Hear Me Out: George Santos and Gypsy-Rose Aren’t Your Icons

Slate Debates

Slate Podcasts

Society & Culture, News

4.6 • 3K Ratings

🗓️ 16 January 2024

⏱️ 41 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

On today’s episode of Hear Me Out… yas, queen? It’s been hard to avoid an onslaught of memes about bad people lately. People like Gypsy-Rose Blanchard and George Santos have been punished for their misdeeds in one way… but now, it seems, they’re being rewarded by the attention economy. The question is: is it our fault? Rachel Greenspan, writer and social strategist, joins us once again to argue for discretion in memeing. If you have thoughts you want to share, or an idea for a topic we should tackle, you can email the show: [email protected] Podcast production by Maura Currie. You can skip all the ads in Hear Me Out by joining Slate Plus! Sign up now at slate.com/hearmeoutplus for just $15 a month for your first three months. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	This is here me out. I'm Celeste Hedley. To paraphrase and slightly twist the words of Taylor Swift, why aren't we exhausted by rooting for the anti-hero? We live in an attention economy. That's a cliche at this point, but if you're online ever, you've probably seen an increase recently in jokes posted about bad people, sometimes rooting for bad people.
0:23.6	Consider George Santos and Gypsy Rose Blanchard
0:26.2	to people who have been shunned by society
0:28.8	in different ways, punishing them for undeniable misdeeds and then rewarded in other ways.
0:34.2	These people are raking in money on social media.
0:37.0	They're being invited on talk shows, they're being called icons,
0:40.0	and they're the butt of a lot of jokes.
0:42.0	But at what point is that the same kind of reward? and they're the butt of a lot of jokes.
0:42.8	But at what point is that the same kind of reward
0:45.2	as all that other stuff?
0:46.6	A lot of the times the answer is it's funny
0:48.2	because Republicans like George Santos
0:50.2	are so dumb and it doesn't matter and then Trump becomes president again and it's like oh
0:56.0	wait oops I didn't mean that. Rachel Greenspan joins us once again to argue for
1:01.1	discretion in maiming.
1:03.3	Stay with us.
1:08.4	Welcome back to Hear Me Out.
1:10.4	I'm Celeste Hedley.
1:11.4	In the words of Lady Gaga, you live for the applause.
1:14.0	Are you like Tinker Bell?
1:15.0	If we stopped clapping, would you disappear?
1:18.0	No.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Slate Podcasts, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Slate Podcasts and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.