Episode 454 Scott Adams: Public Demonstration of False Memory, Charlottesville “Fine People” HOAX

Date: 2019-03-17 | Duration: 36:58

Topics

Taking calls from people who believe the “fine people” hoax LINK to FULL quote, not CNN edited version: https://blog.dilbert.com/2019/03/17/episode-454-scott-adams-public-demonstration-of-false-memory-charlottesville-fine-people-hoax/

Rough Transcript

This is an auto-generated transcript and may contain errors.

Transcript

[0:06]

[Music] well I’m here a little bit early today because I wanted to do something special I want to do a demonstration of false memory public false memory this might be kind of freaky to some of you good morning good morning but before I get into that we’ll need some volunteers so I’m going to Tweet this in a moment while you’re while you’re waiting so this should this Periscope should be appearing on my Twitter feed right now and I want to make sure I get some people uh here so let me tweet it retweet it with a comment come come test your false memory about the find people hoax just bear with me this will be worth it find people

[1:09]

will be worth it find people Hox with a trained hypnotist all right so all right so I’ve tweeted that so I should be able to get some volunteers so what I’m looking for is people who believe that President Trump called the uh the racist in Charlottesville fine people but before we get to that so if if you uh if you believe that you saw or heard the news that President Trump called the neo-nazis and the racist fine people if you have a memory of that then I want to talk to you so sign up to be a guest uh on this Periscope just select the choice to be a guest and then I will choose you and we will talk about your false

[2:09]

false memories now uh before we do that don’t you want to have the simultaneous hip yes you do raise your your glass your mug your cup your chalice your Stein your thermos it’s time for the simultaneous zp oh I think we’ve got a hit somebody named Trump is racist as hell this should be good I don’t know if this is a real account but let’s see what pull out my microphone we’re going to add a guest and guest can you hear me guest

[3:14]

you do remember it clear’s day but did you see the whole quote or did you see only a partial quote no oh did you run away don’t run away oh so you don’t you don’t believe that charless yeah hold on hold on hold on they’re they’re telling me that I can’t hear you so I’m going to have to click all right can you hear me so the guest is gone let’s try another guest if we can get one so that guest was not a real guest uh he was

[4:16]

guest was not a real guest uh he was pretending to be an anti-trumper who just made a fake account just to uh to do that um we should try one more guest to see if anybody is a taker so so here’s the challenge uh I only want you to come on if you believe that the president called racist fine people in Charlottesville so I’m going to ask Cameron on but Cameron if that’s not what you’re here for it’s going to be a quick call but we’ll also see if we can hear you Cameron K Cameron went away okay so is there so we’ve got over a thousand people is is there no one here oh Cameron is back let’s try you again Cameron Cameron are you there and I don’t know yet I don’t know yet if the audience can hear you we had some uh audience problem

[5:18]

some uh audience problem before uh looks like they can can hear you but nothing say something uh Cameron good morning Scott and a can you hear me so audience can you hear the guests there’s nothing I can do to fix this if you can’t hear it because there’s just one BT Seether on or off all right all right it would be can’t hear now this is very I could hear you on previous periscopes and hear the guest fine so it’s it’s a little odd they can’t hear me on this one some some people see they say they can’t hear you all right so some of them might be pring so um Cameron did do you have a memory of the president we all saw it were I mean I saw CNN they played the clip yes I do and I also have a memory of that press conference he did with

[6:18]

of that press conference he did with Elaine Shia with him in Trump Tower and I I thought his his repudiation of it was a little weak at the time you know people asked him um do you denounce this and he said uh yes I I condemn and that was kind of it so did did you hear this part of the quote so at the same time that he said the the quote that you do remember damn it he said uh excuse me excuse me he was talking about the statues and stuff he said you had people in that group uh uh but you also had people that were very fine people on both sides that’s what you heard right they were very very fine people on both sides that’s right the same time he said that he also said right after that I’m not talking about the neo-nazis and the white nationalists because they should be condemned

[7:20]

because they should be condemned totally did you hear him say that it was said at the same time it was basically a few sentences later yeah I I did and by the way he was unprompted he was unprompted for that so he was without being asked he clarified just to make sure that nobody would believe that he said that the Nazis were fine people is that the way you remembered it that he said I’m excluding them specifically I I did remember I want to give a quick shout out to my friend Adam schmutter who’s asking who’s watching by the way but um yeah Scott do do you do you have a false memory of that event I actually I actually did and I’ll tell you um Mr Adams that really you were the first person one of the first pundits I ever heard that that really clarified that he was talking about the statues before I had heard you I think it was on Fox and Friends talk about that I I had

[8:21]

Fox and Friends talk about that I I had really thought that oh my gosh you know it took him too long to condemn it um he must really believe this that it’s uh that he he’s okay with the white supremacist because they’re his base like I I really thought it that was the case until you clarified the statute debate now once you hear that that one of the biggest stories of the past two years once you hear that that never happened and that it’s easy to show it never happened because you just have to show what he said and what he said was on on video it was reported but it’s easy to compare that they they cut off the part where he made sure that there was no question he wasn’t talking about the Nazis right and Scott I’m a big fan of yours and um I worked for uh President Obama and um you know usually in the straight ticket Democrat when it comes to these things and I’ll tell you even though your your argument logically made so much sense um and I I still had my

[9:22]

so much sense um and I I still had my doubts about it until I saw people posting the actual quote on Twitter and then finally when I read the quote on Twitter I think some of my cognitive dissonance was going away but um you know it’s still a challenge it still comes back from time to time do doesn’t that uh doesn’t that make you feel that you can’t believe anything else you saw yes absolutely including video and photographs I can’t believe it right including video that’s exactly right all right thank thank you Cameron thank you very much Scott an honor to speak with you all right thank you all right we’ll see if anybody else wants to come we’ve got uh well no we’ve got the same Joker from before don’t want to take the Joker um so if anybody else would like to come on and talk about your false memories um by the way the the false memory of a national event is fairly common I don’t

[10:24]

national event is fairly common I don’t know if you know that it’s a Well documented phenomenon uh you could find lots of cases where people have very clear memories of historical events that happened in their lifetime that never happened it’s it’s really really common and if you don’t understand how common that is you don’t really understand the the world you live in until you realize that you can have memories very clear memories of things that didn’t happen and you could even share those memories with other people could be multiple other people who think they have a memory of a historical event in their own lifetime something they believe they saw something they believe they were uh part of so we’ve got a taker let’s see if we can add this guest guest are you there hi

[11:25]

hi sorry so um I understand how we always forget how we always have um this this cognitive dissidence when it comes to reality we always see how we want to see the current wait now guest are are did you believe that the president said the racists were fine people in Charlottesville what I think he said was just that there were fine people on both sides and I think that was that specifically was a false equivalency find people on both sides I mean I don’t think hold on hold on hold on but but do you also know that at the same time he said that a few sentences later and without any prompting he said the following and I’m reading his quote I’m not talking about the neo-nazis and the white nationalists because they should be condemned totally now is that sentence very clear to you that he was not making any equivalents

[12:26]

that he was not making any equivalents about Nazis and fine people but the question is who were the people at Charlottesville who were the people that he spoke of so according to the New York Times there were people there who were just there to uh protest the statue removal who were sort of free speech historical preserver type people that were not in any way associated with the racists and condemned them now now there’s also a video of some of those people talking about the event immediately after uh and they have there’s a black person in the group and they’re saying we came here just to protest the Free Speech element we have nothing to do with these Nazis um so do you would you agree that the New York Times and the video of people who are actually at the event were real people I will agree that the people who came there legitimately to protest the monument were in the minority and that the objective of the protest especially

[13:29]

the objective of the protest especially when something so akin to what I felt was like Crystal you know with all the uh torches I’ll be it tiki torches that to say that they were that the intent of Charlottesville was to protest the monument was not it it was to wait was that Terr hold on hold on you’re making a Claim about some conceptual person we’re only talking about President Trump president Trump’s exact words were I’m not talking about the neo-nazis and white nationalists because they should be condemned totally now you a question you do have a question about who he was talking about but it’s very obvious that he wasn’t talking about the racist right because he said it in direct language wouldn’t you you agree I not entirely wait hold on hold on hold on are you I agree that

[14:30]

on hold on are you I agree that don’t don’t go on further until we clarify this I agree read can can you let me talk yeah sorry all right do you think this sentence is unclear I’m not talking about the neo-nazis and the white nationalists because they should be condemned totally is that unclear I do not feel that is unclear outside of context all right and in well so in in context he said there were fine people on both sides but then to clarify he said I’m not talking about the neonazis and the white Nationals it’s all part of the same statement how it seems like the two statements that contradict each other find people on both sides and or not talk about the neo-nazis no it’s it’s it’s contradicting your own lack of understanding it’s not contradicting what was happening my lack of understanding of Trump no what was happening was there were some people who were not racists who were there about the Statue issu do you agree that that’s true because the New York Times reported

[15:32]

true because the New York Times reported it and you can see a video of those actual people who have what’s that I’ll stipulate to that I didn’t read that personally so so now that you know that there were people there who were not antifa and they were not part of the the racists would you say it’s now completely clear to you that this was always fake news because the president said I’m not talking about the Nazis and the white nationalist at the same time you talked about fighting people one statement among so many statements that he has said especially during that uh impromptu uh what’s it called uh Trump Tower meeting all right but but hold on if you’re if you’re saying that he made other statements that are unclear um that would be a separate issue but if we could just stick to this you would agree now that the the widespread reporting that we saw I think we saw reported maybe 10 times on CNN

[16:32]

we saw reported maybe 10 times on CNN just this week alone would you agree that that is fake news because his statement is very clear I’m not talking about the neo-nazis and the white nationalists that was that was to clarify his fine people statement is that is that completely clear to you that at least on that point it was fake news I will to that if that is true because I don’t actually get cable either oh uh if you would like to check it do you have obviously you have Twitter right yeah okay so uh go to my Twitter account and you can see some bright bar articles that point to the actual actual language the actual video so if you want to test this just go to my Twitter account you can see a bunch of tweets there but thank you thank you for playing thank you very much I’ll be back by that was interesting wasn’t it see if we got another one let’s add

[17:38]

Dave and by the way with the last guest did you hear the long silence that the the long silence is uh that’s a tell for cognitive dissonance there there was a moment there where his brain was actually Frozen all right caller Dave Dave can you hear me yes hey Scott how are you I’m good how are you good thank you did you believe that the president said there were fine people uh among the actual racists in Charlottesville did you have a memory of that a false memory uh no I did not I I didn’t hear him say that and uh well of course I heard him say that but I didn’t I know what he was talking about he was simply talking about uh statue people the statue people yeah it it was it was crystal clear to me there was there was nothing so Dave Dave I’m I’m only trying to talk to the people who had a false memory of the event uh but you if you have a quick question let’s do that because I’m

[18:39]

question let’s do that because I’m waiting for other people to come on oh okay so you you just want to Okay I uh one thing I one thing I didn’t remember is the quote that you’re that you are uh referencing that he said afterwards I don’t remember hearing that from him yeah the the reason you don’t remember the clarifying quote is because it’s generally a left off of the news so there there was a reporter question in between so the the president had his fine people quote with some other stuff and then and then the reporter said George Washington and Robert D Lee are not the same because the president made some reference to Slippery Slope you know what happens if they start taking down George Washington statue so but it was immediately after the reporter said that that Trump went went into a longer paragraph and when he he clarified without being asked and this is the important part the reporters didn’t ask him to clarify he just clarified because

[19:40]

him to clarify he just clarified because he didn’t want to make he wanted to make sure that nobody could misconstrue that he was calling the races fine people so he said it in the clearest possible way all right um yeah see that’s that’s deception right there that’s that’s ridiculous unbelievable see I that’s something that I that should have been clear to everybody all right so Dave we’re gonna We gonna uh click you off here thanks for playing and I’m gonna see if I can get um somebody on here who had an actual false memory so again if you had a a false memory that the president called the racist as charlot phille fine people I want to see if I can deprogram you in real time here uh as I de deprogrammed the prior caller not not this one but the one before um and it’s it’s really amazing isn’t it so if you try to depro deprogram somebody from their false memory that Trump

[20:40]

from their false memory that Trump called racist fine people you’re you’re usually going to get some version of what you witnessed so if you watched me talking to the the caller before this last one you notice that he started going all over the board talking about another event so the moment he got a little trapped on his false memory the very first thing he did was change the subject and you saw that that I very aggressively changed him back to the to the point and then once changed back to the point he acted like it was almost like he couldn’t hear it or he was sort of cognitively blind to what I was saying but once once he couldn’t escape did you hear the long pause where I said now that you’ve heard it now you’ve seen it now that you know it was fake news you know do you believe it’s fake news you saw that it was just a long pause that long pause if you’re a hypnotist you recognize it right the long pause is

[21:42]

you recognize it right the long pause is not a normal situation of somebody just waiting to collect their thoughts they they’re actually rebooting their whole brain that that’s the reboot and once you learn to see it you can recognize it in the wild I produce this a lot so because I am a hypnotist and because I tend to have a if I may say a greater Mastery of the facts than most of the people I talk to because most people are not well informed on most things right since I pay attention and I’m I’m doing this sort of as part of my career now I tend to be more informed than the people I’m talking to on the topics that I talk to them about uh but when you see that look where the brain reboots it’s changes your whole feeling about reality because the person is rewriting their history in their brain in real time while you’re looking at them and and for a moment

[22:43]

looking at them and and for a moment they can’t process the outside world so the brain actually goes into a like a reboot shutdown mode where for a moment they can’t interact with the outside world and uh I have produced that in other people countless times but you but I wanted to do it in public so you could see it in real time I want to see if I can get somebody else on here for the same thing let’s see so I’m only taking people I’m only taking people who believe they heard uh the the president say that racist were fine people all right guests Millennium mom now I’m I’m only taking people who believe they have that fake um that false memory can you hear me Millennium hi I can hear you okay great did did you believe that the president called the racist fine people in Charlottesville Okay the reason why I

[23:45]

in Charlottesville Okay the reason why I believe that and I’m I’m actually a trump supporter I actually believed that he said it because of the repetition that I was getting from the media and and here’s here’s something that I just wanted to add to that hold but hold on but you do not believe it now I don’t believe it now no no no no not after seeing that transcript that you posted um are are are you saying that you that I was the first person to tell you that was fake news no no no you told you said it in the Scopes but I couldn’t find the actual transcript when I went to look for it I tried to find the audio of the you know after one of your um one of the we’ve lost your audio so I had to I had to gain you D you because the audio went away all right let’s say we’ve got the passport gang I don’t know who that

[24:47]

the passport gang I don’t know who that is but let’s see if you had a false memory about the Charlottesville incident guest can you hear me he hey Scott how you doing I can hear you oh good did did you have a false memory that the president said the racist would find people in Char well you know what I was going to say is the same thing as the previous guest uh I was only watching mainstream media at the time and I never I never heard that part about uh him saying that the the white supremacist were not included I I think it was the way that the C that CNN and MSNBC were editing the footage that made it seem like he was equating uh antifa and the white supremacist right and now and now that you’ve seen the actual language I assume you have does it change your view of how uh illegitimate the newses well yeah I’ve been thinking that for a while you know I was I back in

[25:49]

for a while you know I was I back in 2016 I I voted against Trump I was you know I was against him and I I was just watching like Rachel madow every night and I was like this guy’s going to get arrested any minute now but it just kept going on every night and then I I started like seeking out alternative uh alternative news sources you know and uh yeah and it wasn’t until you that I actually saw him say he’s not talking about the white supremacist they are not included so that I haven’t heard that before on the mainstream Media or I mean I don’t watch a lot of Fox News either but I do watch it sometimes but I haven’t really heard anybody refute that and and quote him in that manner so uh it’s really it really spins your brain doesn’t it what uh what political affiliation do you do you claim are you independent um well yeah I would say I’m independent I used to I used to you know I was a a supporter of Barack Obama that was like the first time that I voted um

[26:50]

was like the first time that I voted um I’m mixed rced African-American so you know that was the first time I was really inspired to do anything and then you know I was I was thinking well Hillary is going to be the safe bet Trump is crazy and I I was just getting everything from the mainstream media so I thought he was race kind of racist I thought he was kind of crazy I thought he might get us into some Wars you know things like that and and now that seems kind of crazy doesn’t it yeah yeah and especially after I watch hoax you know I’m trying to show it to everybody in my family yeah yeah well well thank you thank you for uh seeking truth I’ve got another uh caller or two I thank you very much all right we’ve got a guest whose name is stop Trump now hi did did you think that uh the president called the racists in Charlottesville fine people do you have a false memory of

[27:55]

that well let’s let’s let’s see if let’s we can let’s see if we can get to the bottom of this one did you know that in the same time that he made the quote about find people on both sides that he also said a part of the same thing without any prompting at the same time the same day in the same he said this sentence I’m not talking about the neo-nazis and the white nationalists because they should be condemned totally so do you believe now having heard the rest of the quote do you believe that it was true that he called the the Nazis fine people when at the same time he said I’m not talking about the neo-nazis and the white nationalists do you do you now understand that that never happened that he never uh you’re a f all right so he was just a prankster um

[29:03]

just a prankster all right um the prankster was not a real yeah he was just a troll so do we have anybody on here who believes that Trump that in other words is there anybody on here who has a uh is there anybody on here who has a false memory the president Trump called the racist fine people in Charlesville yeah it was the same person um so that that caller was the same guy as before he was just a troll so let’s see M Moi Richard well chances are he’s a better look at this guy two followers all right so it looks like I’m only getting trolls at this point

[30:05]

all right so um this experiment is very interesting isn’t it look at all the people who are wandering in here including all the people who saw my tweet because I tweeted that I’m doing this right now and you notice we can only get one person who would say that they actually believed the thing that’s this considered the main news all right so same guys back [Music] again let’s uh how do I block that guy all right so I need uh anybody else who wants to say that they have a false memory of Charlottesville Scott is Yang a racist well yes um I would say that uh Yang who’s running for president um has has presented his argument in racial terms and said that it might not be long before white people

[31:08]

it might not be long before white people were shooting up um Chinese places of worship I guess because uh because China was going to be the big you know the big Boogeyman of the future so that might make it dangerous to be a Chinese American if China the country is being demonized and he did call out white people people as the Potential Threat so uh I would say that that’s racist by definition yes all right it looks like all the people who want to come on here are just uh trolls so so um here’s the interesting thing we have now now watched um both breit Bart through Joel Pollock and you’ve watched me on Twitter and Periscope saying loudly and often that the fine people hoax is a hoax and the reason I keep hammering on this I know some of you are saying please go to

[32:09]

know some of you are saying please go to another topic you keep talking about the same thing it might be the most important thing in the world think about that it might be the most important thing in the world what I’m doing right now I and here’s the argument a huge part of the animosity in this country is built around the fact that Trump and therefore Trump supporters have a certain set of views and if that’s not true and if they don’t have these set of views as an average you know we’re not talking about the outliers the actual racists but the general Trump supporters if they don’t have the views that the other half of the country believe they have then most of the problems in this country go away let me give you an example what is the craziest thing about the border security battle you know the whole wall versus no wall here’s the craziest thing about it it was a fight where both sides

[33:11]

it was a fight where both sides agreed both sides want border security in general yeah there a few outliers on both sides that have the crazy views but both Democrats and Republicans want better border security they’ve paid for it in the past and the way they want it is according to whatever the experts say makes most sense so this was an unusual situation in which we couldn’t do what needed to be done and everybody largely agreed some of the details they didn’t agree on but that was for political purposes now why is it that the Democrats would resist so hard something that even they wanted it’s because they think that the president is motivated by racism why do they think he’s motivated by racism well probably the basis of that the strongest pillar of that belief is the fake news that he once called racist find people which never happened it’s a false memory that the country is is

[34:11]

false memory that the country is is experiencing if you remove that false memory and you convince people that it was a false memory and that it was important and that they believed it it will change their entire view about other things they hear about this president in other words it will allow them to have a a critical facility that they lacked before now this is true of you know both sides right I’m not saying that one side of the political Spectrum has all the fake news you know it gets spread around but it is the most important thing to get our minds right in this country so that we can do simple things like improve border security um false memory or just a lie I will tell you that from my own interactions and I can’t I can’t give you more detail than this so please don’t ask but I’ll tell you that from my own own interactions I can tell that CNN

[35:12]

interactions I can tell that CNN actually believes they have a memory of the president doing calling the races fine people they have an actual false memory now I say that not with 100% certainty but all of the signs and again I can’t give you the details of why I think I know what I know but it seems to me that they actually believe it and it seems to me that it’s based on a false memory which they may have generated on their own and then had it reinforced by other fake reporting on the on the same topic because remember the people who work at CNN are are people right they’re human beings and human beings are are very easily f fooled by false memories it’s a universal quality of people so those of you who are saying the CNN is knowingly lying I would say that’s not demonstrated it is

[36:13]

demonstrated it is demonstrated uh to my satisfaction that at least some members of CNN believe they have that actual memory of it happening and it just didn’t happen um so I guess there’s nobody else who wants to be deprogrammed is there anybody else who would like to be deprogrammed from the false memory that uh from the false memory that President Trump once called the racist fine people no other takers all right um I’ve got lots of other stuff to talk about but I wanted to keep this Periscope about that and I’m going to sign off for now