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Blocked and Reported

Episode 5: Katie And Jesse Decide Who Is Valid

Blocked and Reported

Katie Herzog and Jesse Singal

Unknown

4.64.1K Ratings

🗓️ 20 April 2020

⏱️ 60 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In a shocking moment that definitely wasn't scripted, Katie almost singlehandedly immolates the podcast by dropping a horrific slur just seconds into the episode. After the cohosts recover their composure, they discuss an outrage story about Canadian military pronouns, Alex Berenson's coronavirus contrarianism, and the fairly nonsensical process people follow to decide what they believe. Jesse then tries to unpack Online Validity Discourse, leading the cohosts to discuss fascinating and provocative questions like "What does it even mean to be valid?," "How many people can you have sex with before you're not asexual anymore?," and "Would Jesse dress better if he were gay?" The cohosts close out the show with a brief chat about Blocked and Reported's possible Patreon future, and a request for listeners to email in to let them know what sorts of perks they'd be interested in.
Show notes:
-EXCLUSIVE: Canadian Armed Forces requires all personnel to stop using gendered pronouns (https://thepostmillennial.com/canadian-armed-forces-requires-all-personnel-to-stop-using-gendered-pronouns) (The Post Millennial)
-Alex Berenson's Twitter account (https://twitter.com/AlexBerenson)
-Here Are the Questions the Right's Favorite Coronavirus Truther Isn't Willing to Answer (https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/jge7g4/here-are-the-question-the-rights-favorite-coronavirus-truther-isnt-willing-to-answer) (Vice)
-Does the King of the COVID-19 Contrarians Have a Case? (https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/04/does-the-king-of-the-covid-19-contrarians-have-a-case) (Vanity Fair)
-We feel too bad spotlighting any specific tweets about people "being valid" so here just click this link to take you to a search for that phrase instead (https://twitter.com/search?q=%22you%20are%20valid%22&src=typed_query)
-When A Child Says She's Trans (https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/07/when-a-child-says-shes-trans/561749/) (Jesse's article in The Atlantic)
-Slate, Pete Buttigieg, And The Limited Market For Left-Wing Identitarianism (https://jessesingal.substack.com/p/slate-pete-buttigieg-and-the-limited) (Singal-Minded)
-The Weirdly Enduring Appeal of Weird Al Yankovic (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/09/magazine/weird-al-yankovic.html) (The New York Times Magazine) (and the audio version from The Daily (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/12/podcasts/the-daily/weird-al-yankovic-coronavirus-music.html))
-The Family Featured in the NYT Article About Queer Families Looks Awfully Straight (https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2018/04/30/26113961/the-family-featured-in-the-nyt-article-about-queer-families-looks-awfully-straight) (The Stranger)
-If you have questions, comments, or -- especially -- opinions about what our Patreon efforts should look like, please email us: blockedandreportedpodcast@gmail.com (mailto:blockedandreportedpodcast@gmail.com)

This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.blockedandreported.org/subscribe

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Hey, Jessie.

0:03.0

Hey, Katie.

0:04.0

Hey, did you see we got a nice new review on iTunes from a woman named Karen Low?

0:10.0

Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on.

0:12.0

That's not cool.

0:13.0

Did you just use the K word?

0:15.0

What's the K word?

0:16.0

The K word, which I'm not going to say, is a slur.

0:19.0

Didn't you see that tweet from the feminist writer Julie Bindle?

0:22.0

She wrote, does anyone else think that the slur is woman-hating and based on class prejudice?

0:28.0

And as an art and feminist, I agree with that completely.

0:31.0

You shouldn't use that word.

0:32.0

And you're talking about the word Karen, right?

0:34.0

No, no, no.

0:35.0

You can't say that.

0:38.0

It's a slur.

0:39.0

If I identify as a Karen, can I say the word Karen?

0:42.0

I suppose so.

0:43.0

I mean, I don't know what the ethics are here.

0:45.0

It's tricky.

0:46.0

Maybe there's an argument that because you're saying someone's name rather than using it as a slur,

0:52.0

you can say the K word, but maybe should we drop the R?

...

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