Hi, this is the Vermont Institute of Community and International Involvement tonight, talking with our friend and scholar, Kurt Mehta, about India today. I want to talk a little bit about why I think this is such an important topic and why I hope people will either see us on CCTV, which is recording this event. And it will be shown later on Public Access Television, CCTV channel, used to be 17. I think it's now 317. It will be recorded and shown later. And the reason that we, the Vermont Institute of Community and International Involvement, or Vicky, have chosen this topic tonight. Number one is because our friend Kurt Mehta was born in India, and he just returned from a trip there. And so he probably will have a lot to say about India today. Second reason is that we have covered before the interesting idea that India is part of a group of nations called BRICS. And that's Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, which seems to be forming a block that's independent of both economic developments in the East and the West, particularly independent of the American system of finance and capitalism, which extends between the United States and especially the Western European powers. It seems that BRICS nations appear to be developing an independent block in order to escape the hegemony of the American dollar and the American and European capitalist system and form their own block and their own systems, many of which are probably going to be quite similar to a capitalist model. But we're here today to talk to this topic with Kurt Mehta. The other reason that I think India is incredibly important today is that I read, I believe in the New York Times, that India is going to exceed the population of China. And that might happen as early as April of this year, which means that India has become a regional yet global power that people are going to have to pay attention to. And the last reason I think this is important is that India and many of the other, we used to call it the third world. Now I think it's the developing nations in both Latin America, South America, Africa, and some of Asia, that these powers are beginning to challenge the idea that they have to choose either the Western alliance of NATO or the Russian and the Chinese alliance, particularly around the Ukraine war. India has kept itself vestidiously neutral in that struggle and has not chosen sides. And this is an increasing pattern that we see in the developing world of Latin America and in India, in particular in Africa. So anyway, this is Kurt Mehta who will comment on all these issues on India today and his return from a trip abroad. OK, so. Thanks for having me, Sandy. Thank you. Yeah. So I always enjoy doing our little stints for CCTV and the local community here in Berlin. And the world. And the world. And the world. Right. So I mean, as Sandy mentioned, I just came back. You were born there. I was born there, lived there for about 10 months. Then my family emigrated to the United States at the age of 10 months for me. So you weren't familiar with India at all, really? No, no. Had a short visit when I was three years old and then had a lengthier visit when I was 10 years old. And it's been a 40-year absence after that. I did not go back. Did not think I was ever going to go back. Why? Made a promise to my younger brother that we would never go back. Why? We did not have a good time in 1983. The culture shock was too great for us, for both of us. My brother's five years, my younger, and my brother was born here in the United States. And the patterns, the way things were done were just so different. It felt like an upside-down world. Infrastructure wasn't there. People were dressed differently. And for an 11-year-old immigrant who was just trying to fit in to American rock and roll culture of the early 1980s, it was just too honestly upsetting and disturbing. Why? Having grown up in Northern New Jersey, you saw people that were lower middle class. You didn't see abject poverty. Where were you at that point? A part of India. Oh, OK. So my family is from a state called Gujarat. The language spoken there is called Gujarati. That's my native language. More so than English, but not the English dominant. There's about 80 to 90 million speakers of that language. So just to give you an idea, that's more than the number of people that live in Great Britain and speak English. That's more than the number of people, I think, that can correct me, that speak French in France. And that's more than the number of people that speak Italian and Italy. Of course, French and English, once you go outside of them, their defined borders are much more present and spoken in the developing world as well as, you know, North America and Australia and New Zealand, with respect to English and that. But so it's a language that most people never heard of. Yet there are 90 million speakers. That particular state, province in India, also gave birth to Mahatma Gandhi on the flip side. The current Prime Minister Modi. And if you don't know anything about politics but know about the arts, the family of Freddie Mercury. Oh, really? From the Queen. From the Bohemian Rhapsody film. Bohemian Rhapsody and We Will Rock You and all those other great hits. So his family was originally from that state. So we probably shared a language. But you don't speak it. I do. It's my native language. You do speak it? It's my first language. My parents, I spoke with my parents. So you speak it fluently? Absolutely. Boy, I bet you could get into that with the UN. I can't read and write it though. It's a different alphabet. Not even a single letter, but I can speak it fluently. It's my first language. Well, I know the tower. English comes second. English is second. Right. But English is sort of a national language of all of India. So yes, partly the reason I was excited to go back, I mean, I was there on a wildlife safari trip. So I was there to track lions and leopards, which I got a chance to do. And that was wonderful. I exceeded my expectations as I'd just come back from Africa this past summer. And I didn't think that this was an inferior trip with respect to sighting animals. Had a good time. That being said, I was also excited to use my native language there and partly got to use it with the exception of a couple of, I do have a couple of relatives that are still there that I touch base with, some older ants that they're up there in age. And aside from that, I mostly spoke English on this trip. The younger people, people under the age of 40 did not want to speak the local language. Did they speak it at all or is it just? They spoke it at all, but if I would speak to them in their language, they responded back in English. And if I left that particular state and went out of the state, I would be as clueless as you would be or anyone else would be that is not from India because the language spoken was English. Wow. Is that, are those native languages disappearing, do you suppose? I think we're far, but it's two-fold. It's not because people are drawn to English because it's a unifier, but two things, Hollywood and then the local industry there is Bollywood. So if they spoke a second language, younger people wanted to speak the language that they watched their favorite TV shows and movies which is Hindi, I don't speak that language. And they're very different? Very different, even the alphabets are completely different. So even a non-native would notice the alphabets look different. That wouldn't be able to recognize anything. So spoke a lot of English there on the trip, wasn't expecting that. So English is in fact a unifier. I learned from a couple of relatives who were attorneys there, it's the language of all, it's language of the Supreme Court of the country. The constitution was written in English. There is a constitution. Yeah, it was based on the American constitution. Good, good for them. It was written by an untouchable in the caste system. And he was the author of the Indian constitution, largely based on, the constitution was written in 1950. The country was achieved independence in 1947, Great Britain, two years after the Second World War. But the constitution was ratified by the states in 1950. Well, of course they can't go to the English constitution for a model, because there is one. There is no such thing. There is no such thing, correct. So I'm glad they looked at it. And the language of the courts in the country, state courts, as well as the Supreme Court of the country, all arguments are done in English, all decisions are published in English. I met a young attorney on the Leopard Safari, he was about 22, 23 years old. And I was asking him the language that he was a student of Admiralty Law, that was gonna be his specialty. And I asked him the language of the Admiralty Courts and in India he said definitively English. And he was going to London to get his some advanced degree there. I wonder if that's true in the other colonialized countries? For instance, in French West Africa, I wonder if that is the lingua franca is French. Yeah, I mean, I know in a number of other former African colonies, English is predominant. And I think they're making attempts to try to reduce the role of English. In India, there was an attempt to do that. It doesn't seem successful, if anything, the influence of American, largely American pop culture has made English more appealing for the under 40 crowd and the educated crowd. I mean, that's critical to know. If people are not educated, there's a lesser likelihood that they're gonna speak English. But even those, a couple of family members that I had that were not terribly educated, they can string together a sentence by having watched enough Tom Cruise and Sylvester Stallone movies. And I was impressed by how they were able to string words of English together to form short sentences and actually communicate and understand the language, our language, language. We're looking at a map provided by Anna. Yeah, so yeah, I was on the northwest coast. Northwest coast over here. Point to it if you want me. Right here. Uh-huh, okay. So was that in a city? Yeah. Is it true that there's such a thing as an East, as an Indian standard of English? Just as there's British English and American English?   So certainly, Grant, there is an Indian English. The words are the same.  They have an easier time comprehending, you know, British people speaking English. Because, you know, they have a greater, a lower history with great Britain. So that English is, you know, it's easier for them to understand. They'll have to listen to me a little more closely or to an American a little more closely to get what they're saying. Except for the younger people who were, who were, you know, largely indoctrinated by Hollywood and American pop music will get, you know, I couldn't believe how much, you know, hip-hop and rap music I was hearing, American rap music. I don't think people knew some of, you know, the nasty language that was said during the songs, but they were singing about it. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, I mean, that's on the language. But, you know, you mentioned an interesting point. In the month of April of the New York Times is predicting that India's population is going to exceed China's. And, you know, it's going to be that 1,500,000,000,000 child born there. And that will exceed the population of China at that point. So, you know, not in terms of concentrations that we're used to, but in the overall world picture, one out of every five people is from India. Not even South Asian I'm talking about, but India. If you take South Asian, they are probably talking about the other populations in Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Bangladesh. That's an additional half of the billion people. Well, so those are now independent though. These are all independent. I do want to address somewhat of the history of India. Nepal, was Nepal part of India? No, it was never a part of India, proper. But there are Indian people living there. And the language. And religion, correct? Correct, the two religions in Nepal are Buddhism and Hinduism. They're both much better in India. Right, okay. So, getting back to, I guess, the historical past is what I would love to talk a little bit to you about. Okay, so, India was an independent kind of region or a kingdom until the British or to the East India. The East India Company got a charter from Queen Elizabeth I in 1600. 1600, that's what I thought. Yeah, 1600, 1601, the first contingent or shifts owned by the East India Company. Again, a private corporation, not different from Microsoft or Amazon or IBM. Yeah, very powerful. Well, Lockheed Martin. Well, Lockheed Martin, a powerful corporation that went to India to do business. In 1600. In 1600. Kind of the dawn of English and periods, imperialism. Really the dawn, very early. Right, well, they'd already gotten, I think, Scotland and Ireland. Yes, yeah, in terms of the United Kingdom. And of course, the United States. And, yeah, our 13 colonies here. The 13 colonies, right, right. The 13 colonies in North America. Right. Yeah. So, but it was a company rather than the government. Right, right. It's important to distinguish, you know, where our history here deviates from that of India's, was that the 13 colonies were administered by the British government. Right. Where India was doing business, the different regional kings and mobile emperors were doing business with the EIC, which is short for East India Corporation. Okay. Yeah. All right, and that was an English corporation. It was an English corporation. But it was militarized, didn't it have its own military? They had a security force. Uh-huh. Called the security force. Well, it was a security force. That was a long book. And that was allowed. I mean, there was, was there a central government which was... It wasn't a central government. Okay. It's not a central government. Central government. No, no, India, India. It wasn't a central government. So India in the 1200s was invaded from the West by Arabs. And they established a Islamic state in India. We kind of know it as the Mughal Empire.  But they brought Islam to the Indian subcontinent. And different parts of India, presently Pakistan on the East side, Bangladesh, and then there are different pockets within India itself that have, you know, majority to large Islamic populations as a result of that Arab invasion in the 1200s. So the Arabs were, you know, the Muslim influence on India lasted for about 400 years up until the British came. But the British didn't come. It was the East India Company. It was the East India Company, right? Yeah, again, important that you read that statement. What did they do? Did they sort of conquer India then? They did not conquer. They were doing, they were doing business with the Mughal Emperor and the Mughal emperors. Their capital was Delhi, which now it's the capital of the country is New Delhi. But it was in that same region where they had most of their assets and controlled much of the Indians subcontinent, not all of it, but much of it from there. And they, the East India Company became more and more involved with getting different kinds of land grants from the Mughal emperors and also giving the Mughal emperors things that they wanted in terms of trade. And money. And money, yeah. But mostly it was about trade. It was about things that they could not get in India that were available through Europe and through the Middle East and that in turn the East India Company was able to get a lot of things that they couldn't get and that they were interested in acquiring from India.  Right. So the big land grab, so to speak was the originally in Europe it's known as the War of Austrian Succession. Uh-huh, that's right. Which in our country we know as the French Indian War. So India was involved in that. India was involved, but it was involved from the standpoint of competing colonial powers Right, always right. Had a fight. So who was involved? The French, the Dutch, the Portuguese, and the British. It was at the end of that war, the French and Indian War that we call here in the United States, you know our family father Jordan Washington was actively involved in. 1753. Right. Yeah. Not only did Great Britain acquire a domination over Canada by taking over Quebec and the French. And the United States. Right. But they also basically became regional hegemones in the subcontinent of India. Right. So many people called that war actually the First World War. You could look at it that way. Yeah, because it was all these global powers competing with each other over dominance in basically in the colonial world. Which includes, you know, our part of the world. Yes. And I think it's probably one of the wars that in American schools, I mean I can say my experience, that I knew the least amount. Exactly. You know, it focuses usually on the revolutionary war and the civil war. And of course the two world wars in the 20th century. But not so much. But that's an incredibly important. Incredibly important in terms of its impact on the history and the landscape of the world right now. Exactly. And power dynamics. Absolutely. And honestly the ascendancy of the language you and I are speaking for one another. Including to the north of us in Quebec. Because that's where Quebec was defeated by, essentially by Ottawa in a lot of ways. And that's when Canada began to have all its problems in a way between the English speakers. Yeah. And then Quebec. And had that war turned out differently, you know, the language that we're speaking and right now could have been French. Of course Spanish. Yeah. Right. Right. Because of, you know, the two big combatants were the French and the British. Right. More so than the French and the British. Okay, so then India by that point is essentially conquered by. Essentially conquered by the East India Company. Not the government? Not the government. The government of Great Britain did not come in until 1857. So the East India Company, they dominated for a little over a century. And they were able to exact taxes on the population. They removed much, it was much of the wealth of the country in the form of golden diamonds and textiles. And they also created an incredible cottage industry for Great Britain. Right. In terms of. Textiles, right. Textiles. And exclusivity. So not only was, and I'm not limiting this to the population of the subcontinent of India, I'm sure to extend it to Africa. Right. Or some of their 13 colonies here. But products, raw materials were taken out of India, manufactured in Britain, and then sold back to India. Exactly. At a significant premium. And that was called, I believe, the mercantile system. That was the mercantile system. And it basically created a buttress for these industry upon industry, home industry in Great Britain. Which by the 1960s, Great Britain faced near economic collapse. Because at that point, not only had they lost their colonies in South Asia, most of their African colonies were gone. So these markets, that they dominated, had monopolies over, who are basically, you know, disappearing. Right. The interesting too is that they lost their empire, essentially after World War II. Yeah. With the colonies in Africa, in Asia, kind of declaring their own independence and beating the British. I mean, that happened. In part.  I guess they replaced it or tried to. Right. The United States, right, they stepped in. However, without the colonial, the actual physical colonial dominance that Great Britain had in terms of administering countries, the United States corporations had significant roles and they continued to have significant roles in Latin America and the economies of countries. However, you know, one can argue with the exception the entry of Iraq that the US government did not necessarily go in and run the show. The corporations. No, right, right, right, but the power of the United States made that feasible. And the United States came out of World War II really as the only victor in a lot of ways. And they kind of at least attempted to replace the old English empire. I remember Winston Churchill said he didn't, he was going, he saw himself as presiding over the demise of the English empire. And that was sort of not militarily so much replaced by the hegemony of the US. Yeah, the United States and the US dollar. Right, exactly. The US dollar and that continues today. And that continues today. But now let's, let me talk about one other thing in terms of Indian history that I don't think most Americans know anything about. And that is the partition movement which happened in the 40s right after, okay, so India becomes independent of Britain in 1947. Right, so it was that. What was this partition deal? There was a big article about partition in the New Yorker which was really excellent to me because I didn't know very much about it. Explaining how violent it was and how it split India basically in two, right? Yeah, go ahead, would you? The famous comment that Gandhi made when he, when partition was basically the news of partition was broken. What was this partition? Yeah, it was essentially the quote was, yeah, that my heart has been broken into two pieces. Yeah. So partition, there was an Indian independence movement that had started in the 1870s, 1880s. Against India. Against Great Britain's rule. Okay, right, okay, yeah. The independence movement was called the self-rule movement, translating in English. And the self-rule movement consisted of mostly men who were either Hindu or Muslim. And they got together and got along well. Their goals were the same. But as time went on, specifically the Muslim members of this political organization, all very learned men and some women too, but mostly men began thinking that Muslims needed their own homeland, that they did not have a place in a country that had an 80% Hindu majority, that they would be swallowed up. And there were also gonna be some acts of reprisal from the 400 years of Islamic domination of India between the years 1200 and 1600. And much of Indian culture was transformed during that timeframe, which I would probably argue continues to this day in large part.  Muslims. Muslims being a minority, about 15 to 20% of the population. Yeah, or even less. I mean, there are Christians and Jews there too. There is still there.  And they lobbied heavily to the British government as it appeared by the end of the Second World War that Great Britain was now going to release. Absolutely, yeah. It was gonna, because they simply didn't have the manpower or woman power to preside over 400 million people in South Asia when people didn't have basic infrastructure in Britain because of the German bombing of cities there. They simply didn't have the resources or the labor power. At that point, they were being lobbied heavily by the Islamic contingent in this independence movement to divide the country and give us our own homeland from which Pakistan was created. Okay, but wait a minute, let's talk. So the British granted that? Essentially. Why? They carved up the subcontinent. And is that really what the Indians, both Muslim and Hindu wanted? Hindus did not want that. Certain Muslims, and again, out of fear. But the Hindus did not. No, they wanted to keep a unified. And what was the relation between those two religions? Was it nasty and hostile and violent even? I mean, the history is not different than Yugoslavia, if anyone knows that. People lived together. However, there would be rioting and there were resentments over time because the culture and the country was changed during the 400 years of Islamic domination where there were a lot of forced conversions, society changed, women were made to be more modest in dress. The Muslim. Correct. Yeah, in line with a lot of the other modest aspects and a lot of culture, homosexuality was largely crowned upon, which was not the case before. By Muslims? By Muslims and then further exacerbated by Victorian Britain. But not by the Hindus. Not originally. I mean, there was also a movement that is not to completely go off the track here, but transgender people. But I saw that there was an article about that in the nation. So it wasn't until about 1840 that the British Penal Code that was administered in India specifically made a ban on homosexuality, as well as people that were transgender. And that ban was not lifted until about five years ago by the Supreme Court. OK, but so it's curious to me that there are partitions. There are partitions in the British Empire specifically. Yeah, so I mean, not to sound conspiratorial, but I'm going to give you the conspiratorial saying that. Look, all a conspiracy is an agreement to do something illegal. It happens all the time. So whether you look at Rwanda, which was administered by the French, the local populations view, educated populations view, is that they left us in a situation where we're going to be fighting with one another in perpetuity, and we're never going to get ahead. That happened in Rwanda. The seeds that were planted by the French in Rwanda between the Hutus and the Tutsis resulted in the genocide in the 1990s. OK, so I'm similarly in Britain with respect to British administration. And again, I'm giving you the conspiracy view, not saying that this is the gospel. But the idea was you're going to keep India, Pakistan, and East Pakistan, which later became Bangladesh, fighting with one another, which is the case for decades. And these countries are going to be permanently kept down because of the inordinate amount of defense expenses that they face, because the partition boundaries, whether it's Rwanda, whether it's other places in Africa and the Indian subcontinent, were unsustainable boundaries, which were going to lead to fighting and led to about a million people in the partition killing one another. OK, so if we could get that map, perhaps I'm not certain of here if you hear me. But so the partition was what? What became what? So it was the partition. Yeah, so if it were a matter of creating an India and Pakistan, two states, and then also Burma, the Far East. Yeah, so Burma becomes a state then, too. That's correct. About two years later, after India and Pakistan achieved their independence in 1947, Burma, Myanmar now, achieved its independence, all originally part of this wide Indian subcontinent at Sri Lanka, the island to the south of India. OK, and that's that. I knew about this first from you as well. I never knew that Burma was part of the Raj, I guess. Right, right. Until we read that book together, George Orwell's Burmese days, which was rat-treating that now, right? Oh, OK, OK. OK, so this partition, however, was quite violent. Quite violent. Were there forced population exchanges or what? There certainly were, Sandy. And I think that's what the violence, you know. Yeah, I mean, it seemed horrendous. I'm not certain why people don't know about it. Yeah, I mean, the violence was horrific. Why? Because people were moved. People were moved. People were forced to move. And people were given short periods of time. And again, you're talking about a country at that point that a subcontinent that had been largely rendered poor? By what? I remember this was an interesting question. So I mean, colonialism in general, whether it was with respect to the 13 colonies, or in Africa or in India, it was essentially, it was a vacuum cleaner sucking all the wealth out of these places. That was an important question that you raised before in my thoughts. That was was India devastatingly poor prior to the British conquest? So good point. So in 1600, India's world GDP in terms of its proportion of GDP in 1600, was estimated at 26% of the world's GDP. When the British left in 1947, it was reduced to 4%. With a population of 400 million people. OK, but this to me is an important question. Then maybe we'll go on. But many native or indigenous peoples argue that being taken over by an advanced economic system who might mean progress, like capitalism, like imperialism, actually made their lives poorer. That in fact, indigenous economies perhaps provide more sustainability than modern economies. Right, that's what kind of you're saying. Well, there's partly that. And then there's partly, again, whether we're talking about making Iraqis purchase exxon oil that is explored and taken out, drilled from Iraq, or it's about purchasing tailor-made clothing where the cotton is from India and then sent to Great Britain and then sent back. Right, I wish it was. Yeah, which was, and then it's sold at a premium. Significant added premium to poor people. And taking away their industries in the process. That's what they try to do in the 13 colonies. In the 13 colonies. Our founding fathers here were very aware, believe it or not, it's not something that we learned about in school. They were very well aware of what was happening in India and what the East India Company was doing. And it's not the main reason for our American revolution. Well, it's a big one, though. It is a big one. Amongst the intellectuals of the time, the Hamilton's, the Jefferson's, the Franklins, they were very astute and very knowledgeable about what was transpiring. Well, that was the age of the Enlightenment, right? Right, right. OK, so all right, getting back then to partition. Yeah. Violent, however, these new states emerge, correct? Right, right. And so I guess to get us up to date, what happened then to India? What did it remain for between 1947, say, and present, right? Yeah. And but it has increased in your mind in becoming a real regional power or what's the deal? Right, so I mean, the country was extremely poor, after the partition, independence, whatever you want to call it. There's one no region that's still contested, correct? Casual? Correct, correct. So the lines, so again, going back into partition, the way it was done, there was a plebiscite everywhere around the country, the subcontinent. Which means a vote. A vote, right. People were allowed to vote and vote which way they wanted to go. Did they want to become part of this new Pakistan? Or did they want to remain with India? And you had intense, intense lobbying efforts by local regional leaders, stay with us. No, come over, stay with us. So what you had was a development, and I'm taking Burma out of the picture right now, is not just a Pakistan on the west and India on the east, but there was Pakistan, then there was East Pakistan on the other side. But they're separated. Separate by an enormous Indian heartland in the middle. And then there were also some moves to take certain parts of India in the south that had large Muslim contingents, large Islamic populations, and also had that as part of Pakistan. It did not prevail, the southern part of it. So that remains in India. That remained in India. Again, heavy, heavy lobbying by Hindu leaders giving the local Muslim clerics and the population's assurances that they would be given full free religious rights to practice and in bribes the local leaders to get their local population to vote a certain way. And they remained that way. But on the east and the west coasts of the country, they both decided to form a new country called Pakistan, East and West Pakistan. Okay, so. So that has resulted in an impact on India today because the province known as Kashmir, they had a great deal of difficulty deciding. And that's where the fighting happened, where the population is majority Muslim, but they had a Hindu king who appealed to the British as well as to religious wise the Hindu leadership in India for assistance, for military assistance because he did not wanna become part of Pakistan. Okay, so Kashmir is disputed. Kashmir is disputed and now at this point, both countries, India and Pakistan for quite some time now have had nuclear weapons. So it's a flash point. Kashmir is a flash point. I know of so many people in the process. Okay, so. The country too. What about India today? Okay, it's led by a man named Modi. Right, so. Is he the prime minister? Yeah, so Modi is a Hindu. He is a Hindu and he belongs to a political party that I guess, I'm trying to use a bland, neutral language, but it appeals heavily to the populist sentiment of 80% of the population, 80% of the population is Hindu. And he tries, I mean to give people an idea of what it's sort of like is in the United States with I would say probably an 80% Christian population, maybe higher, making issues out of things and I'm using an analogy, the war on Christmas, telling 80% of the population that they're being attacked, they're being attacked, they're being attacked. So he's been kind of labeled in the Trump camp, correct? Yeah, yeah, however, after having been there on the ground, at the same time, this populism has also on the side note for people that are not really that interested in the polemics, there's been a tremendous amount of infrastructure development that he's helped and people credit him specifically his administration with respect to building roads, access to clean water, access to clean bathrooms, fixing up the airport so that they don't look like developing world airports anymore, they look like- Shiny new ones. Shiny new ones, making the trains work. So I mean, it can be looked at as dangerous, I mean, using the old Mussolini example, having the strongman, but he made the trains work on time. And there's a certain beauty to that for a portion of the population as well as the visitors. Oh, okay, everything's working okay. So it remains to be seen how- But is he, I mean, I think he's also been labeled in the West as, I guess the word, used to be fascism, although I don't know what that really means, especially as it's applied to India. Right. I guess nationalist, militarist. Nationalist most certainly. I mean, again, I'm comparing my memories from that I had in 1983 to the present. I don't remember seeing too many Indian flags in 1983. I don't even think I saw one at the airport. And Indian flags are everywhere. No, yeah. Everywhere. You have motto, modos, modos on walls and murals. Clean India, modern India, new India, incredible visit India, all these. So he's instilling, now again, you can certainly interpret it that is- Yeah, okay. Is that 1933 Germany or is it just, he's trying to instill pride in a very divided country that has 78 languages, 13 of which are official languages and the unspoken language of communication is English, a foreign language. Well, not, essentially it's almost not a foreign language anymore, right? Oh, no, no, foreign in terms of its origins. It's origin, yeah, yeah. Okay, so tell us then, you were there last in the 80s, is that what you said? I was there in 1983. Okay, which you hated, you said. Yeah, I mean, the infrastructure, the lack of a visible middle class was shocking, yeah, when you're coming from a country that prides in our middle class, unfortunately it's also shrinking here too. That's right, right. But what I noticed was, I would probably say 30 to 40% of the people were still quite poor, but there was a great deal of affluence and a very solid middle class. This time. This time, traveling domestically on planes, on first class trains, car ownership, which was largely reserved for the wealthy in that country in 1983, is something that the middle class can aspire to, having their own car. Okay, so you liked it better first of all, right? Well, how about the women? It was more comfortable. So the male-female relationships that I saw there in terms of how the two genders interact, women seemed a lot more independent. There were many more female business owners. There were women in commerce, women younger than the age of 40. Now, I'm not calling this progress, but from a standpoint of choice, I think it's progress. They were dressing the way they wanted to dress, which was Western, jeans, short skirts, heels. And if they wanted to for religious ceremonies, or cultural ceremonies, they wore traditional clothing, but it was something that was in large part relegated to special occasions where the clothing of the day, a fair number of older women were wearing what we would call comfortable Western clothing. We probably should, I would welcome any questions or comments from our audience if they are some. Otherwise, I did want to ask Kurt a couple of more of your impressions, including what is the situation with poverty that you saw, but also, is India kind of on the rise? What's going on in terms of global super-powered politics? What's going on? Yeah, so I think one of the points when you started out the conversation was India being a member of this loose confederacy called the BRICS, the RICS. Which is Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, which seems to be, as you said, a rather loose confederation of nations, which are really challenging the economic dominance of the West. Of the West, specifically the United States and the United Kingdom. Right, here you go, yeah, right. And one on each continent, which I find interesting. Right, yeah, there's a potential, right. With none in North America. None in North America, right, right. That's it, yeah. So the, now, two of the five members of BRICS are, certainly they have an adversarial, unfortunately, but they have an adversarial relationship being Indian-Chinese. So whether or not both nuclear powers and both have an adversarial relationship because there's- On the borders. On the borders. And the close relationship that China has with India's main adversary, military adversary, which is Pakistan. They've had a strong relationship for close to 60 years, China and Pakistan. So whether or not BRICS is really able to get off the ground and really, if it's able to replicate the unity that the European Union and the United States has, that's questionable because China and India are in this pack. But there's certainly a different point of view expressed on the ground in India that I found with respect to the war in Ukraine. Right, right. What was that? The conversations that I had with more educated people, a couple of people in my family was that, and I'm giving you an unfiltered comment, Ukraine is part of Russia. And so in a sense- End of sentence. Right, right, I'm sorry. So in a sense it was the same finding as our colleague Erickon Nero found in Africa that there's more favorability toward Russia than you might guess here, certainly. Certainly, certainly. And again, to give people a full picture in addition to this natural affinity that comes from Cold War alliances that people in India have towards Russia. Favorable. Favorable, yeah. The other part of it is that Russia has negotiated some fairly attractive petroleum oil. Deals. Deals with India to keep a loose group of countries as part of its oil market. So when I was in India, doing the conversion from their currency there, they're called rupees to US dollars and they use the metric system as opposed to the English common system that we use with respect to weights and measurements, trying to figure out how much a gallon of gas costs. So I was able to basically come to a conversion of about 550 a gallon, which in the United States that would probably lead to the change of political administration at the White House, but that was considered a good price in a country that's still more. And from what I understand before the Russians cut some of these sweet deals with the Indian government and Indian oil producers, the price of gasoline, as we call it, was closer to eight dollars a gallon there. Yeah, so I mean, I was given a couple of rides by some relatives and I was looking at the gas station pumps and all that and doing the conversion and thinking, boy, some of these new people that were just getting keys to cars in that country. Yeah, thinking, how would they pay eight dollars a gallon on incomes that are significantly lower? Nice photo op of three BRICS members. Which is? I'm not sure we have... No Putin's not, oh yes it is, yes, of course. We have Vladimir Putin from Russia, Modi in the middle and the Render Modi in the middle, the Xi Jinping of China. Well, again, like I said, nice photo op, but I don't know that the two guys on the right get along that well. It's a strange, yeah. Well, I don't know if Russia gets along with China either. Yeah. However, they've had their hostilities. But the thing that's so interesting to me, one of the reasons I think is my offices is here in this building called the African Association. The Association of Africans Living in Vermont is getting a different view on, for instance, the war in Ukraine because the colonized nations in Latin America, in Africa, and in India, and in Asia some really have a different view about Russia and China than what we do. Look, I mean, there's an allegation that, I mean, Pakistan, which was always firmly during the Cold War in the US. Yes, right. And the US used Pakistan as a launching base during the Soviet-Afghan War successfully, which may have led to the Soviet empire, basically. Falling apart. Bankrupt. Yeah, right. The prior prime minister of Pakistan, his name was Imran Khan, had some old cricket player who became prime minister of the country. There were allegations that when he, for the first time, warmed up to Putin and Russia, that the United States had something to do with his ouster. Of course. And he is no longer the prime minister. Yeah, that's not a surprise. Yeah, because they, you know, he did the unthinkable for Pakistan, which was solidly in the US camp for a long time. Since John Foster Dell has first visited Pakistan in the early 1950s during Eisenhower's administration, that the Pakistan and Russia don't have anything to do with one another. They don't have anything good to say about one another. When Prime Minister Khan of Pakistan entertained Putin coming to Islamabad, their capital, the next thing he knew, he was out of a job. Well, that happens everywhere. Yeah. If you think about it, any nation which appears to be leaning toward specifically Russia, not so much China, but Russia. Yeah. The United States always tries to overthrow and get regime change in those countries. Really, essentially, I think that's really probably what happened in Ukraine too. Yeah. In 2014, when the kind of the pro-Russian, Ukrainian president was chased out to be replaced by a president that was favorable to the EU, to NATO, and to the United States. I mean, this is part of the Cold War. But the other thing I find more and more interesting because it sort of has a lot transformed my thinking is that after World War II, when these colonial nations were seeking independence and seeking other modes of economy, other than dependence on the white European powers, Russia actually helped them. Yes. And so that's why they're not gonna be anti-Russia now. I don't think. I might be wrong. I guess I'm asking your opinion on that. But they seem to be... Yeah, Russia not only provided them economic assistance and military assistance, they also provided them with an economic model, which many countries... Yes, exactly. Exactly. And I use the term south. Yeah, the developing world. The developing world that it appeared to the leaders in those countries, the more populous leaders in those countries, that the system of capitalism that was espoused by Western Europe and the United States was not a feasible system for countries that had poverty levels that exceeded 50%. Yeah, right, right, right, right. And that trickle down theory. That's true, too. Yeah, trickle down theory of acquisition of wealth was simply not acceptable and was not quick enough in terms of developing, providing sustainable economic results for people. People needed food. People needed medical care, not notions about freedom and other types of more concepts, abstract concepts. And the system that Russia was offering was something that was a little bit more practical. And also appealing, yeah. And appealing, especially for countries that had excessive numbers. I'll try one other thing, and then maybe we should ask for questions before we wrap up. It was not appealing to those countries which had been colonized by the white European capitalist powers, the main ones, France, England, Holland to a certain extent, Portugal. Portugal, Belgium. Right, those countries had, according to those colonized countries, had been exploited. So they're not gonna turn to them, those countries for assistance as they gain independence. Not without a great assault, yeah. In terms of the advice that they put on. So their view is enormously different, I suppose, than the views of the West. And honestly, because, regardless of our disagreements with China about different things, China has made tremendous inroads in Africa. Exactly, also as Russia, too. Yeah, but China doesn't have a history of colonializing these powers. And so there's no negative racial baggage that China has. There's no slave trade, as you pointed out. There's no slave trade, there's no slave trade, and there's no real racial baggage that China has when they show up in Uganda to build roads. And Russia doesn't really either. And Russia did not either. They did not have colonies in the developing world where apartheid-type systems were implemented for a ruling class at a... So India is then on the rise, wouldn't you say? It appears that way. I think they have significant hurdles to overcome. Their expenditures in areas of defense are quite debilitating. Yeah, however, fortunately we are in a wealthy country. At this point, right? Yeah, but we are a rich country, if not the richest. And India is not. So having a large military defense budget of having to buy extremely sophisticated fighter planes and keeping the nuclear arsenal up to snuff is a huge cost. And it's often, it comes down to guns or butter. Yes, right, according to my economics college handbook. Right, whether or not you're gonna provide the population with certain social benefits, which are practically non-existent in India, or do you keep the country safe from actual land armies and or proxies through terrorist actions, you know, in quotes. However, it does seem to be, in your opinion, a power to watch on the global. If not for any other reason, the fact that the population is gonna exceed that of China's in two months from the date of this show. Okay, are there any questions or comments from our audience or are we gonna say good night for now, I guess? And I just want to announce what we are also doing next week for the Vermont Institute of Community and International Involvement, or Vicki. Next week, we will be interviewing and with an in-person hybrid audience, Jean Bergman, are you Jean Bergman, who is a city counselor in Burlington from Ward 2, who is going to speak about the resolution that's going to be placed on our town meeting ballot.  This is a citizen's commission. I don't exactly know how that citizen's commission would be elected or appointed. However, it is a very important ballot item. We will be interviewing one of his chief proponents next week, counselor Bergman. And I'm hoping to have both an in-person audience here at AALB at 20 Allen Street on the third floor and also join us on Zoom. On the 15th, we will have the opponent of that same resolution, city counselor Ben Traverse and he will be here to speak against it. So join us either in person on Zoom. I thank Kurt Mada for being with us tonight to talk about this very important to me anyway, different India that is emerging in the current years. So thanks, Kurt, and thanks. Thank you, Sandra. Thank you, Eric Añero for all his technological skills and putting this forward. We'll see you in a week or so. Thank you.


It was clear that Lena would need an external support that would do the job instead of her own heart. Just because they couldn't copy the heart 50 years ago doesn't mean we can't sit now. There are some devices out there which actually give us help. Working at BerlinHeart gives you some very unique kind of challenges. Of course you have a quite different view on your challenges when at the end of the line a life depends on it. The heart itself is just a simple pump and so with our ventricular assist device we are building a kind of add-on for the heart. So the heart and the VAD share the load. The heart then can take it quite easy for some time until you're healed. The challenges are not only technical but very medical, a lot of bioengineering. The variance of the physiology is different from one children to another. The testing is important and that's where the AI system is helping by simulating the human body for us. Measurement devices from an AI combine the sensors we need right now. Almost all of the challenges for a blood pump are more challenging when you want to build a device for children. When Jennifer was born we were told that her only chance of survival would be a heart transplant. The younger they are the harder it tends to be on their bodies. It was clear that she was not going to survive her weight unless drastic measures were taken. Our only option was the X-Core system. There were no other options to keep Jennifer alive. X-Core is like unique to the world. You cannot compare to other products. You need to show that your product is doing what it should do and you can only do that by testing. We try to substitute the physiological parameters of a body. You get pressure, you get temperature control. You need to start to think about what happens if it's raining outside, what happens if it's 35 degrees outside. We are using an AI equipment on a daily basis so we can see different small failures in the product which we can only see by testing. I'm highly motivated to go to work as I know that my work is helping other people. Juniper, altogether, she was on the X-Core system four and a half months. The day that we left the hospital then it really hit home that we got to finally take our baby home and start our new normal with her. If there was no X-Core system she would never have survived. If I could say something to the engineers that helped make the X-Core system, I would say thank you. They have saved not only my child but countless children who would never have a chance to make it to transplant if it wasn't for their hard work. Do you remember the machine that mommy has shown you that you had to have saved my life? Hi baby, I love you.


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I've been fascinated by, and that is rituals. Okay, like we're getting right into it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But like extremely fascinated by rituals. Good. I'm a big student of mythology. Okay. Specifically like Joseph Campbell. Yeah, good. And I'm going deep on Joseph Campbell, looking at stuff like Arthur Schopenhauer talks about, but even looking at like modern day military where they have certain ritual practices or even looking at religion where they have ritual practices and looking at like how one ritual can be a catalyst to completely transform someone's perception of reality. And so you wrote this paper, how rituals alter the brain to help us perform better. Okay, I was wondering which paper you're really referring to, but that's it. Yeah, good, good. So I'd love to kind of do a deep dive on this. Yeah, totally. So I'll have to think back now because that's a few years in the middle of my PhD. That was work that I did with a shout out to a student, a former student of mine, Devon Bonk. Devon is now a PhD student in his own right at I think the physical education department, kinesiology department at University of Toronto. So he and I were just brainstorming one day talking about rituals in the context of performance and in performance generally, but in particular with athletes and professional athletes. And so you have, and I'll talk about athletes in a second to sort of set up context, but I remember I was actually talking to one of the lead surgeons, I think it was St. Mike's.   She will do the cosmetic surgery to help them and skin grafts, et cetera. And we sat down to her coffee and it was really interesting. She's like, we actually have these quirky pre-performance rituals before we go into the operating suite, the operating room, where the head surgeon and the nurses will engage in these really weird superfluous quirky behaviors that we could construe as ritualistic. And she said, it's particularly odd for us because doctors and in particular surgeons are seen as like the most cold calculated robotic like human being. If there ever was one or should be one, it should be a surgeon who's not operating or doing their job based off of some sort of emotion, but instead of sort of sticking to a process and a protocol. And she said, despite that stereotype, despite that image of the surgeon, we were still engaging in these performative rituals because they helped to, and they did, most people don't have an answer when you talk to them about why do you do these rituals? It's really, you have to probe them and unpack it. But she's like, yeah, it just makes us feel like where we can do our job. We feel better about it. So they even had like a shrine before. Really?  They would have this shrine that they would, dare I say, like pray to before going in and operating. So that psychology, which is, I'm going into some performance context. It's high stakes. I'm feeling particularly anxious. I'm feeling stressed. I need to do something to anticipate what's going to come. And that usually manifests itself in some form of ritual or ritualistic behavior. So we see it in there, insurgents. We see it in military and we see it in athletes. So athletes are the one that we sort of think about because it's sort of, you know, we see it in sports. We love to follow athletes. It's just sort of fun to see what they do. Raphael Nadal is highly ritualistic and, you know, bordering into compulsive, how obsessive and extreme he is when he does his pre-performance and during performance rituals. So you could argue that most professional athletes, most people who have some sort of high stakes performance will have a ritual. And so this is where we were starting at with the study. So then the next question was, okay, from process, from sort of looking at it mechanistically because we're scientists, we want to understand what's actually going on. Why are they doing these things? Because it's a bit of an opaque window. We're not really sure why they do them. So it's like, okay, let's look in the brain. And we have these great neuroscience methodologies and tools that we can use to sort of peer into the inner workings of a person's brain and see what is actually happening during a ritual when a person is doing that ritual and what is happening after they've done the ritual when they're mid-performance. And we had two hypotheses, two competing hypotheses. The first was that rituals help to alleviate anxiety and the part in the brain that's sort of responsible for generating that signal of anxiety, especially in particular in response to failure.  Some people will collapse under that pressure, under that weight, other people will sort of push it back and move on. So we thought that ritual is sort of helping them move on past that performance setback. And then the other function we hypothesized was that rituals are helping us to align our motivation, getting us in the right sort of frame of mind so that we can go into that performance with a degree of confidence, that we're sort of self-signaling to ourselves, I'm ready for this, whatever it might be. So why that's important is because there's a particular brain signal, a particular signal in the brain that arises from the anterior cingulate cortex or the ACC, which is just behind our prefrontal cortex. It's sort of seen as the, in sort, our ancestral past, our evolutionary past is seen as the first prefrontal cortex before the humans had the massive prefrontal cortex that we have.  Very adaptive, very functional signal that we have. And so we wanted to see, does ritual mute that signal, sort of turn it down, or does ritual heighten that signal? And why that's important is because that signal has been associated with chronic anxiety. So people with clinical generalized anxiety disorder and OCD tend to have a very high amplitude, a very high signal of the ERN, because they're hypervigilant, what's going on? What's going on? Am I feeling a certain way? Why am I feeling that way? So they have this massive ERN signal. So a big signal can mean that you're overly anxious and overly hypervigilant, which is not good for performance. So ritual might actually help to just turn down a little bit, not so much so that you're sort of not seeing any of the failure. You don't want to mute it completely, but you want to see it in such a way so that you don't react defensively. So that you accept the failure, you integrate it and you move forward in an adaptive way. So we call this like priming. Yeah, I guess it's, yeah, the ritual, you mean? Yeah.   Yeah, that's good. Going back to, so the people with generalized anxiety to sort of have a really high signal, people who are super religious, zealots extreme, even extreme like in their religiosity and religious behavior have a very low signal, meaning sort of like back to, I can't remember who said it, maybe Marx, religion is the opiate of the masses. So religion is this analgesic, it's this distraction so that we don't have to face some of the most harsh realities of our existence, which is like we're mortal. What Nietzsche had is saying, like the toughest thing a man can do is to sit by himself. That's it, exactly, exactly. And there's a study that gets at that, which is hilarious, talk about it in a second. And so the ritual for an athlete or for anyone who's going into performance is sort of somewhere in between those two states. You're not the extreme religious person who's refusing to acknowledge that life is tough, but you're also not the hyper-vigilant chronic warrior and worry-wartened person with anxiety, who's just picking up type two errors everywhere they go. So you're sort of right in the middle. And that's what we find with the study. And one other thing I'll say about that is why that's a particularly cool study, aside from the fact that we did it, is that we designed an ad hoc ritual, so something that we created. That's not cool. Because we couldn't, because as a scientific experiment, we couldn't go to a person and say, do your ritual before, because there's all sorts of confounds with it. Yeah, it skew the results too. Exactly, so anytime you're doing a true experiment, you have an experimental condition and a control condition, you need all of the participants in both conditions to have the same starting point.  And so that's what we did. I created up, I designed this set of behaviors that involves repetition, redundancy, a lot of movements and vocalizations. And then we said to them, we didn't even use the term ritual whatsoever, because that comes with its own hidden meanings. Of course, yeah. Confrontations. So we said to them, do these actions once or twice a day for a week, memorize them and then come into the lab and you're gonna do this performance thing and we gave them the opportunity to do the ritual one last time. But essentially what they were doing was they were taking these arbitrary ad hoc behaviors and ritualizing them as a function of doing them every day at home. So that by the time they came into the lab on the eighth day or whatever it was, those behaviors are no longer just mere behaviors. Those are in a sense, ritualized behaviors. So that was another important point, sort of a value out of that particular study.


So, I'm not anything the same like, you know, nere muta. But I'm not said, I'm not anything like Chella Tukuta, who comes to insult people and whatever. No, no, no, me I'm not insulting people. I don't insult people, I'm not insulted Muizukanji. Of course, she made me upset when she posted what was a private conversation she posted it on social media. That's what made me upset. I was trying to reach out to her and she texts that and posted it on social media. That was very wrong and that's why I went ballistic on her because you don't do that. What was she trying to create? What impression was she trying to create? What narrative was she trying to create? That I was talking to her, I was after her. Come on, that is what made me upset. But really, the point is just those two. Number one, yes, you can go as high as you want but not at an expense of this guy. No, it is not right. You cannot be using a name of somebody. You cannot be using somebody to be jumping on him to go up. That is what I'm against. Number two, you have a child together. I mean, do a co-parenting. Let this child be also part of the father. Because the father is there and the father is dying to be with the child. So why should you create this barrier? Why should you distance the child from the father? That was my objective. So I am totally different from those people that you celebrate to say they are heroes, whatever like Chela. I mean, in South people for no apparent reason.  I mean, why are you doing that? Why are you doing that? You are not promoting people. Why are you spreading that hat? Why, for what? And the same with this Didi Mutambo.  The sky is the limit. It's true. It's true. I would love that if I have an opportunity when I will be president.  I will definitely live, I will not live Muizukange out of my government. I'm telling you, I would not. And even now, if HH has something that he can give to Muizukange, I would say, please go for it. Give, give her. I would really want that. I would really want that. That is okay. So I'm not against her progress. No, I'm not.   You have to talk rubbish outside. That's the end of the Pyana language. They speech or you don't see anything like that. Why are you talking like that. You don't know why I am telling you. You don't know why I am telling you. So I go from all these stories. I can't recall. I will take all the rest of your stories.  You like talking about that, but you know, I... But your behaviour doesn't show your marriage. It doesn't show your marriage. Why doesn't it show your marriage? xa' birth xa' mounsant xa', mounsant yah 2 Gadhi bul bir mu pe Instagram pall. Which way are you talking about schöne Forbes? Why are you talking about him? Hey guardianship messages have got tons and tons of messages Why are people можем g despuésова venge new messages for your maps? Why are they sending you messages? For what? Why are they sending you messages coolly? Don't destroy your in your really cool map more popular kind stories can be put our versions disunity feed for them.  It can't happen! You can't bring an excavator on an open pitaux mine You can't bring an excavator on an open pitaux mine It's an open pit It's opens That's mushrooms It's doesn't look like mushrooms So why are you busy talking about an excavator which has got no use for you and it will never have use for you? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why? we should be clapping for your maps because in terms of music i mean it's one of those it's one of the legends that guy is a legend why are we not celebrating him we are not celebrating him because we have good people like each team are you i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm telling you this because you are that toxic you are that toxic and i want to tell you that i'll be following you i'll be following you you talk nonsense i will come and talk you talk nonsense i will come and respond you you the way you are responding about me is you can't what i said you are trying to feel well you know again that catheter instead of advising the young lady nicely instead of advising the young lady nicely so you are misleading people you are misleading people like a serpent and that's why you need to be craft what i said is not bad the reasonable people they have understood what i was talking about they have understood and surely if you are a sensible woman you're supposed to be advising that young lady properly you're supposed to be advising that young lady properly to say no i mean you have this child please allow this child to be in the life of this woman now you are encouraging hey so you are the bad people that needs to be told off and i'm telling you off advise that young lady encourage nicely we don't have a problem we don't have a problem you are you encouraging we don't have a problem but advise a proper you are yours aa what you like how many children you have how many father's you are do you have hany many fathers buy one in the bank how many fathers do you have for those children do you allow those those children to interact with their fathers do you allow them do you why are you so interested in your maps my my my brothers and sisters excuse me i'm talking so strongly but i want this chimayoti chi re ke e fo chi chi ta because you cannot be talking pamo ai chi like that and in the meantime you come up and cover yourself shan shani god what what what what god are you talking about which god allows you to talk so badly about a young man which god is this what are you preaching what nonsense is that what nonsense is that you preach you preach you preach but what's your problem woman what's your problem he is not your husband mind that husband of yours talk about your husband don't talk about your maps don't don't talk about your maps talk about yourself you have made people hate your maps for no apparent reason your maps is a humble guy is a humble guy he doesn't talk much he doesn't he doesn't yes he has reacted sometimes because of the way you have pushed him that's how he has reacted he has reacted because of you know bad women like you talking about him when he's innocent what has he done what wrong has he done the wrong thing that your maps the only thing that your maps has done is because you know there was this narrative that was running around created by muizukanji which has to stop and of course marrying this woman child in the calipa and i understand but you cannot compare yourself to this young girl you can't you can't kill this and and you can't there's no comparison there is no comparison you can't compare yourself with a a a database a database here in federo database here in federo you come and compare yourself with an s-class of this of this of new mode a new model you can't you can't run together database here five speed um with an s-class new model new model here you compare hey database here in india now here in india here kale here but you visit her also instead compared to know we are going to know that we should compete hey what what what are you talking about to you might kill this why why then body kill is you you say a lot of things hey why are you talking about this young girl why why you cannot be talking like that you can't i'll be responding to you and yes you can accuse me that you know they have paid me but to me youngsters they can't give me nothing hey they can't give me nothing even when i look at their life i just smile i'm saying let them enjoy their life life is not yet has not even yet started with life is not yet has not even has not even yet started with those has not yet even started your maps na kid is life has not even yet started it hasn't they have got a long way to go they have got a long way to go and and elders like ourselves what we do is to wish them well is to encourage them is to guide them that's what we do not to start coming and insulting them that's what you do elders is to encourage them and where necessary guide them but guide them even that guidance there is a way that you guide people there is a way that you guide people reach out to people find a way of reaching out but then you cannot also impose yourself you can't impose yourself you can't impose yourself so why are you imposing yourself to be in a chimbusa for kid is team for kid is team and the the husband that you you so much uh you know crave to have because manakashin gare kufubira nishare foa at na iwomu pishepo because you are appalling that as much as i'm older than you but not even me you need somebody shanshani those are the kind of people that you need to be looking after because even that boy that boy that you brage my husband my husband my husband i don't know how available he is because it is really really available you wouldn't be so much on social media talking about the young people even you need but i want to talk about the naka 70 80 shanshani shanshani will ever change according to my diapers those are the people that you need so leave the young boy leave your maps leave kid is leave them let them enjoy their life those are just young people let them enjoy their life i know kid is sometimes she comes out strong that's that's a fact sometimes kid is comes out strong but you know i mean what you expect from a young person when you push a young person i mean she will respond because i've watched many times people that have complained about kids i do go and watch to say how come she said this this is what i do i've seen two more comments no i've ever i go to see and i really see that i mean the woman was provoked and as a young person at the age really i mean you expect sometimes to come out like that of course it's not that i'm encouraging you know bad language i'm not i'm not but you should be understanding for some for people that are young even when they are dancing they are young they are young even kid is herself she's young don't make her old don't make her old that's why even me i'm not really a person that should be wearing too much t-shirts to her so you know you know let them enjoy their life let them enjoy they have got only one kid for goodness sake between them of course there is there is book at that or they need to be considered i really want to you guys you should be considered in bukata because bukata is part of your family don't leave out bukata in in in in your issues please consider and do whatever it takes to be part of part of you that issue of having wedding you know birthdays and she's not there that should end by the last event that will happen or the other events make sure that that child is part of part of you i'm encouraging those of you who are watching to watch the video that i posted earlier on where this child is coming out and blaming the father to say you were not there for me and the father is coming out to say but look i only had the one night stand with your mother and the your mother was very difficulty and the girl is still blaming the father to say no you should have fought hard you should have fought hard for me and so i'm saying the same thing to your maps and the and kid is because you are together fight hard for that child let that child feel part of that family i'm sure mouzukanji is going to respond uh you know differently i am very sure i know some people have been talking to i know that and i'm very sure that i mean she listens she listens she will definitely you know facilitate that you know this child is part of this family and and i believe that you know even mouzukanji and kid is can actually be in talking terms can actually be in talking terms can actually be friends i believe so but you know why it is difficult for these people to be to be to be friends it is because of people like living tambo that is a problem it is because of like people like living tambo they encourage if you have up but they encourage hatred and so those of you who are saying yes you support mouzukanji if you support mouzukanji please allow mouzukanji you know to soften up so that they can be friends even with the kid is for the sake of their children we have got families today i was talking to namzi i was talking to namz not a lot of you know namzi you know that girl that was in prison and whatever i was talking to her i was talking to her you know when i was driving from from kawater and as we were chatting i remember visiting visiting her at her house and you know she she she divorced with her husband but she has got children her children they stay with the father and they step mum and they visit namzi and even the child that they have the child that the husband the ex-husband have with the wife even visits namzi at her home the child like in this case like the child of your mups and kiddies even visits namzi in other ways like the child that is between namzi between your mups and kiddies even visiting your mouzukanji's house it is possible it is possible and even in my situation i can tell you my kia goes to my to my ex-wife my two girls when they when they go she goes kia goes to my ex ex-wife kia goes there even when they go out recently our daughter completed grade 12 and they went out for lunch and kia was part of them what is wrong with that that is how we supposed to be whatever rivalry that is between two mub two women should not be transmitted to children it shouldn't it shouldn't yes this woman as they pass with your husband yes you are this you are now the current whatever you have those issues for the sake of the children you are supposed to drop down those emotions you're supposed to drop down those emotions and it is possible and if that happens it is very good it's very healthy for the children because the children will grow up knowing to say our parents are in harmony not every day akrimon akrimon akrimon it is not helpful but i do understand i understand mizukandji she also still young i understand kiddies she's young i understand mups she's young elder like leading tumble elder does like leading tumble ah the ones who are supposed to help them to see things like that but if elders like you leading tumble first before you even start fueling hatred you even pray what nonsense is that you even pray and then you start fueling nonsense fueling you know hatred between mizukandji and and and kiddies why are you fueling that hatred why not encourage these women to support each other you are saying supporting women supporting women why can't you support these women why can't you support the unity of these two women for the sake of their children and for the sake of the good the the the whole country because if there is harmony between these two they can do a lot


In the latest episode of Bill Maher's Club Random Podcast, his guest, Andrew Schultz, complains about a phenomenon that's not actually happening. But like the rub that he is, Bill Maher believes him and proceeds to get enraged by said phenomenon that's not actually happening. And then they kind of just go back and forth complaining about this thing that isn't really a thing that nobody's talking about. And it's so laughable, it almost feels like this could be satirical. Like if you told me that this was satire and I didn't know the people involved, I would believe you. Nonetheless, this is real and they're seriously angry about this issue. Let's watch. The reason we're gay is because we're attracted to one sex rather than the other, right?  Well, but that's binary. That's binary. The other guy. Yes, no, I know.    What?   I can't even follow this. Let me tell you.  You are.   No, they don't add on a penis. Okay.  But no penis. No penis, actually no.   Yes. Well, yeah, I find that. That's where we are. I've gone from, I was once told. But it's just a preference.  Oh Christ, I hope they don't snip that out here. Bill Maher says, no, but that's, I can't even.    Before I ask you your plot. And how are you telling me this? I mean, when does, how does it end? The gay rights movement was about liberation. This is about controlling people.   No, they're not. They're not. You made that up. Who believes you? This is one of those stories that somebody tells that on its face is so ridiculous that you can obviously see that they're lying. They're making it up because they're bored or they want attention.   And I don't know why you made that up. But regardless, you are playing into this vilification narrative about trans people pushed by the right, which intends to portray them as unreasonable authoritarian bullies when in actuality, that's not what their real grievances are. I take it most trans people don't care if you're attracted to them. In fact, I'd say that 99.9% of trans men couldn't care less about you, Andrew Schultz, and whether or not you want to date them. But what they do care about is being able to exist regardless if you understand them or are attracted to them.  But when a community becomes a political target, people will believe anything to confirm their preexisting biases about this community. I mean, ask yourself this, Andrew, do you really believe that trans people are demanding everyone in society to be pansexual? Do you honestly think that most trans people are thinking about whether or not folks like you are attracted to them? They're normal people just like you and I, they're thinking about video games and how to pay the bills.   He also said something that stood out to me. He said, quote, if we get rid of the binary, what happens to homosexuals? As if gays and lesbians are existentially threatened by the existence of trans people, it's just so cynical and bad faith that it's laughable. It feels like a parody.     Cody Johnson sarcastically asked, are they?  And the same sentiment was also expressed by Daniel Summers, who also said he has never been told this in his years as a gay man. And the same is true for Ashton Pittman, who says literally nobody is telling us this.  And that right there is I think the core issue here.  And this is just another example of that. More responses here.  I love how nobody's buying this. Oatmeal influencer says, nobody in human history has ever said this. Andy Richter responded saying, can you believe all this stuff that isn't happening to me? It's like there are whole groups of people who aren't doing things that impact me in any meaningful way. And I'm furious about it. Life is so hard for me because of all the things that aren't really happening. I think that the only thing that would have made that story better was if he confronted the person who said that he's a bigot for being gay and then said, and everybody clapped like that. Just that would have been like the cherry on top. If he said that, I think it just would have been perfect.  And I wouldn't be surprised if Andrew Schultz ended up on that subreddit. Now I tweeted out that response. I showed you what I said, but somebody decided to bring the receipts and they shared this tweet for all the people about to say this isn't happening. Here are the receipts. And she linked to a tweet from 2018 with, wait for it, two retweets. Wow. You know what? I stand corrected. Andrew Schultz is correct. This is apparently a wide-ranging phenomenon because two people retweeted that and 17 liked it. So, yeah, look, you can probably find a tweet from a trans person who's also a white supremacist and maybe that tweet has 10 likes. But does that mean that all trans people are white supremacists and all trans people agree with that sentiment? Of course not. Trans people, again, like all people, human beings, just like us, they're not a monolith. OK, sometimes they'll say things that you might disagree with. That's fine. Sometimes they'll say things that other trans people don't agree with. But the problem is that these generalizations at this time when they're fighting for existence, literally, are extremely harmful because it just adds to this narrative that these people should be outcasts from society. Look at them. They're so unreasonable. They're bullies. We're supposed to accept them. Like this all adds to that narrative.  And of course, Bill Maher believes it because why wouldn't he? He has made it his mission to showcase any times whenever the left has gone too far, gone too woke. But how often does he actually talk about right wing extremism, which is actually a threat to US democracy? It's just it's comical at this point. But the sad part is that narratives like this, even if most people don't believe it, it still lands with some people and they believe it. It's just another reason for bigots to hate trans people.  I should definitely be against them.   Don't date trans people. Don't talk to trans people. Don't understand it. And just let them exist. Stop fighting against them. Right.  Live and let live. Why don't we get back to that philosophy? OK, defend them because the same reasons why the right is against them are for the same reasons that the right is against you. I dreamed I saw my maternal grandmother. She was stroking herself absentmindedly. I let her have her way. The genital region was exposed. I let her have her way.


So we're hit guys and inadvertently kind of a whole rest of the industry is now latched on to high intensity in some Former fashion as maybe defined differently than we would use it, but they're definitely calling it that Rather than than trying to find out, you know, how little can they work? They're trying to know the pendulum has swing totally in the opposite direction How much hard work can we do not just work? But how much really ridiculous hard work the crossfits the insanity these these things Why do you think all of a sudden work hard work is in vogue? I mean it's just this kind of brain sort of picking out that while the sudden those of us who've been Attempting to just work really really hard for a really long time now all of a sudden everybody else Oh, it's really really hard to even if they're defining it differently Bill. I don't know I just can't I want to think there's a cultural like guys, but I don't think there is no I think it's just the fetish nature of the exercise industry. I think it's just It's turn the next thing. It's just it's turn Now in the literature side of things the pendulum is really swung towards high intensity and Finding out how brief you know what the minimal effective dose is so in the in the scientific field They're really swinging our way and they've swung so far our way I'm just waiting for the the backlash and the pendulum to swing in the other direction. Why all the hard I Think a lot of it probably spawns out a crossfit. It's done a beautiful job of tapping into the the 30 to 40 year old Yuppie mentality of Johnny quest and you know They're not gonna know what Johnny quest is But just that whole you know, I'm You know Because you know her one the core with his with his movement idea I think he actually has something there as far as trying to change physical education Yeah in America or in anywhere for that matter because one of things I picked up in graduate school is really interesting was that this idea of not like You know being strong to be being good enough in your body to be useful in other things rather than just being a walking sculpture In actually in the physical education literature There's a backlash against like sports-based physical education because kids can opt out so early and they learn nothing about how to move Yeah, they don't even learn the game because if they can get tagged out first thing They're not comfortable their bodies. They're just out big movement in the 50s and 60s It was very much like move Nat. Yeah in elementary school physical education I mean, I remember I was in middle school. They even had a book about it called toughen up And it was all these kids, you know monkey bars and doing the human flag and all this sort of stuff Teaching the human flag to kids. Yeah, that's crazy and That just gradually fell out of vogue and now Well, I can't imagine. I thought it was in it was in you know my talk earlier when I was saying how you know We're in a high Stimulating it highly stimulating environment and so these kids are always clicking the dopamine button It's no surprise that boys sit in class and they just go. Oh my god.  Yeah, like that was all it took and it's just You know, I just now hopefully it swings back in that other direction Well, you know when I was a kid We had the president's physical fitness test twice. Yeah, that's still existed when I was like when I was in high school Yeah, but I haven't heard anything of it now. They actually in my kids school They had a presidential fitness award thing Last year they did away with it Because it was you know encouraging Competitivism and wasn't fair to the kids that weren't as athletic and in turn that was discouraging the less athletic kids from Participate, how do you tease out that data and be like clearly? It was the presidential fitness program that made this kid get a D in math You know, there's no data. It's just a you know Now the political correctness gone wild the high schools in my town Part of their gym. They have exercise machines cardio machines. So it is more fitness-based than sports-based But it's just like it's just like corporate fitness, right? It's the top guy as a fitness guy They can justify the corporate fitness right that guy top guy leaves and the accounts come in. It's gone It's gone. What do we use the square footage for get rid of right? Yeah, so it's the top guys, you know preference I guess Well, you know, it's it's funny kind of you even see that in places You think should have should actually be on board with this Like we were as a company trying to get in with St. David's a hospital in in in Austin there We're and we're trying and they built this beautiful like 2000 square foot like fitness center for their for their people kind of adjunctive to their McKenzie physical therapy clinic And the things like that cobwebs like like nobody's using it at the rate that that they thought it would be used And it's it always blows my mind how many times I'm driving across town And I drive past one of the hospitals and all the nurses outside smoking Oh, yeah, just like a litany and then there and then there's the guy of course with who's who's drug his IV out Toot me's out there smoke. Yeah, it's just like I Don't know one of the things that came away through my graduation about health education is like you can't just rationally present Things to people you can't just be like here is the Interpersonal like like dare dare to keep kids off drugs doesn't like drop the drop the car from the crane now I remember I was gonna talk about here we go drop the car from the crane and the crash is like This is what happens if you're if you're high and you get a car wreck and all the kids go cool Yeah, they don't they don't get excited excited about that and health and fitness simultaneously You have a whole slew of people who need it and they can't be reached rationally They need like structural changes to their lifestyle or they need Some amount of some amount of I'm gonna say community intervention perhaps too strong word But facility being able to facilitate getting over some of those hurdle excuses like you're talking about in a marketing sense But we in the fitness industry kind of have but not we necessarily in this room But the fitness industry in general they have the sort of highest shiniest fruit I use this in Al Jago if you're under an apple tree and you're hungry. What do you do? You're usually grab an apple, but if you're in the fitness industry What do you do? You try to climb to the top of the tree and get that apple like inherently it becomes this incredibly complex thing Overly complex thing right out of the gate for so many people if they can start it. It's inherently unsustainable. They crash They never go back. This is the New Year's resolution cycle Well, and this is what we talked about eight years ago ten years so though Which was where where hit if it is a phenomenon say Drop the ball was by emphasizing how hard and how brutal the workout was and how big But that wasn't what the general public That that wasn't appealing to the general public the general public would have found the peeling half hour once or twice a week That you know, you know the real the real Real basics, but the real. Yes. Yes Early nor less marketing and I don't even know if it was marketing at the time was look how efficient We made strength training so they have more time to go practice go do your martial arts go do your sports and Then somehow it got it got turned into you know It really seemed to succeed in spite of itself because I don't know if it was like this for the Nautilus fitness centers for you Like it was for me back in the mid 70s when they just blew up everywhere But what you got from the community that was just clamoring like standing in line in the morning to get in It was like a Nautilus Center was like studio 54 You know, it's like a big dude with a velvet rope just to get in kind of that was genuine though That wasn't manufactured like nowadays, right? But it but it didn't come out of their marketing it came in spite of their marketing It was just like all these things are cool-looking and it's different and All the all the beautiful people are doing it So everyone wants to do it. We have nothing to do with their actual marketing approach It just right happened or again How much Arthur made in spite of the fact you didn't like have like non-competes with the people buying his equipment or like like Darden to talk more about this but like sell these lines of equipment and it was like the agreement was like two lines It was like yeah, it it was a way People could get out of it in in a very reasonable way and go off and somehow not do the Nautilus method Not that whole thing. I think my Dr. Doug McGuff who had a great talk today to my left buildy Simone who's been training people about as long as I've been alive Yeah, as long as I'm in a yeah, yeah, and based on talks yesterday So what we're gonna do is a kind of as a point of interest ten years ago, roughly What was the sticking point for so many people reading the book was it? Physics was it physiology? Well, you know First it wasn't so I'm not a professional writer. So this wasn't an assignment. I didn't have a market in mind I had injured myself and this is me working out over really four-year stretch me working out what happened and discovering what I prefer to as a disconnect between exercise and biomechanics and So basically I rebuilt my own Process of working out and then I realized what from all my notes and sketches and diagrams women. I have something here But I didn't know what it was. I didn't know if it was a commercial book. I didn't know if it was an academic book so I just put it together and Had a smile bound because I didn't know I remember getting that book Yeah, and of all the ones you've written That's my favorite one because when it came to me it like has this little note scrolled on it It's like big and my own blah blah blah and like please read this. Tell me what you think and I Well, it's so cool because you were living through your thought process you were thinking on paper and I was like one One exercise, yeah, and I have a lot of stuff in the studio. I have to do one these things Why do you think all of a sudden work hard work is in vogue I mean it's just kind of brain Sort of picking out a lot of wild of sudden And the turn of the 1800s with health food and then I'm forgetting the name of some of the guys in the late 1800s with these like full-on You're gonna you know be barefoot. You're gonna be naked. You're gonna be training for an army fat Yeah, that's right. That's right the lion and


This is stock number nine four two six. We are here at Summit Automotive in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin Your new and used Jeep headquarters today. We are checking out this super clean 2018 Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo this vehicle has a 3.6 liter v6 motor From this HD video you will be able to tell that this Jeep is extremely clean all the way around No dense dings or scuffs on that front bumper billet silver is the color it has good year for Tara tires on it These are 245 70 r 17s No scuffs or scrapes on this rim and that tire looks like it has about 60 to 70 percent of the tread left We shoot all of our videos in 1080p So if you have HD capabilities on your computer tablet or smartphone device turn them on right now because it's like You're right here looking at the Jeep with me. I didn't see any denser dings on that hood It has the projector lamp headlamps and the projector lamp fog lamps down there Very nice shiny paint passenger side room is an excellent condition as well No scuffs or scrapes on that and as you go down this side of the Jeep No dense no dings very very clean down this side We shoot these videos So if you are far away or even if you're close by and just cannot make the trip down You can still see the vehicle hear the vehicle and have confidence in what you're looking at before you even get here So a lot of vehicles out of state and this is mainly how we do it Making sure our customers know exactly what they're getting before they even get here back rim No scuffs or scrapes and those back tires have just as much tread as the front tires as We come around to the back You can see the rear bumper does have the built-in Reverse sensors The rear gate is an excellent shape no dense or dings on that does have a backup camera The back storage area is very very clean got two little compartments on each side and Underneath you have the full-size spare tire with all the jack tools Those seats do fold down almost completely flat for extra storage a lot of nice metal flake in that billet silver color and As we go down this side of the vehicle just as clean as the passenger side Didn't see any dense or dings down this side of the vehicle and For full disclosure this back rim here is an excellent shape. No scuffs or scrapes on that Did want to show you one thing one feature that this vehicle does have it does have the capitalist fuel fill Which is a really nice feature never get gas on your hands again Power windows power locks and power mirrors the nice woodgrain trim Throughout auto headlamps. We got factory floor mats throughout this vehicle as well power driver seat No rips or tears on this seat and it is an excellent condition black cloth interior part of the Laredo package an inch configurable TFT display and you can see that this one has 15,219 miles with the digital Spedometer right there in the left-hand side you can see it as the compass right-hand side outside temperature display And those are all configurable so you can change those Leather wrap steering wheel Bluetooth audio controls on that side cruise controls on this side back of the steering wheel has radio controls and Speaking of the radio. This is the seven inch Seven inch radio it is Apple CarPlay and Android Auto compatible also has a very high definition backup camera Dual climate control starts stop technology backup sensors the eco mode can do a sport mode where you Shift with the handle here and then a stability control Has AM FM and serious satellite radio capabilities Down here you have an Augs and two USB jacks This one has the keyless enter-and-go system, which is a really nice feature You just have to have the key in your pocket and then you can just press the start stop button And that will start the vehicle passenger seat is very clean as well. No rips or tears on that And we have a factory floor mat on that side as well Take a quick look at the back seats and then we will check out under the hood Back seats are just as clean as the front seats. No rips or tears back here It does have the latch child safety system for your car seats and these seats with that lever right there Do fold down and you can see it see that they go almost completely flat back here Which is really nice if you're hauling extra stuff You also have your rear air vents right there and factory floor mats throughout back here Take a quick look under the hood heated mirrors Under the hood we have the award-winning 3.6 liter Pentastar v6 motor engine bays very clean runs very smooth this Jeep has been fully safety and inspected by our Jeep certified Technicians has a fresh oil and filter change all the fluids have been checked and topped off and the vehicle has been To make sure that it is 100% ready for you And to see more pictures of this Jeep Grand Cherokee or one of our other 400 new and used cars trucks SUVs minivans Wranglers half-tons you name it. We got it go to our website www.summitauto.com full pictures and descriptions of every single vehicle on our lot Videos of every single used vehicle that we have all at summit auto.com Thank you so much for checking out the video if you want to make this Jeep ears Give us a call right now<PHONE_NUMBER> ask for one of our sales associates to make this Jeep ears today Once again that number is<PHONE_NUMBER>. Thanks again for checking out the video if you like it Want to check out more videos like it go to youtube.com slash summit auto remember to like subscribe and share on this video and all The videos you see there and back in a second You'll see a link to subscribe to our YouTube channel on your left a link to more used inventory videos on your right to See all the incoming inventory daily and on the bottom if you haven't been to our website a link to this vehicle on Our website click those check us out and we really look forward to helping with this super clean 2018 Jeep Grand Cherokee Laredo. Thanks again