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From the unexplained to the mundane, come join us on a journey to the fringe.

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Hello and welcome to Journey to the Fringe, where sometimes we cover groups of swastikas

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in their logos, and a good chunk of them are probably not great.

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We are your podcast hosts, Taylor and Chelsea.

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And Chelsea, this may actually come as a surprise, seeing as how we've been talking about these

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people for several hours.

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This is one of those times, and maybe you should Google the Falun Gong and check out their logo.

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What? How did this surpass me? Huh.

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Yeah, it's not even a little bit of swastik.

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In all of the googling I've done about the Falun Gong, this has not come up yet.

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Yeah, there is no less than five swastikas in their logo.

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You should know it's not due to Nazis.

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It's actually a very prominent Buddhist symbol.

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When I was in Korea, if you look at a map of the city, you'll see swastikas on it,

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and that's where Buddhist temples are.

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Yeah, and it's all over Asia.

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But nonetheless, there are five swastikas in their logo.

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It's hard to believe we made it over two hours of talking about this group before it came up

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in the podcast, but it made it nonetheless.

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You find those groups usually use it to show that they're so enlightened,

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and that it's a good, nice symbol, and the cults and bad people don't usually use it for that reason.

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Yeah, oh, and it was used a lot before the Nazis came to power?

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Yeah.

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Robert Evans actually just did a behind the bastards episode on swastikas not that long ago.

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I listened to it, yeah.

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And there used to be a town in Ontario, Canada called Swastika.

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Chelsea, you can actually look it up.

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The Edmonton Swastikas was a hockey team.

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What?

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The more you know.

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Oh my god, look at this hockey team photo.

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That's not good.

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You really can't use that symbol anymore.

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Yeah, it's definitely a different time to be alive than then.

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A lot less dysentery, a little more negative views of swastikas.

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Yep, very negative views.

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But anyhow, let's get back on track.

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We've got a lot to cover still with the Falun Gong.

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What we've been covered for a while.

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Just give you a little reprieve there.

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Chelsea, we learned a lot of the bad side of Falun Gong in the last episode.

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Where we're going to pick that up now is how it's impacting the world that we live in today.

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Oh, I thought we're going to do the good side of the Falun Gong.

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I mean, that first episode was the best representation.

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That was it?

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I'm willing to do that.

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I'm willing to do.

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But they don't get sick.

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They don't get sick.

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That actually.

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They don't need hospitalization.

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Let's stop focus on that.

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Let's focus on how they're impacting the world today.

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So Chelsea, this group has a lot more sway in the modern world

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than I would really like to say a cult should.

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We're going to start off looking at some of their business endeavors.

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The first one being ultra surf.

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What is ultra surf?

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Well, in 2001, it was founded by Chinese dissidents in Silicon Valley.

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Basically what it is, it's a VPN for users in China to evade government censorship and monitoring.

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As of 2011, ultra surf reported over 11 million users worldwide.

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During the Arab Spring, it recorded a 700% spike in traffic from Tunisia.

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So it is actually like worldwide used.

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It's basically a way to avoid internet censorship.

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I mean, that's not a horrible thing, but it's also owned by the Falun Gong.

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And I should say too, similar traffic spikes occur frequently during times of unrest in other regions

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like Tibetan Burma.

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Some people have called it the most important free speech tool on the internet, but.

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I don't see it being a horrible thing.

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No, it seems like a good idea.

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This is the best thing they've ever done.

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It's anti-communist for sure, because it's meant to specifically get around the great firewall of China.

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There is some good parts to it, but let's talk about the rest.

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Some technologists have expressed reservations about ultra surf's model.

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However, in particular, its developers have been criticized by proponents of open source

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software for not allowing peer review of the tools designed, except at the discretion of its creators.

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Moreover, because ultra surf operates all its own servers, their developers have access to the user's logs.

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This architecture means that users are required to trust ultra surf not to reveal user data.

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Ultra surf maintains that it keeps logs for a short period of time and uses them only for the

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purpose of analyzing traffic for signs of interference or to monitor overall performance and efficacy.

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The company says it does not disclose user logs at third parties.

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However, we got to take their word on it.

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Yeah, because they don't let anybody else look at it.

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In an April 2012 report, Jacob Appelbaum with the Tor Project criticized ultra surf

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for its use of internal content filtering, including blocking pornographic websites,

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and for its willingness to comply with subpoenas from U.S. law enforcement officials.

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So it's anti-government, except in the case of the U.S.

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Is that weird?

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Appelbaum's report also noted that ultra surf pages employed Google Analytics,

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which had the potential to leak user data and that its systems were not all up to date with

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the latest security patches and did not make use of forward security mechanisms.

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It is a little weird, but this group and connection to the U.S. government is going to come up a

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lot in this episode.

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Oh, okay. I was like, why would they just choose the U.S. government? But okay.

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That made sense.

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Furthermore, Appelbaum claims that ultra surf client uses open and free software,

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but it's not disclosed. And this use and lack of disclosure is a violation of the licenses to

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use these products. In response, posted the same day, ultra surf wrote that it had already resolved

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these issues. Again, they don't actually let anybody else look at it, but they're saying that

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they do.

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If you were like, let me look at it to see and they're like, sure. I mean, that would immediately

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put doubt into your minds of who they're giving it to.

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Apparently a top secret NSA presentation revealed as part of a 2013 global surveillance

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disclosure. They dismiss ultra surf's response there as I'll talk in no show.

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Like they're just saying it.

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And then in a really weird coincidence, a Trump appointee named Michael Pack, who's the head of

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the U.S. agency for global media, made a real big push to get government funding for this project.

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The ultra surf?

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Yeah.

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Is that not Ray's red flakes?

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Michael Pack made a big push to stop federal funding for open technology fund, which develops tools

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that allow people to get around controls on internet access, which received 20 million in

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government funding as of 2022. So just cut it off. And then the last I could find on this is that

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this was from 2021, I believe in November. Mr. Pack provided ultra reach internet corp, which is the

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overarching company that does ultra surf nearly $1.8 million in federal contracts. Now as the

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time of the article I read, they'd only received 250,000, but still it was a push to move government

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funds from one project to a Falun Gong project in the tune of millions of dollars.

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That's weird. Is it because China hates them?

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No, not necessarily. And we're going to get to it in the next part, which is if you've had an

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interaction with Falun Gong, it's going to be through this group or the next one we talk after

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it. But the next one I want to talk after is the bigger surprise for Chelsea here. So we're going

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to start with this one.

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By after, do you mean part four?

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No, no, it will be in this episode.

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Falun Gong owns the Epoch Times. This is a newspaper.

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Yes.

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Did I sound shocked?

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Yes. And for those of you wondering why I titled the episode, so this is the payoff finally.

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Let's go into it a little bit. The Epoch Times was founded in 2000 by John Tong,

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spelled T-A-N-G, and other Chinese Americans affiliated with the Falun Gong new religious

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movement. Tong was a graduate student at Georgia at the time, and he began the newspaper in his

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basement. Founders said that they were responding to censorship inside China and a lack of international

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understanding about the Chinese government's repression of Falun Gong. In 2009, Lee Hongjur,

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the founder of Falun Gong, appeared in the newspaper's headquarters in Manhattan and called for the

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expansion of the Epoch Times to, quote, become regular media, end quote. Lee has called the Epoch

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Times our media, as in the Falun Gong's media, along with their other arm, the new Tong Dynasty

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Media Corporation. They're not going to come up as much, though. Two former employees said that

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the top editors traveled to meet with Lee at Falun Gong's compound, Dragon Springs, where he weighed

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in on editorial strategic decisions. However, the Epoch Times denies that these meetings take place.

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Of course they do. I believe I've used the Epoch Times for a year and a half.

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Yes. And I said, you know, that's owned by a cult, right?

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Yes, I remember that. That's in fact where I learned that they own this.

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Former Epoch Times employees have noted Falun Gong practitioner's involvement in management and

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editorial process, and three anonymous former employees said the Epoch Times workers were

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encouraged to attend weekly, quote, Faw Study, end quote, sessions. Outside work hours, study

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Lee's teachings. Former employees have said that criticizing the Epoch Times amounts to disobeying

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Lee. According to an NBC news article, the Epoch Times quotes generally stayed out of US politics,

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end quote, before 2016, unless they dovetailed with Chinese interests. Ben Hurley, a former Falun Gong

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practitioner and Epoch Times writer until 2013, said the paper was critical of abortion LGBT people

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and that Falun Gong practitioners saw communism everywhere, including in international figures

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like Hillary Clinton and Kofi Anand, who was the head of the UN at the time. But there was more

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room for disagreement in the early days. Since 2016, according to NBC News, the Epoch Times has

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promoted favorable coverage of Trump's campaign and presidency and emphasized topics like Islamic

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terrorism, illegal immigration to the US, anti-global warming conspiracies, great replacement theory.

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This is weird. I mean, it makes sense. It has also emphasized what the publication claims is a

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labyrinthian global conspiracy led by Hillary Clinton and former President Barack Obama to tear

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down Trump. A former Epoch Times reporter who covered the 2016 campaign, Steve Klatt said his

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editors had encouraged favorable coverage of Trump after he won the Republican nomination and that

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quote, they seem to have this almost messaonic way of viewing Trump as the anti-communist leader

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who would bring about the end of the Chinese Communist Party, end quote. After Trump was

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elected, the Epoch Times hired Brendan Steinhauser, a Tea Party strategist, to reach out to more

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conservatives and encourage the Trump administration to oppose the persecution of Falun Gong. So, yeah,

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they definitely linked to very pro Donald Trump conspiracies and QAnon. And if you go to their

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front page right now, there is literally on their front page a 2020 election fraud article.

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On my way. Oh, they cover Canada. Oh, yeah, it's in 80 countries.

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How am I supposed to look at this? One sec. Let me go to the front page.

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I went to Canada. So now it's showing. Oh, I went to the US one. But...

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Oh, it keeps redirecting me to Canada. Canada, factual and unbiased news provided in-depth

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coverage. There's a video playing right around Epoch Times. Oh, yeah. And if you read number three,

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trending videos, number three is thousands of 2020 votes misreported. Oh, great. Yeah.

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That's a Trump thing. That's a Trump thing. Yeah. Not even like past it. Like this happened

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four years ago and they're still pushing it hard. And it had a huge presence on Facebook

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right around the time of the 2016 election. I don't really get into it, but it's a scandal where

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they were running Facebook groups that didn't really talk about how they were the Epoch Times.

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And we're just like, they'd share pictures of puppies and things like that and then slowly

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leak it over into talking about conspiracy theories and QAnon and things like that. And like,

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they would have groups of five million people on Facebook that were there originally because they

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were talking about puppies sharing. Yeah. Misleading information. Anyhow, they've been banned from

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Facebook since then for being misleading ads and not saying where the actual money is coming from.

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And also there was a big controversy too because they were faking subscribers by making fake accounts

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and like they got caught because they had celebrity pictures. It's just like random people who were

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in the group. I just came here. Trump Flags terrorists, slams border deal, catastrophe waiting to happen.

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I actually came across that today. He said a terrorist attack was 100% going to happen under

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this administration. And Chelsea, like you can see at the very top, it's all the languages

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it's reported in. So you can go Chinese, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Hebrew, Japanese, Korean,

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Vietnamese, like this. This is crazy. I'm just scrolling through this. Some of the articles

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that they have on here. Don't read too much because there's a surprise on this page that leads us

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into the final part of the epoch time section. Okay, don't be a jerk at the gym. Not only did they

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push Donald Trump part in 2017, the German edition, epoch times, Deutschland, which became

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wet only in 2012 was ascribed by online magazine, the China file is aligned with the German far right

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and attractive to supporters of the alternative for Germany, AFD party and the anti immigrant group,

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Pajita, Stephanie Albright, a reporter for the German broadcaster RTL who spent several days

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inside the epoch times Berlin office while investigating the far right said that the staffer

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she met were all felon Gong practitioners who had no journalistic training and did not check facts

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trusting instead in the alternative sources they consulted during her times the epoch times office

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albright was exposed to debunked conspiracy theories such as pizza gate m trails weather

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changing machines and the great replacement theory. In France, the epoch times gives quote an

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unfettered platform to Jean-Marie Le Pen, the patriarch of the French far right and his daughter

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Marine Le Pen, who leads the nationalist party her father founded, who by a very narrow margin

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lost to Emmanuel Macron by a very narrow margin, the group that epoch times wants to lead the

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country just lost. The epoch times also publishes climate change denial content. It promotes

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doubt about modern science and medicine in line with Falon Gong's teachings. The epoch times has

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increased its revenue just over the last couple of years by 685 percent. What? It makes a hundred

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and twenty two million dollars as of 2021 annually. And since 2019, it has gone mostly digital

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spending millions on Facebook and YouTube advertisements. Although again, it was kicked

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off Facebook for that controversy I just told you about. Let me just find the name of it real

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quick. The beauty of life is the name of the facet group that caught all the controversy and got

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them kicked off. Are they on and they probably have another one? They probably do. But I honestly,

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I don't go near Facebook anymore. I don't really want to look as of 2023. It is the fourth most

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subscribed newspaper in the United States, which is just mind boggling. Yeah. None of this stuff

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makes sense to me. I read a few people who used to work for it who were Falon Gong practitioners.

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And they said at first they were not paid at all. It was all volunteers. And then eventually they

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got paid twenty thousand dollars a year to write for them. Their headquarters is in Manhattan.

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So like nobody can actually afford to live there if they're paying twenty thousand a year. Yeah.

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And they're expected to pump out five articles a day for that salary. That doesn't seem like

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something anybody would want to do. Doesn't give any time to actually reflect on what you're writing.

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No. During covid, absolutely a rat nest of anti covid conspiracies. And I believe pretty much

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everybody in Canada in the U.S. got a free copy mailed to them during covid with anti covid

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conspiracies in it. That's nice. Do you remember I got a copy of it in the mail once and it was

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right around that time during covid. Yeah. I've never seen it in print. I mean, I don't think.

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I found this website healthfeedback.org. It has a lot of the claims they've made in specific articles

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just to give you an idea of things that they've said in the article or in the headlines.

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Rat study alleged to link covid vaccine to autism. This is unsupported, but a statement they made.

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Natural immunity is better protection than covid 19 vaccine. Miss leading title. Study in Italy

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shows nearly one in three covid vaccine recipients have neurological side effects. Not correct.

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An accurate reporting by Pfizer would have shown equal numbers of clinical trial deaths

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in the vaccine and placebo groups and thus no benefit of vaccination. It is incorrect.

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Covid 19 vaccines are responsible for killing 17 people, 17 million people incorrect. Those are

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like very different numbers. 17 versus 17. Yeah, I'm just looking through their covid right now.

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Soaring childhood obesity after covid 19 lockdown poses lifelong health threat study. So yeah,

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very strange. Seeing as how do you remember from the first episode that Falun Gong practitioners

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are forbidden from being political in any way? Yeah, it seems pretty political like incredibly.

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Though they may not know because they don't have time to think about what they're writing.

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Yeah, and I do just want to give you guys, I did read one article on here and it is specifically

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titled because there are so many articles from other news groups saying like these guys are

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terrible because they don't actually do any journalism and just report Trump great all the

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time. Wave of hip pieces reveal why establishing this terrified of this defiant newspaper. This is

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from the epoch times and it basically says we didn't change. Everybody else just became anti-Trump

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for some reason and they're evil. We are unbiased and we only interpret everything from an anti-communist

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standpoint, which again isn't unbiased in itself, but let's not worry about that at this point.

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I love the spin they put on it. Do you think that they're funding Trump potentially? I don't know

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for sure, but I did find an article. Where is it? I need to find it really quick. GOP presidential

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candidate Larry Elders, who people may remember that name. He was running against Gavin Newsom to

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become the governor of California and he received from the epoch times between one million and five

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million dollars. Yeah, it wouldn't surprise me that they're heavily funding some of these things.

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Because when you're running for any government office, you have to do financial disclosure.

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He reported earning between one million and five million dollars from the epoch times.

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And I just want to say too that I am not slandering the epoch times by calling them extremely far

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right or conspiratorial. And in fact, they sued a journalist for calling one of their journalists

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extremely far right and spreading conspiracy theories such as Antifa is behind the January

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6th riots. The court concluded that no, in fact, they were very correct. They may have made an

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overgeneralization, but they were incredibly correct for calling you guys far right conspiracy

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theorists. And it wasn't like they sued the New York Times either. It was like the main bugle

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or something like that. Like it was not somebody who has all the money behind them. But yeah,

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they had people at January 6th who were reporting and they said, oh yeah, Antifa's here doing all

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the violence. Why? This doesn't make sense to me. They believe that Trump was going to bring about

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the end of the Communist Party in China. Okay. So they went all in on him and they appeared to have

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a working relationship at this time. Remember, this is not the first cult that we have seen

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Donald Trump have a relationship with as he came up in the Mooney's episode two. Also,

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for those listening at home, which is not all of you, if you're in the car, this probably applies

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to you too. Out on the streets, do not listen. Washington Times and epoch times now are the

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two cult related new sources that we should be avoiding because they're both cults. But remember,

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Washington Times, not Washington Post. Washington Times. Yeah, we've brought them up. They were

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in the Mooney's episode, they're owned by the Mooney's. Right. Okay. So epoch times are Washington

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Times. Who has the bigger epoch times? It's the bigger breach. It says weird. You will still see

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epoch times coming up in conspiratorial circles and far right circles. And you should know absolute

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all their journalism is actually dog shit and has a slant towards bringing about the end of the

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Communist Party in China. And Chelsea, I've been looking for all the stuff they have here. They also

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have new Tong Dynasty news media, which has a lot of association with YouTubers. And I just have this

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one part from the rational wiki. I always like using the rational wiki because they use very

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colorful language when covering these types of things. This is what they say about the epoch

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times. Besides its usual anti PRC diet tribe that asked readers to resign from the Chinese Communist

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Party regardless of actual membership. The paper often publishes woo and conspiracy such as chemtrails,

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UFOs, an entire section titled beyond science. The beyond science section includes such things as

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12 million year old vehicle tracks, ancient Sumerian spaceships, and hype over meditation and near

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death experiences. Former employees noted the secrecy of the publication's ownership and funding

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and tendency to promote red baiting as well as anti abortion and homophobic views. Other former

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writers noted it's almost slave labor like work environment where they need to meet a quota of

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writing five articles per day and reaching 100,000 views and are paid in virtue, a white substance

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in another dimension that you gain when you do good things. Falun Gong associated editors then

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remove mentions of issues which conflict with traditional values as well as those unfavorable

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to Trump. This is not surprising since it was promoted by Chris Kitts of fake news website

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before it's news. They have an entire section called beyond science and that clicks something in my

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head. Chelsea do you ever remember it's like years ago there was a guy named Mikey Chen and he was

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doing a YouTube show called beyond science. No. And it was all like more paranormal or

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fringy news science stuff is what he was doing. Let me take a look. Yeah, take a look. I'm sure

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you've seen this guy and he also has a thing where he like goes and eats food and learning about this

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I learned that this guy is a Falun Gong practitioner. Really? Yes. And I learned that his subreddit

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is absolutely like the coast to coast subreddit and it is hilarious how much they hate the guy.

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I love that. I look at the history. Yeah, this guy's in his mid 40s. He married somebody who

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was 23 a couple of years ago. It was super sketchy. They went over all the controversy in there.

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They talk about how he's clearly balding now and just like he tries to cover it up in terrible ways.

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They just got divorced him and his 23 year old wife. Super sketchy. Anyhow, it turns out they

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have quite a few YouTube personalities who have millions of followers like Mikey Chen who push

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Falun Gong things and that's through their new Tong Media group. I didn't know that the epoch

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times was owned by the Falun Gong and even if I didn't know, I didn't know the history of the

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Falun Gong. And so you put things where they're putting so much money into Facebook ads and doing

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deceptive things like that. They're going to get a big following and if they're just sharing things

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especially during COVID, it probably amassed a huge following just with that and that's where

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there's a huge problem with it. We should know all their journalists are producing like five

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articles a day. Not all of them are just pro-Trump. They have things that are relatively normal

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that distort people down their pipeline. Yeah. And then I mean you just kind of push the narrative.

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So it seems like they're just distributing them into society to just see what sticks to see.

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And then just I mean then you're just going to be reading articles or not even reading

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articles just being like yeah I read it in the epoch time. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah there's an entire

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media group behind it. The epoch times is not the only one. They also through this own

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New Tong Dynasty television which was on the air. I think it still is in Canada. It's offered

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through Roger's Cable. They also own the where is it. I had one more I needed to talk sound of hope

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which is a radio channel that this all goes through as well. But Chelsea now I do want to draw your

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attention to that top part and one of the things that's always pinned at the top of epoch times

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is up there and I want you to say what it is. Okay. I feel like we're looking at different

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page. Are we really. Yeah. Is it not on the Canadian version. Mine too looks like yours.

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No it's not. Interesting. I'm trying to delete Canada but it keeps bringing redirecting me back

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to oh no it keeps redirecting me back. That's okay it actually does show up here still.

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It's still like not in the same way on the Canadian version but there's always an article

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that on the front page about Shen Yun and Chelsea have you ever heard of Shen Yun. No but I have

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actually I haven't heard of it but I've seen it. As in you've seen advertisement correct.

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Not you've been to a show. I don't know maybe that's what I did I see it in China. No you didn't

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because remember Falun Gong is banned in China. Well I don't know they love Shen Yun apparently.

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No Chelsea actually on the on the Canadian version where it says feature Canadian news just below it.

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There's a bunch of Shen Yun. Yeah it will always be there no matter where you're watching it it

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will always be there. Right above there's an ad for Shen Yun that says special coverage underneath

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there's an article and then you can if you go I just. Chelsea can you read the article title.

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There's a sense of the divine in Shen Yun says California theater goer. Actually just click

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on the Seymour and read a few top vertical headlines. What the hell is this Shen Yun China before

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communism Wikipedia came up when I googled Shen Yun and what it just said was this makes me question

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what this is China before communism Shen Yun's London performances leave CEO in awe of Chinese

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history Shen Yun's presentation of classical Chinese dance astounds Kamikura audience.

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Shen Yun is truly good and inspiring says Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel Shen Yun is very uplifting

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very spiritual says Emmy award winning filmmaker is that James Cameron. I don't think it is.

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This is weird look at this is like a very nice age find a show near you. Yeah and I knew about

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Shen Yun up until like probably a year ago I didn't realize there was a relationship with

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Alan Gong and I always thought it was like a Chinese equivalent of Cirque du Soleil like I saw the

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advertisements that's what I got from it but I did see these like weird because they always get like

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viewer reviews of it and they're just so oddly worded like there's a spiritual. I have to give

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you another one. Okay Mastercard VIP says he felt connected to God during Shen Yun. Okay these are

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all the nice reviews and then directly to the right Shen Yun faces unrelenting interference from

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Beijing in South Korea. Sorry one more one more Shen Yun performing arts wraps up 2023 world tour

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amidst audience praise and acclaim. I really like this one it's right near the top Shen Yun is

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built on the values of goodness and commitment to traditions says physician and you'll notice

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when we're telling you who give this review it's not the New York Times it's not the New Yorker it's

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not like any reputable reviewing company it is people who they say saw it and have really weirdly

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spiritual connections to it. So you can narrow it down on the side it says global review USA Canada

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Europe Asia Oceana Latin America I thought you could just choose like a review from Canada like

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Canada but if you open it you can do Calgary Edmonton Hamilton Kitchener and it's all over yeah

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Bremen Burgess like you can click on specific cities and it's the same thing all of these reviews

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of how amazing it is and life changing it. Yeah from Vancouver business owner Shen Yun makes you

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want to be a better person says Vancouver business owner. This is so you can narrow it down by your

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specific location in case anybody is curious what they're talking about in your location about Shen

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Yun. This is so weird. Like I said these aren't reviews from like actual reviewing companies

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who go to plays like this or performances like this. Yeah I found the New Yorkers review or at

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least somebody from the New Yorker who saw it and did an article in the New Yorker about it

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I just need to take out some highlights. Okay. After we took our seats two hosts with animatronic

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smiles speaking both Chinese and English began introducing a series of dances which were called

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things like goodness in the face of evil and the world divinely restored. The female dancer moved

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in hypnotic swirls the male dancers jumped and flipped behind the stage was an enormous screen

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upon which digital backdrops ancient temples royal gardens the cosmos appeared along with

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digital dancers who would walk to the bottom of the screen and then pop out via the appearance of

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a living dancer on the stage. Living wow. The colors were near neon and unnatural they reminded me

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of the glowing hues of photo hunt the tabletop bar game. The host started talking about a spiritual

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discipline called Falendafa and they then introduced a dance in which a beautiful young

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follower of Falendafa was kidnapped and is imprisoned by communists who harvested her organs.

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Whoa I'm hallucinating. I whispered to my brother in the dark.

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It keeps going. Do you have something to say though? Is this Falengong's dance company?

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It's exclusively Falengong's yes. Okay this makes a lot. I guess I don't know what I was

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thinking there but yes that does make sense. Okay it seems incredible though. Look at all these

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good reviews. Yep from every city. And you will see if you go on YouTube and try to find it you

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cannot find anything from the actual performance. They keep that incredibly hidden and all you will

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see are these reviews. I mean the reviews look great. Would everyone like to learn a little

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Chinese? One of the hosts asked. He intoned a phrase and asked the audience to repeat it.

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That phrase means I love Shengyun he said. I felt my forehead the dances continued. Sleeves swirling,

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skirts rippling. A man came on stage to sing a song in Chinese which was translated on the screen

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behind him. We follow Dafa the great way he began. Yeah he singing about a creator who

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said mankind and made the world anew. This is a quote from the actual play. Atheism and evolution

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are a deadly ideas. Modern trends destroy what makes us human he's saying. At the end of the song the

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row of older white people sitting behind me clapped fervently. In the final dance number a group of

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Falendafa followers who wore blue and yellow and clutched books of religious teachings battle for a

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space in public square with corrupt youth. The corruption was evident because they were wearing

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black looking at their cell phones and in the case of two men holding hands. Chairman now appeared

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and the sky turned black. The city in the digital backdrop was obliterated by an earthquake. Then

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finished off by a communist tsunami. A red hammer and sickle glowed in the center of the wave.

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Days I rubbed my eyes and saw a huge bearded face disappearing in the water. Was that? I said to my

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brother wondering if I needed to go to the hospital. Carl Marx he said yeah I think that tsunami was the

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face of Carl Marx. Shen Yun according to Shen Yun means the beauty of divine things dancing. It can

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be translated as the rhythm of a divine spirit or more simply God's melody. The Shen Yun performing

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arts organization was founded in 2006 in New York's Hudson Valley and put on its first touring show in

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2007. By 2009 there were three touring Shen Yun companies. Today there are six companies each

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consisting of 40 or so dancers. All of them trained at the Feitian Academy which is situated at Dragon

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Springs in upstate New York. The dancers are accompanied by an orchestra that incorporates

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Chinese instruments. Each troupe includes about 80 people in addition to this 96 American cities it

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is touring this year. Shen Yun would also visit Vancouver, Berlin, Auckland, Taipei, Daigou

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and a dozen other places. Shen Yun is a non-profit. In 2016 it reported more than $75 million in

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assets and more than $22 million in revenue. Given the amount of money the organization seems to

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spend on advertising it's hard to believe that it could be in the black but the Guardian has

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reported that each city's Shen Yun advertising campaign is sponsored by the local Falendafa

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association. The ad blitzes are carefully coordinated. Shen Yun ads is basically a season on the

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calendar now. In January I decided to double check my Woozie memory and buy a ticket to see Shen Yun

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again in Lincoln Center and after the purchase went through I received a survey that asked me

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which of the 36 different versions of Shen Yun ads that ran into a New York. Newsday spots,

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Metro North posters, brochures, and mail had convinced me to buy tickets. Shen Yun's saturation

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has reached such a ludicrous intensity that it has in recent months become a meme. Part of the

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seeming strangeness of Shen Yun could be attributed to a latent orientalism on the part of Western

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viewers including those of us who are Asian descent but the real root of Shen Yun's meme-friendly

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eeriness is that the ads brightly and aggressively broadcast nothing at all. That's why it's so

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00:34:08,360 --> 00:34:13,080
easy to imagine them popping up in Ebbing, Missouri or in the extended Blade Runner universe or on

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Mars. The ads have to be both ubiquitous and devoid of content so that they can convince more than

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00:34:17,720 --> 00:34:23,000
a million people to pay good money to watch what it is, essentially religious political propaganda

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or more generously an extremely elaborate commercial for Falendafa's spiritual teachings and his

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plight vis-a-vis the Chinese Communist regime. The Chinese embassy for its part warrants the

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00:34:33,160 --> 00:34:38,280
American public to stay away from the so-called Shen Yun performances of the Falun Gong Organization

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00:34:38,280 --> 00:34:43,880
so as to avoid being deceived and used by the cults. I think I can end it there with that quote from the

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Embassy. This is bizarre that they have a dance company and so I saw they have some performances

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00:34:49,800 --> 00:34:56,280
here in Vancouver and it's very weird I put reviews and it's all five-star reviews but then

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00:34:56,280 --> 00:35:05,720
you go to Reddit. I just like this one somebody says has anyone actually gone to Shen Yun and it

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00:35:05,720 --> 00:35:10,440
says I've seen so many ads I'm genuinely curious who has actually seen the performance and some

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00:35:10,440 --> 00:35:19,320
guy commented that they've seen it twice and they're like why have you gone twice and he said it was

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00:35:19,320 --> 00:35:26,600
a decade apart one of my kids wanted to go it's just religious propaganda and symbolism it's

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expensive too like I don't think you can get in there for under a hundred I just looked no it's

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a hundred dollars for the back and it's just people being like reminder Shen Yun is a cult it's the

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Falun Gong and you will see posters for it everywhere I saw one where I live in Kelowna a poster

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when I've been in Vancouver I've actually seen like the performers have to go out and like advertise

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00:35:46,920 --> 00:35:52,120
it in malls like they'll just stand in the middle of the mall and hang out wired no I have seen it in

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00:35:52,120 --> 00:35:57,480
a mall that's where I know it from I have just the mall right here yeah all the reviews where you

424
00:35:57,480 --> 00:36:05,000
can review TripAdvisor are all five-star amazing this is so weird yeah but like straight up

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00:36:05,000 --> 00:36:11,480
cult propaganda if you see an advertisement for Shen Yun it is cult propaganda and all of the

426
00:36:11,480 --> 00:36:16,760
dancers are part of the cult and the ABC investigation that I talked about in the last episode

427
00:36:16,760 --> 00:36:23,160
one of the people who left the cult she was mixed race and had sexual thoughts about women so she's

428
00:36:23,160 --> 00:36:28,440
oh no that's bad for her she ran into huge problems with them but she also and this is part of the

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00:36:28,440 --> 00:36:32,520
article I just want to read at this time master Lee was establishing the professional dance troupe

430
00:36:32,520 --> 00:36:37,800
known as Shen Yun Anna's mother encouraged her to train to be a Shen Yun dancer quote she thought

431
00:36:37,800 --> 00:36:42,280
that it was the highest honor possible and that it would guarantee me getting into heaven essentially

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00:36:42,280 --> 00:36:47,240
end quote but Anna felt that she was not as gifted as the other dancers and then there was the incident

433
00:36:47,240 --> 00:36:52,360
at the summer dance camp in New Jersey Anna's teacher placed her in front of a mirror and lifted

434
00:36:52,360 --> 00:36:57,080
up her shirt quote she grabbed my stomach shook it and then turned to the other kids in the class

435
00:36:57,080 --> 00:37:01,800
there were several of them and she said do you see this everyone this is an example of how a woman

436
00:37:01,800 --> 00:37:06,680
should not look at the age of 13 Anna ended up hospitalized with anorexia and that's part of

437
00:37:06,680 --> 00:37:11,720
the reason she ended up leaving the cult wow not that they were good to begin with yeah and you know

438
00:37:11,720 --> 00:37:17,000
what I found these on it was the st. Louis subreddit and they said Shen Yun was coming through and I

439
00:37:17,000 --> 00:37:23,240
seen it this comes from macaroni incident it was posted in 2022 people think they're an amazing act

440
00:37:23,240 --> 00:37:27,400
their marketing is everywhere who wouldn't in reality they got a lot of their ads and free

441
00:37:27,400 --> 00:37:32,040
stuff by bugging the shit out of their companies for in-kind donations in the form of ad space

442
00:37:32,040 --> 00:37:36,840
because they will relentlessly ask until you give in I used to work for a nonprofit arts company we

443
00:37:36,840 --> 00:37:41,640
ended up letting them use one of our dance floors for free for their performance in our city they

444
00:37:41,640 --> 00:37:46,040
also got tens of thousands of dollars in ad space in our playbills management just wanted them out

445
00:37:46,040 --> 00:37:51,960
of their hair and then this one coming from pjamas 41 two years ago as well in 2022 I've done

446
00:37:51,960 --> 00:37:57,160
advertising business with them before they will low ball the hell out of you and push until they

447
00:37:57,160 --> 00:38:01,880
get a firm answer a few years ago I gave up and just said no haven't worked with them since so

448
00:38:01,880 --> 00:38:06,600
not exactly a great group to work with Chelsea were you able to find any one star reviews this one

449
00:38:06,600 --> 00:38:11,480
just says very bad performance is very unprofessional because I feel like this is a good way to end it

450
00:38:12,120 --> 00:38:19,080
jeez this is all about the staff is this actually Shenyun no I know I just noticed that it's all

451
00:38:19,080 --> 00:38:25,800
not it at all it's all about the theater itself I know same that's what I found so fortunately

452
00:38:25,800 --> 00:38:30,360
we're just gonna have to revive rely on the new yorker for their one star review although I think

453
00:38:30,360 --> 00:38:35,800
it might have irony level of like a four out of five stars but those are the ways that we've all

454
00:38:35,800 --> 00:38:42,840
have interactions with Fallon Gong that we didn't know crazy no I had no idea I hope that this at

455
00:38:42,840 --> 00:38:48,520
least gives you some sort of ammo the next time that family member tries to share a news article

456
00:38:48,520 --> 00:38:53,000
with you and you can say you know that was published by a cult right yeah or when someone's

457
00:38:53,000 --> 00:38:57,560
like I just want Shenyun I am actually just like mildly actually curious to go see a Shenyun

458
00:38:57,560 --> 00:39:02,680
performance but I do not want my money to actually go to them I know that's my exact train of thought

459
00:39:02,680 --> 00:39:08,600
that I just had in thinking about it I hope this has been useful this is a huge group and is still

460
00:39:08,600 --> 00:39:13,160
very active today I feel like it was necessary to take this time to focus on these people and

461
00:39:13,160 --> 00:39:19,560
nobody knows anything about them I appreciated it spanning three episodes it was a fun one yeah

462
00:39:19,560 --> 00:39:23,960
and I have been Taylor here with Chelsea we are Journey to the Fringe thank you all for listening

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00:39:23,960 --> 00:39:30,360
and we'll see you next week bye thank you for listening to Journey to the Fringe if you have

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00:39:30,360 --> 00:39:37,000
liked what you have listened to please like share subscribe or follow depending on what

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venue you are listening to us through also please if possible leave a five star review as that really

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00:39:43,480 --> 00:39:48,600
helps us in the algorithms should you wish to interact with us please check us out on your

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00:39:54,040 --> 00:39:59,000
give us ideas for new episodes or tell us that we're wrong and terrible either way please send

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00:39:59,000 --> 00:40:10,840
us an email at Journey to the Fringe at gmail.com for now I'll see you in the next episode