This is kind of apt timing for this topical intro.
Chelsea, we've been talking about Japan for a couple weeks now in our podcast as we are recording this episode.
One thing we haven't talked about really is modern day Japan, which is facing a aging population crisis.
And one economist has come out with a brilliant plan for dealing with it that made it to New York Times.
This is not the New York Times episode because they have a robust paywall.
This is instead the Daily Mail version of article, which we will be going over now.
It came out on February 12, 2023, written by Steven LaPour,
title of the article. Yale University Economics professor sparks outrage by proposing mass suicide
in disembowelment of elderly people in Japan to deal with the country's rapid aging society.
What, but why?
We're going to get into that.
Okay.
I think or we won't.
And there will just be more questions.
I'm just saying we're just leaving into that, hey.
A Yale University professor has sparked outrage by suggesting the only way to deal with Japan's
rapidly aging population is a mass suicide in disembowelment.
Oh my God.
Yusuke Narita, an assistant professor of economics at Yale,
notice he is not in Japan nor old.
Also the photo they have here of him, he's wearing glasses, I think.
Yes.
Yes, that is him.
One side of his glasses is a circle and the other side is a square.
Interesting.
That would make it hard to focus on him.
Yes, but not for him to focus on you.
It's the ultimate game plan right there.
So Yusuke Narita, an assistant professor of economics at Yale, who is not in Japan nor
old, so doesn't have to deal with this, defended his views in a New York Times profile this weekend
after he made the remarks on a streaming news program in 2021.
Quote, I feel like the only solution is pretty clear.
Unquote, he said at the time, quote, in the end, isn't it mass suicide and mass of the elderly?
End quote.
So Puku was a ritual disembowelment that was forced upon samurai who had brought dishonor
to themselves in 19th century Japan.
Narita told the New York Times he was taken out of context, but he has also said that
euthanasia could become mandatory in the future, his comments forcing a backlash nonetheless.
He claims that this would allow younger generations to make their way in business,
politics, and other aspects of society that the older generation refuses to leave.
Japan has a low birth rate and the most public debt in the first world.
The country has 1.34 births per woman below the United States at 1.65.
Last year, Japan sought the population plunge by more than 600,000 due to declining fertility
rates in a rapidly aging population.
The country's population dropped forward the 11th consecutive year and was down by 644,000
according to his Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications.
The overall population fell as death succeeded births by 609,000 and his people who moved out
of the country outnumbered those who moved in by 35,000.
Yet Yusuke's comments not only made people angry, but won him an audience.
He has over 569,000 Twitter followers, which doesn't actually seem like that much.
I feel like they're throwing that out of proportion there.
Especially with the way Twitter is right now.
He frequently shows up in Japanese media wearing casual clothing and presents himself
much like a radio shop jock, his Twitter bio proclaiming, quote,
the things you're told you're not allowed to say are usually true, end quote.
Narita was asked to defend his views in a class earlier this year and did so by
showing a clip from the 2019 film Midsomer in which a cult forces an older member to jump off a
cliff. Whether that's a good thing or not, that's a more difficult question to answer Narita said.
So if you think that's good, then maybe you can work hard toward creating a society like that.
So it really doesn't sound like he actually has an argument other than there's too many old people.
I mean, I guess that's your argument.
That's your argument.
And that's why you should, if you're looking for a job that you don't have to be that good at
or explain yourself that well or actually get anything right, go be an economist.
It's the easiest fucking job in the world so long as somebody wants to hear what you're saying.
His comments received renewed attention when social media discovered them in January
with the sociologists complaint proclaiming them as hatred towards the vulnerable.
Narita told the Times he was primarily concerned with the phenomenon in Japan where the same
tycoons continue to dominate the world's politics, traditional industries and media
entertainment journalism for many years. And I don't know how he's saying that just that
only happens in Japan where it's just like people have always been in the media or just the media.
Yeah, I was just thinking that.
He literally lives in the US and teaches at Yale. Like how does he not see the simile?
I think if I'm not mistaken, most of the world has that problem coming up. Most of it.
Yeah. Maybe the Western, I don't know.
He allows that the way he said it was meant as a metaphor for how an older generation must be phased
out and he has softened his language since. And quote, I shouldn't have been more careful about
their potential negative connotations. Narita said quote, after some self reflection, I stopped using
the words last year and he's not alone over as one of the major players in the country's
liberal Democratic Party, which we talked about extensively suggested old people need to hurry up
and die. Narita spread his message on social media and in comedy shows, energy drink ads and even
via TikTok impressionist comedy shows. I think that's as far as I need to go. I thought that was
an interesting article I found today. Yeah. And really just like I have very little respect for
economists just because not really anything other than a way for rich people to make everybody else
agree with. That's literally the job of a economist. What a fresh take on Japan's aging population.
Who would have thought it would be so easy to fix that problem? Yeah, not only they would all listen.
That's a different problem. Yeah. Shall I say anything to add to that? Yeah, I don't think so.
Okay, then let's how about get into this episode. Okay, let's do it.
From the unexplained to the mundane, come join us on our journey to the fringe.
Hello and welcome to Journey to the Fringe. We're sometimes timing of intros and episodes being
filmed and what's coming out coincide perfectly. We are your timing wise apt hosts, Taylor and
Chelsea here today talking about something I don't know other than that it is foot oriented,
which sounds kind of creepy if taken out of the context of fringe topics, which just makes me
think big foot. But I will leave that up to Chelsea to reassure me hopefully that it is going more in
the big foot way and less in the creepy way. Hey, how did you guess that? I tried to make it so
cryptic. So just like Taylor who said yet another episode that is a surprise, well probably only
a true surprise for Taylor is the title by this point is probably very punny and gave it partially
away or you read it or you're just here and it is a surprise. So Taylor, since you're the only
person I can ask right now because I can ask the listeners, the only person you can ask who will
give you an answer, you can ask anybody in real time, but I want an answer right now. Okay,
I want an answer. So I have to ask you, what would you say if I told you this episode was about
feeds and not big foot? I would possibly say it would be cryptid footprints. Okay. In general.
Well, it's not so. Okay. Oh, no, we're not going the creepy way. Are we? I don't know where you're
thinking. We're not talking about foot finishes. Okay, because those are mainstream at this point.
Yeah, mainstream for us, not foot finishes, not cryptid feet and not just any feet, not just,
you know, mundane feet. Oh, wait. No, I figured it out. It's the feet that keep washing up on shore.
It is. Yes. So this episode is you win nothing, but satisfaction, I'm guessing it. This episode is
specifically about many single feet. Some of them match. Some are not matching. There's a
feet in running shoes that are found washed up on shore in a very specific area in the world,
which is the Salish Sea. So not only am I doing a sort of mystery, well, it's not really a mystery
actually. Turns out they pretty well know why they're washing up, but it's one of those topics
that I think many people think it's a mystery. It also comes with intrigue of- I also think people
don't want to hear the answer because any actual answer as to why dismembered body parts are washing
up on shore, probably going to be a sad or disturbing answer. It is. It kind of is. I got
some satisfaction in getting that answer though. But I feel like most people are going to hear
that and they say, well, that's creepy. I don't want to learn anything more about it other than
that there's a mystery of feet. Well, that comes at the end. So listen to the whole episode. Or
people really like the theory that they just hear hot. There's a mystery of foot and they don't want
to ruin them. And they like that. I was- I don't know if I was satisfied with it, but we'll get to
it eventually at the very end. So at least listen to all the mystery and then keep going. It's weird,
but I digress. I'm also doing this sort of mystery episode because it's super local to me and it's a
weird thing. So I didn't know just how local it was to me. I thought it was Vancouver Island, but
turns out a lot of it's happening right in my neighborhood, but you know, in areas I've been
to before. If you haven't heard anything about this or if you need a refresher, since August 2007,
at least 20 detached human feet have been found on the coast around the Salish Sea. And the Salish
Sea is in the Pacific Ocean. Well, it's beside the Pacific Ocean. I just really want to ask a quick
question here. Would you consider it 20 feet or would you consider it 20 foot? Because they're not
pairs. Like they're individuals. A lot of them. Some of them are pairs and I didn't know that. So I
guess you could use it interchangeably. It's kind of like if you have a bunch of individuals, it would
be persons. It should be foot. I think it's foot, but I don't know for sure. You need detached human
foot, which sounds wrong to say. Yeah. Also, it does disturb me how close you are to these and
you're doing an episode on them. And I learned some really cool things about the area I live in.
No, it's not the fact that I worry for your safety. I'm more so worried you have involvement in this.
And that's why you're learned so much about it. You can't just put that in this episode.
You can edit it. You're editing this episode. Chelsea has no attachment to this mystery.
Disclaimer. Okay. So 20 detached human foot have been found on the coast of the Salish Sea.
I listened to a bunch of podcasts leading up to this and I find it so funny that everybody says
Salish wrong and they're saying Salish or something like that. And being that said, I'm really hoping
I'm saying Salish Sea right because that's the only way I've ever heard it pronounced.
Oh yeah. And I heard the Indigenous group, the Co-Salish. It comes up a lot in land recognition.
So I assume it's the Salish Sea. Yeah, I assume it is as well. And I've heard it pronounced
multiple times being where I'm from. So that's it. So the Salish Sea is in the Pacific Ocean area
off the Pacific Ocean. But it falls within the island territories of Canada, correct? Yes. And
the United States. So it lies off the coast of British Columbia, specifically between Vancouver
Island and the mainland British Columbia, as well as Washington State. So it includes the Strait of
Georgia, the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and the Puget Sound. And not only are there a f*** ton of islands
in this area, it also includes Vancouver and Victoria in Canada and Seattle, Tacoma, Everett
in the United States to name just a few cities that you're going to see that fall into this
general area. I know Washington has a lot of islands in this area as well that I'm not as
familiar with. If you're American, that would be the Juan de Fuca Strait. Yeah. I must stress that
this phenomenon is specific to this area in the world. And while it does happen in some places,
like one or two, it's extremely rare for it to happen more than once, even remotely close by
to each other. Feet do not just wash up in such numbers or frequency literally anywhere else in
the world on beaches. And we'll get to that in a little bit as to why that probably is later on
in the episode. Like I said, the odds of the frequency in which this is happening is literally
million to one odds and the odds are even higher to find a matching foot. So first I want to start
off with that setup with the foot sightings. I mentioned the date August 2007 when at least 20
detached feet of foot have been found washing up on shores around the Salish Sea, but it actually
goes back further than that. There is one foot sighting dating back to 1887. Have feet been
spawning up on shore since humans have first landed in that area? No, actually. So this is the first
one that we have on record. It's 1887. And this is a full half of a human leg. So like from the knee
down washed up on the shores near Falls Creek. Oh, shit. So shrinkflations even hitting the legs and
feet to their right. Yeah. Washing up the shores. A leg in a boot like knee down in a boot. And it
washes up near Falls Creek in Vancouver still wearing this boot baffled by the severed extremity.
The constables of Vancouver decided that rather than pounding the pavement trying to find the
owner of this boot, it wanted to return it back to the owner. The obvious way to do this was to
place the leg on a pike and leave it outside the precinct office in case the owner came looking for
it. Or maybe somebody knew whose boot that was. They're like, that looks like Bob's boot. And
they're like, you know, now that we mentioned it, Bob, we haven't seen Bob in a while. And he had a
really nice boot. I want you to have a nice boot. Nobody ever found the owner to this boot or leg.
It's still a mystery to this day. But fun fact, I found it fun for all you locals in the area,
the police station where this leg sat looking for its rightful owners now gone. And that's not the
fun fact. What is there now is called leg and boot square. And that does still stand. It's by Falls
Creek. If you're ever in Vancouver, I myself probably by this time have visited it. And I will
be posting it to the social medias that I found that to be a very interesting Vancouver fat. And
I love that it's still a place leg and boot square. So it's literally just named after the fact that
somebody found a boot there. Yeah, it is a boot with a leg in it. Okay. The very cleverly named
leg and boot square. Is it cleverly or just really lazily? It's very literally. That's the right
answer. Yes. The next sighting, which was published in the Vancouver Sun, July 30th, 1914, that recent
arrivals from Kim'squit, sorry, that one I do not know if I am saying right, reported a human leg
encased in a high boot was found on a beach near the mouth of the Salmon River, a previous name
for the Dean River near Kim'squit near the headquarters of Dean Channel. It was thought
the remains were from a man who had drowned on the river from a previous summer. So there we have a
few odd sightings going back. These ones are legs and boots. But nobody was worried about that guy
being murdered and his foot being chopped up. No, not once did that come up to be honest with you
that someone was worried there is a serial killer of what? Okay. Yes. Okay. I just wanted to make
sure that was intentional. A feat if you will. It wasn't until I thought until you realize what you
said. That's good. Yeah. That's good. We can edit it out in a post game. The sightings were slow
back in the old days. Like a one footed individual. Those are the only two we have up until August
2007. Holy shit. Look at 100 years. Yeah. Then there's a long ass hiatus until August 2007. The date
I have already said brought up. Yep. August 2000. And we'll live in infamy. Yes. Sure did. Here it is
another time but I will actually tell you about it now. I think let's continue on and see. I know
we're talking sightings but while we're doing that let's throw in some stats. Since September
2018 there have been 15 feet found in British Columbia between 2007 and 2018 and I'm pretty
sure there have been no more foot sightings since that time which is why we have that specific time
of 2018 September. I have been found in the state of Washington so we're winning here in Canada.
We're winning the foot race. Yeah. We're winning the foot race.
Yeah. It's not to break or anything. This first modern day sighting I guess you would call it.
The detached foot's return happens on Jebediah Island in BC. Here's the date again August
20th 2007 just in case you forgot. And this sighting was from a 12 year old girl visiting from
Washington who picked up a size 12 men's white and black Adidas shoe and opened the sock for some
fucking reason. She didn't realize there was a foot in the shoe when she grabbed it and no the fact
there was a sock sticking out of it. Yeah. You would think it might be heavier than you would
think if it was just an abandoned boot. And this girl would be like in her late 20s now. I wonder
if she still like holds this memory in her mind. I would not doubt it. I've never found a foot so
I don't know how it never returned to Canada. Yeah. Probably not. It's a horrible place. Wouldn't recommend.
Full of foot. She pulls back the sock for some weird reason to find a man's right foot. It is
thought to have become disarticulated due to submerged decay. This kind of shoe was produced
in 2003 and distributed mainly in India. So six fucking days later. Six days later. All of a sudden
there's feet everywhere. Foot's everywhere. August 26 2007. Remember the first date was
August 20 2007. Six days. Remember the state because I only give you this one once. This one's
Gabriola Island in BC where a man's right foot was discovered by a couple also disarticulated
due to decay. I'm pretty sure disarticulated means foot has come apart from the leg. The foot in
shoe not the couple is disarticulated due to decay. It was waterlogged and appeared to have been taken
ashore by an animal. It probably floated ashore from the south. The shoe as size 12 white Reebok
was produced in 2004 and sold worldwide but primarily in North America and the type has
since been discontinued. Just the world on the same page. Disarticulated means separated bones
at the joints. Yeah. So that would be at the ankle joint. Yes. Also it concerns me a little.
These are like fairly large men's size shoes. Yeah. They're not average. Like the average size
of a man's foot is anywhere between eight and 10. Oh I didn't know that. You're learning lots of fun
facts in this episode. So there's a quote from this particular foot finding from Gary Cox of
The Horse Boys or the RCMP if you prefer who told the Vancouver Sun quote two feet being found in
such a short period of time is quite suspicious. Finding one foot is like a million to one odds
but finding two was crazy. I've heard of dancers with two left feet but come on and listen to Gary
go. Those horse boys end quote. What are those horse boys actually the quote ended before I said
that. So if the quote ends at but come on. The third foot February 8 2007 on Valdez Island British
Columbia. It was inside a men's blue and white Nike running shoe size 11. It was produced in
2003 and sold in Canada and the US from February 1st to June 30th 2003. Super short selling time on
this. Foot number four May 22nd 2008 Kirkland Island BC which is an island in the Fraser Delta
between Richmond and Delta BC. I've never actually heard of this island and when I googled it it is
not like an inhabited island. It's just an island you can visit and this one was a woman's blue and
white new balance running shoe size seven. It was produced in June 1999 and distributed through
major retail stores. This found foot was wearing a sock and sneaker. It is thought to have washed
down the Fraser River having nothing to do with the ones found in the gulf islands which is where
the previous feet were found. I don't know if it's good to ask this question now or if it's going
to come up later because you've brought up each time where the sneaker that they're wearing or the
shoe they're wearing is predominantly sold but they all seem to also be wearing socks. Is it less
regional for socks or is it just something that they've never really looked into or not?
Pretty much I think they're just describing in detail what they were wearing and pretty much
all of them were wearing socks in a running shoe. Okay but they described like oh this shoe's sold
here so they're trying to pinpoint where these people are from but does that sock not give you
any further information or is it something they've never really looked into? Probably not. I would
assume socks are less regional than shoes which have much more so a cultural connotation and
not necessarily regional but maybe monetary differences especially if you're from a wealthier
country you're gonna have more different options than at pork. Yeah I think you're right and with
the sneakers I think they're better able to determine like a time frame of perhaps where
this foot came from because some of these time frames are super specific like the one only had
a time frame of a couple months that it was being sold. Yeah okay. Like the previous one we were just
talking about was only sold I mean but then you never know when it went into the water. And sneaker
heads have been like quietly waiting for this phenomenon to happen their entire lives so all
this information they've been collecting their entire lives finally became useful. Yeah so if it's
a sneaker head that's been doing this the last couple of years wouldn't surprise me at all.
You know what it could be someone who went and just uploaded that to Wikipedia because in the end
this compiled it into a really nice just like source of everything so he might have just gone and
added this but no actually I went through the news articles as well it was also in the news
articles okay. In 2011 the fourth sneaker out in Kirkland Island was identified as being part of a
pair of blue and white new balance sneakers belonging to a woman who jumped from the Petulo
Bridge US Minster in 2004 which is British Columbia and the Petulo Bridge does cross over the
Freezer River. Foot number five a match to the third foot found on Valdez Island so we're getting
matches now which is found on Westham Island by two hikers June 16 2008 and matches the third foot
in shoe identified as belonging to a 20 year old Surrey man reported missing four years earlier so
these are all the last two I mentioned are local to the area. Now foot six August 1st 2008 near
Pished Washington our first one in the States this is a right foot inside a man's black size 11 shoe
was discovered by a camper on a beach it was covered in seaweed the site of the discovery was less
than 16 kilometers from the international border in the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Testing confirmed
that the foot was human please say the large black top size 11 athletic shoe for a right foot contains
bone and human flesh this is the first foot of this series to be found outside of BC the RCMP and
Clalem county sheriff's department agreed on August 5th that the foot could have been carried
south from Canadian waters so we are straight up just thinking this is a Canadian problem.
No we're saying that's ours we get that point. Yeah we have the foot. It's really 16 to 4 not
15 5 jerks. Yeah we spotted you a point because we felt that. Foot 7 Richmond BC the date November 11 2008
again the known woman's left foot in a shoe was found floating in the Fraser River in Richmond
the shoe was described as a small new balance running shoe possibly a woman's shoe the forensic
DNA profiling analysis indicated that it was the genetic match to the foot discovered on Kirkland
Island May 22nd. The Fraser River if you're wondering about that you're thinking river what's
going on the Fraser River does connect out to the Salish Sea from the mainland I don't know where
it originates like way back into British Columbia I think. Foot number eight also Richmond British
Columbia again October 27 2009 our right foot in a size eight and a half Nike running shoe on a
beach in Richmond the remains were identified as a Vancouver area man who was reported missing in 2008
in January. Foot 9 my birthday August 27 2010 would be island Washington a woman or child's right foot
without a shoe or sock I must have missed this even though it's right here without a shoe or
sock interesting this foot was determined to have been in the water for two months Detective Ed
Wallace of the Island County Sheriff's Office released a statement saying the foot would be
tested for DNA however there is no match found in the national DNA database interesting no shoe or
sock I thought they were all in shoes. Foot 10 Tacoma Washington December 5 2010 found on the
title flats quote the right foot was still inside a boy size six Ozark trail hiking boot and likely
belonged to a juvenile or small adult and quote police spokesman Mark Algum said Tuesday in Tacoma
about 40 kilometers south of Seattle and 225 kilometers south of Vancouver. Foot 11 August 30
2011 the next year Falls Creek British Columbia another popular area and we're going back to the
area of foot and boot square sex unknown on this one a foot was found in a man's white and blue size
nine runner floating next to the Plaza of Nations marina attached to the lower leg bone it had
disarticulated naturally at the knee due to the water wait so this particular area does actually
get a different type of foot showing up yeah boots at least things that could fit in a leg yeah
they've attached different differently at Falls Creek yeah yeah yeah you're right very strange so
the last one we got no running shoe or a sock this one we get more of leg in there foot 12
is also a weird one sassam at lake British Columbia November 4 2011 sassam at lake is in port moody
British Columbia if you know the area sassam at lake is a lake it is connected by a small kind of
it's not I wouldn't call it a river by any means there's like an inlet I don't know it's not an
inlet like if you look at a map it's not really anything but it is connected through like a small
thing I wouldn't even think that a foot would go maybe it got stuck in it it's one of the warmest
lake British Columbia I don't know it's not like a river or anything it's super weird it kind of
connects to the Salish Sea through this which is an inlet from the Salish Sea port moody has an inlet
it's connected to the Indian arm this one I just think it's weird because I would think of it more
as a lake I wouldn't even call it connected to the rest a man's right foot inside a size 12
hiking boot was discovered by a group of campers in a pool of fresh water at sassam at lake near
port moody in January 2012 this foot was identified by the BC coroner service of that as Stefan
Zaharushko a local fisherman who went missing in 1987 police believe the foot separated naturally
from the body and do not suspect foul play 1987 to 2011 that is a long time for yeah that's 24 years
yeah I just I find that one weird and I wonder where he was fishing I would also want to know
like the status of the foot when they actually found it because like that couldn't have looked
fresh no it not in the lease bid at all but we're on to the next sighting okay December 13 no time
to think 2011 or no sorry this is not the 13th of December it's the 13th foot December 10 2011
lake union Seattle Washington human leg bone and foot in a black plastic bag under the ship
canal bridge as of January 2nd 2012 the medical examiner has not found a cause of death or identified
the body a few things I find wrong with this can you find a cause of death from a leg bone love loss
but I don't know no you know what if it had some sort of like disease in it you might be able to
like I could see certain like disease from possibly like leukemia or uh cancer of the bone
one of those two I suppose yeah but then at that point you gotta ask why is it in the river and
why is it in a black plastic bag yeah this is the first one that showed up in a bag too that's
kind of weird you're completely right on that one and nobody says on this one specifically that we
do not suspect foul play I would find and everybody else says that it feels like if you find a foot
you gotta say that or it's implied that there was foul play it's true and that's why there's so much
mystery behind this because you don't usually hear it in conjunction with the article totally natural
yeah yeah which some of them are yes I guess apparently um yes so foot number 14 January 26 2012
Vancouver BC on January 26 2012 the remains of what appears to be human bones inside a boot
were found in the sand along the waterline at the dog part near the maritime museum at the foot of
Arbutus street in Vancouver and that's all we got on that one May 6 2014 another one in Seattle we
discovered the 15th foot human foot in white new balance shoe found along the show oh we haven't
heard what kind of shoes other than a boot and a hiking boot recently found along the shoreline of
Centennial Park near the pier 86 green terminal a new balance model 622 athletic shoe was white
with blue trim size men's 10 and a half the model of shoe was first available for sale in April 2008
from an initial news photo it appears to be a left foot and that's a lot of detail for you there
on just what exactly was found in conjunction with the foot for the 16th foot you ask I know
you're just like just get on to the next foot this one's found on Vancouver Island February 7
2016 near Port Renfrew which is on the side of the island that's right on the ocean is that
really the Salish Sea then it's not the Salish Sea on that side I don't believe that one would be
Pacific Ocean because there's nothing sheltering it that's just why don't be yeah that's Pacific
Ocean so not specific to the Salish Sea but I guess they're not like being like technically a few of
them are not specific it can be the Pacific yeah hikers on Botanical Beach near Port Renfrew and
Vancouver Island found a foot in a sock in a running shoe February 17th this is 10 days later
Vancouver Island again in Port Renfrew February 12 2016 foot 17 with that I keep getting the foot
confused with the date so February 12th which is the date the second foot was found in Port Renfrew
I foot washed up near Port Renfrew again Vancouver Island BC Coroner's Service said it matches the
one they found five days earlier so well that's at least good it's not like separate mysteries
that are hitting Port Renfrew and it washed up in the same place I find it interesting on this one
that this one is the ocean and it washed up in the same place whereas in the Salish Sea they've
been all over the place yeah all over the place but they're also like different shoes and feet
as far as yeah but there's been matches and the matches have gone into different islands and stuff
where there's more area to get lost in it washes up in the same spot which I think is a little bit
weird and interestingly enough there are at least from what I understand the rest of the world does
have ocean and land coinciding together running into each other if you will and they do not get feet
in shoes washing the floor exactly this is the only place in the world that this appears to happen
on a regular basis for a little while yeah and there are much more I mean there's a higher
population in this area due to mainly Vancouver and Seattle and Washington but it's not like those
are even big cities like compared to other cities that can be on the ocean they're not and there are
much bigger cities on the ocean even North America even the west coast like LA and San Diego are
probably bigger even on lakes yeah and this is not happening so we're almost there foot 18
Vancouver Island again remains of a leg with the shoe attached washed up near the settlement of
Jordan River on Vancouver Island I don't actually know where that is number 19 was found May 6 2018
on Gabriola Island again population on Gabriola Island is small oh yeah it's like in the hundreds
is it not I believe so yeah um as are most of the islands we're talking about Vancouver islands
the biggest of all the islands um oh my god all the other ones are tiny even one's not even populated
that Kirkland Island shortly afternoon on Sunday May 6 a man walking along the shore on Gabriola
Island encounters a hike I wanted to correct myself it is 4,500 people live on Gabriola Island 4,500
it's getting up there okay so shortly afternoon Sunday May 6 a man walking along the shore of
Gabriola Island encountered a hiking boot with a human foot inside wedged in a log jam and also
seems suspicious to me and here we're joining up with foot 20 in West Vancouver September 2018
hey foot good to see you yeah a good old friend the foot foot 20 we miss you
West Vancouver foot with light gray Nike free run or RN shoes free run I feel like that foot
took that name too literally yeah it doesn't need a body shoe on the shore near the 30th street
beach access point to West Vancouver the size 9.5 shoe was manufactured between February 1st
and 17th of April 2017 again a very short period of time it was believed to have been worn by a
male and had a blue sock that's the first time we've actually seen a sock described that's the
most they've ever described this yeah I feel like you can get more information out of the socks and
they've given us it is and on foot 20 they finally give us the sock information yeah now we're all
out of feet to talk about the victim is believed to have been under the age of 50 they really narrowed
it down yeah if you are curious on that one foot I have that information for you they were under
50 oh hold on we have one more hold on no no I just said foot 20 again yeah I must have been
excited about foot 20 okay now January 1st 2019 when people on Jetty Island and Everett Washington
hold on we did just do foot 20 but I have another one okay there are two foot 20s understood yeah
two foot 20s there's a reason we're not counting one of them maybe I don't okay let me just read
maybe I'll come up with the answer or maybe I count I mixed up my count maybe this is just 21
yeah yeah so the most recent sighting of what's or discovery I guess I keep killing them sightings
but I'm so used to seeing sightings on here on Journey to the French because we're used to cryptid
sightings are you a full sighting it's more than just a sighting like they found this it didn't just
run off after that would be discovery yeah of the foot as in I discovered a detached human foot not
I had a sighting of a human foot and then it was gone yeah if you found the rest of the body would
you consider that the detached body and then you found the foot oh no not at that point I don't think
I would be like how much of the body do you have to have to decide one side the passion the other's
not I found this detached body from its foot yeah I don't think anyone would how much how much of the
body do you need then to make that decision I was just gonna say what's the appropriate amount of body
to say this body is detached from its extremities and that reminds me of a joke on Flight of the
Concords back in the day where their friend I forget his name but he was talking about somebody
that was grabbed by the penis and they cut the band's body off from there and they say didn't you
mean that they cut his dick off and they said no because at the end of the day he was just a dick
and it brings up a good question or topic at least to talk about I would say the defining point is
probably all the limbs is it all the limbs is it a weight proportion or is it like a
significance portion at least but like even hmm even if it was a severed head you would say sever
head they didn't discover the person it's true we really do think of the torso yeah it's really the
torso like we always think of like the place where the place where like the humanity exists
is in the head but that can be severed and then you still think it's missing from the body yeah
weird it could just be a journey to the fringe thing or science do you think science would agree
I think that's a grammatical thing I wouldn't call it a scientific discovery
of what you need to be considered being an incomplete body and even so if your torsos
cut in half you would say missing half it's just rediscovered half a severed torso yeah not a body
okay so the last sighting the most recent January 1st 2019 is this the second 20th sighting this is
and you know I think where the confusion is coming from is all that talk of August 20th 2007 no hold
on it said the last sighting was 2018 now I said August 20th 2007 I'm confusing myself
said it too much it's the only date I know this must be like a new new one well it's not new because
it's 2019 because my sightings were up until 2018 so I think I must have found another one
is what's going on here just let me just tell you about it instead of all this hearsay about where
I came up with it January 1st 2019 when people on jettie island in Everett Washington called police
to report a boot with a human foot inside which the coroner was able to match to Antonio Neal
who is missing since December 12 2016 we keep talking about like every time you they find it in
a shoe you go very in detail as to what the shoe was and it was like it was created in like a 20
minute window at this factory for distribution in one town in eastern Idaho whereas with the boots
it's just a boot yeah boots are all the same you know I'll like keep assuming is these cowboy boots
keep showing up and they're like oh f**k them I hate cowboy boots you're poking holes in this okay
it's true boots are boots socks are socks unless it's the one blue shoes aren't very f**king
specific like all like again just just going back to my theory it's a f**king sneakerhead behind this
whole thing but it must be okay there's more of a conspiracy to this than we think a boot's a boot
I guess no due to boot it and there's so much to shoes that much must be taking into consideration
even though there's more of a boot there it's very generic everything what color what shoe size
where it was produced and nothing of the sort for the boots moving on so among the 20-ish feet found
we think there might be 21 there are a couple of hoaxes I didn't tell you about the hoaxes just in
case you're getting confused right now or pranksters if you want to call them you're gonna get into
views right like I don't have to speculate what you mean by hoax right a couple okay yeah it's
vague I'm not gonna tell you the whole story cuz we came here for the real who was to say who was to say I
just don't know what part they're hoaxing okay I'll tell you okay so the pranksters if you want to
call them stuff shoes with chicken bones or a skeletonized dog paws and place them along
Canadian shorelines and one was specifically found in Powell River and Powell River never came up once
in any of the other Powell River inland or am I thinking of somewhere else I think you're thinking
of somewhere else Powell River is on the sailor's sea I believe it is you have to take a ferry to
get oh yeah it's just north of Vancouver Island okay off of Bloor Bay and Myrtle Point yeah it's
as well very small yeah so one of those was Powell River so yeah those were hoaxes and why you would
want to prank that no idea unless you live in Powell River then you might get the idea behind
why they're doing it I don't know not much to do there so let's move on from the found feet I know
I just gave you a lot of found feet for you to recall at dinner parties and you know what we've
been giving a lot of advice lately on how we're getting too fancy Chelsea I'm a little worried
about this podcast how do we actually get back to speaking to the common folk after this I don't
know we don't I think we've just elevated to the next level and we gotta hope that our audience
elevates with us I think we've done a good job helping them get there and if they can't it's
their own fault we're not giving them like ballroom dancing at a kid like I mean it could be used there
it could no but you could stand off like aside to the ballroom dancing having these conversations
yeah small time you will these conversations okay we say dinner party they can be used anywhere
where yeah in the office around the water cooler galas ballroom dances off to the side on the squash
courts in the bathroom when you're in your stall and someone walks and sits down in the stall next
to you or just outside the bathroom door waiting for somebody to come out they're trapped at that
point that's when you got them there I think we just un-elevated ourselves see I think those are
still high brow events high brow events at bathrooms where's people poop they do they do yeah
they would use public washrooms yeah just different public washrooms they got fancier toilets
probably but yeah you can still use all of this there if you're ever struggling to make small
conversation especially where you shouldn't these come in handy for actually if you end up in a
situation where you don't know what to ask you need to say hey 20 more severed feet washing up a
shore count his foot or feet if they aren't actually matching feet many things came up in this episode
in which you can and how much of a body do you have to have before it's severed from the body
yes or what part what is the most important part no you're finding is it the nipple
never ever nipple it would be disembodied from the body disembodied nipple it wouldn't just say
okay where was I anyhow this is where I was saying this topic is better for like large groups of
people hopefully if you're eating like at the large table family so it really should be a cocktail
party Christmas dinner yeah where the Grinch is serving up his very first who roast beast yeah
that would be best yeah because who knows what to talk about when the Grinch has finally sat down
with your clan yeah this is gonna be a real conversation starter or if you're the what do
they call it on curb your enthusiasm when you're in the middle and you get the conversation going
for the whole table this is a good conversation for the middle person at a dinner table to get the
conversation going with the table any of the ones that come up in this episode also if you have to
be listening during like Thanksgiving-ish times you could really just say I am thankful to have two
foots or feet and then go on to explain why you're thankful included with my body at this time and
just still have my body I have severed nail clippings from my body I do not believe those to be my
body or the body itself intact at this moment but at this point do I consider my feet my body now
I'm confused about that okay speculation of where these feet have come from ranges from natural
disasters such as ice bodies if they not thought of that yes bodies first and foremost yes um natural
disasters next such as a tsunami um the work of drug really I've never heard of a tsunami producing
feet no like they they only get produced by human bodies in my mind it's true it's true a foot tsunami
sounds terrifying and also like the next big great horror movie after sharknado the work of drug
dealers I've never heard of a drug dealer dropping off feet and throwing it into the ocean but maybe
I'm missing something especially just being a Vancouver thing yeah like if it was specifically
happening in Vancouver you think people would know about it or at least somebody would have told the
media and or the police that the drug dealers were doing yeah like we suspect drug dealers or like
someone being like hey my drug dealers threatened to cut off my foot and throw it into the ocean
and now they're finding all these feet yeah maybe it would have run some more okay my friend who
lost a ton of money to this drug dealer lost a foot and all the people are washing up and it matches
his shoe and we haven't also seen him yeah some people suspect serial killers and or human traffickers
or people importing humans illegally like um what do they call those isn't that human traffickers
is it coyotes oh yeah that is human traffickers okay yeah I bring up good one theory in particular
concerns of plane crash off quadra island three years ago with five men aboard and only how many
fees I think five would make 10 feet or less if somebody had already lost a foot it could be more
only one of the bodies had been found and I don't know when that was updated or if we've
ever found any of the other ones okay other theorists believe the coastline is being used as a body
dump for organized crime activity a third scenario is a serial killer at work um I'm not sure where I
got third scenario because I already mentioned that and then I brought it up again so by the time I
get to this one it's probably like the seventh or eighth scenario and it's a repeat of another scenario
and like we went through on them 13 of the 15 feet have been identified
Chelsea the most part I told you the Canadian feet I assume then yeah because he said 13 of the 15
right which there's well more than 20 or at least 20 we were a little confused at the end there
yeah we are we're still confused yeah of the Canadian feet have been identified in Canada
the BC coroner and I'm assuming the one in the big with no it specifically said it was never
identified they assume that they're Canadian feet so maybe they just didn't care to identify it but
no we're only counting our feet now yeah okay in Canada the BC coroner service said in December 2017
that foul play had been ruled out by authorities in all investigations and that the feet came from
people who died either in accidents or by suicide and the feet detached during the normal decomposition
process okay so the only thing that we're really sure of is that ducks aren't doing it yes absolutely
positive okay um I would like to unpack both of these things a little bit so the first one 13 of the
15 feet have been identified as we went through so most are attributed to suicide or misadventure
such as the plane crash I just mentioned actually I don't think any of the ones that came up were
actually from the plane crash so not such as the plane crash did we bring up the plane
yeah those are just um most are just attributed to suicide for the most part or a misadventure
like drowning or the guy who disappeared from the fishing boat that one would be misadventure I guess
yeah well all of these individual deaths are well documented and there is enough evidence to suggest
that these deaths were not suspicious and quote yeah well and I mean that one guy tried to have an
adventure on a fishing boat and he just missed so I get it that's probably just working which I wouldn't
call so much of as an adventure no that's a fact but he definitely wasn't trying what who knows what
he was trying to do with his life for feet at that point for I yeah I'm more so worried about what he
was trying to do with his feet at the time yeah as for the normal decomposition process
ghosts the feet that have been found have all been naturally decomposing since there is no clean cut
and the above feet identified there was no suspicions otherwise that they had shown up and
been cut off or anything like that decomposition may separate the foot from the body because the
ankle is one of the most weak joints in comparison to other joints or areas of the body yeah and with
decomposition and scavengers it would actually separate really easily from the body and it turns
out that underwater scavengers like crustaceans will work around bones and other tough obstacles
preferring to pick apart softer tissues and unlike the bony ball and socket joints that join our
legs and hips our ankles are mostly made off of soft stuff ligaments and other connective tissue
the bones are quite small in your ankle so it follows that a sunken shoe wearing body in the
Salish Sea is likely to be chewed apart by scavengers and to have its feet disarticulated from the rest
of the body in short order according to Simon Fraser University entomologists Gail Anderson extremities
such as hands feet and head often detached as the body decomposes in water but rarely float
an interesting point there so then we say the feet were usually found in sneakers as with most of
them except the boots and one without a it was just a barefoot he wants to talk about the boots
yeah except leg and boot square they want to name a square after it maybe it's because it is
so much and like nobody wants to talk about it they want to bring attention so the sneakers the
coroner thought was responsible for both keeping the foot buoyant enough to eventually wash a
shore and forgiving the feet enough protection from decomposition to be found relatively intact
you probably noticed that all the shoes that the feet were wearing running shoes they were running
shoes if you can even google to look at the shoes you can google these exact shoes they come up now
that we've determined that this all really just kind of makes sense i'm wondering where are all
the other detached feet in the ocean going and of the ones that don't end up on the shores around
the Salish Sea are they floating in garbage island they literally must all collect in other places
we're just not aware of surely my theory is that it's just an elaborate advertising campaign by Nike
but i don't have a lot to back up my theory would you call it successful i didn't say successful i
said advertising campaign just healed potentially f**king nailed advertising campaign or neutral did
not did push it just happened we're talking about it aren't we and then something else that came up
i mean it relates to the story one would have to wonder about bodies or feet rather of those found
after major ocean disasters such as the titanic with only recovering 360 of the 1500 lost no feet
mentioned with 500 miles of body strewn about there are known cases of leather being unaffected by
saltwater with archaeologists finding pristine sandals and ancient shipwrecks so the likelihood
of finding leather shoes or even non decomposed remains in shoes from the titanic are very high
in the right conditions it is said that the ocean has been able to preserve organic matter for centuries
with the tentative identification of bodies at the ship's hull but how many shoes are still preserved
there to this day are suspected to lie at the bottom of the titanic now maybe those are the
boots that washed ashore in vancouver i mean that's quite the distance but that's about a hundred
years between the two and it is across a big big chunk of land so it's probably not those but exactly
to our point that we are making about this you're not seeing this happen with this either anywhere
like no mass feats anywhere it's just happening in this one area that too it might just be the
currents at least on the east coast of north america that are not congruent to things washing ashore
great and that's where my next and last point is going as for the popular foot area why is it so
popular as taylor was saying kind of that's where he was getting of course it's very popular to the
currents possibly the man who knows the most about how and where things end up in the sailor sea is
parker meccridi weird thing to be known for why things end up where in the sailor sea but that's
what he's known for a professor of oceanography at the university of washington in seattle
oh f***ing american gets the win yeah i know and it's this has been hyping up canada this whole
time you know they didn't want to take any responsibility for these feet they didn't
want to say whether they're victims of but they got the fuck i might as well end the episode here
just kidding yeah um so he's built a three-dimensional computer simulation at the coastal ocean of the
pacific northwest including the sailor sea and he says quote it's all realistic end quote he says
reqote in the sense that it has realistic tides winds rivers and ocean conditions end quote the
simulation is called live ocean and as we talk on the phone oh no i'm quoting from someone else
and i don't know where i'm quoting some guy says he probably has both feet
someone was talking to him on the phone we both watch it running on his website so it's on his
website pull it up i hope it's there brightly colored water sloshes around the map according to
that day's weather and tides meccridi uses the model to predict where an oil spill would travel
over the course of three days as they watch whoever that is someone with parker mccree
black blobs and this is gonna be noted up in the notes okay i'm not stealing i'll find it
as we watch black blobs appear near seattle in tukoma simulating the hypothetical oil spill
and immediately start flowing north into the puget sound ailing on rainbow colored squirrels that
depict moving waters of various salinites salinities salinities i caught that one soon the blobs break
apart into thin streams and dots spilling and sloshing in every direction as tides and currents
push them around as it turns out live ocean reveals an important key to the mystery why so many feet
are washing up here in particular the answer the sailish sea has the perfect storm of feet in
snaring properties i don't know if i would have put it that way there are way more island dense
areas where people would be drowning like is it just we don't care about them because they don't
speak a more common language like indonesia or malaysia it's not it has nothing to do with
population density it has more to do with the tides i believe in this specific area in the
salish sea which is like heavenly island dense area and you're i know you're not going to have
this answer but any heavily island dense area would have the same issue would it not like i don't see
an area like malaysia having that necessarily neat that the tides are gonna be exactly the same
not exactly the same but like anything with a current with a magnitude of islands is going to
push things ashore particularly like debris yeah and i didn't look into any other area just in this
research this is specific to this area so it would all have to do no and nobody talks about any other
area i yeah it would all but you would think that it would be drawing attention because this is
drawn attention all over the world but i wonder if it is currently like an ethno-sacred ignorance
that brings it that way as in like this unique area for the english-speaking world and this actually
happens all the freaking time island dense areas but um we don't really care about most other densely
island areas because they don't speak our language i can't say but it is a unique situation what is
going on here arca micrity has this tidal map of everything working the reason's that at first it's
an unusually large and complex body of inland water which acts as a trap and as micrity's model
shows once something goes in the water it might wash ashore in plenty of places but it's still
within the sailor sea except for port renfrew second the prevailing winds are westliers so
they bring stuff in from the ocean rather than pushing it out to sea and finally there's something
micrity's model doesn't show but he points it out you see a lot of forks wearing sneakers at the
beach in the pacific northwest where many choose to hike among the slippery rocks taken together
all these factors plus the cool deep waters and healthy scavenger populations make this a sailor
sea an ideal flip magnet i'm not sure where the slippery rocks comes from because most of these
were suicides unfortunately so yeah that's the end of the episode mystery i mean there's not much
to the mystery there isn't a serial killer it's natural causes this is due to tides and due to
sneakers i mean the real mystery here is what's up with the boots i guess if we're gonna say anything
about it what kind of boots why boots i'm assuming the boots are leather it could be rubber boots
that is a kind of it could be rubber boots i never thought of that i thought of like fancy pirate
boots i just thought of cowboy boots yeah and i look i totally understand the albert cowboy that
went to the coast and and got way out of their depth quite literally in the ocean saying oh no
it's super shallow right now don't worry about it and then the tide comes in and that's why we need
more information on the boot there's so many fucking kinds of different boots why they didn't
disclose that information but i have a huge problem with that now that we just meant both were
thinking of different boots anyhow that's it that's the end of my episode yeah and i think we gave you
many a great topic again to bring up in the affairs in your life as you grow more cultured with us
as a both a listener and an experiencer of Journey to the Fringe and here we leave you with the ship
of theses in that how much of the body must be severed off before it can be considered the body
i have been taylor here with chelsea we have been Journey to the Fringe thank you all for listening
and we will see you next week thank you for listening to Journey to the Fringe if you have
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