Social Justice - A Conversation

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Hi, I'm Charles Stanton. I'm on the faculty of the Honors College of UNLV. And the Boyd School of Law.

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Hi, I'm Gabriella Tam. I'm a fourth year accounting student.

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And welcome to social justice, social justice, our conversation

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a conversation.

Unknown Speaker 0:42
Well, good evening, everybody. Good evening, Gabriella, hello. And we're back again. In our in our hearts on this evening. Social Justice a conversation. And we have a whole bunch of, I think interesting things and informative things to discuss with, between ourselves and hopefully, stuff that you'll be interested in as well. Want to start off the broadcast by talking a little bit about the new Martin Scorsese movie killers of the flower Moon, which has received rave reviews, from the critics and from audiences all over the country. He spent a number of years working on this movie. And it tells a really horrific story of how the Osage tribe that lived in Oklahoma were not only cheated out of their rightful oil land, but also systematically murdered by a group of evil doers. And how do you know that whole history only now was coming to to be appreciated and learned by by a new generation of people?

Unknown Speaker 2:04
Yeah, so we, there was a, an article that was released about how Oklahoma teachers are not really sure if they can teach about this book or this movie. And I thought it was interesting because, like, we like we've talked about this before, like there are books being banned, because of the content that they're teaching. And sometimes I'll like, look through, like, what books are being banned and like crazy, because all these books and short stories that I had to read when I was in high school, are being banned. And it's just, it's just like, really interesting how things have changed from when I was like, in high school and like, how it is now?

Unknown Speaker 2:53
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's interesting, not only in Oklahoma. Yeah. But in a lot of states. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 3:02
Like Texas, and Florida, because they all have this like, same. Was it like Bill or like, yeah, it's like, you can't make someone feel bad for their, like race or their gender or whatever. Like, yeah,

Unknown Speaker 3:17
well, you can call it. revisionism if you want. Or you can call denialism of your want. But basically, what's in the movie? What's in these books? is history. Yeah, it's the history of the United States of America. Yep. And the history that has history is non partisan. There is nothing Republican or Democrat, about whether or not a group of people was systematically murdered, to steal the land that they owned, so that the people who committed the murderers could make profit off the oil that was underneath the ground. The movie, of course, is profoundly disturbing on a number of fronts. One front, of course, is the actual murders of these people who were innocent, except for their misfortune, of being able to own land where oil was was located. No,

Unknown Speaker 4:22
it's even crazier, because they were given this land because like these, like the people who gave him the land, but it wasn't like profitable or something. So that was like, even crazier. Like, oh, here's this land JK, we want it back.

Unknown Speaker 4:35
Yeah, yeah. Well, sure, no, of course. And the other aspect of it is how the law enforcement authorities and the people who were supposed to be enforcing the law fails so completely. And what's interesting about that, of course, is that this case was really the case. That was responsible for the creation of the FBI. Oh, the FBI basically came out of this case where they had to get investigators from outside of the state of Oklahoma to try to investigate to try to investigate what happened. I find it interesting as a teacher, that you know what you were saying in the beginning, how you can't teach anything, to make people feel ashamed. And yeah, well, let me let me just say this. And I don't think I'm alone in saying this, because I, you know, I do know a number of people who teach, and no teacher worth his salt, no teacher, whether it be a male teacher, or a female teacher, teaches a course, on a subject like that, in any way to embarrass people or to make people feel ashamed. No, yeah, that's not your purpose. As a teacher, your purpose as a teacher is to teach the history of the country to inform the students, and most importantly, to convey a message that what happens these innocent people should not happen again. Yeah. So by what they learn, history won't repeat itself. All the rest of that stuff, where you know, they want to make people feel low or whatever. No person who teaches properly, I presume, from my experience and observation. Most people do. They're just teaching history. But the problem we have in our country is we have a denial history. We want to deny that the the atrocities like this happened to the Indians. We want to deny that black people were enslaved, we want to deny that women were mistreated. And on and on and on. But it's part of our as part of our legacy. Yeah. And just as the country was built by many great people, there are also many people who were exploiting, exploiting others. Yeah, basically. So that's a lot of it.

Unknown Speaker 7:03
Yeah. Like, I'm just like a saying, like, all of the things I have, like that have happened to us, like it helped shape who we are today that you can, like, apply that to America, like all the things that we did, and all the stuff that has happened in America. That's, that's how America was created to be today.

Unknown Speaker 7:22
Yeah, well, I think I think, you know, there, there's two forces in the country now. There's the inclusive, equitable, diverse side of the country. And then there's the non inclusive, non equitable, non diverse country. And whereas the diverse side of the country wants to learn about these things and find out about this, the other side doesn't want to find out about them, or they or they already know them, but they don't want other people to know about what went on. Yeah. So they create this mythology about how America was created. But the truth is the truth. Yeah, and the only way you can make things better, is if you have an informed bunch of citizens that know what happened in the past. They know the dangers of behaviors that were very evil. Yeah. And they will, they would stand against it and not allow the society to go down that road again. Yeah, exactly. You know, and that's, and that's, that's what the lesson really is. And I'm glad that so, many people are going to see the movie, because the the American Indian and the Indian, the Indian, the various Indian nations, whether it be, you know, a Cherokee or Arapaho or Navajo or what have you and Osage Of course, in this picture. were treated deplorably yeah, by the government, I mean, even today with the remnants of the reservation system, and how the medical care and all the various facilities that will seem to be, you know, obviously Givens are not, and these people living in sometimes very squalid conditions, and I hope this this movie, you know, is able to, to educate people, and also give people hope, that, you know, there will there can be and will be justice, as long as we, as long as we, and then our history, remember history. And, you know, I always talk about, you know, the the ending speech in the verdict where he says, you know, he asked the jury to do justice, and he says, because I believe justice is in our hearts. Yeah, I think that's the most important thing. So we moved from that on to the never ending tragedy of the Middle East. And it It just looks to me. Like we're repeating the same patterns that have happened so many times before. Yeah. I really think I mean, I was looking a couple of days ago, they had a, it was like a drone video of the Gaza area, a place was like destroyed. It was there was I mean, it was just so many areas are only already rubble. Yeah. And it's so interesting when you see, you know, the, you know, the initial terrorist attack, and then the response that how many times has this played out played out over the last 40 or 50 years? I guess, I guess, you go back even further to the 1948 when the State of Israel was created. But it's amazing, you know, they had this, this movie that I had seen. This was a number of years ago called Black Sunday. And I'm watching the movie. And this was right around. This was a few days after the terrorist attack by Hamas. Yeah. So here we go. Again. It's the same. It's the same pattern. And I think it's incumbent I've said this before, I think it's really incumbent upon the United Nations to unify, you know, the, and work to try to find some kind of a peaceful resolution of this thing. Yeah. Because it's just going to mean the murder of even more people. Yeah. And it I don't I don't see it, you know, I mean, if the aim is if the aim is, you know, that, you know, the Israel is one of destroy Hamas, that Hamas is an ideology, you don't destroy an ideology, you can kill people. I mean, they killed I mean, look at all the terrorists that probably Israel has killed over, say, the last 50 years, the terrorists from the Munich Olympics. So people who were involved in, you know, the bombings inside of Israel itself. And it's really a tragedy, because the vast majority of both of these peoples want peace. But they can't they can't get peace,

Unknown Speaker 12:27
because there's like, the two, like opposite ends who are very

Unknown Speaker 12:31
Yeah, well, I think it's the leadership too. Yeah. I think it has a lot to do with the leadership, I think the people are being almost held captive by their leaders. And, you know, we're going to see over the next, I would imagine next week or two weeks, where this thing is going, but, you know, I think the alternatives for Israel as as Thomas Friedman said in his article, I guess it was on the 22nd. of October. There's no, there's no easy way out of this thing. Yeah. I mean, you know, occupation of Gaza. What what are you occupy?

Unknown Speaker 13:17
There's nothing there.

Unknown Speaker 13:20
You know, and then you have the whole hostage situation. And with all the bombing that was done. It's hard to imagine, really, too many people really surviving it at a certain point. I mean, they've had I don't know how many 1000s and 1000s of people already tied. Judo, and of course, how they would reclaim the hostages at this point. I mean, where would they be would even be alive? Yeah. So it's, it's it has its disastrous, its disastrous repetition, as he says in the article of, of the same kind of mistakes. Yeah, it wasn't made. What's interesting,

Unknown Speaker 14:06
too, because we weren't like we were just talking about how the United States it's, there's some people trying to erase our history. Yeah. And, like, when we erase our history, we don't learn and that creates a bigger chance of the same things happening again. I mean, I guess you can apply it to the whole world. Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 14:24
Yo, you can No, of course, have like to take Russia was a perfect example. Except for like, maybe 10 years or so when they had Boris Yeltsin as the president. That really never known democracy. The people keep repeating the same mistakes. It's very, it's very interesting that you mentioned that because they had a very interesting article a few days ago about Hong Kong. How all the major corporations and businesses are pulling out. They're leaving Hong Kong. Yeah. Why are they leaving Hong Kong? I'm leaving Hong Kong and because they're, they feel that their businesses are being taken over by that by the communist regime. And as a result, you know, it's not it's not profitable or productive for them to stay there. And it's interesting. China is sensitive to this China mirrors. China mirrors Russia in that sense. Yeah, they've always had these, you know, these these feudal empires or dynastic empires. And except for a few years, in the 40s, right before Mao became charged to China, they've never had democracy. And a lot of that a lot of that repetition is because they don't know democracy. Yeah, they've had the same. They've had the same way of government. You could speak a little bit about that. But you've been to Hong Kong.

Unknown Speaker 15:53
Yeah, I haven't been in a while. But just like, just like hearing what you said, it makes me really sad. Because like, Hong Kong is a beautiful city. And I like loved going there. And I miss it so much. But like, I know that it's not the same place that I know and love anymore, you know?

Unknown Speaker 16:10
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And of course, they've cracked down on all the, you know, protests and people who want I don't even think I think people are realistic. So I don't I don't know if the people who were protesting against you know, the premier of China actually think they could have have a total democracy, but at least some at least, at least being allowed to express your dissatisfaction. Yeah. Because a hope Yeah. In other words, and they don't want people to have the hope it's the same thing in Russia. Yeah. They don't want people to be able to, to protest. Now, what are the chances of anything happen when they protest? Probably none, because the police and the the army and all that is controlled by the by the by the dictator, but at least give people some outlet for that for their for their frustration? You know, it's an interesting thing, how societies repeat though. Yeah, you know, and, of course, now, it seems to be accelerating. Yeah, that you have in a lot of these countries, Oregon, and, you know, of course, in Hungary. And, of course, you know, Turkey as well. They're moving away from democracy. And that, of course, is the fallacy. It's a fallacy of thought, really, when you think about it, the fallacy of thought is that one person can solve all our problems. In other words, we don't need to interact, we don't need to collaborate, we're going to bring some dis one person in. And this one person is going to is going to, you know, create a new society and a new world without realizing, in many cases, the reason this person is doing what they're doing is not to benefit you or society or anything. Yeah, it's to benefit themselves. Yes, exactly. Yeah. And feather their own nest, so to speak, you know,

Unknown Speaker 18:07
do you think that that could, I mean, I feel like I'd be more difficult, but do you think it could happen here? Do you think some people have that thought, like here in the United States?

Unknown Speaker 18:18
Well, I mean, I mean, over the last, well, 1516 1718 1920 Over the last nine years. It's there's there the ex President certainly would seem to qualify, yeah, that's someone who a lot of people believe could solve all their problems. And so I was thinking too, and, and, and, you know, basically, you know, put on snooze, any kind of democratic, you know, you know, not just principles, but democratic, democratic ideals. Yeah. You know, and there's a lot of people, there's a lot of people that support that. There's a lot of people, it's amazing when you when you talk to people, and you go around in this in this cosmopolitan city of Las Vegas. Yeah, there are a lot of people who support that. But the thing about it is, though, the thing about it is though, you can support conservatism, yeah, we're liberalism. It's not a question of saying that, you know, a person or a group of people should be condemned. But the question is, how you conduct yourself as the president. Yeah. What specifically do you do to follow the protocols that pretty much every other leader followed? Or do you do? Whatever it is that you want to do, regardless of what those rules are? Yeah, I think that's the danger. Yeah, you know, I mean, you know, and now you have over the past few weeks, I A number of people who were working to to say that the election in Georgia was invalid. Now pleading guilty Mark Meadows pleaded guilty. Jenelle was pleaded guilty. There's a whole bunch of people pleading guilty. Yeah. So, you know, yes, you can say, well, they're pleading guilty, because they don't want to go to jail, whatever it is. But the plea of guilty and the senses that admission are wrong. Yeah, that they knew when they were getting involved in these things that it was wrong. And they went along with it. Yeah. You know, it was very interesting to listen to. So Michael Cohen's testimony in the New York case, and how basically, he was told to inflate the values of properties. And the the guy who was the accountant was told to do the same thing, and Judo, how the how the, I guess the standard of what we expect to be the President has, I guess, diminished? Extremely, you know. And, you know, of course, you know, when you look at when Hillary Clinton ran against President Trump, and you looked at the qualifications, yeah, I mean, let's leave, let's just leave politics outside of it. The woman who had all these, all this experience in the Senate, yeah, you know, all these different things, versus someone who had no experience, basically, yeah. Who's Who's, I mean, whose fame already came from his casinos in his buildings, but also from the reality show that he did? Yeah. But that's not that's not a qualification to be president, though. Yeah. But you have a reality show. I mean, it's, you know, it's something that's the moneymaker and all the rest of those things, but you need somebody with experience. And I think the idea that, that that's changed is, basically now Well, anybody could be president, like, anybody could be Speaker of the House. But really, anybody can't be Speaker of the House. Yeah. Because you need certain gifts, you need certain experience, you need a certain temperament. You need a certain character to be able to do these things. It's not just you walk in there. Yeah. And you say, I'm going to ABCD It doesn't work that way. Yeah. You know, it's interesting how, you know, a man who, who was the predecessor to Donald Trump, Barack Obama, how he conducted his presidency. Yeah. And then we and Mitt Romney has said this in his book, you know, you know, how politics has changed so radically, and he saw like, disgusted at this point. And he's not, you know, he's not going to run again for the Senate and everything. But when you look at when you look at how, you know, Barack Obama basically ran basically a scandal free presidency. Yeah, everybody, you know, I mean, you know, the I, you didn't have to agree with all the stuff that he did, but everything was like very orderly, and people, you know, cetera, et cetera. And then you come into this, where people were doing things that were wrong. But what bothers me, and I think I've discussed this with you before. I've shared this with the audience before, how many people who were part of this, who knew that it was wrong? And they didn't do anything? And then then, you know, I guess after January 6, a lot of them left. And then they're gonna write a book. But the thing is that writing a book, yeah, the thing is being involved at the time things are happening. Were you saying, particularly, particularly, General McMaster, particularly General Mattis, particularly General Kelly, all those three men, and even an even Mark Milley, head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to a degree that they saw all these things that were improper? Yeah. And, you know, you're just like, going to flow there.

Unknown Speaker 24:07
No, I also think that like them writing a book is just like, Oh, I just want like, I just want money. You know, it's so it's just so

Unknown Speaker 24:17
crass. Yeah. Chris has the word. Yeah. Correct. But, but I mean, you know, and the other thing about it, too, is like that, you know, you could disagree with the policies of somebody. Oh, yeah. That's, that's, that's, you know, the way politics is, but if you knew like that, and apparently, apparently, some of them did know that there was sharing of vital secrets. That when there was the Helsinki meeting with with, with Putin, that he said, though, I believe that I believe Putin over I believe over all the security agencies that had put all this information together. Then you say, oh, no, no, no, that can't be. But the Congress basically Well, was it the Congress basically went with it. Because he was going to appoint those Supreme Court justices, which he did. He was going to give the wealthy not the 1%. anymore. It's not the 1% anymore. It's the 1/10 of 1%. Like the point zero 1%. It's that concentrated. If anybody, if anybody doesn't believe that, just just go to the recent issue of Forbes magazine to 400. Richest People. Oh, yes. Check that out, boy, because that's about in one year. The concentration is insane, though. It's insane.

Unknown Speaker 25:45
The rich have gotten richer, and the poor have gotten poor. Yes. Well,

Unknown Speaker 25:49
that's what it is. But but a lot richer, though. Yeah, a lot. And the thing about it is, you know, there's nothing wrong with money. There's nothing wrong with being rich. There's nothing wrong with capitalism. Yeah. What's wrong is when you don't also think beside yourself. Yeah, beyond yourself beyond your own thing, where you get where you have all this stuff. And like the pharaohs found that you can't take it with you. So try to help people. It's interesting. You know, I think that one of the persons I really admire is Mackenzie Bezos, the while the woman has done so much, he's done so much. She's given so much money to help all these different causes. And the husband, he's worried about whether he can get his yacht underneath the bridge. And then he wants them to change the bridge so we can get the I mean, there's something wrong there. I'm sorry.

Unknown Speaker 26:44
It's like these people have like no heart. There's just nothing there.

Unknown Speaker 26:49
Yeah, I guess that said, you know, we had seen them in class, Roger and me. Yeah. And there's a disconnect there. There's an emotional. There's an emotional vacuum. When you see people who have nothing, and you have everything, and you can't you don't want to help. You don't want to help. Yeah, it's like it's not even in your consciousness. Yeah. So it's like crazy. It's crazy. You know, it's, it's, it's sad. Really? Yeah. It's sad, because so much could be done. Yeah. It's just like an beloved city here. They don't need to be any homeless. Yeah, you could have everybody eat everybody even have shelter. Everybody have medical care. But you can see it, you know, you can see it in little things. It's like the whole thing with the question of whether the workers are going to strike and everything. Yeah. And you see people getting paid inferior wages. They're raking in all this money, that they're making more money than they've ever made between what the between between what's on the floor of the casino, the shops, the restaurants, the clubs. And then and the icing on the cake is the sports betting. Yeah. And you can pay people a decent wage. People who will clean the rooms and they're doing so many more rooms than they actually should be doing in one day. Come on. It's not right. Yeah. But But hopefully, hopefully, the next generation and all of you out there, can each one of you doing your little way of you know something to to make things better for all of us. Yeah. And as as I like to do sort of new custom here as we close the show. There's a Jewish saying that they can apply to the Middle East for the the young people who, who died both Palestinian Israeli, that may their memory be a blessing. Yep. And on that note, I will I will say good night.

Unknown Speaker 28:53
Thanks for listening, everyone. Good night. Thank you for listening to our show. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at tangi one that is T A N G one at UNLV taught nevada.edu or to contact Professor Charles satin at charles.stanton@unlv.edu See you next time.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai