 1>their house. Yeah, and so then they you know, it's
<v Speaker 1>that idea of like calling something the resistance versus the rebellion.
<v Speaker 1>You know, that just depends on what side of the
<v Speaker 1>fence you're on.
<v Speaker 2>Yep. Propaganda controls so much of what the public thinks.
<v Speaker 2>This power of social psychology, it's so important that there
<v Speaker 2>is discourse that people are taught to be able to
<v Speaker 2>critically evaluate information, consider the source that it is from,
<v Speaker 2>the validity of that source, the agenda of that source,
<v Speaker 2>and whether or not that information should be taken as fact,
<v Speaker 2>because details can be manipulated to prove a point and
<v Speaker 2>go like, oh, well, look, this person that came from
<v Speaker 2>another country is part of a gang, so that can happen,
<v Speaker 2>so we should grid all of them. No, that's not
<v Speaker 2>the way logic works. But yet even in our country,
<v Speaker 2>we've been through that. Oh well, the Japanese attacked us,
<v Speaker 2>so any Japanese citizens we should, you know, probably intern
<v Speaker 2>them in our country. By the way, have you noticed
<v Speaker 2>these super cool posters we did about what you could
<v Speaker 2>do to join the military to go make sure Hitler
<v Speaker 2>isn't putting people into camps.
<v Speaker 1>Well, yeah, it's the idea that everyone thinks they're like
<v Speaker 1>the hero of their story, and that we do to
<v Speaker 1>do a better job of the nuanced thinking, the critical
<v Speaker 1>thinking of what is the other perspective of what we're
<v Speaker 1>doing and why we're doing it.
<v Speaker 2>And that's about all I have on that. It's important
<v Speaker 2>to consider because we even when we think about it,
<v Speaker 2>how visceral of images do we have in the Holocaust?
<v Speaker 1>Pretty fucking in tense because.
<v Speaker 2>It was it was horrible. Yeah, how many visceral images
<v Speaker 2>can you recall of Japanese citizens being interned in the
<v Speaker 2>United States during the same time period.
<v Speaker 1>None. I mean, I didn't know about the Japanese in
<v Speaker 1>tournament until I was in grad school.
<v Speaker 2>How that history was presented becomes propaganda in and of itself.
<v Speaker 2>How many of our parents grew up watching John Wayne Westerns,
<v Speaker 2>who is the bad guy the Native Americans? But in reality, oh,
<v Speaker 2>the bad.
<v Speaker 1>Guy was us white people. There's actually really good miniseries
<v Speaker 1>I finished literally today called The English and it is
<v Speaker 1>more of the flip perspective. It's a Western with Emily
<v Speaker 1>Blunt and I think his name is Chase and I
<v Speaker 1>can't think of his last name, unfortunately, but he's like
<v Speaker 1>the other lead and he's an Indigenous American. And it
<v Speaker 1>is more of that like full throated story right where
<v Speaker 1>the English are considered the actually discusses the bad guys.
<v Speaker 1>It's very good, but it's a very hard watch, y'all.
<v Speaker 2>I'm sure, and it should be because we should be
<v Speaker 2>able to learn the truth as the truth. But to
<v Speaker 2>Ratchet's point, the person who writes history is the one
<v Speaker 2>who won the battles.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, which is why we have to be promoting This
<v Speaker 1>is my treatment. We have to promoting media literacy now
<v Speaker 1>more than ever correct about like what messages are we getting?
<v Speaker 1>Why is it only one in which this group of
<v Speaker 1>people look good, which is what we're talking about, the
<v Speaker 1>Japanese versus Japanese tournament camps versus Holocaust concentration camps versus
<v Speaker 1>even like the way we talk about slavery in this country,
<v Speaker 1>which is one of those things makes America look good
<v Speaker 1>as the good guys. And that's why we learn the
<v Speaker 1>fuck out of that more than like centuries of before
<v Speaker 1>we were like enslaving people.
<v Speaker 2>Where we run into problems as human societies is the
<v Speaker 2>more we dehumanize, the more we create a singular viewpoint
<v Speaker 2>without critical evaluation, without listening to the viewpoints of other
<v Speaker 2>sides of things, we start dehumanizing without critical evaluation, and
<v Speaker 2>that enables bad things invariably throughout history, and we need
<v Speaker 2>to not do that. We'll take a break there.
<v Speaker 1>Treatment, I would say, treatment. This isn't a character movie,
<v Speaker 1>No it's not. So it's hard to treatment. If I
<v Speaker 1>was going to pick someone to treatment with it would
<v Speaker 1>be Dizzy. As I said earlier, because the amount of
<v Speaker 1>times I thought to myself watching this movie and wrote
<v Speaker 1>once in my notes stand up girl, stand up? Okay,
<v Speaker 1>why are you letting yourself be dogged by him? So
<v Speaker 1>what I would do with someone like Izzy or Dizzy, sorry,
<v Speaker 1>someone like Dizzy is what we've been talking about, actually,
<v Speaker 1>which is like build up her identity, build up what
<v Speaker 1>she likes about herself, what she feels is good about herself,
<v Speaker 1>and be more introspective about why Johnny or I don't know,
<v Speaker 1>whatever Johnny means to her is so important to her.
<v Speaker 1>And I do think a lot of teenagers, like teenagers
<v Speaker 1>are capable of having those conversations. I have plenty of
<v Speaker 1>teenage clients that I am really impressed by and that
<v Speaker 1>we can have talks about, like can you can we
<v Speaker 1>explore why that person's validation means so much to you?
<v Speaker 1>Can we explore why you might not have like a
<v Speaker 1>boundary internally in terms of like how much you'll put
<v Speaker 1>up with by this one person? And so a lot
<v Speaker 1>of times when I do this work specifically with like women,
<v Speaker 1>like with female identifying like young girls, but it could
<v Speaker 1>be with anyone is what is it that you're outsourcing
<v Speaker 1>which changes do a lot, which is like what about
<v Speaker 1>yourself or you trying to outsource? What are you trying
<v Speaker 1>to compensate for? Why does this feel so important to win?
<v Speaker 1>Whatever this is with this person? And I wonder with
<v Speaker 1>her because she I don't know, I'd be very curious
<v Speaker 1>to kind of explore with her. Does she feel insecure
<v Speaker 1>about being an athlete? About being so good an athlete?
<v Speaker 1>Like something that is historically maybe not in this movie,
<v Speaker 1>but like considered more masculine, even though I was observing
<v Speaker 1>how gender roles aren't as rigid in some ways in
<v Speaker 1>this movie, and.
<v Speaker 2>I don't think beyond formal dress they really exist.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, because of the way that there's a lot of
<v Speaker 1>women in command as much as there are men. And
<v Speaker 1>it still feels interesting because all the relationships are still
<v Speaker 1>so heteronormative that it does make me curious, like why
<v Speaker 1>Dizzy goes this way instead of going into something she
<v Speaker 1>could be very successful in, that's a sport. Is there
<v Speaker 1>something about that that is an appealing to her? Like
<v Speaker 1>I think she would be really interesting to have more
<v Speaker 1>conversations with and like I said, to be able to grow.
<v Speaker 2>I don't know.
<v Speaker 1>So that's when I have these conversations with young people,
<v Speaker 1>it's like the first time that they're realizing that they
<v Speaker 1>can have a standard, that they can have like a
<v Speaker 1>tipping point in which they will no longer put up
<v Speaker 1>with something. And so it is possible if you come
<v Speaker 1>out with curiosity and come at it more from like
<v Speaker 1>self respect, because that's what bums me out about her,
<v Speaker 1>is that for someone that's so successful in so many ways,
<v Speaker 1>that she doesn't seem to be making choices as if
<v Speaker 1>she cares about herself, and that even in her dying
<v Speaker 1>fucking breath, she's like, I don't care if I die
<v Speaker 1>because we got to smash once for less than twenty minutes,
<v Speaker 1>and I know he's probably not good at it, agreed.
<v Speaker 1>And so I think there's just so much there in
<v Speaker 1>terms of how little she thinks of herself and how
<v Speaker 1>little worth she thinks she has, which also is a
<v Speaker 1>part of what we've been talking about, right, which is
<v Speaker 1>also what maybe this propaganda gave to her more meaning
<v Speaker 1>where maybe there wasn't any. So I think she'd be
<v Speaker 1>really interesting to explore more with and I would do more, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>like introspective talk therapy with her. So you had to
<v Speaker 1>get a sense of Yeah, like internal world, and like
<v Speaker 1>we were talking about, half her practice more flexible thinking,
<v Speaker 1>have her maybe think about things that no one's ever
<v Speaker 1>encouraged her to think about, which likes things like saying no,
<v Speaker 1>which I wonder in their culture if they are encouraged
<v Speaker 1>to say.
<v Speaker 2>No that much, I can't imagine so.
<v Speaker 1>And then how that can trickle down into these kind
<v Speaker 1>of relationships where you let your self be treat like shit, Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>you can.
<v Speaker 2>Say no, but you'd be a citizen, a civilian, you mean, yeah,
<v Speaker 2>you'd be a civilian and not a citizen. So you
<v Speaker 2>can say no, but you know, if citizens are still
<v Speaker 2>going to decide for you anyway, you can say no
<v Speaker 2>if you want, but you won't matter.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, So that's what I would want to do for treatment.
<v Speaker 1>Pretty short and sweet, because like I said, no one's that,
<v Speaker 1>you know, on purpose very deep in this movie, absolutely,
<v Speaker 1>and so I'm also mind will also be brief, which
<v Speaker 1>I'm sure no one is surprised about. I just wanted
<v Speaker 1>to talk a little bit about the rigidity that we
<v Speaker 1>see Johnny's parents have when they have those discussions about
<v Speaker 1>him going to Harvard and expectations that his parents have
<v Speaker 1>about him. Something that I wanted to share is when
<v Speaker 1>you have a young person, when you have a teenager
<v Speaker 1>who is trying to make a decision about something. I
<v Speaker 1>don't know where I'm going with this. What did I
<v Speaker 1>start off with? Supposed to be talking about the parents
<v Speaker 1>and the rigidity of.
<v Speaker 2>The teens through their skull of their identity they formed
<v Speaker 2>ten minutes ago, that is their whole life.
<v Speaker 1>Yes, exactly, Yes, exactly? Is that I think parents a
<v Speaker 1>lot of times come at a teenager with rigidity in
<v Speaker 1>terms of only thinking of their expectations they have for
<v Speaker 1>their child, instead of the possibility of your child having
<v Speaker 1>different kinds of expectations. And so what I wish would
<v Speaker 1>have happened, I wish that they would have been curious.
<v Speaker 1>I wish that these parents would have been curious and
<v Speaker 1>would have said, Wow, I've never heard you talk about
<v Speaker 1>the military before. Tell me more about what makes you
<v Speaker 1>feel connected to that, Open ended questions, open ended questions,
<v Speaker 1>being curious and not and really trying to keep the
<v Speaker 1>judgment that you feel out of your mouth because it
<v Speaker 1>is not helpful. No, and you don't know what the
<v Speaker 1>fuck you're talking about, And you don't and you might
<v Speaker 1>make the things feel sexier that you're pushing against exactly exactly.
<v Speaker 1>So that's something that I wish even and the teenagers
<v Speaker 1>that I work with, that's something that I wish that
<v Speaker 1>their families had more of, just curiosity about what where
<v Speaker 1>they're coming from. Yeah, because something we want to help
<v Speaker 1>our teenagers understand and things that will be helpful is
<v Speaker 1>them making mistakes before they're eighteen. Well, and also asking
<v Speaker 1>open ended questions helps kids think critically, Yes, because you're
<v Speaker 1>asking them to think about themselves and their viewpoint and
<v Speaker 1>to articulate it and be curious about it. So by
<v Speaker 1>being curious with them, you're phoning curiosity within themselves, which
<v Speaker 1>lets them think more critically. Absolutely. That's all I have
<v Speaker 1>for treatment and lecturing is for the parents. Yeah, stop
<v Speaker 1>lecturing because they're not listening. They've tuned you out and
<v Speaker 1>they don't give a fly and fuck as soon as
<v Speaker 1>you start into it because guess what, they know the
<v Speaker 1>exact tone that you have when you're lecturing, and they
<v Speaker 1>will zone out automatically. Sure will so be thoughtful and
<v Speaker 1>ask open ended questions.
<v Speaker 2>So I'm gonna pick Johnny. I think Johnny is a
<v Speaker 2>person who is likely in need of a great deal
<v Speaker 2>of help. Maybe Johnny and Carmen are kind of equal
<v Speaker 2>in that, because yeah, not changed my mind. I'm gonna
<v Speaker 2>pick Carmen.
<v Speaker 1>Okay, all right?
<v Speaker 2>In looking at people who most likely have to reframe
<v Speaker 2>and reform their identities, Carmen was the least challenged throughout
<v Speaker 2>most of the film. But she's the flying bird who
<v Speaker 2>had her wings clipped and then her second boyfriend, Xander,
<v Speaker 2>gets his skull smashed in.
<v Speaker 1>His brain brain sucked out in front of her.
<v Speaker 2>Which is probably what contributed this getting a hard r.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. On all the boobies, yeah, also true, a lot
<v Speaker 1>of boobies.
<v Speaker 2>Those are PG. Thirteen boobies, but.
<v Speaker 1>Many pairs of boobs, that's true.
<v Speaker 2>I don't know what the boob line is for.
<v Speaker 1>Think you can see one pair of boobs for PG. Thirteen,
<v Speaker 1>but once you're seeing like Baker's dozen.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah. Perhaps, But you know, I think it's you know,
<v Speaker 2>the violence that tipped it, because the booby scene is
<v Speaker 2>just this is one booby scene, maybe two, but that's it.
<v Speaker 2>The violence is gratuitous. But looking at I actually think
<v Speaker 2>Carmon is going to need it the most because Carmen's
<v Speaker 2>exposure to trauma is different than Johnny's. Most of what
<v Speaker 2>Johnny encounters he is learning to reckon with because this
<v Speaker 2>is his survival. This is what he signed up to do.
<v Speaker 2>This is his world. This is is getting physical with
<v Speaker 2>things and directly dealing with it is his wheelhouse. This
<v Speaker 2>is not hers. And the amount of things that she
<v Speaker 2>encounters that would have caught her at a moment of
<v Speaker 2>relative weakness and lack of power. And while she never
<v Speaker 2>shows the single sign of being a pretty delicate flower,
<v Speaker 2>she is a combat operative. She knows weapons, she is
<v Speaker 2>ready to fight, and she does. She's not like, oh no,
<v Speaker 2>come rescue me, that's not her jam. But she definitely
<v Speaker 2>is exposed to lots of experiences that would have caught
<v Speaker 2>her off guard, out of position, forced to improvise, forced
<v Speaker 2>to dissociate and find skills that she's improvising through, rather
<v Speaker 2>than well honed combat experience that Johnny, who has been
<v Speaker 2>field promoted to an officer, would have and has formed
<v Speaker 2>some comfort with. I know a lot of our listeners
<v Speaker 2>probably don't understand military rank structure. Like looking at where
<v Speaker 2>Johnny's journey goes. He goes from an enlisted private, which
<v Speaker 2>is the bottom bottom bottom rank of the military to corporal,
<v Speaker 2>which is a squad leader. You're in charge of five guys,
<v Speaker 2>like that's it. To lieutenant you're in charge of forty guys,
<v Speaker 2>or in this case, you know forty soldiers, maybe more.
<v Speaker 2>But Johnny is then moving his way up and he's
<v Speaker 2>having a rapid ascent finding success. Carmen's starting as an officer,
<v Speaker 2>but she's a pilot. She stays in the ship, she
<v Speaker 2>stays in the comfy corners. She's kind of doing this
<v Speaker 2>thing away from stuff, like all bad stuff happens, but
<v Speaker 2>we fly them there, we get them. She's like a
<v Speaker 2>Navy ship fly or pilot, like she's not getting into
<v Speaker 2>the direct shit most of the time. Then she does
<v Speaker 2>and she watches something horrific happen. I think she's gonna
<v Speaker 2>be the one that needs it, So I think her
<v Speaker 2>having some space to process that trauma would be what
<v Speaker 2>I'd want to target, because she's going to be expected
<v Speaker 2>to get right back into that ship and keep flying.
<v Speaker 2>But at some point the nightmares are going to start.
<v Speaker 2>She's going to see that and hear that sound of
<v Speaker 2>his skull being penetrated by that thing every time, and
<v Speaker 2>it's gonna be bad, and she's gonna need help the process,
<v Speaker 2>and there's to be very limited support. Should can be
<v Speaker 2>told to rub dirt on it like, but that's service
<v Speaker 2>and that's not how humans work. All right, let's take
<v Speaker 2>a last quick break here. I'll come back for final thoughts.
<v Speaker 2>Who's going first? Well?
<v Speaker 1>Do we want to end on a?
<v Speaker 2>What note?
<v Speaker 1>Do we want to end on? Should you go? Last?
<v Speaker 2>Man? Yeah?
<v Speaker 1>Sure? And anywe first?
<v Speaker 2>Sure?
<v Speaker 1>Hated it. I'll never see it again. I'll never watch
<v Speaker 1>it again. I don't like any of their faces, I
<v Speaker 1>don't like their acting. I think that this movie was
<v Speaker 1>a fucking mess. The bugs. I don't like anything about
<v Speaker 1>this movie. I found it difficult to understand if I
<v Speaker 1>have to read a bunch of shit after the movie.
<v Speaker 1>That makes me feel like you didn't do a good
<v Speaker 1>enough job with the movie. So that's what I think
<v Speaker 1>about it, you know. Paybacking on that, I also hated
<v Speaker 1>this movie. I will never watch it again, mostly because
<v Speaker 1>this movie is ugly. And what I mean by that
<v Speaker 1>is every stylistic choice this movie makes is assaulting to
<v Speaker 1>my eyes. How I came to this realization was when
<v Speaker 1>I watched that weird game that they play the two
<v Speaker 1>school colors aggressively ugly, Like the font is ugly. It's
<v Speaker 1>like everyone's being filmed under fluluescent lighting the whole time.
<v Speaker 1>It's like the film version of like a Kmart. So
<v Speaker 1>I will never watch this movie again. Too many bug fights,
<v Speaker 1>I got like, That's where I was a hard time
<v Speaker 1>keep a track of things, and I would lose my
<v Speaker 1>interest because once again we're finding bugs once again. I'm
<v Speaker 1>watching this ship cly with this ship. Too much action that, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I just bored and ugly.
<v Speaker 2>Then, So for this Oscar nominated film ew for what effects?
<v Speaker 2>Oh but didn't win You guys can rest easy. Good
<v Speaker 2>But they were invited to the ceremony. Not good for them, Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>but I mean they worked hard. It looks different now
<v Speaker 2>than it did then. But I still have an affinity
<v Speaker 2>for this film. I recognize its limitations and that you
<v Speaker 2>know why it didn't crack into the mainstream I totally get.
<v Speaker 2>But the cult status of it absolutely hit me and
<v Speaker 2>all my friends. Everybody was a thirteen year old boy
<v Speaker 2>when this came out. There's a special place in our
<v Speaker 2>hearts for this. And as we discussed off Mike, there
<v Speaker 2>some of those scenes with people being mobies out might
<v Speaker 2>have had something to do with it. But also, you know,
<v Speaker 2>in the nineties, the awesomeness of like, look at all
<v Speaker 2>these fights, look at all these battle scenes. Well, we
<v Speaker 2>would have all been victims of all the same propaganda, now,
<v Speaker 2>wouldn't we that this movie was trying to point out
<v Speaker 2>and we couldn't see it, didn't know. And I think
<v Speaker 2>for that reason, I've appreciated this film from a different
<v Speaker 2>angle than I did then, and the attachment I had
<v Speaker 2>to it then is different than what I appreciate it
<v Speaker 2>for now. But I also get that anybody that didn't
<v Speaker 2>watch it then, or wouldn't have had as much exposure
<v Speaker 2>to the military family life that I have, you know,
<v Speaker 2>would have a totally different view. And that's cool. But
<v Speaker 2>I enjoyed it, and I appreciate why people are asking
<v Speaker 2>us for as because there's enough going on now of
<v Speaker 2>singly viewpoint forming fascism and what it looks like at
<v Speaker 2>late stage that it's scaring people, and so they wanted this,
<v Speaker 2>so hopefully we delivered, and thank you all for listening.
<v Speaker 2>So as always, guys, please like, share, subscribe, go ahead
<v Speaker 2>and share a review of us. That is the single
<v Speaker 2>best thing that you guys can do for us. Is
<v Speaker 2>a positive review. If you don't like us, forget how
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<v Speaker 1>I don't want to hear about it.
<v Speaker 2>But if you do like us, please go ahead and
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<v Speaker 2>have early access to episodes or maybe some other special
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<v Speaker 2>We have gear available at Tea Public, and we have
<v Speaker 2>lots of ways to reach us.
<v Speaker 1>As always. You can find us on Instagram, TikTok, and
<v Speaker 1>threads a pop from Psychology. You can email us Atopropsychology
<v Speaker 1>gmail dot com. That is the best way to get
<v Speaker 1>hold of us if you would like a response, and
<v Speaker 1>you know everybody likes stay out of trouble, and you know,
<v Speaker 1>let's try to find them. Bugs Go bugs, You
<v Speaker 2>Just a bugs